Slowed and Thowed: Pharmacomusical Meditation

Michael Veal traces dub's influence on other forms of music in different geographic locations at the end of his book Dub: Soundscapes and Shattered Songs in Jamaican Reggae. While he quickly glosses over the well-documented emergence of the hip-hop scene in New York, it is important to note that many of dub's production techniques and cultural production happen in other African diasporas. The South has contributed to the development of American music by injecting the blues, jazz, gospel and other styles produced by African-American communities. Of specific interest to me is screwed and chopped music, which has evolved out of Houston Texas, which has corollaries in memory, fragmentation, pharmacology, and consumption. In my examination, I take a look at “Servin a duce” by DJ Screw, “Still Tippin'” featuring Mike Jones, Slim Thug, and Paul Wall, “Cadillac on 22's (screwed and chopped)” by David Banner, “Love and Happiness (Al Green screwed and chopped),” and Kid606's “Robitussin Motherfucker (DJ Screw RIP).” I conclude by noting screwed and chopped's ability through pharmaceuticals and production methods to create a meditation space for resolving some issues I have with Southern rap culture.

Download
Here's a YouTube playlist for a sampling of some screw videos and videos of DJ Screw and DJ Kralos producing screw tracks:

Helios: A Showcase of Nostalgic Production

Helios: A Showcase of Nostalgic Production

Nostalgia has always been a very prominent emotion evoked by Ambient music. Since the genre rarely utilizes lyrical content to bring about emotions like this, it has always been interesting to me to figure out exactly what aspect of the sonic qualities of Ambient music bring about the feeling of nostalgia. In this essay, I attempt to tap into the sonic qualities via production techniques of five different songs by Ambient/Electronic artist, Helios, who has always been a strong communicator of nostalgic emotion to me, personally. The essay explores the tie that reverb – among other production techniques – has with the creation of mind-space, allowing the mind to fill the space with memories that consequently evoke a sense of nostalgia. Additionally, the concept of “technostalgia” and specific production techniques that represent it are explored as possible contributors to the overall nostalgic phenomenon of Helios’ music. Overall, through exploiting the aural experience of Helios’ work, I hope to provide insight into why it causes such a longing for the past.

The Multiplicity of Noise

The Multiplicity of Noise

The advent of audio recording and playback technologies greatly facilitated the increased use of noise as a compositional element in the 20th century. As this phenomenon progressed, the idea of noise itself began to rupture into multiple strings of conceptions and possibilities. In this paper I show some of the ways that noise has been used as an element of modern audio composition. This is accomplished through discussions of works by Pierre Schaeffer, John Cage, Brian Eno, John Zorn, and Merzbow. Though all of these works are radically different, they all make use of noise to accomplish their goal. As noise compositions, these works illustrate the multiplicity and plasticity inherent in the concept of noise.

Lolspace.org Call for submission

Josh and I have recently started a project in response to some of our readings, discussions and our interest in Lolcat memes. I just wanted to point you guys to our blog, and let you know that we'd love to have some images created by you all on the blog. You can email them to Josh (josh.fishburn [at] gmail.com) or I (hebert.sara [at] gmail.com), and if you're interested in contributing on a regular basis, we can set up an account on the blog for you.


kthnxbai!

Diplo Talks About Jamaica, Dancehall

Here's the video I mentioned in class, with Hollertronix and Mad Decent founder Diplo (Wes Pentz) talking his recent trip to Jamaica with Switch (Dubsided). He gives some really nice insight into what's going on there now, and what its like to produce with Dancehall artists.

Some thoughts on radio...

I had some thoughts on radio after our discussion on Monday that I wanted to share here. My experience with radio has not been one of ephemerality, but of intentional listening and archiving. I don't believe that ephemerality is a necessary byproduct of the medium of radio, but a willful creation of circumstances that invoke such a feeling (not unlike the willful suspension of disbelief engaged in by an audience and participant in hypnosis). The detailed archives that I assume most radio stations keep would show the opportunity to repeat what happened in the studio at any point, much like the storage space on our computers lets us store and listen to podcasts.

I understand the collective experience of listeners to a radio program, but this is also a largely unidentifiable phenomenon with the exception of listening in the same physical space with a group and again requires a sort of suspension of disbelief. Internet radio stations give us real-time statistics (the number of simultaneous listeners to a station) that quantify the collective experience, but a collective listening experience is present in physical space or in the imagination.

The transmission of particular information via radio waves requires a physical infrastructure that eventually sends information wirelessly, which at this point is also the way that many of us receive the information that arrives on our computers. If radio stations have not made their archives available, on demand, to the listening public in the past, today's technology makes that kind of framework possible.

Sounds from Saturn

Via BoingBoing and NASA:

The Eerie, Bizarre Sounds of the Saturnian System

Sounds from outer space are weird, if not downright spooky.

Be ready for a goosebump or two as you feast your ears on some of the greatest sounds gathered during the exploration of the Saturnian system.

Link