I regularly created music or soundpieces for those rather less melodic ones from 1990 to the present day, originally as Reality Engine…I didn’t share much of these works because a) the internet didn’t exist in a meaningful way then, it was all about 32-64kbs files which sounded like they were on the moon and b) I was never really happy with a lot of my work, which is more experimental in nature.
So as we come to the 20 year anniversary of starting my art degree where I clanged lots of bits of metal and made noise that would make a My Bloody Valentine deaf, I thought I’d post some of these, especially as I’ve got a new RAID 0 array and am backing up all my old work on crumbling >15 year old CD-Rs.
The first piece ‘Unseen Voices’ here isn’t from my degree yet after, 2001…probably inspired by the whole craziness after 9/11 as it comes from Nov/Dec 2001 it’s created by Fast Fourier Translations on white noise, it creates a singing sort of choir, one that reminded me of Electronic Voice Phenomenon. Also the unseen bit refers to a piece I planned but never did, one of the creepiest things about one of the Hatfield rail disaster is the mobile phones which survived the crash unlike some of their owners rang for several days after – the emergency services were instructed to leave them alone. So I planned to do a sound piece in a dark room just with the sound of mobile phones, but this piece is an extension of that I think.
Second is one called Counter Surveillance Program for my degree show, the idea was the installation monitored it’s own surroundings constantly, it recorded video as well as showing CCTV of the local bus station – and the soundtrack was similarly stalkerish as it contained radio scans, a la Scanner/Robin Rimbaud:
Next pieces while partly under the Reality Engine banner or my previous guise PFF (don’t ask) are more musical, like this one called YNot (daybreak mix) which is very breakbeat mixed with 8-bit and samples, this would be from the early 90s, and created on OctaMED on my Amiga!
Testbroadcast I think I have posted online before, but mostly hidden away somewhere, this was for a video in my second year, 1994. You’ll notice the theme of radio popping up again and again – I was obsessed by radio and broadcasting – and it appears here with preachers, and samples of The Edge talking about virtual reality (I did my dissertation on cyberspace).
Anf I was channelling some dubstep bass business in 2008 with Cat In Hell’s Cradle (only previously heard over on the Who Boys podcast as a bed!)
And I invented something called Acid Shuffle in 1998…slowing down those acid tracks in Rebirth created a different feel entirely…especially when you turn up the echo!
Loads more here! I’m sure I’ll find more forgotten gems as I backup my old discs to the harddrive…
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