julian at “lend me your ears” recently dropped a mention of the brand new overlap release “vague cities” by chris macnamara.

http://earslend.blogspot.com/2009/10/it-aint-so.html

“…Meanwhile, muffle & echo help shape the slow washes of Chris McNamara’s Vague Cities on Overlap (via Ghostly): the crepuscular Trimalchio, Sleeping Car/Shunting Yard’s serene accretions, the darker unfurling of et puis, the gradual march of Subsandtaxis in Markus Guenter’s remix.”

check it out and support this quite awesome blog and julian’s fine writing on it.

I’d like to highlight the work of little-scale , a hacker from adelaide, who has made consumer devices from sega megadrives to toy space swords sing.

He is playing a show in melbourne, australia on the 17th july 2009 at the queensberry hotel, swanston st, carlton.

OUT NOW on San Francisco based label TwoCircles!

Stolen Nature adeptly bridges the synthetic/organic abyss with uniquely composed granular textures, aleatoric rhythmic patterns and modal jazz structures. The release’s arcane theme is unfalteringly cohesive and conceptual from beginning to end. Miller’s compositional sensibility on Stolen Nature has reconciled the poles of unadulterated, native sounds and processed, algorithmic music. These two adverse ideas are adroitly synthesized into a hybrid entity that lives and breathes on its own. The stochastic electronics laden deep in Stolen Nature’s structure seem to have a sentient quality that hauntingly reflects recent developments in the field of artificial intelligence. The intricate machinations featured on Stolen Nature are inclined to deep personal sentiments and emotion. Cullen’s application of traditional instruments takes the antiquated oral tradition and fuses it into a futuristic context.

http://www.twocirclesrecords.com

It is striking how different operational platforms transform work.

For several years I performed using an Electrix Repeater. This was the looping heart of my rig. It has four mono channels of audio, which can couple up in to two stereo loops. You can also resample and bounce at will, to give many possibilities. The device is cool and quirky, and does things no other device that I know of can do. It also seasons the audio with a rich set of unique sonic artifacts. It is also a straightforward approach to looping: You just hurl things in there and they spin. Synchronization with other devices is possible but not guaranteed. It’s possible to make a big mess real fast.

One of the virtues and hazards of loop-based performance is its raw, uncooked character. At its best, unconditioned and utterly true musical ideas hover in all their otherworldliness, temporarily visiting a particular group of people in a shabby room. The sound is alive and moving on its own, detached from the musician that let it into the human world. The effect can be sublime.

If one is sensitive and careful, these moments can build on one another; the hovering musical presence can be perceived to point the way toward a companion for itself. The Repeater was perfect for responding directly and immediately to this pointing. The character of the music that resulted from working with the Repeater is vivid to me, and for the most part I find that I simply cannot duplicate this character working as I now do in an Ableton Live environment. Live has its own virtues, and is far more powerful than the Repeater. In Live one is able to sculpt a more explicit musical narrative in real time. For me at least, it seems to nudge the player into a more conditioned, compositional mode. This doesn’t mean one has to give in to this nudging, but nevertheless, the game is different. I’m able to do things now that I wanted to do but couldn’t back then. Still, whenever I listen to recordings from the Repeater days, I realize something has been lost.

But this is life, is it not? A sequence of loss mitigated by new powers.

Here’s an example of a piece I used to perform with the Repeater.

beat on

Here’s the same piece from a recent live performance using Live.  The name has been changed to “beat one” to preserve the innocence of the original.

beat-one-excerpt1

All of the musical themes of the Repeater version are present in the Live version, but the character of the music is, in my opinion, radically different. What I am tempted to say as an observer is that the Repeater version offers a clearer window into the unconditioned, while the Live version is more “wrought.” While the Repeater version is perhaps more true, the Live version is probably a more interesting and exciting live performance. The Repeater version is more like a prayer, while the Live version is “cooler.” The Repeater version appeals to the soul; the Live version takes its bearings from the body.

What do you think?

it was an honor for me when christopher willits asked me to start posting regularly on fridays on overlap.org. his only caveat was that the post should overlap with overlap. honestly, i was a little unsure until last night of how i would do that since, i no longer live in san francisco and am unable to attend most overlap events. however, i have decided to post anyway and to find a niche within this growing community of artists. my only regret is that i didn’t start posting there two years ago when i was first invited by jon and chris.

creativity in the dissemination of music through the internet is becoming a more frequent topic on my personal blog. i think it is our responsibility as underground artists to find new ways to use tools like the creative commons to get our work out, but also, we must find new ways to make music and media valuable. it is so easy for anyone to create a torrent and download nearly any piece of media available in the world freely and without regard to the artist who created this media. sites like overlap are in my opinion imperative to the future of independent music because they combine freedom of culture with a platform for generating revenue. i don’t think it is enough for people to keep trying to recreate the same music industry standard label over and over again in a culture that is clearly changing. overlap, in my opinion is one of the finest examples of artists working in tandem with developers to find new ways to create prosperity through art by encouraging online community, hosting live events and publishing music which encourages remix.

last week i posted a review on this site about jon’s site cantocore.com. jon was kind enough to reblog it here, here, and here. so check out jon’s sites and hit him up with mad comments because he is doing amazing work both here with overlap and on his other various creative endeavors.

if you haven’t already read my blogs about jon phillips, you can do so here, here and here. if you are in the bay area and want to attend some cool shows click here to view what the new langston arts group is doing. they will be hosting steven roden and loren chasse today friday, march 20 and there is a terry riley documentary screening on wednesday 25th…thanks to franz gido schnaas for turning me on to the new langston arts.

if you are down south today, make the drive to see carl stone in new orleans at the center for contemporary arts. carl is an amazing guy and a musical genius you can read my interview with him here and my blog about having lunch with him here.

please send lots of feedback as i plan to continue writing for overlap on fridays, i would like everyone in the overlap community to give me great stuff to write about and i hope that my affiliation with this site will not only help grow my own site, but open me up to all the wonderful things that overlap with overlap.

Manji Mountain Remix

I have been reading about Cantocore for a number of days totally obsessed by the complexity of the concepts presented on its site http://cantocore.com/, but it was not until I read the following statement that I was really sold on the idea; ‘Cantocore is the reality of life versus the theory set forth by jurisdictions where people live.’ As an artists who’s personal world view leans towards ontological anarchy, this statement elevates Cantocore from a link on Jon Phillip’s website to the top of the bookmark list on my favorite web browser. Rather than getting into any specifics about the content this review will provide my basic assesment of the site and I encourage you to explore the site in depth as each of the many interactions described are well worth your time in the bloggosphere.

We live in an increasingly global society, the implications of which are vastly unknown and almost totally unexploited as a source of artistic inspiration. Cantocore attempts in my mind to establish a framework through which this unexploited territory can be explored via collaborations between artists in Guangzhou and San Francisco. Here, cultural exchange and the examination of this exchange becomes the medium of the art itself. This quote, an excerpt for the description of ‘Free On Board’ sums it up perfectly.

‘the collaboration, “Cantocore,” takes its inspiration and name from the rapid economic, social, and cultural changes taking place in Guangzhou, the third most populous city in China. Even in the midst of economic crises, factories are producing, Canto hip-hop is blasting, and the cultural industries are progressing. Over the last 30 years cities such as Guangzhou, the capital of Canton, have rapidly expanded economically and socially. From revolutionary upheavals to becoming industrialized global cities influenced and informed by diverse forms of representation, Chinese artists have exerted a growing influence on culture globally. Perhaps nowhere more than here on the Pacific rim of California have Chinese-Americans, who primarily immigrated from Southern China, played such a crucial role in the state’s inception, particularly in San Francisco. Not only does this city have the largest import of Chinese people of any US city, these immigrants also created the largest Chinatown in North America. However, understanding the conceptual framework of Cantocore is not limited to geographic divisions, nor reductive dichotomies driven by post-colonial stereotypes such as East versus West or Olympic nationalisms. Cantocore is the reality of life versus the theory set forth by jurisdictions where people live.’

The content of Cantocore website is not for the light of heart. It requires patience and the ability to navigate complexity. This is not complexity from an information design perspective. Rather, the content is dense and challenging to traditional notions of conceptual art. However, the website itself is also an artwork. It is powered by wordpress, gives you the option to login to the site, contains its own wiki, and is filled with entries about the many happenings and conceptual installations presented by the artists involved in the project. It is in an invitation to others to participate.

If you think that conceptual art is dead or that the Creative Commons movement has not fully realized itself, Cantocore.com might just change your mind. The types of interactions that develop between artists and are explained on this site are sure to fascinate you for days on end. It might even take a few days to understand what the site is all about and how to navigate it. Don’t let it scare you, good art is often complex and hard to navigate, this is net art at its finest.

Though so much art today is the product of globalization, the Cantocore phenomenon is at the bleeding edge of art ABOUT globalization. If you are an artist interested in the Creative Commons movement or if you are an artist unconsciously participating in international net based collaborations, this website will probably school you on how cool interactive art can be and is sure to open the floodgates for new and more innovative ways of approaching Creative Commons licenses.