Disquiet Junto Project 0506: Wipe Out

The Assignment: Take something whole and erase half of it

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

Each Thursday in the Disquiet Junto group, a new compositional challenge is set before the group’s members, who then have just over four days to upload a track in response to the assignment. Membership in the Junto is open: just join and participate. (A SoundCloud account is helpful but not required.) There’s no pressure to do every project. It’s weekly so that you know it’s there, every Thursday through Monday, when you have the time.

Deadline: This project’s deadline is the end of the day Monday, September 13, 2021, at 11:59pm (that is, just before midnight) wherever you are. It was posted on Thursday, September 9, 2021.

These are the instructions that went out to the group’s email list (at tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto):

Disquiet Junto Project 0506: Wipe Out

The Assignment: Take something whole and erase half of it.

Step 1: Take an existing recording of a piece of music, preferably something of your own.

Step 2: Remove half of the track (however you might define half), and in the process create a new version of the original, or something entirely new, or something in between.

Seven More Important Steps When Your Track Is Done:

Step 1: Include “disquiet0506” (no spaces or quotation marks) in the name of your tracks.

Step 2: If your audio-hosting platform allows for tags, be sure to also include the project tag “disquiet0506” (no spaces or quotation marks). If you’re posting on SoundCloud in particular, this is essential to subsequent location of tracks for the creation of a project playlist.

Step 3: Upload your tracks. It is helpful but not essential that you use SoundCloud to host your tracks.

Step 4: Post your track in the following discussion thread at llllllll.co:

[https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0506-wipe-out/](https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0506-wipe-out/)

Step 5: Annotate your track with a brief explanation of your approach and process.

Step 6: If posting on social media, please consider using the hashtag #DisquietJunto so fellow participants are more likely to locate your communication.

Step 7: Then listen to and comment on tracks uploaded by your fellow Disquiet Junto participants.

Note: Please post one track per weekly Junto project. If you choose to post more than one, and do so on SoundCloud, please let me know which you’d like added to the playlist. Thanks.

Additional Details:

Deadline: This project’s deadline is the end of the day Monday, September 13, 2021, at 11:59pm (that is, just before midnight) wherever you are. It was posted on Thursday, September 9, 2021.

Length: The length of your finished track is up to you. It might be best if it’s the same length as the original.

Title/Tag: When posting your tracks, please include “disquiet0506” in the title of the tracks, and where applicable (on SoundCloud, for example) as a tag.

Upload: When participating in this project, be sure to include a description of your process in planning, composing, and recording it. This description is an essential element of the communicative process inherent in the Disquiet Junto. Photos, video, and lists of equipment are always appreciated.

Download: It is always best to set your track as downloadable and allowing for attributed remixing (i.e., a Creative Commons license permitting non-commercial sharing with attribution, allowing for derivatives).

For context, when posting the track online, please be sure to include this following information:

More on this 506th weekly Disquiet Junto project — Wipe Out (The Assignment: Take something whole and erase half of it) — at: https://disquiet.com/0506/

More on the Disquiet Junto at: https://disquiet.com/junto/

Subscribe to project announcements here: https://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co: [https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0506-wipe-out/](https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0506-wipe-out/)

There’s also a Disquiet Junto Slack. Send your email address to [email protected] for Slack inclusion.

The image associated with this project is by Emma Craig, and used thanks to Flickr and a Creative Commons license allowing editing (cropped with text added) for non-commercial purposes:

[https://flic.kr/p/xBs5JS](https://flic.kr/p/xBs5JS)

[https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/)

Sound Ledger¹ (Culture of Noise, Voices of Narwhals)

Audio culture by the numbers

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

71.4: The percentage of Sheffield, England, residents stating a preference for birdsong “coming into their living area from outside”

17.5: The percentage of Beijing, China, residents stating a preference for birdsong “coming into their living area from outside (music was preferred, at 60%).

500: The potential percentage growth of vessel noise in the Canadian Arctic in the next few years

▰ ▰ ▰

¹Footnotes: Sheffield + Beijing: [bloomberg.com](https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2021-covid-city-noise/). Arctic: [newyorker.com](https://www.newyorker.com/science/elements/the-acoustic-lives-of-narwhals).

*Originally published in the [September 6, 2021, edition](https://disquiet.com/2021/09/07/this-week-in-sound-field-recording-the-video-game/) of the This Week in Sound email newsletter ([tinyletter.com/disquiet](https://tinyletter.com/disquiet)).*

This Week in Sound: Field Recording, the Video Game

A lightly annotated clipping service

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

These sound-studies highlights of the week are lightly adapted from the September 6, 2021, issue of the free Disquiet.com weekly email newsletter This Week in Sound ([tinyletter.com/disquiet](https://tinyletter.com/disquiet)).

As always, if you find sonic news of interest, please share it with me, and (except with the most widespread of news items) I’ll credit you should I mention it here.

▰ There’s a new video game coming out about field recording. It’s called Season, and based on various reports it seems to involve a protagonist “creating ‘a time capsule’ and deciding ‘what would capture the spirit’ of this world.” Despite the soothing premise, it has a dramatic backdrop involving, perhaps, some sort of “world-ending event” that sets the field recordist’s task in motion. PlayStation announced the game in December 2020. It’s being developed by the Scavengers Studio, based in Montréal, Québec.
[https://happymag.tv/season-field-recording-game/](https://happymag.tv/season-field-recording-game/)
[https://blog.playstation.com/2020/12/10/introducing-season-a-game-about-capturing-that-fleeting-moment/](https://blog.playstation.com/2020/12/10/introducing-season-a-game-about-capturing-that-fleeting-moment/)
[https://www.play-season.com/](https://www.play-season.com/)

▰ Pilita Clark in the Financial Times decries the use of voice recognition software “to allegedly predict good recruits,” pointing to it as an example of algorithmic overkill in modern hiring.
[https://www.ft.com/content/85278dcc-fed1-4c44-90e6-bceed6828c41](https://www.ft.com/content/85278dcc-fed1-4c44-90e6-bceed6828c41)

▰ “Among the important facts would be the nature of the clip, the purpose of the use, the intention of the creator and the user, and the perception, actual reliance and reasonableness of reliance of the listener.” A laywer breaks down some of the factors to consider in light of the rise of audio deepfakes. The author is Katherine B. Forrest, a former U.S. District Judge in New York and former Deputy Assistant Attorney General with the U.S. Department of Justice.
[https://www.law.com/newyorklawjournal/2021/08/30/hearing-voices-from-beyond-the-grave-emerging-uses-of-deepfakes/](https://www.law.com/newyorklawjournal/2021/08/30/hearing-voices-from-beyond-the-grave-emerging-uses-of-deepfakes/)

▰ A bird appropriately named Echo at a Sydney zoo has taken to imitating, with eerie and alarming accuracy, the sound of crying babies. The lyrebird, a resident of Taronga Zoo, apparently can also do a solid rendition of the “evacuation now” announcement, too. (Via Lawrence English)
[https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/sep/02/targona-zoo-lyrebird-perfectly-mimics-the-ear-splitting-wail-of-a-crying-baby](https://www.newyorker.com/science/elements/the-acoustic-lives-of-narwhals)

▰ What the Arctic loses in ice it gains in shipping traffic, and what it gains in shipping traffic it seems prone to lose in sea life. Marguerite Holloway explores how noise pollution has led narwhals to cease making noises themselves. “That is a very worrisome trend, of course,” says Susanna Blackwell, a marine-mammal-acoustics expert, “because that means that these long-distance communicators can’t hear each other any longer.”
[https://www.newyorker.com/science/elements/the-acoustic-lives-of-narwhals](https://www.newyorker.com/science/elements/the-acoustic-lives-of-narwhals)

▰ “In place of the tendency to fixate on the quantity of sound in our environment,” writes Feargus O’Sullivan, “we should think a lot more about its quality.” The article is an overview of how the “soundscape” approach to urban planning judges factors beyond merely decibel levels. “There’s no consensus about the types of sounds that are intrusive, either. Research comparing the U.K. with China and Taiwan has found marked differences. When residents of Sheffield, England, were asked which sounds they preferred coming into their living area from outside, 71.4% of respondents chose birdsong and no one chose music. When the same question was posed to residents of Beijing, 60% chose music first and only 17.5% chose birdsong.”
[https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2021-covid-city-noise/](https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2021-covid-city-noise/)

▰ “Environmental researchers warned about the damage that noise pollution is causing in natural areas due to ecotourism and recreation activities (such as electronic music parties) that are being carried out in the jungles of Quintana Roo.” The article quotes a Dr. Yann Hénaut, of El Colegio de la Frontera Sur.
[https://www.theyucatantimes.com/2021/08/noise-pollution-is-killing-birds-and-mammals-in-quintana-roo/](https://www.theyucatantimes.com/2021/08/noise-pollution-is-killing-birds-and-mammals-in-quintana-roo/)

▰ Amazon has updated its Echo devices to recognize high background sounds, and compensate accordingly. “The feature gives Alexa the ability to respond to questions at a higher volume when loud background noise is detected,” writes Molly Price. “It’s a handy option that is surprisingly late to the game, given that Alexa has known how to whisper for some time now.”
[https://www.cnet.com/home/smart-home/how-to-use-alexa-adaptive-volume-on-your-amazon-echo/](https://www.cnet.com/home/smart-home/how-to-use-alexa-adaptive-volume-on-your-amazon-echo/)

▰ Abner Li lays out potential Google Assistant technology that might bypass the need to say “OK, Google.” Ankit Banerjee checks in about potential privacy concerns.
[https://9to5google.com/2021/09/01/google-assistant-quick-phrases/](https://9to5google.com/2021/09/01/google-assistant-quick-phrases/)
[https://www.androidauthority.com/google-assistant-ok-google-optional-2745962/](https://www.androidauthority.com/google-assistant-ok-google-optional-2745962/)

▰ Apple has acquired a company called Primephonic, a streaming service focused on classical music.
[https://www.forbes.com/sites/rashadgrove/2021/09/06/apple-announces-its-acquisition-of-primephonic-a-classical-music-streaming-service/](https://www.forbes.com/sites/rashadgrove/2021/09/06/apple-announces-its-acquisition-of-primephonic-a-classical-music-streaming-service/)

▰ “The steep climb to commercializing voice” is pondered by Ken Sutton, CEO and co-founder of Yobe, an AI/voice software company. Yobe refers to this as “the cocktail party problem”
[https://techcrunch.com/2021/09/03/the-cocktail-party-problem-why-voice-tech-isnt-truly-useful-yet/](https://techcrunch.com/2021/09/03/the-cocktail-party-problem-why-voice-tech-isnt-truly-useful-yet/)

▰ The folks at Nintendo Life discuss their favorite “isn’t-quite-music” sounds from video games. Winners include the Metroid Prime Trilogy, Super Mario World, Super Mario Sunshine, and Resident Evil 4, among others.
[https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2021/09/talking_point_whats_the_best_sound_in_video_games](https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2021/09/talking_point_whats_the_best_sound_in_video_games)

The Art of Drones

A document of three Takeyuki Hakozaki installations

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

*What Comes After* is the perfect title for a collection of tracks that are, themselves, the sonic byproduct of art installations. The installation was the thing; the audio is a memory. A set of those memories is what came after. Each of the three tracks is a recording of roughly seven minutes taken from one of three different set-ups that artist Takeyuki Hakozaki had at the HAKO Gallery in Chiba, Japan, earlier this year, back in mid-February. (I’ve been to Chiba several times to attend the annual Shonen Jump festival, but I’ve never been to an art gallery in the city, which is outside Tokyo.) One of Hakozaki’s pieces involves several electric guitars resonating thanks to electric fans. Another involves audio tape rubbing against guitar strings. The third use a synthesizer to process tape loops. Each recording takes the form of a drone. Each is marked by different elements, and throughout you can hear voices here and there (if you speak Japanese, which I can’t, you might be able to make out some of what is spoken). “Air” is symphonic in scope, the overtones so rich I’d swear I can hear a choir chanting amid the resonances. Magnetic” is rough and raucous, albeit in slow motion. “Complex” is like a shoegazer track, subtler than “Air,” less frictive than “Magnetic.”

If you scroll back through the gallery’s [instagram.com/hako_chiba](https://www.instagram.com/hako_chiba/) account, you can find documentation of the [first (circulator, “Air”)](https://www.instagram.com/p/CLOvpTzjZLl/), shown above, [second (loops, “Magnetic”)](https://www.instagram.com/p/CLTAirID-TI/), and [third (synthesizer, “Complex”)](https://www.instagram.com/p/CLWMI24jmP8/) projects.

More on HAKO at [h-a-k-o.com](https://www.h-a-k-o.com/). More from Takeyuki Hakozaki at [signflax.com](http://www.signflax.com/index.html) and [instagram.com/t.hakozaki](https://www.instagram.com/t.hakozaki/). The audio was mastered by Taylor Deupree (of 12k Records).