Intense Tech #06 — Groovy Groove and Tick Tricks, Part 1 (Defense Mechanism)

defense-mechanism on lsdj timing: what a tick is, how grooves assign ticks to lines, a numbering convention that makes G commands readable, per-channel swing, and phrases lengthened with H (intense-tech).

Key claims#

• A tick is the smallest unit of time — "basically the Planck unit of LSDj"; its length depends on the tempo (a tick at 80 BPM is twice as long as at 160), and individual ticks "may vary slightly in the interest of keeping the tempo as consistent as possible". K, D and R values are ticks (K01 kills after one tick); wave instrument SPEED is in ticks; tables run one line per tick by default.
• A groove sets how many ticks each phrase or table line lasts; the default is 6/6 (the second 6 is redundant). A G command on a line makes that line last the groove's first value and the following lines the next values: 7/5 placed on line 3 gives line 3 seven ticks, line 4 five, and so on.
• Hypnogram's numbering: groove 00 stays 6/6, grooves 01–0C (or up to 0F) are set to 1…12 ticks so that G05 visibly means five ticks per line; 10–1F hold custom grooves (G10 = 7/5 swing) — "immediately obvious how many ticks each line lasts for".
• Per-channel grooves: in the author's "Into You" cover the wave channel runs 7/5 (swung kick and bass) against 6/6 elsewhere — "kind of in-between swung and straight time". 7/5 is 16th-note swing; 8/4 and 9/3 swing harder; 8/4 on one channel against 7/5 on others gives "more fluid swing feels"; "Illumin8" uses 8/5/7/4 — both swing feels in 24 ticks over four lines — for "a looser, less rigid, more human-like feel".
• G11 = 3/9 (or 3/9/6/6, leaving room for commands) for note bends and for a wave kick that lasts only three ticks before its bass note ("BEAT JUiCE"). LSDj 6 restarts a groove when the same G is repeated; earlier versions do not.
• Resolution: a 6-tick phrase lasts 96 ticks; at a 3-tick groove a phrase lasts 48, so two phrases cover the same time (three at 2 ticks, six at 1). H in a phrase lengthens it: the first digit is the hop count (0 = go to the next phrase), the second the line — in "Near Miss" H71 hops to line 1 seven times and H5A to line A five times, an arpeggio made of phrases instead of tables.

Practical takeaways#

Name grooves by their tick count, swing only the channels that need it, and treat H as a phrase-length tool: a 3-tick phrase plus hops gives double resolution without losing bar length.

Notable quotes#

"A tick is the smallest unit of time in LSDj. It's like a pixel of time."

Pages touched#

shuffle-funktempo · rhythm-and-groove · chord-arpeggio · orderlist · lsdj · intense-tech · defense-mechanism