Disquiet – Page 738 – Listening to culture. Playing with audio. Sounding out technology. Composing in code.

What Sound Looks Like

An ongoing series cross-posted from instagram.com/dsqt

April 23, 2016 / By Marc Weidenbaum

There are hokey antiquated signs one buys at in-name-only nickel/dime (ye olde) shoppes in historic districts, and there are, you know, actual old things that are defined as old because they linger well past their own era and deep into the alien present. The rust on the wiring here marks the sign as something that may have been hokey once upon a time but that has at least begun to earn the right to be thought of as, itself, old. (Those doorbells, yellow like the teeth of a life-long if not long-lived smoker, further testify to the passing of time.) That is to say, it carries some prohibitive weight. The admonition against not only “peddlers” but the more ambiguous “agents” and the now fairly obscure “solicitors” is enough to make all but the most self-confident of visitors second guess themselves before daring to push one of those buzzers.

An ongoing series cross-posted from instagram.com/dsqt.

The Close Parenthesis of Doom

Drone sludge metal from Traunstein, Germany's .(((DEEP))).

April 22, 2016 / By Marc Weidenbaum

Thanks at least in part to Sunn O))) the close parenthesis has come to typographically symbolize, to visualize, the sound of a deep, rumbling, eschatological drone. Daniel Lechner and Robert Axthammer know this well, which is why their doom drone duo act is called not simply Deep but .(((DEEP))). “Breath,” the third track on the pair’s SoundCloud page, is 15 minutes of intensely quavering doom drones, layered for much of the middle third with the sort of broken-glottal vocalese associated with orc mating rituals and the blackest of black metal. It’s an impressive feat. The orcs return later, but only after a short glimpse of the ethereal, thanks to a more angelic if still deeply subsumed choral part. This is dense stuff. It also has an impressively extended fade, not just the drone volume being pitched down, but amid that toxic denouement new fears arise, crackling and churning. Turn off the lights, play it loud, and let it seep into the carpet and into your skin.

Track originally posted at [soundcloud.com/deep-doom](https://soundcloud.com/deep-doom/breath). The band .(((DEEP))). is based on Traunstein, Germany. Track found via a repost by the [soundcloud.com/anarchy4bits](https://soundcloud.com/anarchy4bits) account.

Disquiet Junto Project 0225: Serial Composition

Sight read a late-1940s painting by Argentine artist Lidy Prati as a graphically notated score.

April 21, 2016April 22, 2016 / By Marc Weidenbaum

lidyprati

Each Thursday in the Disquiet Junto group on [SoundCloud.com](https://soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/) and at [disquiet.com/junto](https://disquiet.com/junto/), 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. 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.

Tracks will be added to this playlist for the duration of the project:

This project was posted in the afternoon, California time, on Thursday, April 21, 2016, with a deadline of 11:59pm wherever you are on Monday, April 25, 2016.

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

Disquiet Junto Project 0225: Serial Composition

Sight read a late-1940s painting by Argentine artist Lidy Prati as a graphically notated score.

This week’s project takes as its subject a painting recently posted by art critic Blake Gopnik. Seen here, it dates from around 1948, he writes, and is by the Argentine artist Lidy Prati (1921-2008). In his description, Gopnik references Piet Mondrian, whose music is often associated with musical scores. Both the grid-like structure of Prati’s piece and its title, “Serial Composition,” suggest it as the subject of sonic investigation. Gopnik connects the piece to computers: “[I]t speaks of a system that can generate them. Computers and their algorithms seem on this painting’s mind, at a moment when computers still filled entire rooms with vacuum tubes.” (Note that as I was researching this project I came across work by Marcelo Gutman, who has created colorful score tributes to Prati.)

These are the steps for this week’s project.

Step 1: View the circa-1948 painting “Serial Composition” by Lidy Prati at this URL:

http://blakegopnik.com/post/142806762364

Step 2: Consider it as a musical score. Think about the sort of musical composition that “Serial Composition” might be.

Step 3: Record yourself performing “Serial Composition” as a graphically notated musical score.

Step 4: Upload your completed track to the Disquiet Junto group on SoundCloud.

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

Step 6: Then listen to and comment on tracks uploaded by your fellow Disquiet Junto participants.

Deadline: This project was posted in the afternoon, California time, on Thursday, April 21, 2016, with a deadline of 11:59pm wherever you are on Monday, April 25, 2016.

Length: The length is up to you, though between two and three minutes feels about right.

Upload: Please when posting your track on SoundCloud, only upload one track for this project, and 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.

Title/Tag: When adding your track to the Disquiet Junto group on Soundcloud.com, please in the title to your track include the term “disquiet0225-serialcomposition.”Also use “disquiet0225-serialcomposition”as a tag for your track.

Download: It is preferable that your track is set as downloadable, and that it allows for attributed remixing (i.e., a Creative Commons license permitting non-commercial sharing with attribution).

Linking: When posting the track, please be sure to include this information:

More on this 225th weekly Disquiet Junto project (“Sight read a late-1940s painting by Argentine artist Lidy Prati as a graphically notated score”) at:

https://disquiet.com/0225/

What Sound Looks Like

An ongoing series cross-posted from instagram.com/dsqt

April 21, 2016April 21, 2016 / By Marc Weidenbaum

If you’re visiting this apartment building, you may wonder what sets apart apartment #4. Did the button for #4 simply die in the main interface, requiring this makeshift, unit-specific alteration? Was there a dramatic, gossip-ridden falling out with the neighbors, to such an extent that the dwellers of #4 felt the need to extricate themselves entirely from the hardwired entryway expression of their building’s community? Or was the separate button an attempt, on the part of the landlord, during a real-estate dry spell when #4 was long vacant, to promote it as a special unit, perhaps not with its own elevator playing Satie, but with its own distinct doorbell and accompanying signage?

*An ongoing series cross-posted from [instagram.com/dsqt](http://instagram.com/dsqt).*

What Sound Looks Like

An ongoing series cross-posted from instagram.com/dsqt

April 20, 2016April 20, 2016 / By Marc Weidenbaum

Got to see the movie I did music supervision and sound design for on a real screen tonight, the San Francisco premier, a packed house at the Clay. Wish my partners in sound crime (Marcus Fischer, composer and fellow sound designer; Ted Laderas, featured cellist; and Paula Daunt, remixer) could have been there.

*An ongoing series cross-posted from [instagram.com/dsqt](http://instagram.com/dsqt).*