Chat rooms have a bad rap. They’ve gained a touch of the aura that used to hover around the word “hacker.” Though today it means something closer to “entrepreneur,” hacker used to be equivalent to “dangerous anti-social malcontent.” Chat rooms …
My review of the new book Sound Unbound: Sampling Digital Music and Culture (MIT Press), edited by Paul D. Miller, is in the latest issue of Nature magazine, dated May 1 — founded …
In the current moment of hybrid music, of field recordings mixed with live performance, of remixes that can pass as first-draft compositions, of laptop-enhanced traditional instrumentation, it can be informative, not to mention entertaining, to listen before you look, or …
As the April issue of Wired is being replaced on newsstands by the May one (an Apple cover story giving way to Steve Carell’s mug), here’s a shot from the former:
Photographed by Nick Waplington, …
This is Thomas Fang speaking about circuit bending in advance of the Bent Festival, to be held this weekend in Manhattan:
The spirit of circuit bending is random effects — fucking with the electronics system until you get something you …
A fifth anniversary entry from the Turntable Radio podcast features Japanese figures DJ Baku, Exsample (Ken-One, Naoki and Shige) and Miyajima. Like the best abstract turntablism, the work …
Thanks to the sort of dark, nearly sub-aural thuds that make speaker cabinets rumble with pulmonary might, the dozen tracks on Products of Passed Days by .at/on (born Anton Holota) contribute to a …
The two tracks that comprise Gregory Taylor’s Two Maps of Danaraja, on the Stasisfield netlabel, are studies in contrast. The prominent features of “Seismic Profile” (MP3) are long drones while “Orbital Photo” …
The following statement is attributed to Ben Watt of Everything but the Girl, in support of Record Store Day, Saturday, April 19, 2008:
it is hard to underestimate the role of independent retail in the music industry. as the world continues …
The drone in the background of a sample excerpt from Totstellen’s recent Tunnel Brücke CDR has a sonar quality and the sublimated buzz of distant industrial activity (MP3). In fact it’s an augmented field recording, taped in a tunnel …