Atoms and errors: towards a history and aesthetics of microsound

Thomson, Phil

doi:10.1017/s1355771804000299

Cited by 14 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 44 publications

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“…Popularized by Roads's (2001) book, Microsound, as well as the freely accessible .microsound mailing list, it is notable for acting as a material point of contact linking practitioners inside and outside of research institutions (see Cascone 2000;Thomson 2004;Demers 2010). Referenced in genres such as glitch, microsound, and "extreme" computer music, it has also played an important role in the work of institutional electroacoustic music composers such as Agostino Di Scipio, Damien Keller, Horacio Vaggione, and others.…”

Section: Pulsargeneratormentioning

confidence: 99%

Sound Synthesis Procedures as Texts: An Ontological Politics in Electroacoustic and Computer Music

Haworth

2015

Computer Music Journal

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This article describes a set of "textual" technological practices that have been emerging over the past decade in the work of underground electroacoustic and computer music composers, focusing particularly on Florian Hecker and Russell Haswell. Guided by methodological insights from the field of software studies, the article zooms in on two computer programs, PulsarGenerator and GENDYN, presenting a genealogical analysis of them as cultural objects and outlining how these lines of descent are aestheticized in their works. In the hands of these artists, sound synthesis procedures carry an author function, and this transgresses both their legal status as technological "inventions" rather than texts, as well as their ontological status in the electroacoustic music genre. Combined with a compositional focus on "sounding" the materiality of these technologies-the particular affordances, limitations, and quirks of their operative functioning-this textual practice contributes to a new aesthetic, one that challenges the prevailing logic of secrecy, alchemy, and semblance in this music. Using the notion of "ontological politics" inherited from science and technology studies, I show how these practices highlight zones of contestation over electroacoustic music's ontology.In 2008, a piece of code was shared on the online forum for users of the graphical programming environment Max that was purported to be the work of the British electronica duo Autechre. Autechre are a notoriously clandestine outfit, especially regarding their working methods, so this rare insight into their téchne naturally garnered some interest. The code itself is visually very messy and the only instruction on the screen is to "load a short .aif and then press spacebar." This action launches a sequencer that triggers polymetric patterns comprising short synthesizer sounds; they approximate kicks and snare drums, as well as "laser" sounds, so-called "gabber steps," and other sound effects. It sounds a bit like Autechre, at least close enough for the code to be debated in nearly 150 subsequent posts. The discussions it elicited ranged from the question of whether or not information "wants" to be free; to what constitutes an instrument and what a "trick" or "effect" in electronic music practice; to the role software environments play in creativity and whether they should be credited in CD publications; to questions of open and closed source software and the types of behaviors, secretive or pedagogical,

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Section: Pulsargeneratormentioning

confidence: 99%

Sound Synthesis Procedures as Texts: An Ontological Politics in Electroacoustic and Computer Music

Haworth

2015

Computer Music Journal

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“…The purpose here was to provide more textural aesthetic to the resultant audio and this sequence choice also means that few words of melodic sections would ever appear in their entirety, giving the resultant music a much less cohesive feel and making it often difficult for the listener to identify structural cues in the music. This choice of particularly short segments of musical audio to create larger compositions broadly falls within the domain of microsound, which is often considered to be a precursor, or particular form, of glitch based music [21]. Whilst it is certainly true that using extremely small, varied fragments of musical audio result in glitch type music, glitch music could also consist of much larger segments of audio, re-arranged in a random way, and also qualify as glitch.…”

Section: Aceremix: Glitch Productionmentioning

confidence: 99%

ACERemix

Cunningham

Weinel

Griffiths

2014

Proceedings of the 9th Audio Mostly: A Conference on Interaction With Sound

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In this paper we discuss the use of a recently developed audio compression approach: Audio Compression Exploiting Repetition (ACER) as a compositional tool for glitch composition and remixing. ACER functions by repeating similar sections of audio where they occur in a file and discarding the repetitive data. Thresholds for similarity can be defined using this approach, allowing for various degrees of (dis)similarity between materials identified as 'repetitive'.Through our initial subjective evaluation of ACER, we unexpectedly discovered that the compression method produced musically interesting results on some materials with higher levels of compression. Whilst listeners demonstrate this level of loss of fidelity to be unacceptable for the purposes of compression, it shows potential as a performance or production tool. When applied to pop songs the predicable form of the music was disrupted, introducing moments of novelty, while retaining the songs quantized rhythmic structure. In this paper we propose the use of ACER as a suitable method for producing sonic materials for 'glitch' composition. We present the use of ACER for this purpose with regards to a variety of materials that may be suitable for glitch or electroacoustic composition and using ACER in several different ways to process and reproduce musical audio.

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“…My own electronic music practice (see Riis 2010a; 2010b) can be described as being concerned with the aesthetics of failure, unravelling hidden functionalities in the machine through use of various bending (Ghazala 2004; Goriunova and Shulgin 2008; Thomson 2004: 212) and hacking techniques. A common denominator in this artistic practice is the comprehension that electronic music is the music of the machine, with the inherent notion that, in order to get as close as possible to the machine's own voice, the artistic examination must take as its starting point the alternative use of the malfunctioning of electronic and mechanical sonic processes.…”

Section: Steam Machine Music As Point Of Departurementioning

confidence: 99%

The Media Archaeological Repairman

Riis¹

2013

Org. Sound

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This paper investigates how a contemporary constructed mechanical musical instrument driven by a steam engine can be used as an instrument that brings new knowledge and understanding to rudimentary conditions regarding electronic music. The investigation takes its starting point in the media archaeological repairman that digs out the malfunctioning music machine and gives the material physicality a pivotal role, in contrast to the otherwise more symbolic understanding of electronic music that seems to be predominant. This alternative conceptualisation of electronic music focuses on rudimentary understandings of physical and symbolic framings of machine-based music, which are unfolded through the notion of operative technology, and brings new knowledge regarding key epistemological issues regarding timing, malfunction and operation within electronic and machine-based music.

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Atoms and errors: towards a history and aesthetics of microsound

Cited by 14 publications

References 44 publications

Sound Synthesis Procedures as Texts: An Ontological Politics in Electroacoustic and Computer Music

Sound Synthesis Procedures as Texts: An Ontological Politics in Electroacoustic and Computer Music

ACERemix

The Media Archaeological Repairman

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