Leyden Jars
Katie Dey
Tristan Perich
Arca
Pan Sonic
Yohuna
Phew
HOX
Elysia Crampton
Rattle
Compton White
Gonjasufi
Cremation Lily
Nathan Bowles
Crystal Castles
Claire M Singer

 

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Leyden Jars Entanglement Achieved at Room Temperature
‘From within the Glass Isle come Leyden Jars, continuing to reveal the strangeness which is to be found in what others gloss over. It takes patience to come to any sort of understanding with regard to ‘Heat Death’. Unlike their other project what’s being accessed here is primordial in tone, the very elements which when acted upon by a catalyst achieve sentience; those behind this album are that catalyst. Where once there was only a void now there is an intellect at work. Observing. Cataloging. Quietly moving through three dimensions whilst plainly coming from the fourth. Perhaps it is just artistic license but I suspect this record’s cover is indicative of what happens when the mysterious chemistry at work contained herein begins to leak out. Do we term this experimental? Would minimalism be the best summation? Both of these are part of the formula but they’re only employed to draw a person into the complexities which these two are gnawing away at. There are coordinates making up some of the titles, other compositions are just a single word while you get a complete diorama being depicted on several; the only similarity to what they have done before would be in the arrangement of elements. If you wanted to view ‘Heat Death’ as the darker, more subversive half you wouldn’t be far off the mark.’ — marks

 

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Katie Dey Fear o’ the Light
‘Australian recording artist Katie Dey’s ‘nightmare pop’ weaves through gorgeous and unexpected sound- scapes – at times weirdly off-putting, at others beautiful and ethereal – all anchored by a hypnotic sense of melody. Following 2015’s Orchid Tapes-issued critical darling asdfasdf, Flood Network further explores the beauty in chaos and even destruction. Shape-shifting interludes realign the listener’s perspective between immersive sonic environments where melody and lyrics could mean anything, everything and nothing all at once.’ — Joy Void Recordings

 

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Tristan Perich Noise Patterns live @ La Malterie, Lille
‘Like Lou Reed’s manic manipulation of his guitar signal on Metal Machine Music, Perich processes his single noise oscillator to incomprehensible pulsating structures. Echoing Reed, Perich punctuates his statement with a lingering, “infinite” wash of noise. Like Marclay, Perich pulls at the tension of cherishable objects and additionally draws his medium in as a performer, a direct, primary source of noise. Like Wiese’s, Perich’s album requires ritual, attention, and participation of the listener. Unlike Sachiko M’s Bar さちこ, however, the music on Noise Patterns overwhelms its object, eating it up with highly compositional material. Perich’s musical identity sits behind the MCU with every pattern. Where Sachiko M dissolves into the glossy surface of the CD — allowing disbelief that she was ever really there, holding a key on her sampler the entire time — Perich asserts his self: an individual, a voice.’ — Ben Levinson

 

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Arca (feat. Mica Levi) Baby Doll
‘It’s ugly, because translation isn’t clean: a self can’t be translated perfectly (“Vicar” is the tension, stomp and stop, whips or wonder? A shout or a belch? Ecstasy or pain?). Entrañas is guts and bowels and entrails (and meat), and Entrañas is image digestion, self-processing. If you find an alien inside you, but the alien feels right, the alien is you. “Baby Doll,” an alien voice: “Girls can wear jeans/ Cut their hair short/ Wear shirts and boots/ Because it’s okay to be a boy.“ Art, like gender, doesn’t have to exist in a single fixed space: we can be at odds with our guts (“But for a boy to look like a girl is degrading/ Because you think that being a girl is degrading/ But secretly you’d love to know what it’s like/ Wouldn’t you?”) Arca’s art is fluidity, bodies chewing through boundaries and sounds, and the ventricles around Entrañas are personal. We can live as a becoming-text, between binaries and album releases and formats and identities. We don’t have to be on our way to a fixed point (Nelson: “How to explain, in a culture frantic for resolution, that sometimes the shit stays messy.”) But fixed points intrude, pressurize the safe space in our stomachs, implant their rigidity.’ — Frank Falisi

 

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Pan Sonic Atomin Palluu (Part 2)
‘Atomin Paluu features the final studio recordings made under the name Pan Sonic (Mika Vainio & Ilpo Vaisanen). Recorded per their usual working methods at Mika’s home studio in Berlin from 2005 to 2011 and subsequently edited into this album format by Mika in 2015. The film, Atomin Paluu (2015) is a Finnish production, created by Jussi Eerola and Mika Taanila, documents the building of the first nuclear power plant since the Chernobyl meltdown in 1986 – a project that fell foul of much bureaucratic wrangling and control which manifested itself in the need for over forty cuts of the film. Atomin Paluu, the soundtrack, shows Pan Sonic uniquely using selected third-party field recordings from filming at the building site. As the film’s soundtrack, these recordings were also bound up in a complex series of delays in the release of the film.’ — Forced Exposure

 

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Yohuna Golden Foil
‘Patientness is an ode to patience: taking things slowly, enduring through difficulty, finding strength within yourself when what’s familiar feels so far away. Taking time in a world that wants everything to happen so quickly. It’s light and then dark, heavy and then weightless, with Swanson’s haunting words and pulsing dimlit beats stringing the stories together, often hanging atop swatches of ambient electronics.’ — Orchid Tapes

 

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Phew Signal
‘Hiromi Moritani (Phew) is a Japanese avant-garde vocalist who started out as a member of the legendary punk band Aunt Sally. In 1980 she collaborated with Ryuichi Sakamoto on the single Shukyoku. In ’81 she and the members of Can made the album Phew. After taking some time off, Phew made a recording with former members of DAF and Neubauten. She subsequently released two albums with Anton Fier, Bill Laswell and others. She is currently active in a wide range of projects, including Novo Tono, Phew Unit, a duo with Seiichi Yamamoto, and Big Picture.’ — discogs

 

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HOX It’s Too Much
‘Hox is Edvard Graham Lewis (Wire/Dome/He Said/He Said Omala/Ocsid) and Andreas Karperyd (Omala/He Said Omala/Woodwork). Duke of York is their second release following on from the highly acclaimed it-ness in 1999. Duke of York is a bittersweet contemporary electronic pop record which could only exist as a result of the unison of these particular, peculiar souls. At once tender, skewered, sophisticated and unsettling Duke of York is a both a journey through the collective minds of Lewis and Karperyd and a substantial representation of their individual talents. Whilst both tackling the sonic side of the outing Lewis also presents pleasantly paranoid lyrics, Karperyd drapes it all in a distinguished design. This combination presents a substantial study of the sonically impressive, visually inviting and songs rich in brooding, dark atmosphere and melodic content.’ — Editions Mego

 

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Elysia Crampton Children Of Hell
‘In 2015, Crampton told TMT: “I stand for an unrepresented history of musicians and writers of color, female authors, queer artists… I stand for these histories coiled at event horizon, on the brink of new universe or total disintegration, braided with nothingness.” The darkest moments of Demon City are perhaps an approximation of this nothingness, the negative land that threatens voices outside the mainstream cultural narrative with the oblivion of erased stories and forgotten names. “Demon City” and the track that follows, “Children of Hell,” are a culmination of all the elements of darkness Crampton has brought down upon us: synthetic saxophones squealing with glee, prison gates clanging shut, a melodic figure trudging down toward the deepest darkness. “E,” says a deep male voice, as if reading the inscription on a tombstone.’ — Chris Kissel

 

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Rattle Stringer Bell
‘In our maximalist, sensory overloading times it’s bewildering to find something as sonically spacious, sparse and economic as a dialog of two drum sets. Being bombarded with information reduces us to passivity and egotism; “We don’t want to assault the listener with too much to listen to, think about and take in, all at once.” Rattle’s very manifesto for music allows us breathing and thinking space. Theresa Wrigley (of Fists) and Katharine Brown (of Kogumaza) began playing together out of genuine curiosity and, as a result, have created a quietly dramatic and loudly intimate record. An honest experiment, this is not some vain exercise in being “experimental”. It sounds like they play some awkward version of sonic pictionary, giving each other the most abstract or apparently mundane tasks – silence, or waiting, or the sound of one hand clapping, or rain, or spiritual claustrophobia, or playing hide and seek, or a rattle.’ — Danijela Bočev

 

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Compton White Track 2
‘When TNGHT released their debut EP four years ago, fans and critics lamented the fact that it was simply not long enough. The very same criticism is perhaps the only one that can be fairly levelled at Compton White’s self-titled debut: at just under 20 minutes, “quality over quantity” is quite clearly the intention. Though biographical information is scarce, one can glean that White – real name Lloyd Whittle – is from a lineage of Travelling showmen, and has lived his life between the Isle of Wight and London. As such, his album is steeped in nostalgia for a childhood spent between two radically different settings – juxtaposing the chaotic and the calm, the urban and the pastoral, the contemporary and the sentimental. On listening, the first thing to really hit home are the album’s varied musical influences: the first song, ‘Track 2’, is driven by a simple yet beautiful melody around which contorted vocal samples weave and clusters of falling drums stumble. At times, the textures of the synths recall sounds that formed the bedrock of the classic Warp Records sound (such as the acidic bleeps of LFO). White’s contemplative guitar riff, peppering ‘Track 2’, also echoes Campfire Headphase-era Boards of Canada and perhaps even the The Beach Boys. Similar influences can be heard on the new Avalanches album, Wildflower. With the Avalanches, however, one is always made aware of the referential nature of their music, whereas for White, his familiarity with the work of past masters never reaches the point of mimicry, remaining faithful to his own sound.’ — Christopher Sanders

 

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Gonjasufi Vinaigrette
‘Ever since A Sufi and a Killer sent his scarred wail out into a wider world, Gonjasufi’s future has seemed pretty open-ended. What path would his hip-hop-influenced psych take? Subsequent releases—especially 2012’s MU.ZZ.LE—veered closer to a series of confrontational wake-up calls than the inner voyage of the mind than “psychedelia” typically suggests. Jay Z’s “Nickels and Dimes” might have lifted the hook from the Gonjasufi cut of the (almost) same name, but its mournfully introspective spirit was something too bare-nerved to co-opt, the catharsis of MU.ZZ.LE pared it down to just the “psych-” and laid bare just how many far more unsettling things could be attached to it as a suffix. Callus is deliberately abrasive proof of this: an album that’s disorienting at its catchiest, harrowing at its ugliest, and more than willing to run both of those modes at the same time. Gonjasufi’s described this album as a document of his effort to embrace hate and pain, not out of nihilism or defeatism but as a way to endure what he sees as a surplus of the stuff getting dumped on everybody’s heads so he can return it as love. The album title says as much—it literally suggests growing a thicker skin—and the record’s mode feels like a much-needed endurance test in turn. It’s harsh and raucous and even oppressive, despite the fact that it ventures only rarely (and briefly) into uptempo trad-aggro turf. It’s both a call for confrontation and a search of positivity.’ — Nate Patrin

 

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CREMATION LILY live @ United Forces of Industrial II
‘Cremation Lily is the project of UK based Z. Zsigo. For the past 5 years Zsigo has been consistently working under most people’s radars with his distinctly personal take on power electronics, developing a modest cult following and a respectable catalog of releases through his Strange Rules label. In 2012 the project was brought to the attention of Steve Underwood from Harbinger Sound who subsequently released the ‘Fertility Servent’ 7” and the project began to gather a more visible live presence thanks to gigs with the likes of Consumer Electronics, Con-Dom, Natural Assembly and on the east coast of America too with Alberich and Âmes Sanglantes.’ — boomkat

 

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Nathan Bowles Gadarene Fugue
‘Although a swamp boy by birth, Nathan Bowles — of the old-time stalwart Black Twig Pickers and moonshined drone ensemble Pelt — has a deep reverence for mountain soil. Perhaps a necessity for anyone who chooses to peddle in American folk traditions, Bowles has always been keenly aware of his place in tradition, not unlike fellow Virginian and NC transplant Daniel Bachman. Such a path has been well-trod and the thorns cleared long ago. We can trace lineages, if we are so inclined. Say, Mike Gangloff and Jack Rose into Fahey and Basho and Kottke into Charlie Patton and Blind Blake. However, what Bowles and our current generation of American revivalists have demonstrated is the clear vitality of this tradition, its powerful cling to our consciousness that requires we constantly revisit and reinvent it.’ — CYNOCEPHALUS

 

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Crystal Castles Concrete live in Santiago, Chile
‘That’s not to downplay Glass’ importance but rather to illustrate that her departure — officially announced in October 2014, with Glass writing that she felt her artistry was no longer a good fit within the confines of Crystal Castles — never meant Crystal Castles was entirely doomed as a project. Yes, as a vocal, lyrical, and textural presence, Glass, who’s now pursuing a solo career, brought many unique traits to the table. There was something so likably genuine and honest about her very presence. But the new singer — whose identity was the subject of much speculation until it was revealed to be Edith Frances during a performance last year at Johannesburg, South Africa’s SoundsWild festival — is ultimately a fine fit. The most diehard of Crystal Castles fans were slow to embrace her, but ultimately, Amnesty (I) should be enough to convince of her capabilities.’ — CoS

 

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Claire M Singer Diobaig
‘Solas (‘Light’ in Gaelic) is Claire M Singer’s debut album spanning 14 years of her work in acoustic and electronic composition.In recent years she has focused on writing and performing a mix of organ, cello and electronics with regular performances at Union Chapel where she is Music Director, running a diverse programme of concerts and educational workshops around the Chapel’s Henry Willis 1877 organ. Other performances include the Roundhouse London by The LCO Soloists; a’ fàs soilleir, an audio-visual work, exhibited at Tate Modern London, XMV New York City and Ceremony Hall Austin TX and she has performed as part of Spire at Muziekgebouw, Amsterdam, Kunst-Station Sankt Peter Cologne and many more.’ — Touch

 

 

*

p.s. Hey.  An early-ish heads up that, starting on Thursday, I’ll be taking a forced vacation from the blog for ten days. Zac and I are going away to shoot a music video, and it’s unlikely that I’ll have time while I’m working on that project to do the p.s. daily. If I can manage to along the way, I’ll pop in unexpectedly. So you’ll get a batch of restored posts from my murdered blog during that period, and I’ll be back for sure at the latest with a new post and a p.s. wherein I’ll catch up with all of the comments that have accumulated on Monday, September 26th. But I’ll be here and regular until Thursday. ** Tosh Berman, Hi, Tosh. Thanks much! And I thank Ben for bringing that to the fore. ** David Ehrenstein, Thanks on Ben’s behalf — not that he needs my behalf — , maestro. ** Steevee, Hi. I keep wondering if there has always been a large, probably majority contingent of movie buffs who knee-jerk reject ambitious, serious, idiosyncratic films as ‘pretentious’ because I do feel like I see that attitude evinced a lot more nowadays, but then social media has allowed everyone to become a pedestal-ed pundit/critic, I guess, and when I think back on the days when serious, daring films were more prevalent, more accepted or maybe begrudgingly respected more widely, I was probably living a sheltered, in that sense, life. Oh, right, ‘Killer of Sheep, duh. I spaced on him having made that film. That’s a fantastic film, yes. ** Wolf, Le (La?) Maîtresse Wolf! Thanks, buddy, about the funding. Yeah, we’re just thrilled. Oh, I like some of Haynes’ films, don’t get me wrong. And I’m totally supportive of him as artist/filmmaker. His stuff just generally doesn’t reach me. There’s a self-consciously brainy, slightly forced-feeling, semi-subtextual thing about most of his films (for me) that doesn’t float my boat, I guess. No big. I love your love. Augiéras: yeah, I’ve been surprised that a lot of French people here whom I assumed would know him/his work don’t at all. It’s very strange. Very, even ultra-happy Monday! ** Cobaltfram, Hi, John! Very nice to see you in these new digs, my friend! The happy, or mostly happy ending to the Google thing was more than a bit of surprise. But yes! I’m actually going to be in NYC in October first, but briefly. Zac and I are going over for a showing there at long last of ‘Like Cattle Towards Glow’. On the 20th. Details soon. You should come! But, yeah, in November it’s possible I’ll be there for a bit. There’s the MoMA thing on the 7th, and then, on the 17th, the New Museum is doing an event about my GIF fiction books and as a launch for the new GIF novel. I think Zac and I are going to try to rent a car and do a amusement park-centered road trip in between the two events, but I should be there at least a little, and it would nice to do a coffee if that’s possible. I’m good, extremely busy, but with great projects across the board. That’s fantastic news about where you are and how far you’ve come with your novel! Congrats! Well, you can certainly be invested. It would be weird and self-defeating if you weren’t. ** H, Hi. Oh, very interesting about the film classes. The classes are specifically oriented towards queer cinema, or partly and helpfully so? Ugh, the hot weather there. We’ve been fairly lucky here in Paris. Just a handful of insufferable days. ** Dóra Grőber, Hi, Dóra! Well, because we got that funding from the committee in the Bas Normandie region, we’re obligated to shoot most of the film there. Our film is mostly set in the suburbs/a neighborhood. My guess is that we’ll probably film it in/near the region’s largest city, Caen, but we have to go out there and scout around. I see, about the reason for the move. But, yeah, it will be exciting to be in capitol city, no? Theoretically, you’ll have access to more culture and gigs and art and interesting things in general, won’t you? But moving is weird and sad. It’s weird when a house that was yours becomes someone else’s. But the melancholy about that kind be intreating in a way maybe. We’re still planning out what the music video will be and trying to decide on locations and how many people will be in it and how we can find them quickly. I don’t know what a ‘ruin pub’ is, but I like the name and what it calls to mind. Cool about the video you made there! That sounds really nice! Awesome! My weekend was pretty okay. A bunch of music video work/ planning. Pretty quiet. Last night I saw this kind of amazing animated film called ‘L’Enfant invisible’ by Andre Lindon. Here are some stills from it. It’s very strange and beautiful, and he made it entirely by himself, which is crazy when you see how much work that would have involved. He was there to talk about it. It was quite inspiring. Oh, and on Saturday Zac and I went to L’Etrange Festival, which is this Paris film festival where our film had its world premiere last year. We saw a program of short, kind of occult-y films, most of which were bad, but they were showing a film I really like — James Batley’s ‘Kneel Through the Dark’ — which I hadn’t seen projected before, and James was there, so I got to say hi, and that was cool. Other than that, I think just work and planning unless I’m forgetting something. How did Monday match up with you? ** Oliver, Hi, Oliver! I’m so glad you came back! Big congratulations on getting your Chinese degree! Wow, I remember when you were early on in that study, I think. I hope you will get back into writing, and I would love it if the blog can help nudge you in that direction in any way it can. Thanks so much about the guest-post. That’s very kind and cool of you. If I can do anything on my end to help or anything, just let me know. Have a great day! ** Mark Gluth, Hi! Ah, I see. Well, in my limited experiences with that sort of thing, those kinds of things can take their sweet time, or unsweet time. Interesting. Yep, mega-agreement about Steven’s gif work, big time. ** _Black_Acrylic, Hi, Ben! Oh, my great — and far more — pleasure, sir! An honor, a thrill! ** Misanthrope, If it is, I want. That would be a good slogan for a band or a politician’s presidential quest or something. I suppose it’s remotely possible that Dahmer had a burning, uncharacteristic jones for a little snack that day, but still. I sort of like the artificiality when they lip-sync. Especially when they lip-sync songs by people who lip-sync during their own performances like Britney or whoever. That’s kind of meta. ** CodyR, Hi, Cody. That so sucks. I just texted with you, and I’ll talk to you later. ** Slatted Light, Hi, D of the Daisies. Wow, I have no idea where that sprang from. I just feel like the JT Leroy crap is just never ever going to end and just go away. I’m so sick of her. The Strum film is far, far, far closer to the actual. That new doc is a horror, and not in the good way. I was just reading about ‘Don’t Breathe’. Huh. Too good to be true, eh? That sure does seem to be a common thing with horror films these days. I saw ‘The Witch’ not long ago finally, and it was like, okay, yeah, kind of stylish, kind of nicely slow-ish, but … that’s it? That is deflating to hear about the Detroit context. Obviously, that was what almost entirely made me curious. Oh, your question. Well, it’s hard because we’re not interested in working with people with acting experience or only with very, very little previous experience at most. For ‘LCTG’, we ended up auditioning one actual actor because people were saying how amazing he was, and maybe he was, but his skills and go-to performance ideas within the context of what we were making made everything he did seem excessively carved out and even hysterical. So I can’t think of any known actor who I, at least, would want to work with. Okay, Shelley Duvall would be an insane dream. I’m sure we could get something weird and subtle out of her. But mostly I would probably think of known people who aren’t actors but rather, I don’t know, musicians or artists or something. I don’t know. Anyway Shelley Duvall. Or Lukas Haas. I’ll ask Zac today and tell you his answer if he has one. ** Kyler, Hi, K. Good. Not boring is life’s ultimate goal. And being busy with a million things is something I know all too well. Welcome home, though! ** Okay. What’s today? Oh, right, a gig. Stuff I’ve been listening to and absorbing with a positive effect and outcome. See if any stuff in there gets anything positive to happen anywhere inside you. See you tomorrow.

 

ART101, 2014-16

A four-part voyage to the limits of interconnected group consciousness.

Starring: Morgan Cahn
Written and Directed by Ben Robinson
Music by The Danger Gang – Wow!
Editing and Post Production ep. 1 > 3 by Andrew Maclean
Ep. 4 Assisted by Andrew Maclean
Ep. 4 Editing and Post Production by Dave Hackney

 

ART101 ep. 1 – This is the first step on your artistic journey.
Published on 9 Jan 2015.

 

ART101 ep. 2 – The Next Step.
Published on 17 Aug 2015.

 

ART101 ep. 3 – death lolz.
Published on 21 May 2016.

 

ART101 ep. 4 – The Eviscerated Corpse.
Published on 10 Jun 2016.

 

ART101 is an actual thing, a YouTube channel. Or so at least that’s what it once was, and I’m happy to talk about it now in the past tense. ART101 was a crazy ambitious idea I had for a multimedia art extravaganza, one that would redefine art for the digital age and set off an explosion of activity on social media, although it never quite worked out that way in the end. I’ll use this here Day to go through some of what I wanted from ART101, why I didn’t get it and why I hope it might still remain a worthwhile work of art. I think of ART101 as being a mad quadruple prog box set in my back catalogue, a wild overreaching folly that might still be good for a laugh. Maybe ART101 was just too beautiful and too damn smart for its own good. And remember, ART101 is an actual thing, a YouTube channel:

 

 

Our story starts back in 2012 when I made a film called Death Paints Red Daubings for Dundee’s Generator Projects artists’ space. DPRD was the first film I’d ever made, done in a wild rush of inspiration that somehow went really well, a situation that left me at a bit of a loss as to what to do next. I thought part of what made DPRD so successful was that it was made entirely without irony. During the shoot I’d constantly tell the crew that “we’re not making a parody”, so this time I wanted to come at its follow-up from the opposite direction. From a position of 100% Meaning It, I wanted a flip to Irony Overload and figured that the best place to find this absence of sincerity would be on the internet.

I had a successful project complete, so I duly applied for funding from the Dundee Visual Artists Award for this next stage in my artistic development. With the DVAA money I bought a camera and then assembled the ART101 crew. We’d all previously worked together on the art zine Yuck ’n Yum: Andrew Maclean works as a technician at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design in Dundee and has access to their many technical facilities, while Morgan Cahn is a talented performer who’d previously starred as the voice of Miss X in my DPRD film. A friend’s band gave us the theme song, I wrote a script and we filmed the whole thing over 2 days in early January 2014 at the art school’s green screen studios on 2 cameras.

 

 

The premise of ART101 is that it’s a YouTube channel teaching its viewers how to make art and how to be an artist. Its language is aimed at that generation widely known as “millennials”: a plugged-in, attention-depleted audience keen for instant gratification. Morgan’s monologue is all completely scripted and delivered straight to camera with eye contact maintained throughout. Each of the 4 episodes has a different theme with its own colour and a separate prop. The idea was that Morgan’s character would eventually destroy her computer and set herself free from this social media tyranny. Not I’m any kind of Luddite myself, I just saw it as a neat way to end the series.

So the 2 days’ filming all went swimmingly, and a few weeks later Andrew made up a pretty coloured image for each episode:

 

 

And then… and then, and then… there was a delay for a year. I should explain at this point that the crew were never paid anything at all for doing the project but still, I found the wait hard to take. Morgan moved back to America, I was still making excuses whenever I saw anyone at any art openings, and all excitement I’d once had about the endeavour was quickly fading into nothingness. The DPRD film had been completed in a matter of days and I wasn’t expecting ART101 to be any kind of an issue. After a year of my chivvying, cajoling, mithering and badgering, Andrew delivered the goods and, to be fair, he made a rather splendid job of it. Episode 1 came up slathered in FX, super fast paced editing and it looked as hyperreal as you like. 9th January 2015 saw the YouTube broadcast of ART101 ep. 1 – This is the first step on your artistic journey.

 

 

Getting that first episode out there was such a relief. I’d hoped to spread the word all over social media, creating a Facebook group, starting a thread on the b3ta.com links page, setting up a Twitter feed to compile any comments and feedback we received.

 

 

I can see now that I should have come to this with some kind of marketing strategy, because sadly our film attracted very few comments on YouTube or indeed anywhere else. Reasons for this? I dunno, maybe the film’s not clear in its intentions or maybe it just didn’t engage its audience for whatever reason. Had I dealt with it properly, I’d have road tested the project with focus groups and got feedback before releasing it out into the world. Anyway to their immense credit, a few familiar names from this ‘ere blog ponied up with encouraging words, including Thomas Moronic who consistently left some great commentary that I’m very grateful for. I then went on to start a thread on reddit.com to drum up support but my newly-created account only attracted one single response, this from a user named jbhitman:

“Just my opinion, but this seems like somebody trying really hard to be funny….but failing…horribly”

I don’t mind admitting I was mighty put out upon reading this, but then social media’s no place to expect cuddles, right? I commissioned a steel plaque engraved with jbhitman’s message, and submitted it to the 2015 Generator Projects Members Show. This seemed to go down well, as did my talk at the gallery’s Show and Tell event, and I began to feel better about the whole sorry episode.

 

Ben Robinson – ART101 Reddit.com Negative Feedback Plaque, 2015, engraved steel plaque.

 

There was positive news from the online Scottish arts channel www.artinscotland.tv who came round to my flat a few weeks later to interview me about the project:

 

 

And so the first episode was now complete. I’d said repeatedly during its making that success never depended on YouTube viewing figures, that “It doesn’t have to be a viral hit, I just want it to be good.” I got exactly what I’d asked for as I remain very happy with the work itself, and yet the views have always remained stuck in the low hundreds. I was starting to learn that even with a hallway decent product, online success won’t just fall into anyone’s lap.

 

 

Getting episode 2 finished proved to be a similar ordeal, not launching until August 2015 but again it wound up being a worthy product. The script drew heavily on Greek myth and invoked the figure of Dionysus to encourage viewers to embrace a form of religious ecstasy. Success of a kind was to come, on a more local level this time. Again I was interviewed for the Art in Scotland channel, and now the work was shown at Dundee’s McManus Galleries as part of their exhibition Classical Art: The Legacy of the Ancients.

 

 

Seeing ART101 displayed in such a context was gratifying. I guess the museum’s thinking was that the YouTube addition brought their story right up to date, from Ancient Greece to 21st century social media. They had the computer screen mounted on a sleek console and everything looked rather spiffing, Morgan’s face now beaming out as viewers perused the museum’s antiquities, while the second Art in Scotland interview was being filmed at the DCA meeting room. I gave an update on our progress since last time:

 

 

So headway was seemingly being made, although the next instalment wouldn’t appear until the following year. 9 months later, episode 3 was titled “death lolz” and it saw Morgan instructing our audience of potential artists to create art in order to live forever. The scenario was played out against an orange background and she wore a rubber zombie mask to illustrate her points about mortality. Every time Morgan mentioned the word “death”, her face would be superimposed onto a CGI skull. Whenever she said the phrase “We are born with a repetition compulsion,” Andrew created a Doppler effect-type noise to go along with the visuals.

 

 

Again, despite our best efforts the viewing figures were modest and the film was very much delayed. Episode 3 wasn’t broadcast until 21 May 2016, which meant it had been some 9 months in the making. The situation became increasingly fraught as the months went by. My brother Nick stepped in here, and post production duties for the 4th and final instalment were duly taken on by Dave Hackney, a professional editor with the Digital Cortex group. Thankfully, it meant things were ready in just a couple of weeks.

 

 

That final ART101 episode is titled The Eviscerated Corpse and it sees Morgan’s narrator destroying the computer that had up to now defined her existence. For this scene we used my old MacBook laptop that I’d long since replaced, and whose screen I’d spilt coffee on some years previously. We watched an old YouTube clip of Ice T dismantling his laptop in the back yard of his LA crib as a form of preparation. Even then the thing was still a struggle to destroy, Mac products being of such sturdy build, but eventually we prevailed and with that, the ART101 project was complete.

 

 

So ART101 turned out to be a torturous experience, but on the other hand all our friendships have survived intact. I’m very grateful to all who contributed and, whatever the delays, we got there in the end. It could be down to Dave Hackney coming at this with a fresh pair of eyes but I think Episode 4 is maybe my favourite of the lot. Over the coming weeks my plan is to submit this to a few short film festivals, and I’ll keep everyone posted with news of how everything goes. Who knows, maybe just maybe the ART101 story might have a happy ending after all?

 

 

 

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p.s. Hey.  ** By mostly coincidence the blog again gets the lucky break of using its facilities to focus on and celebrate another fantastic work by someone whom this place is honored to call a distinguished local, namely _Black_Acrylic, who lives his life and makes art under the real name Ben Robinson. Those of you who’ve frequented DC’s for a while undoubtedly know something about Ben’s wonderful, long term, episodic, video-based and recently completed project Art101. And now you can explore and experience the project in full and learn about his experiences along the way. Art101 and the post are a very entertaining treat, I promise you, so please use your blog time this weekend to check everything out and then speak accordingly and in whatever form you wish to _B_A in the commenting arena. Thank you very much, and even more thanks to you, Ben! ** Billy chainsaw, Billy, maestro, dear pal, how great to have you inside here! My great pleasure on housing Steven’s work, and much gratitude to you for speaking to it. Take care, buddy, and, obviously, come back any old time. ** Dóra Grőber, Hi! Cool, that makes total sense: your take on the value of face-to-face. Yeah, it’s nice to have an almost normal back, it’s true. Thanks! And thank you for the congrats about the film/funding success. Yes, we’re thrilled and now anxious to start working. I guess location scouting is the first thing. You have to move? Oh, no. Or … maybe you look forward to that once the grunt work apart is over? Do you have a new place picked out? What are the advantages or even disadvantages of your next place compared to your current one? My day was pretty lowkey-ish, just work and stuff. Zac and I started figuring out the music video in more detail, and we’ll hopefully a pretty solid plan by the end of the weekend. Speaking of weekends, what will you be up to? I’ve got work and seeing a couple of films and hopefully being around friends too on my theoretical agenda. ** Dadoodoflow, Thanks, man. Your entangled fingers clearly helped. Thanks for the thoughtful response and ideas-sharing with Steven. I feel like gifs are freed in a weird enough way to call their own, new medium’s shots. I mean I consider my work with them to be fictions, novels, short stories, just like the ‘real’ kind, and I weirdly think that’s true, weirdly. Good weekend to you! ** Tosh Berman, Thanks for taking to Steven, and thank you for your thanks about the film funding. Yeah, that was great news for us. ** Schoolboyerrors, Hi, Diarmuid. I suppose it won’t be a surprise to you that my spellcheck insistently wants your name to be Diamond. Glad you liked Steven’s work! And I’m happy you like Vår. And thanks about the funding. It was and still is a rush. I’m still kind of floating, you’re right. Well, now that Zac and I have no use for luck for the time being, all of ours is being airlifted as I speak to you with Fulbright’s name stamped on it. ** David Ehrenstein, Hi, sir. I do like some of Todd’s films, just not most of them. And I do like ‘I’m Not There’. I would say the films of his that I like a lot are it, ‘Superstar’, and ‘Velvet Goldmine’. And ‘Dottie Gets Spanked’. ** Steevee, Hey. Thanks, man. Well, our new film could well get more play in the States. It’s not about sex, which will certainly help, and it has a single narrative running through the entire thing. And having a producer who actually understands the film and really believes in it unlike the case with ‘LCTG’ will help too. I’m sorry but those people arguing for CA:CW over KoC are undoubtedly lovely and even thoughtful people, but Jesus fucking Christ nonetheless, ha ha. I have this dream that any minute now the superhero blockbuster genre will be dead as a doornail. If that dream comes true, maybe Zac and I will chime in. Doubtful, though. I know not nearly enough about Charles Burnett’s stuff to have a fully formed opinion. Actually, maybe I’ll do a post on him as a way to learn more. How was that film and the q&a? Are you a big fan of his? ** _Black_Acrylic, Thanks on both front, and, duh, thank you again ever so much for entrusting the goal of helping the dispersal of your fine project to this humble abode. Enjoy your weekend, man. Love, me. ** Thomas Moronic, Hi, Thomas! Thanks, get some shut-eye, and see you soon! ** H, Hi. Thanks for the congrats about our film progress and for letting Steven know what you thought. Mostly work and nothing to report on my end too. ** Chris dankland, Hi, Chris. Cool, great, your thoughts on Steven’s work. Thanks from my part of the post’s bargain. Me too, re: what’s up our new film’s sleeves. We know the sleeves, and we think we know what’s up them, but you really don’t know until it starts happening. Good weekend! ** Mark Gluth, Hey! Thanks for christening the new pad. It still feels weirdly brand new to me. Yeah, stuff is going really well on my end, thankfully. And yours too no doubt. I have heard some things from Michael about what you and he are up to and planning to be up to, and I’m consequently quite excited, of course. What, holy moly, about the William Morris thing. Did nothing come of that? Strange and, yeah strangely cool no matter what. Have fun on top of fun this weekend! ** Jonathan Parker-Bryant, Good morning, if it’s morning at this moment where you are. It is here. Thank you so much for your attentiveness to the recent posts, and I’m happy they had some kind of through line that entered you. Yeah, I haven’t seen ‘Barbarella’ since the old days, but, based on clips I’ve come across, I do think maybe abstaining as an adult could be more fruitful for your soul. Thanks a lot for thinking about and speaking to Steven’s work. Well, I’m not so sure that the people around here constitute polite company, ha ha. I would always gravitate towards the bizarre, but, by doing so, a downside always potentially awaits. Good romance, good. Heartbreaking about Vin Scully’s imminent retirement. I probably already mentioned that, some years ago, I tried really hard to get to interview him. I had a good venue (an LA Weekly cover story) lined up, but Mr. Scully apparently only does three sit-down serious interviews a year at most, and I didn’t get through that threshold. Thanks about the funding. Nope, the band whose music video we’re doing is not Sparks. Now that would be a great gig! Maybe we’ll send a polite query to their people. You have the weekend of your dreams please! ** Misanthrope Hi, G. Thanks about the funding. Crazy. I like zucchini muffins! Now you’re talking. I did read that Jacob Ketterling was found and his disappearance figured out. Adam Walsh was so not Dahmer’s M.O. Attributing him to Dahmer makes no sense at all. Surely your weekend will provide a brief albeit too brief respite from the same old shit. And how so? ** MANCY, Hey! Oh, man, the thanks are so infinitely and entirely mine. I’ve been buzzing and daydreaming ever since I first saw ‘4LANGUAGES’. It’s not only amazing, but it has kind of a thrown down the gauntlet in the best way. Thank you thank you! ** Bill, Hi, Bill. Thanks for the congrats. Yeah, we’re really happy and rarin’ to go. I hope you get to make the weekend count, and/or that it makes you count. Well, you always count. What am I saying? ** Okay. You know what to do with your local time this weekend, and please do that ‘what to do’ to your heart’s content, and then let Ben/_B_A know something about it. Excellent weekends to you all. See you on Monday.