ABOUTSONOMODEBERLIN2026
Played once: This set doesn't exist yet. It is composed live, the moment you press play. Note by note, only for you. When it fades, it is gone forever.
01The idea
Every recording is a promise that something will sound the same again. Sonomode makes the opposite promise.
When you press play, a set begins that did not exist a moment before. Each record in it is written while you listen, voiced and mixed in the moment, and blended into the next over thirty-two to sixty-four bars, the way a DJ carries one record into another. The set has no end. It also has no copy: it is made for you, now, and it is not kept.
That is the whole idea. Music the way it was before it could be stored. A room, a night, a sound that happened once.
Note by note, only for you. When it fades, it is gone forever.
02How it works
Sonomode is two things working together. A composer, called Charcoal Membrane, writes each record: its key and tempo, its sounds, its patterns and the long arc of how it opens, builds and lets go. A synthesiser in your browser then plays that score: every kick, bass line, hat and echo is generated from scratch on your device. There are no samples and no recordings anywhere in the chain.
Charcoal Membrane works by what we call controlled taste in randomness. Chance proposes; the membrane decides what may pass, and how slowly. The floor stays still, a tuned kick and rumble that never move. Everything above it drifts: a line opening through its filter, percussion that changes one edit at a time, an answer that waits for a gap.
It is generative music, but not a model trained on other people's work. Its rules were written by hand, by ear, over many nights in the studio.
03The sound
Deep, minimal, hypnotic techno, between 132 and 138 BPM. Rolling low end, round kicks, nothing harsh. The set wanders slowly through hypnotic, submerged, dub, acid, psychedelic, rhythmic and hard-groove territory, each record six to ten minutes long, each in key with the one before.
It is mixed and mastered as it plays, to the standards of a club system: steady loudness from record to record, a mono low end, clean peaks. On a laptop, on headphones or on a full rig, it should sound like one producer's dark studio, all night.
04The producer
Sonomode is made by Sandro Vogel in Berlin. It plays on the same sound engine as his own studio, a synthesiser he built to write his tracks, and its composer carries the taste he spent years forming on dance floors and in front of speakers.
The pictures the music plays on are his too: a small archive of plates, quiet and editorial, that the sound touches in rigid, careful ways.
05How to listen
- Set
- Deeper, auto or harder steers where the set goes next; you hear it from the next record. Hold keeps the current groove for thirty-two more bars; next record starts the blend now.
- Live
- Hold bass cut (or the B key) and the kick and bass drop out, then slam back in on the next bar. Hold echo (or E) and the set is thrown into a dub echo. Both let go by themselves.
- Keep
- The fine coloured strip under the volume is the record you are hearing, drawn as it plays. Press keep and you take its sound print with you: a picture of what you heard. Never the sound.
- Settings
- Choose the picture the music plays on, and set the equalizer for what you are listening on.
- Rest
- Leave the mouse still and the picture takes the screen.
06Questions
Is Sonomode free?
Yes. Open sonomode.com, press play and listen for as long as you like. There are no accounts, no subscriptions and no ads.
Can I hear my set again?
No. Every set is composed once, for one listener, while it plays. Nothing is recorded or stored, so when a record has played it is gone, and no one else will ever hear it.
Is Sonomode AI-generated music?
It is generative, but it is not a model trained on other people's music. Its composer was written by hand: it chooses sounds, rhythms and arrangements by rules of taste, and every sound is synthesised from scratch.
Where is the sound made?
In your browser. Each record's score is composed on the Sonomode server; every sound is then synthesised and mixed on your device. Details are in the privacy policy.
Which browsers and devices work?
Any current desktop or mobile browser: Chrome, Edge, Firefox and Safari. Headphones or a proper system are best.