Re: (idm)gescom minidisc

From Mark Stevens
Sent Fri, Jun 11th 1999, 10:02

On Thu, 10 Jun 1999 11:30:58 -0700 (PDT), you wrote:

>The idea is that because of the nature of the minidisc technology, there
>is no pause between tracks (as there is on a traditional CD). Therefore,
>if you play the Gescom minidisc on "Random," it will flow in an
>unpredictable manner, and the little snippets will start to appear in
>pairings and sequences that, although unplanned in their specificity,
>will illuminate each other in a manner that a normal recording does not. 
>I hope that clarifies it.

The only slight snag is that not all MD players have a seamless
'random play' function. My deck, a Sony JE-520, pauses for two seconds
and shows an animated shuffling arrow as it decides the next random
track to be played. A very annoying 'cosmetic' feature, because
technically the machine *is* capable of playing tracks in any order
without pause. Also, many of the tracks on the Gescom minidisc have a
silent intro or outro.

My way of playing the MD is simply to program my own sequence, which
the deck will then play seamlessly (silence in samples excepted). And
it's also a great source of samples for creating your own Gescom
remixes!


--
Mark Stevens

http://www.sonance.demon.co.uk/