uncommon ambience

Uncommon Ambience: At the Movies this week, finds us (ostensibly) in Maine — I'm pretty sure most of the film was shot in the Rust Belt. But for the sake of continuity we will be in a Maine hayfield with a rock and a bird that do not belong. And look! Here comes Red. Ellis Redding, "Red," searches among a hayfield for a mystery. In a place that looks "right out of a Robert Frost...

The Perfect Storm's Widow's Walk... Ambience Anticipating a Giant Storm at a Coastal Bar — "They're out on the Flemish Cap. I got it straight from Big Bob Brown." This episode expands upon a scene from the film   The Perfect Storm . Eight hours of an uncrowded Gloucester-esque bar being boarded up amongst the gales whipping up from the harbor. It will be the perfect storm, un...

Uncommon Ambience: At the Movies; Field of Dreams  (1989) ambience — Field of Dreams fits in well with the other weird baseball fantasies we love. Casey at the Bat , the figment of Doubleday field , and the wonderfully strange  the Natural . The book version has zero redemption by way of smashed outfield lights . Just a baseball Superman shackled by fate, circumstance, and stupidity. Only, Roy Hob...

Birds and backyard ambience — as spring descends upon the Piedmont, so do the birds. And they were chatty this morning, so I stuck my microphone out the window. That's about all there is to say — Oh, stay away from Jimmy Connors tennis on the Atari Lynx. I found it cheap on eBay and decided what the heck. Watching Jimmy Connors in the early 90s at the US Open was fun. I thought that maybe his...

Uncommon Ambience: At the Movies—Blade Runner outdoor noodle establishment ambience. Eight hours of sound inspired by the scene where  Rick Deckard gets something to eat before being "arrested" by Gaff. The Ritz at the Bourse, my favorite movie theater in Philadelphia, showed a rerelease of the 1982 film while my fiancé was in town. This was about 14 years ago—and it was either the Final Final Cut...

Uncommon Ambience: At the Movies—Vintage newsroom ambience.  I've worked in large newsrooms, though none had operating typewriters. There were relics in our office, all of which were reduced to desk tchotchkes. The owners wanted to remind us that they wielded them for producing news, not like us fancy laptop people with quiet plastic keys.  Anyway, this movie-flavored ambience episode reproduc...

Uncommon Ambience: At the Movies , we are adding a new type of ambience this week. Themed ambience,   based on the  ⁠opening scenes of the 1983 film  Wargames ⁠ .  This is a recreation of the hours preceding the Snyder and Phelps shift that ended quickly with a gun over a key-turn. I watched the film on the Home Box Office in 1984 (40 years ago) — and holy ****, the open still messes with me (****...

Bowling Ambience — This was recorded near the ball return of the dark lane on a decently attended Wednesday. And I don't know about you, but I keep getting fed bowling memes on social media. There is always some dude staring in a direction, then a bowling mishap plays, the dude reacts in a banal sorta' way before looking to a new place, and then we get a new ****** bowling mishap. This ***...

Retro Arcade Ambience — So picture this, it's 1980-something and mom and dad dropped you off at the mall with five bucks, "we'll pick you up 10." Mom and Dad have a date night — and they're not playing around; they are going to the Red Lobster. Dad messed up, and now he's going to be paying for lobster. The mall entrance is all glass and guarded by teenagers smoking cigarettes. "The **** you looki...

Cozy fire and rain ambience — You booked your Bennington Bed and Breakfast just below the towering Battle Monument. You promised your partner it would be perfect. Hit a few trails on Prospect Mountain. Dinner and shopping downtown. Some hip art gallery or bookstore. It'll be a hoot. Then months of plans ruined by a fluke thaw. "It can hit 60 in February?!" "A'yuh happens every year around this tim...

Gymnasium/ basketball ambience — How do I explain this briefly? I went to military school in the South. I was that ***** of a student to need military school in the South. So we had a gymnasium that was not air-conditioned; all we had were gigantic fans in the ceiling that sucked the air out. So when you stood in the doorway to the outside, it was like standing in a vacuum. It's hot in the Sou...

Relax to the coastal storms of Vineyard Haven — rain on the harbor, gulls overhead, and the distant hum of ferries. Recorded on Martha’s Vineyard during back-to-back summer thunderstorms, this seaside ambience is perfect for calm, focus, or a stormy night’s sleep. Off topic... Have you ever seen Point of No Return? Bridget Fonda stars as a troubled assassin who goes headfirst down a kitchen dumbwa...

Snowfall and mild traffic sounds — this is two hours of falling snow and mild traffic... but who gives a **** about that? I want to use this space to campaign for a dish washing simulator for the Nintendo. I want ****** stacks of dirty dishes that I have to figure out how to Tetris into a small dishwasher.

Rainy Hotel Ambience — Have you ever wandered down a long, narrow hallway following the loud hum of an ice maker? The small room in a hotel that houses free ice and expensive snacks — $5 Doritos is a thing, y'all. You walk into a hum that vibrates throughout your body as you hold out your tiny ice bucket with the mini-trashbag to catch the tumbling cubes. Those ice buckets are too small.

This is the shower being recorded from the room next door. There will be tinkles of water, bathroom fan, and gurgling drain on the other side of the wall. Essentially layered gray-ish noise.

Reach out and touch fare (har) — ehem, this is from a recording of the Silver Line. It was a cold, icy January evening, and I was heading downtown to see a comic book movie. Strap in for two and a half hours of Subway. There will be stops every 15 minutes. And no need to worry about Ra's al Ghul.

Car defrost ambience — It's the kind of cold out there that freezes your nostrils together as you breathe in. And ice and snow are covering the windshield. It's time to begin the clearing process — and don't be like a neighbor who just cleared a peephole in his giant truck windshield and then took off for work. Defrosting takes time and patience.

Falling snow and wind soundscape — recorded on the evening of the 14th. The beginning flakes were sloppy, and they came down in clumps. We got three inches. And then, on Monday, it got sunny, and the roads cleared up. Still, the county closed school on Tuesday and Wednesday. So I had to spend another weekend with my ****** children.

Moderate rainfall on a parked car. I don't know what else to say as a description. Oh! I found Winter Spiced Cranberry Sprite at the Annandale CVS! They had a bunch left if any of y'all wanted to grab some. And I met up with a friend I haven't seen since covid lockdowns. We went to a glammed-up taco spot in Alexandria. That was great. Anyway, that was my Saturday.

Rain and ice ambience — This is what the worst snow day ever sounds like. The kids were hoping for measurable snow, and they got a lot of rain and graupel. I'm unsure if what is falling in this recording counts as graupel, but I like saying graupel. My grandmother would call any sky ice that she didn't deem snow, "graupel." And she would wave her hand while she did it like "...

Waves, boats, birds and more. This recording begins late at night and ends with the first ferry steaming in and out of Vineyard Haven Harbor. This is a recording from outside the Vineyard Harbor Motel from the summer and captures waves, birds, a giant yacht mildly humming nearby, light traffic from Beach Rd and other chill mechanical sounds. Great soundtrack for a post-holiday hangover... I'm tire...

Almost 4 hours of December rain on the roof... ambience. It's a soggy day in the Mid-Atlantic... A perfect distillation for our household post-Christmas (the kids' favorite holiday). There is Lego carnage and strewn Care Bears across the living room floor. A gold ribbon accidentally clings to the cat. The encouragement is gone for snatching peppermint from the branches of our fake tree. Th...

Hotel room fan — Anyone else not looking forward to sleeping in their old bedrooms this holiday season? Just down the hall from our aging parents who sneak up on us late, like ****** ninjas in nightgowns, "You sure you're not cold, sweetie?" "No, ma." And you ask yourself, "Why didn't I just get a room at the Crowne Plaza Albany? They wouldn't encourage me to eat unrecognizable leftovers from the...

After-hour Vineyard Haven Harbor Waves — This episode includes after-hour waves lapping the harbor beach — the rattle of far-off machinery and the occasional car navigating nearby Beach Road. And I was wandering up the street to Cumberland Farms to buy some late night powdered donuts.

(Dual Shower Nozzle Ambience) I always dreamed of fancy bathrooms. Bathrooms where I could press digital buttons controlling a host of nozzles pelting me with technology-controlled water (like the **** in the movies). When the opportunity came to remodel our shower, I leaped at the remodeling designer with these ideas. It was too expensive, so I compromised. I had the designer pencil in a dual hea...