The key here is to practice learning to listen to the imperfections: instead of thinking, this bass line isn’t powerful enough, “think” this bass line can be powerful enough after some sound design work and mixing. But how are the notes? By hearing past the immediate lack of impact, you become a better judge of whether or not a particular part (or the whole track) is going in the right direction.
I find this idea reliable and what I think VCV RACk brings to the table. Or modular synthesis in general. The composition is so unlike normal DAW composition that the idea of perfection at least for myself isn’t possible. I find modular synthesis a meditative sound practice. Allowing the sound to become whatever it wishes in my hands.
A similar technique can be found in ambient pieces such as Brian Eno’s Music for Airports, which is made from multiple tape loops of different lengths. This “analogue” approach to the concept is truly asynchronous and played forever, uneven tape loops are unlikely to ever resynchronize. You could achieve a similar effect in your DAW by offsetting one of your loop lengths so that it’s not quite aligned with the metric grid. Try playing with the amount of offset until you find relationships which sound interesting. This can create some very unusual rhythmic effects.
Something I’ve researched before is Brian Eno’s music for airports where he created generative tape loops and allowed the composition to become what it became. I found this quote again reliable to my own current practice, with tape loops and modular synthesis.
Record the sound of an open microphone in a quiet room (or even just a channel on your audio interface with nothing connected) and then dramatically boost the level of the recording” The inherent noise of mics, preamps, and audio interfaces can take on a new character when boosted enough to be heard as an intentional element in a mix.
Sample the sound of a turntable’s needle in the “runout” groove at the end of a vinyl record.
This idea of noise and colouring compositions or recordings is something I’m familiar with and reading this section made me nod and smile with an agreement. Sometimes the silence in the track or the noise/sounds within it is what makes it sound as if it has depth. Plugins such as Izotope vinyl create this hiss and hum that is usually not wanted. But the noise and other sound elements can really make a track feel thicker with depth. I found the idea of recording the preamp noise and then using it in a composition to be really good!
Field recordings of almost any source can take on the character of abstract noise, provided they’re processed in the right ways. Try applying lots of reverb to urban, factory, or nature recordings
Using field recordings as abstract noise to create something for hiss or hum is a great way of composing, seems field recordings really do have multiple uses.
Instead of always trying to maximize the quality of your listening environment, try occasionally listening in a deliberately “bad” way. Particularly during the creation phase, doing this might help you hear things that are acoustic illusions which you might find musically interesting enough to actually incorporate into your music.
Honestly, something I’ve never considered but now will, the sweet spot can seem like the perfect area to compose but like this section describes, the imperfection can bring ideas towards what we couldn’t have realised before. Perhaps a weird filter through a wall can make us want to filter our bass or change our tone if we’re not in the perfect sweet spot of the speakers’ angles of production.