Month: April 2024

Alpine Dream

I initiated the recording process for my final piece, tentatively titled ‘Alpine Dream’. I began with a highly specific idea that I wanted to convey, experimenting with the potential that the analog oscillators of Behringer’s MS-20 clone could provide. I tuned the sound of rushing, roaring and whistling winds in an attempt to re-create the atmosphere I was interested in with my prior bass amp experiments. In a somewhat pareidolic way, the synthetic illusion I found to be more evocative than if I had attempted to record real winds through painstaking field recording. The ontological significance of the man-made’s oscillator and circuitry emulating the natural so well is an intriguing dichotomy. Despite my hesitations surrounding the computer, and especially AI and generative techniques, I still feel the value of certain applications of technological transmutation. I attenuated the Attack, Decay, Sustain, Release, and especially Hold controls to simulate wind’s rising and falling. Recording two sparring and contrasting takes, patching first the pink, and then the white noise generator to the external input of the high pass filter. The interplay between the smoothness of the white and the coarseness of the pink lent real environmental shape to the work, I could imagine the way crags, outcrops and stones filter wind in different ways.

I also used the ring modulator and feedback that can be created with this kind of lowpass filter to sculpt a bright, fluting tone, one that suggests a tense serenity heard faintly on high winds. This lent my piece a musicality that indicated to me the direction it could be further taken in.

The Behringer K-2 with pink noise patch

Alongside the synthetic winds, I recorded a ride cymbal played gently with brushes and beaters, aiming for a worldly, monastic tone and very faintly suggestive rhythmic gesture.

Digital Synthesis

In our study surrounding the mechanics and potentiality of digital synthesis, we engaged with certain examples of instruments found within Ableton and Logic. The first, with its carrier waves and modulators was Ableton’s versatile hybrid FM synthesizer, Operator. Despite its many advanced capabilities, including some emulations of acoustic and other instruments, FM synthesis often has a particular tone, one that I associate with watery keys.

Experiments with Operator

Slowly experimenting with subtractive synthesis through Ableton’s Drift synth plugin, I worked with the envelope in real time, to explore the possibility of making the impression of hand modulation, akin to manipulating the envelopes or oscillators with an analogue synthesizer.

My experiments in Drift

A large concern I have is my own subjective, synaesthetic perception of the plasticky quality of software plugins and synths, though Ableton’s Collision did a lot to assuage these feelings. I was impressed with its deft balance of analog emulative capability and potential for digital abstraction, it could produce a very eclectic range of sounds. I found some of the more overt resonances to be somewhat uncontrollable, but from all the Ableton synthesizers so far, Collision was the most accessible while producing results of great variety.

My experiments in Collision

My summative feeling with many synthesizer tools and processes, is that in living in the dynamic and ever-distracting world, learning each tool takes a considerable amount of time. In some cases, I value immediacy and accessibility over millions of computational outcomes. I feel some regret at that, knowing that some incredible, applicable sound could be discovered deep in the halls of tools like Operator, Drift or Collision that I may never reach. I believe this is why I have also struggled with creative coding, the time spent to reach a sine, square or sawtooth wave is far greater than loading the simplest sine, square or sawtooth preset on any basic keyboard or software. The darkest, most shameful part of all is, I think, I wouldn’t be able to tell the difference. Of course, the vast nature of these tools and the limited time we presently have with each to create, renders these as more excursive, shallow investigations, yet I am still undecided as how I fully feel about these tools. Lucidly, I feel that how I feel is the most important factor, emotion means a lot to me. Technical understanding comes second, at least for now. Tied with emotion is tactility.

In wanting to gain additional capabilities for the creation of my own artworks, and in response to these lectures, I bought a Behringer K-2 semi-modular analog synthesizer, based on the recommendation of Wolves in the Throne Room’s Aaron Weaver (Weaver, 2021). I was also inspired by Phil Elverum (Elverum, 2023) and David Longstreth’s conversation concerning the synthesizer’s potential in capturing the essence of the real more than field recording. Investing in the paradigm of tangible hardware allows me to feel a sense of ownership over the tools I use to create, and the lack of computer interface should allow me greater focus to listen and explore attentively. I look forward to experimenting with it, and will apply the crucial fundamentals of synthesis learned in these lectures.

Bibliography:

Weaver, A. (2021) ‘Ash Fox (Boreal) vs. Aaron Weaver (Wolves in the Throne Room): An Artist to Artist Interview’. Interview with Aaron Weaver. Interview by Ash Fox for Invisible Oranges, 19 August. Available at: https://www.invisibleoranges.com/ash-fox-boreal-vs-aaron-weaver-wolves-in-the-throne-room-an-artist-to-artist-interview/

Elverum, P. (2023) David Longstreth (Dirty Projectors) Talks with Phil Elverum (Mount Eerie) on the Talkhouse Podcast [Podcast]. 22 February. Available at: https://www.talkhouse.com/david-longstreth-dirty-projectors-talks-with-phil-elverum-on-the-talkhouse-podcast/

Analog vs. Digital Synths

The idea of a ‘versus’ between two versatile synth toolsets to be redundant and largely manufactured, aligning with similar grudge matches such as PC vs. console gaming, iPhone vs. Android. In simple terms, both have benefits and shortcomings.

If I were to be harsh, I feel that the article lacks analytical dimension and detail, it’s very much an accessible often making infantile assumptions, ‘most musicians prefer analog synths for its [sic] customizing options’, ‘digital synths are much easier’

The article’s premise of a ‘versus’ is simply breaking down the varying qualities of analog and digital synthesis and presenting a choice for the consumer. It is worth noting that the writer recommends three digital synths as opposed to two analog synths. As someone who owns both an analog synthesizer, the Behringer K-2, and a digital synthesizer, the Roland JV-1080, I feel no pull toward choosing a side. The embedded video of Junkie XL talking about the ephemerality and unpredictability of analog synths, alongside the uniqueness of digital synths illustrates this point. I understand the personal advantages and disadvantages with using each in my creative practice; I am very much enamoured with Roland’s classic 1990’s presets, each a beautifully engineered sound vignette. With the same breath, I would add that there is a time and place for them, and they have to be used with extreme forethought.

I do, however, resist using software synths or VSTs, out of a distaste for the computer screen’s lack of tactility and the meditative, reactive listening that working by ear can encourage.

A core memory for me is how I acquired my only keyboard/MIDI controller. At my workplace in 2019, there was a pile of scrap metal and dead appliances spilling into the yard area and one morning after a thunderous rainstorm someone left an old, cheap Yamaha PSR-225. I brought it into the workshop, and quite literally poured the water out of it and left it to dry on sawdust. I later tested it, and it worked. It’s still my unwieldy main keyboard and controller today. In a very real way this, if not cemented, reaffirmed in me the necessity of marriage and symbiosis between the organic and the digital in my own creative practice.

Bibliography:

Bish, S. (2019) Analog Synthesizer vs. Digital Synthesizer: Beginners Guide. Available at: https://www.keytarhq.com/analog-vs-digital-synthesizers/ (Accessed: 22 April 2024)

Evil Flooded Chapel Undercroft, an experiment in sampling

Working with Ableton’s Simpler instrument, I manipulated my phone recording of the water dispenser outside the classroom. Processing the original with pitch shifting, overdrive, church reverb and certain drum enhancing plugin called ‘Low Rider Drums’. I worked mostly blindly, adding and removing effects and time stretching by ear after I had selected a rhythmic portion of the water dropping that I wanted to sample. I struggle to articulate and act upon intention within the maximalist DAW ecosystem, feeling dragged onward more than investigating.

A screenshot of the simple working session, later to spiral out of control

Taking the processed samples home, I added them to Logic Pro’s Sampler and Quick Sampler instruments, further distressing and attempting to draw out what could be considered a pad. Ableton’s pitch and reverb manipulation had morphed the ambient, muffled crowd voices into a somewhat sinister tonality that I could apply musically and rhythmically with my own setup. The dark, synth-like pad and sloshing water drove me to imagine some captive wretch navigating the haunted undercroft of a chapel, flooded knee-high. Similar, I later thought, to Ged in Ursula K. Le Guin’s ‘The Tombs of Atuan’. My visual imagination plays a defining role in the works I create

Logic Pro’s Sampler, where I initially experimented with mapping varying samples across my keyboard

The excitement has been largely in hindsight; seeing the naked, original recording in sharp relief against the total transformation of the final experiment. Resampling my own work is something that interests me, but I would be more engaged with the process if I was using a hardware-forward, more analog approach.

Gallery Visit

The first two series of works in our gallery tour on Thursday the 18th of April were directly concerned with, and addressed, locality. Specifically the area around Whitechapel, London. Janet Cardiff’s ‘The Missing Voice (Case Study B)’ was illuminating in the way it exploited the headphone paradigm, placing the listener in the real world on a sound walk. Beginning at the Whitechapel Gallery, we were directed through the streets and alleys by Cardiff’s voice, relaying an abstracted noir narrative about a murdered woman, the narrator. Tracing her movements, asides and observations from subjective historical perspectives. It felt like embarking on an adventure, or entering a video game, it was a truly exciting experience, one that demonstrated the great potential of sound art in a way that I had not encountered before. Its tangible connection to a real, ever-moving environment, drawing connections through time, created an eerie documentation of the universality of human moments, contrasted by change.

Andrew Pierre Hart’s exhibition within the Whitechapel Gallery itself, ‘Bio-Data Flows and Other Rhythms – A Local Story’, was concerned with the diaspora living within, and migration to, the Whitechapel area. Primarily exhibiting paintings, the sole noteworthy piece that incorporated a sonic element was ‘Free Writers’; an abstract film comprised of shots of the local area interspersed with freely improvised dance routines. To view the film, the audience sits on a plywood box which had subwoofers built in. In conjunction with the imagery, such as a passing underground train, the vibration through the seat was designed to situate you within Whitechapel’s ‘vibrant rumble and dissonant past’. The composition and execution of the film left me with the sense of it being made hastily; much of the footage was of poor quality and seemingly furtively collected in dark streets and train platforms, from a smartphone. While this could suggest a quotidian reflection of diasporic life in Whitechapel, as an art piece it felt like a pedestrian afterthought. Also, as a carpenter by trade, I was quick to notice the underwhelming filling and sanding on the screw-holes in the plywood seat. Perhaps irrelevant, yet that may have lent in some small part to my personal disengagement I felt, and the sense of a lack of thought being put into the construction and creation of individual elements in the exhibition.

The group watching Andrew Pierre Hart’s ‘Free Writer’

The final exhibition we visited Maria Than’s exhibition at the arebyte Gallery, ‘Homage to Quan Âm’, was a thematically rich, lively and cohesive experience.

Detailing the ideological strains and subsequent resolution of the artist’s Buddhist childhood clashes with the humour and excesses of pop culture, Than tells a thematic narrative of coming to terms with, and embracing, Buddhism and the teachings she received in her youth. I appreciated most the variety of disciplines on display, from video art to animation, 3D renders, virtual reality installations, to physical sculptures, the diversity of material presented was impressive for what was a fairly small space. The most interested of all was a low disk of fine sand, that imagery was projected onto from above. When the sand was manipulated, the program presumably knew the height of the sand, and you were able to move the image in physical space through the sand as an interactive medium. It was a soothing, sensorial centrepiece in a very digital-forward exhibition that felt very considered. I have never seen a piece of art do quite what this piece was able to.

The central sand piece in Maria Than’s exhibition

The application of AI and technology as a symbiotic force for social good is a central concern for Than and her work, and I do not want to say I was disappointed with the broad usage of AI throughout the exhibition, but I did see very immediately recognisable image and video processing techniques that are to be found everywhere. Distorted episodes of The Simpsons and Malcolm in the Middle were enabled by AI effects that are commonplace in the digital realm, and an unavoidable dichotomy exists in the current cultural dialogues surrounding the usage of artificial intelligence. I believe that whatever constitutes the ‘art world’ is more readily accepting of the usage of AI, than many commercial or industrial perspectives. I wonder why? Perhaps artistic application preludes an interrogation of the meaning of agency in creation, where industrial applications feel more intended to deceive. I am still very mixed on AI as a tool for creation, generally falling on the side of disapproval, especially if the resulting processes seem so familiar and accessible, almost desperate for more radical, deep exploitation and exploration, rather than as a creative shortcut.

120WATT Wind

“I heard a wind and thought oh, a moving painting” – David Lynch

I am drawn to wind as a suggestive tool in shaping the emotive character and earthy topography of a soundscape, it’s a conceptual device I return to frequently. Recently I have been experimenting with creating analog wind sounds entirely without field recording, specifically using the Laney BC120 bass amp onboard EQ and the Boss GE-7 Graphic Equalizer as a refining booster.

Capable of being very loud, without any input and the gain turned up, the beat-up amp produces a dense white noise that can be dialled and sculpted firstly with the onboard 6-band EQ to highlight wind’s singular tubular whistle and roar. Then I sent it through the Boss EQ and from the 120 watt output of the amp to my interface, to increase volume and further shape the sound. I recorded a continuous, ten minute take in an act of extreme, intuitive, meditative patience.

120WATT Wind (extract)
Studio image at dusk, bass amp whooshing.

Something about hardcore, intent focus on one or two elements allows my imagination to slip into a deeper, circumferential immersion in the creative process. I start to see, and hear, many more layers existing ephemerally beyond the apparent surface. In some respects, I feel this is a trait of mine that should be controlled with more rationale and objectivism; in sinking too deep I can lose sight of the needs of the overall composition, and outside interest. What to me contains depth and meaning along a vector of imperceptible change may to others just be thin noise, stripped of context and plain-sounding. I think it’s important to indulge my interest in details while also ensuring the overall is represented and accounted for. As an initial impetus, this was an engaging experiment for me.

Informing my fascination with wind, apart from formative rural living. In some respects I could be endlessly replicating the same sensations I felt in a blizzard on the edge on the dark Icelandic Highlands, unable to even open my eyes against the battering wind and snow, illuminated only by gift shop signage.

Collected in an album, ‘Anthology Resource Vol. I: △△’, Dean Hurley’s sound design work with David Lynch on 2017’s ‘Twin Peaks: The Return’ has inspired me greatly. The opening cue, ‘Intro Cymbal Wind’ is a perfect kernel of the entrancing, mysterious mood I find so interesting. The associative, cinematic contribution that sound has the capability of conjuring and highlighting is a quality that I am eager to explore with my project, creating spaces for the imagination to roam within.

Listening to an interview with Hurley on The ION Pod where he detailed the secretive processes behind some of the acousmatic, elusive ringing drones and winds were constructed for Twin Peaks: The Return was illuminating. The use of comb filters in particular to manipulate room tones was an approach I had not previously encountered. My own experiment is considerably more naked, so processes such as these could aid in further deepening my exploration of an element such as wind. Lynch’s 2007 exhibition soundtrack album also recorded with Hurley, ‘The Air Is on Fire’, (which was also subsequently used in part in Twin Peaks: The Return) has a similar palette, and also inspires my view of sound’s potential crossover with the fine art world, soundtracking an exhibitive space and bringing the viewer into a world outside of the gallery and potentially inside themselves.

Bibliography:

Boiler Room (2018) He Heard a Wind | Behind The Sound design In Twin peaks. 9 May. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CPeiUFybVUs&t=74s

ionOne, ionTwo (2021) The Ion Pod: Ep. 38: Night Electricity Theme with Dean Hurley *UNLOCKED* [Podcast]. 16 September. Available at: https://share.transistor.fm/s/2b2fdf54 (Accessed: 17 April 2024).

David Lynch (2007) The Air Is on Fire. [Digital] New York: Strange World Music.

Rita Evans Lecture

Still from performance documentation of ‘Tuning in a Vacuum’, performed at the Towner Gallery, Eastbourne

Rita Evans’ sculptural sonic artworks and performances were an engaging insight into the bridges between physical art objects, kinetic performance and sound art. Concerned with invention, and the emergent sonic properties of new instruments, Evans’ pieces concerned themselves less with digitally processing or transforming source sound in a reduced listening capacity, but rather directly capturing the acoustic properties of material objects themselves.

The tactility of the sculptural creation of sound was exciting and inspiring. Interestingly, she referenced being inspired by the Sussex Trumpet in the arrangement of the dual players in 2021 performance ‘Tuning in a Vacuum’. As a native of Sussex, this was a piece of history that I was unaware of. The connection of modern art pieces to ancient instruments of the past through ritualist conceptual frameworks is a subject that intrigues me greatly. It’s a fascinating, amusing dichotomy.

What amused me was her apparent hesitancy for her work to be seen as science-fictional, so much that she mentioned it. Aurally and visually, I was distinctly reminded of ‘Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory’, and the look of her chosen performers and their attire resembled civilian clothes in Star Trek.

One quote struck me, and I’m paraphrasing, “empathy creates polyrhythms”, which I understood as a cogently-intentioned phrase in relation to the performers’ emotionally reactive playing with each other’s varying pieces, but comprised of the kind of hand-wringing, nonsense language carefully tuned to the sensibilities of the neoliberal arts institutional arena. A groaner. In the Q&A, she admirably talked about not revealing too much, or perhaps digging too deeply into artificially grafting meaning to her work out of demand for one. There are many facets of meaning, and many kinds of it, and a temptation exists to remove yourself from attributing intuition in a time of such penetrative examination of the artistic and political meanings of a creative action.

Bibliography:

Towner Eastbourne Commission: Tuning in a Vacuum – Foundation Foundation Emerging Artist Award (2022) Available at: https://ritaevans.com/portfolio/tuning-in-a-vacuum-towner-eastbourne/

Borders and Migrations

As part of our Global Sonic Cultures lecture series, we studied the troubled and complex term of the ‘borderscape’, and the multitude of meanings and Jacob Kirkegaard’s 2020 piece Membrane was somewhat controversial among the group. What I’m sure was a well-intentioned sonic commentary on political, social and national divisions between the United States and Mexico,

Kirkegaard had placed contact microphones, capturing the vibrational qualities of the wall. It sounded dark and frightening, which unfortunately felt cliched in light of the political and social reputation the border wall holds. There was an uncomfortable sense of the artist as disaster tourist. I am vehemently against the suggestion that artists only work with what they know, yet I wonder what relevant perspective can be brought beyond an exercise in recording technique and revelling in the traumatising severity of the situation, adding or signifying nothing.

‘Border Cantos’ from 2016 by Richard Misrach and Guillermo Galindo was far more successful. Alongside Misrach’s large photographs, Galindo creates musical instruments from found objects discarded and lost by those making border crossings. ‘Limpia (Cleansing)’ was rich in allusive meaning and subtext; Galindo’s instrument titled ‘Zapatello’, modelled after DaVinci’s ‘il martello a camme’, animated a row of discarded shoes rigged on a hand-cranked rotating machine.

Galindo’s ‘Zapatello’, 2014

As they stamped on the stretched drum skin, the off-centre rhythm rose and fell with the speed of Galindo’s hand-cranking, suggesting anxious running, the pace of the journey. Centred through the rotating shaft were wooden shooting range targets; human silhouettes, with what amounts to a deadly scoreboard on them. A large, sculptural shaker comprised of angular welded spikes rattled with spent shotgun shell casings trailing from the points. It made me think not only of the theme of escape and risk of shooting, but of desert history, the native population displacement caused by atomic testing; the shaker almost impressionistically resembling the demon core of a nuclear weapon, or a great tyre spike. They were shuffling, oddly beautiful performances comprised of items of loss and hostility, enabling effective political and emotive commentary without purely existing as touristic, 1:1 reproductions or documentations of sensitive borderscape politics. Using found objects connects a potentially abstract and complex issue to the desert earth, grounding us in a sense of the unseen life experiences their former owners went through.

Bibliography:

Kirkegaard, J. (2021) ‘Listening to the Heart: Jacob Kirkegaard by Julie Martin’. Interviewed by J. Martin for BOMB Magazine, 5 March. Available at: https://bombmagazine.org/articles/2021/03/05/jacob-kirkegaard-interviewed/ (Accessed: 12 May 2024)

Amon Carter Museum of American Art (2016) Border Cantos: Richard Misrach|Guillermo Galindo. Available at: https://www.cartermuseum.org/exhibitions/border-cantos-richard-misrach-guillermo-galindo (Accessed: 12 May 2024).

‘Talking Points’ Project Script

Kitchen opening

We open in a transparently natural, ordinary domestic kitchen environment, detailed by a gently ticking clock, boiling kettle and the soft sounds of glassware and cutlery moving. Human activity. We move toward a radio, and it has a dated 1950’s quality, further alluding to the environment. Like traveling through a resonant tube, we enter the radio and are transported through an indeterminate, textural transitory realm with much motion. We emerge on the other side in the radio station studio, where two hosts are running a call-in show.

Ohio train derailment conspiracy theorist

The first, politically charged caller:

Host: We have a caller who wants to share his experiences in the aftermath of the recent Ohio train derailment and the subsequent residential evacuation. Hello, you’re on the air. What’s on your mind?

Caller: Hey this is Charlie, calling from East Palestine, Ohio. My girlfriend and I were evacuated from our apartment because of the train crash and chemical spill in our town. I’m- actually, we’re staying with my parents in Akron.

Host: Thank you for sharing, Charlie. How are things looking back in town now, a few days into this disaster? What have you heard from the community?

Caller: It’s been rough. The clean-up is, um, it’s ongoing, and there’s still a lot of concern about the environmental uh aspect and our safety moving forward.

Host: It’s understandable that there would be lingering worries. How do you feel that the emergency response to the situation has been?

Caller: Well, uh, it’s been a mixed bag. They have been trying to deal with the immediate aftermath, but I really feel like more could be done in terms of long-term support and ensuring our community’s well-being.

Host: That’s a valid point, Charlie. It’s important for communities to receive adequate assistance during times of crisis. Have you had any notable figures or officials visiting or offering support to East Palestine?

Caller: Actually, that’s where things get frustrating. While we’re dealing with this, Biden has been visiting Ukraine instead of focusing on what has happened right here in our town. We’re being overlooked and we’re fighting for more visibility and assistance, to see our leaders actively, uh addressing our needs and concerns.

Host: Of course, yeah. In an emergency, it’s crucial for communities to feel supported and heard by their leaders. Thank you for sharing your thoughts with us today.

Caller: And you know what else worries me? I’ve been uh following the news closely, and the other things that have been going on these last few days. I saw what Aaron Rodgers was saying on Twitter, all we’ve been hearing is unidentified objects shot down, weather balloons shot down. And suddenly no one wants to hear from us anymore. They don’t want us to talk about railway industry lobbying or uh safety regulations, or uh Epstein’s client list coming out either.

Host: That’s a big claim, Charlie. There’s still a lot going on, and there’s confusion and uncertainty. But-

Jaxx (Host from the Future)*

Host: And welcome back listeners, we have a caller on the line, hello! How’s your afternoon going? You’re live on the air and what’s your name?

Caller: Hey, how’s it going, I’m- you know, err… It’s- feeling a bit rough, you know, got laud off from my job, err… it’s good day, I love listening to your show, and it really brightens my day, you know?

Host: Sorry to hear you got laid off there, they probably didn’t deserve you anyway! (laughter) But now you’ve got more free time, any exciting plans for the weekend?

Caller: For the weekend, no, keeping it pretty chill, um… seeing some lawyer-seeing some friends, just relaxing, watching some TV, watching some Gogglebox, doing some gardening as well with the missus, just keeping everything really chill, you know?

Host: Well, that sure does sound like the perfect weekend to me! What tunes can we play you to make it even better?

Caller: Ah, you know, something to get me really hyped up and in the mood, get me through the weekend and push me into next week, a bit of Imagine Dragons, you know, 1975, something with a bit of kick, you know?

Host: Well I think I’ve got the perfect thing for you coming just around the corner! But, while I’ve still got you here, have- have we met somewhere? Have I got a twin I didn’t know about because you sound really similar to me?

Caller: This is going to sound crazy Jaxx, but I’m you, I am you from the future, they can recall deleted images Jaxx! You need to destroy them, you need to destroy that hard drive, you need this job!

Alien caller

Having pivoted to a somewhat shady advice and problem-solving segment of the call-in show, the host’s tone of conversation is perceptibly lighter and less formal. They introduce a caller:

Host: Hello caller, you’re live and anonymous on DTF Radio Network, don’t say anything I wouldn’t say! What’s got you down on this beautiful evening, or afternoon, or morning. Wherever you are. Where are you caller, speak up! Is he-

Alien: Hey guys, hey. Can you hear me? I’m in my truck right now, so the signal’s not gonna be too, y’know, perfect or anything, but… Yeah, I just wanted to say I’m big fans of you guys, I listen to you on the road all the time.

Host: That’s appreciated caller-

Alien: What could be better than being on DTFRN? Sorry, I’m just excited about appearing on the show finally. I like to observe human nature.

Host: Ok, thanks, you’re sounding a little muffled, is your connection good?

Alien: Yeah, yeah. This is the first call I’m making using these Airpods, and I don’t really know how they work, so if it sounds, y’know, like I’m underwater or whatever, y’know- forgive me.

Host: What, are you sitting on them? Um, let’s move this along, we’ve got a lot to get to, what’s on your mind?

Alien: Yeah- I am seeking advisement.

Host: Advisement, ok… Do you need us to call someone?

Alien: I have a girlfriend and in recent times we have argued. Argued about what a state the house is in.

Host: Well, help out cleaning once in a while and everything will be good, okay?

Alien: Arguments increase in frequency as the house in turn gets smaller.

Host 1: Ok, let’s wrap this one up. Good talking to you, Mr. trucker.

Alien: What could be better than being on DTFRN? Sorry, I’m just excited about appearing on the show finally. I like to observe human nature. ‘K, bye.

We transition to the invisible bridge of electrons stretching out into space, reaching the alien. We exist for a while with him in an indeterminate realm, floating weightless as he scans the frequencies and learns about the human condition. Comprised of a collage of broadcast feedback culminating with:

Archival radio montage (fluid order, threaded throughout):

-Theo Von long-distance relationship (between conspiracy caller and alien)

-Howard Stern serial killer

-Rush Limbaugh veteran anti-torture

-Deer crossing sign removal

-101.5 tax cuts F you

Granular content overloading

This meld of sampled content and sound/noise/music builds to an overwhelming crescendo before abruptly ending.

*note: while improvised during recording, this sequence has been dictated here for continuity and reference

Elements of a Radiophonic Artwork

In making radiophonic works, a somewhat distinct creative and analytical approach must be taken. Sound must be used in an overtly communicative way, articulating happenings, and working in collaboration with the voice to accentuate, illustrate and imaginatively define the invisible world.

In some respects, I feel that the inherent directionality of sound, sound effects in particular, is something I have consistently undervalued, or not fully comprehended. A third, imagined image is created, beyond simply the music or words, when sound effects dimensionally bring words to life. Sometimes the most seemingly obvious, clearest, honest or minimalist path is the most effective, which is a lesson I want to reflect on as we work on our group radio piece.

Sharing our work with one another on Google Drive highlights our individual strengths, and allows us to refocus how we can contribute uniquely to the whole group. In comparing my work to Arad’s archival, sample-based compositional work, I know, and it’s apparent, that my weaknesses are his strengths; complex digital signal processes, how to thread disparate samples intuitively, how to source said samples. Arad is far more engaged with the non-linear, more programmable workflows of Max for Live and Max/MSP than my own, more linear, traditional tracking. I treat the computer as a tool far blunter than its capabilities; like a tape recorder ostensibly. The way my brain works, I am easily lost amid endless choice. So, in recognising abilities and delegating the use of them, sharing work has proved invaluable in effectively maximising the effects of, and learning about, each others’ strengths.

An example of Arad’s work-in-progress

I think my natural recourse is to add as little as possible, a minimalist approach. My mind finds it more immersive to sink into an atmosphere with few, but definitive elements guiding the way. If a composition is too busy with noise and activity, unless purposefully, I find I lose focus on the process. I try to avoid projects becoming a sinkhole of time, attempting to cut off and preempt any unnecessary additions that could bloat a project with too much second guessing put into it.