For my first meditation, I created a patch (download) that slowly and randomly displays each pixel of a image or movie file via a polyrhythmic process. The algorithm divides the display window in half so that the pixels in the left side of the screen are rendered with a “count” of 4, and the pixels in right side of the screen are rendered with a “count” of 3. The 3 count rhythm generates more pixels per cycle than the 4 count, so the right side technically renders quicker than the left, but the difference is just barely perceptible. Below is a photo of the patch, and a video of the process in action (for the input file, I used this colorbars picture):

Click To Play

I was also able to capitalize on a curious glitch I found in jitter. When I increased the speed at which the polyrhythmic beats are triggered, jitter starts throwing large chunks of the file onto the screen creating a weird and wonderful Mondrian-esque sprinkle pattern that I really dig. Below is the video:

Click To Play

Last night I saw Bjork perform at Madison Square Garden. It was a fantastic show. I haven’t seen a full on stadium show in a while, but Bjork delivered complete with multiple lcd screens, elaborate costumes, lasers, pyrotechnics, guests (Anthony, for one), and her amazing voice. As the vast majority of pop music is stuck in a creative cul-de-sac, it’s refreshing and inspiring to see an artist of such fame and notoriety continue to push both herself and her form in exciting and creative directions.

There were two other massive bonuses to the show. Chris Corsano, one the most progressive percussionists around, played on Bjork’s last album and was invited to tour with her (you can see him performing with Bjork in the above video). I was very happy to watch him play, albeit from a distance. I find his continuing search to find new approaches to percussion extremely inspiring. Here’s a video of him playing live:

Plus, I got to see the Reactable live as well (an amazing NIME experiment). It was developed by the Music Technology Group at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona. The table sounds great, its interface is simple yet elegant, and watching it played live is physically compelling.

The sounds I’m presenting for this week’s nime class is a 1 min 20 sec mashup of the music that has has most influenced me recently. The layers are:

Max Roach & Anthony Braxton, “Rebirth”, from Birth and Rebirth
Arthur Russell, “Wax the Van”, from World of Echo
Keith Fullerton Whitman, “Track 3a (2waynice)”, from Playthroughs
Merzbow, “1930″, from 1930

Here’s the result:

Lately, one of my main uses of music is in aiding with writing. I’ve found that when I’m writing music functions not so much as background “filler”, but helps create a sort of optimal mental environment or atmosphere in which it’s easier for the necessary words and phrases to reveal themselves. Thus, Levitin’s description of the state of “flow” resonated with my experiences of writing while listening to music. In addition to Levitin’s point, though, I think that caffeine is usually necessary to get to this state as well. I usually prefer music with heavy drones, ambiance, or colorful electronic textures. Some of my favorites lately have been Oren Ambarchi, the kraturock supergroup Harmonia, and the band Deerhunter who come from my home area of Atlanta.

Also as Levitin described, I write and listen best when there are no vocals present in the music or the vocals are heavily mixed or washed out in the mix. This is probably attributable to a competition of imperatives between mental processes struggling to trump each other. This struggle between arranging and processing language at the same time becomes even more exaggerated when someone is talking in the room with me when I’m writing. Listening to music while reading can be even worse. Processing language both visually and aurally is extremely frustrating. If I want to listen to music while I’m reading, the volume has to be very low. Maybe this tendency towards distraction means I’m slightly ADD, but I’d rather consider myself “precariously engaged”.

I know many people listen to music while sleeping, but that’s usually unsuccessful for me, especially if the music is heavily rhythmic. This is probably due to my years of drumming. Rhythms force me to pick them apart, and beats create too much of a sense of repetition and stability for me to fall in to the floating gossamer of sleep. I usually prefer “white noise” in the background when I sleep, and I have an air purifier that I run on “high” that really drones me away.

There are a few musicians who aid me in sleeping though. The beautiful sounds of Matthew Cooper, aka Eluvium, help me take wonderful naps. Johann Johannsson is wonderful too, especially his album Virðulegu Forsetar. Yet both of these artists tend towards abstract and droning sounds. I would guess that whatever effect this music has on my ability to sleep is the same effect that it has in aiding throat singers/overtone singers with meditative practices. Here’s an unqualified claim from wikipedia: “Studies measuring the frequencies of the throat singing and the brain waves of the monks have shown synchronicity [sic] in the brain, causing it to emit similar waves to those found in studies of silent meditation” (look where the article talks about Tibetan chanting). Well, that proves it.

My class project entails an investigation into the narrative potentials of new media, in all its philosophies, permutations and forms (electronic literature, hypertext, interactive fiction, blogs, games, args, narratology, ludology, et al), culminating in the creation of my own internet art/net.art/e-lit work work.

For now I’m just going to use this blogsite for project updates, but eventually the project will develop its own separate web domain.

Since the first 3 milestones for my project are mainly decision making steps, I’ve decided that the time between these milestones short. Once I start creating and building, the time between milestones becomes greater to allow for progress.

Timeline:
1. Sept 27th-Finalize plot for narrative/study different platforms for online narrative.

2. Oct 4th-Decide upon the form my narrative needs to take/what combination of online media/languages i will use to tell the story.

3. Oct. 11th-Begin to build the online project

4. Nov. 15th-Have made most of the final narrative and formal tweaks of the project and polish created content.

5. End of semester- Have final version of work completed.

Ongoing:
Study & practice javascript/PHP/MySQL/Flash
READ!

Bibliography & References (ever growing):

Nelson, Literary Machines
Murray, Hamlet on the Hollodeck
Bolter, Writing Space

Fruin, First person: New Media as Story, Performance, and Game
Ryan, Narrative as Virtual Reality
Manovich, The Language of New Media

Anything by N. Katherine Hayles, What is E-lit? for starters….
Joseph Tabbi: Toward a Semantic Literary Web: Setting a Direction for the Electronic Literature Organization’s Directory

Mark Amerika and alt-x

http://eliterature.org/

Disrupting narratives at the Tate

Grand Text Auto

Here’s a trailer for Nancy’s No Keys piece she performed this summer at Green-Naftali gallery:

Click To Play

I assisted with the performance’s sound. Special thanks to Gian Pablo as well for all the video work. It was a treat to help Nancy on this piece. I really enjoyed it. Congrats Nancy!

Adam Parrish and I have been meeting this summer to create handmade electronic sound devices. So far, we’ve made and played with contact mikes (both as receivers and drivers) and a variety of oscillator chips. The pics below show the breadboard setup of a four oscillator chip controlled by 10k pots and photoresistors, along with two types of capacitors. We then drive the output into a LM 386-based amp circuit, and the results are pretty fun and noisy:

We’ve drawn out plans for a full-on synth, comprised of 8 oscillators and controlled by 1ok and 100k pots, plus 1mfarad and 10kfarad capacitors. We plan to use 1/8″ jacks to feedback the signals into each oscillator and then send the signal out of the circuit. Now we have to come up with something to house the circuit. I vote for an old school “Masters of the Universe” lunch box.