[click on the picture to download]
A note: This record is meant to be shuffled once you put it on your ipod or burn it on a CD. The tracks have already been randomized to some extent, but the basic idea is this: every time you go to listen to the recording the tracks are in a different order (simple!). In this way, the act of listening enables new relationships to develop between sound events which are unique to the moment of the listening. Of course the recording itself has a finite amount of sounds (as it is a recording). The medium by which the information is being transmitted (a pre-recorded set of events) is therefore obviously ill-suited to dynamic change. This recording is of course not going to change that, but is merely my own personal attempt to at least begin to tangle with this problem (if you want to call it that) of stasis in the recorded form. The language we use to discuss the recorded format (record, tracks, sequences, cuts, etc.) sets up the listener for a guided, directed listening experience, which of course hasn't traditionally been an issue for either the musician or the audience. In essence, this is an attempt at a non-linear (as much as that is possible) listening experience. This recording was synthesized from two improvisations on an un-amplified electric guitar performed back-to-back. The performances were then cut up into internally sequential pieces, and randomly put back together. There were no edits other than those used to divide the performances into smaller pieces of differing lengths. One more thing lest this begin to sound like a dissertation: the recording itself was fun to make and a satisfying experience, which is about as much as you can ask for.
