Improvised Electronic Music

https://hexpressionist.bandcamp.com

HEXPRESSIONIST is my latest project. The music I release under this moniker is inspired by micromontage techniques. It is almost very much inspired by the abstract expressionist movement.

These recordings were made quickly with little thought. This is the music of raw expression. I spent months collecting and processing samples then I performed the samples improvisationally in real time using controllers. Nothing was done to the music afterwards.

The result is an uninterrupted definition of myself.

Harmonium and Guitar

I’ve been experimenting with a new recording technique. Basically I’m trying to make the most of my gear. I’m sure I could eliminate giant chunks of time by using a better process, but this seems to be working at the moment.

I mic my harmonium using my brother’s bass drum mic. The mic is plugged into a mixer along with guitar. The guitar is not directly plugged into the mixer though. It is first plugged into my Boss BR 600 (for the effects) which is then connected to the mixer. Finally the mixer is plugged into my Loop Station.

I loop layers of harmonium at different volumes with different EQ to maximize richness. In a sense I use the mixer as an instrument by constantly moving faders and turning EQ knobs. Then I add in reverb-drenched guitar. I don’t play riffs. I just layer individual notes in hopes that an melody is eventually created by chance. Working this way keeps the guitar very abstract. I’m heavily inspired by Fennesz and Robert Fripp.

Once I’m satisfied with the loop, I disconnect it from the mixer and record it into my BR 600 using the guitar input. Then I plug my ipad into the BR 600 and “decorate” the loop with field recordings, granular noises, and glitchy synth stuff. Finally I export the loop and decorative tracks into Audition where it’s all polished up.

postfailure

The time between lines is intentional.

Death by tornado or by the bullet of a racist. Equally tragic. Both violent conditions of the earth. I see no difference between man and moon. Properties of particles poeticized.

I have yet to meet a moment uncoated in absurdity.

Time-specific line. Words beyond myself. Perhaps denial of the self. Not denial. The dismissal of. Rather.

I was yelled at once by a blimp. I could not respond appropriately. My attention anchored by sonic textura. Microtona. Overtona. I want to record you. I said.

You can’t fight racist without fire they said. But can’t I. I can appropriate brown with sound. One day an uneducated white man will point to a brown bearded man and say, 

“That there is a harmoniumist”

A human’s search for answers and an insectoid’s disapproval of simulated death.

The nature of things which hang in between. I swam in the Bardo once. But I didn’t drown to get there. And something was aware of my dishonesty.

My body is a remote-controlled car and I’m sitting on a cloud in the corner of the sky with the controller in my toes.

need

Perhaps I wouldn’t write if my mouth lubricated itself during times I need it the most.

Like when I stopped her at the door. Onlookers impatiently observing the distance between us and the door. Me trying to fit words into the most loaded minute.

The minute between her and the door.

The struggle of fitting words into a perpetually shutting clamp. Perhaps I wouldn’t write if I could form sentences then.

The Chance There Is No Chance

I think the reason I’m so attracted to indeterministic processes is because I actually don’t believe in chance and instead what I think happens is I’m opening the door for something that’s trying really hard to not be found. It’s that same strange thing that talks to you when you take over an eighth of mushrooms. The thing that tells you exactly what you need to hear in order to make the most out of your next day. It’s that same thing that pushes the ball in a direction when it’s perched perfectly on the tip of a needle and there’s no gravity or wind. When you roll the dice how do really know there wasn’t a nudge from unseen forces during a split millisecond between tumbles. Whenever you leave her an opening she will seep in and select a thought from a collage of thoughts created by the dopaminergic surge. And maybe I’m writing this about my work. Or maybe about a girl who decided to text me the same day Animal Collective released Painting With. I’m glad we’re on good terms now, because I stopped listening to one of my favorite bands because of her. I’m glad we’re on good terms now, because I would often eat too many mushrooms and slip into a depressive coma with dreams of things I could have done better, but now I think of fractals and love. Now I keep getting that I’m-gonna-save-the-world-with-music trip. My ego wants to compose micromontage music for the sake of intellectual prowess, but that thing above my ego (probably another ego) wants to write dancy stuff for the purpose of healing hearts. I’m glad I read a bunch of essays by Cage, because now I perceive heartbreak as chance phenomena. This thing that happens in order to set in motion a series of events which ultimately lead to riffs, collages, poems, and I don’t dare think of trading these things for money, because unclosed loops tend to generate feedback which oscillates in the heart and if you eat a lot of cheese like I do you cannot afford it. Basically. Let it end at your art. I finally finished another collage after about six months of mood swings and daunting MBA coursework. The time spent making collages is my time and that’s my reward and that’s why I don’t wanna sell my shit, because money doesn’t justify inner turmoil the way art does.

IMG_6802

 

Exploded poetry

Aside from social media marketing and blog promotion, scheduling apps such as Buffer can be used to write “exploded poems”

An exploded poem incoorporates time in a new way. It can be thought of as a new form of concrete poetry. Instead of using physical space to enhance meaning, one can use temporal space. Gaps of time between lines can help us achieve new meanings and aesthetic ideas.

I started writing exploded poems after getting bored of Twitter. I started noticing a subconcious desire to inflate my ego using indirect statements. Everytime I opened up my Twitter app the same thoughts would cycle through my head. How can I indirectly say something good about myself without making the intention obvious. Finally I came to the conclusion that Twitter could serve a better purpose as a creative outlet. 

Whenever I have an idea for a poem, I write the lines in Buffer (scheduling app) and randomly schedule the lines. After doing this for a while I realized it woulf be more interesting to assign meaning to times. For example, I can use the 3:30 for lines full of mispelled words and I can use 4:44 for lines containing no adjective. 

Essentially scheduling allows for new way to portray aesthetic and conceptual ideas. I think embracing technology is an integral part of avant-garde philosophy. 

Objectivism 

I’m no longer concerned with illusions of good and bad or the shackles of right and wrong. Instead I’ll ask myself:

Is it probable?

If so, I’ll harness a process to dilute probability. These processes may include procedural or generative techniques. Essentially I’ll do what ever it takes to summon ghosts. I can’t rely solely on my own decisions since they are derived from external reinforcements. I’ve always been attracted to the highly improbable. It is worth hunting for and  it is worth making. It gives my life value. It makes me feel as if I actually contributed something to the world.

Is it stimulating?

Either aesthetically or conceptually the work must elicit a surge of neurological activity. It must enhance the mind of the observer. The first time I listened to Stravinsky, I felt as if I had taken amphetamines. I want to induce this same response using collage art.

Art is the only free will. Therefore we must constantly reject any artistic conditioning. Rules are for robots.

Behavioral

things must behave in order for the toaster

to toast.

but I propose a toast to disorder

in order

to disturb a process

one must make the claim

that he/she

is trying to harness chance

for toast

behavior is for the toaster

and I am

not toast + nontoast

for how loaded is the toaster

like a political statement or a flag

I am simply misbehaving

because I was created in an algorithmic sneeze

the flowers which my not have bloomed

if cells did what they were suppose to do