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 never anticipated.Fang’s specialty is mashed-up Furby toys. More at nypress.com.
Upcoming
• February 5, 2020: The first session of the 15-week course I teach at the Academy of Art about the role of sound in the media landscape.
• April 15, 2020: A chapter on the Disquiet Junto ("The Disquiet Junto as an Online Community of Practice," by Ethan Hein) appears in the forthcoming book The Oxford Handbook of Social Media and Music Learning (Oxford University Press), edited by Stephanie Horsley, Janice Waldron, and Kari Veblen. (Details at oup.com.)
• December 13, 2020: This day marks the 24th anniversary of Disquiet.com.
• January 7, 2021: This day marks the 9th anniversary of the start of the Disquiet Junto music community.
Dates TBA
• There are entries on the Disquiet Junto in the forthcoming book The Music Production Cookbook: Ready-made Recipes for the Classroom (Oxford University Press), edited by Adam Patrick Bell. Ethan Hein wrote one, and I did, too.
• At least two live group concerts by Disquiet Junto members in the San Francisco Bay Area are in the works for 2020.
• I have liner notes for a musician's solo album and an essay in a book about an art event due out. I'll announce as the release dates come into focus.
Ongoing
• The Disquiet Junto series of weekly communal music projects explore constraints as a springboard for creativity and productivity. There is a new project each Thursday afternoon (California time), and it is due the following Monday at 11:59pm: disquiet.com/junto.
• My book on Aphex Twin's landmark 1994 album, Selected Ambient Works Vol. II, was published as part of the 33 1/3 series, an imprint of Bloomsbury. It has been translated into Japanese (2019) and Spanish (2018).
Background
Since January 2012, the Disquiet Junto has been an ongoing weekly collaborative music-making community that employs creative constraints as a springboard for creativity. Subscribe to the announcement list (each Thursday), listen to tracks by participants from around the world, read the FAQ, and join in.
Recent Projects
• 0438 / Deep Plan / The Assignment: Compose a piece of music in which something special is situated at the very center.
• 0437 / Echo Relocation / The Assignment: Record someone else's field recording of their environment playing within your own.
• 0436 / Planetary Headspace / The Assignment: Share a recording of your local environment to create a communal soundscape.
• 0435 / Woodshed Report / Share something you've been working on (and respond to what others post).
• 0434 / Beat Kit / The Assignment: Create music with beats crafted by fellow Junto participants.
Full Index
And there is a complete list of past projects, 438 consecutive weeks to date.