Bookmarked. I already occasionally listen to local and nonlocal police scanners via Broadcastify with my own playlists of atmosphere and ambient-shoegaze music. No joke. I'll use this. Some beautiful, fresh music on the roll here.
You are listening to New York – police radio and ambient music
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Re: You are listening to New York – police radio and ambient music
#22Worth mentioning that they cover a number of cities, including St Petersburg, where they listen to road traffic police (in Russian of course).
Re: You are listening to New York – police radio and ambient music
#23Can someone elaborate please? Why listen to police radio while listening to ambient music? I am genuinely curious and would like to understand this better.
It invokes a mood. It distills a spirit of night and cities that never sleep. Urgent events from a police scanner play upon a feeling of social connectedness. Combining that with ethereal music plays upon senses of tranquility, danger, peace, haunting, calms before storms, and life transpiring. Dramas like Blade Runner, The Killing, and True Detective, as a few examples, achieve many of their most beautiful moments through that same, heightened essence.
It's great for programming at night. It's meditative without entering a full alpha state. It's like other moods, such as sounds of rain and nature, that linger but don't distract. Many people find it conducive to "the zone" of creativity and productivity.
Re: You are listening to New York – police radio and ambient music
#24Can someone elaborate please? Why listen to police radio while listening to ambient music? I am genuinely curious and would like to understand this better.
Well, there a variety of tunes out there with understated music and methodical sampling of the human voice like that for effect, although usually they try to provide something a little more concise and deliberately narrative to go with it -- limitations of the medium. I'm pretty out of touch with the usual channels so I can't actually name any of it done in the past 40 years or so, but here's some classic Simon and Garfunkel overlaying Silent Night with a really depressing 7 o'clock news: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WgYFXCUEL4Y
Also, every so often you hear about a crazy fire going on or someone trying to jump off the Golden Gate bridge. (On sf-1033, naturally, not this one. Also, I like what sf-1033 does with the reverb on the police scanner bits.) It was really great back when people were rioting in the streets after the World Series victory, throwing bottles at the police and burning an articulated Muni-bus.
Re: You are listening to New York – police radio and ambient music
#25I absolutely love this. On one hand you've got the peacefulness of mellow ambient music, and on the other, the potential death, doom and destruction from the police channels. It properly conveys the 'techno' feeling that something can go horribly wrong at any moment.
Re: You are listening to New York – police radio and ambient music
#26[ SomaFM SF 10-33] http://somafm.com/sf1033/ Ambient music mixed with the sounds of San Francisco public safety radio traffic. [ SomaFM Mission Control ] http://somafm.com/missioncontrol/ A mix of ambient and experimental music mixed with the historical sounds of the space program.
Have you noticed some changes in sf1033 in the last 9 months ? It feels now as if the mixes are deliberately more musical than ambient.
Re: You are listening to New York – police radio and ambient music
#27[ SomaFM SF 10-33] http://somafm.com/sf1033/ Ambient music mixed with the sounds of San Francisco public safety radio traffic. [ SomaFM Mission Control ] http://somafm.com/missioncontrol/ A mix of ambient and experimental music mixed with the historical sounds of the space program.
Have you noticed some changes in sf1033 in the last 9 months ? It feels now as if the mixes are deliberately more musical than ambient.
I personally don't really listen to sf1033 at all, but figured I'd toss it in since I figured HN probably has a skew toward that area ;-) For more ambient, I'm usually listening to recommendations by,
* http://reviews.headphonecommute.com/
* Spotify: http://open.spotify.com/user/headphonecommute / spotify:user:headphonecommute
Re: You are listening to New York – police radio and ambient music
#28The site is also mentioned in a good episode of the design podcast 99% Invisible.
http://99percentinvisible.org/episode/episode-23-you-are-lis...
Re: You are listening to New York – police radio and ambient music
#29This is just great. Not only the sounds, but I love the backdrops. I'm reminded of how much I miss LA.
Re: You are listening to New York – police radio and ambient music
#30Can someone elaborate please? Why listen to police radio while listening to ambient music? I am genuinely curious and would like to understand this better.
Well, there a variety of tunes out there with understated music and methodical sampling of the human voice like that for effect, although usually they try to provide something a little more concise and deliberately narrative to go with it -- limitations of the medium. I'm pretty out of touch with the usual channels so I can't actually name any of it done in the past 40 years or so, but here's some classic Simon and G…
For a more recent example, Manu Chao also samples a lot from similar sources, like radio ads, movies and political speeches (usually in Spanish). E.g. in Welcome To Tijuana: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qw2Pny_N_Tg&t=2m30s