In this episode I share my last sorta finished bit of music.. that I’ve been meaning to post forever.. I’m not sure what I think of it.. maybe you can leave your comments to help me think this through.. At the moment I’m thinking the mix could be fixed up a bit.. with respect to the base end.. That’s my chief issue.

I wrote a lot about this little project.. and so.. well, I should leave some links to said posts.

• Music to Freak Out Stoners: Music Production in the Deep End 
• MTFS Revisited: New Sonic Adventures

After this, we get a few posts that.. Kinda go into the depths.. and these are sorta subtextual, at least, stuff on this production.

• From Linguistics and music, to depth  psychology, psychedelics, mysticism, philosophy.. and Aesthetic as it relates to my musical art project
• Notes from a rad mad Electroacoustic creative music production process
• Some Jolly Lyrics.. to the music I’m making
• Must post something….. News from the front: Music Production blah blah blah’s

So I guess that’s it.. after that the blog kinda goes off into sound synthesis… which may sorta form the basis of what I show in the next podcast episode.. so till then hope you dig it.

I should add that should you want to subscribe to this via iTunes, this be the link. 

 

 Music to Freak Out Stoners Revisited [6:20m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

So, Boston Podcamp 3 is just about here… and in anticipation of that.. I figured I’d at least have to post new episode… So it here it is.

In this podcast we can hear 3 bits of work.

1.  Toshiro Mifune VS John Wayne.. in progress (the last version I made available for a limited time)
2. Peter’s Hill: This is an old “Fresh Meat” project between the Ev-on, and myself.. It’s sorta representative of a spirit / energy I’m interested in bringing to my work today.. Hopefully Ev-on will play a roll in this..
3. The New Metal Track… This is very early.. and there’s even a lot of work I’ve done for this that is yet to be a part of the track.. but I wanted to have something to share with you anyway.

So that’s about it really…

So I hope you can dig it. 

Oh, one last note… you can subscribe to this podcast via iTunes via clicking here.

 

 New Music Directions: Pre Boston Podcamp 3: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

I wanted to give an update on the podcasting adventures.. just in case anyone’s interested.

I have 2 podcasts… which I update pretty infrequently these days..  

The first one to note is the Asymmetric Biz Cult Podcast… For this one I team up with Mark Hanser, and Evan Pew.. where we talk about “the new asymmetric business of culture creation.”  Umm.. this is a somewhat complex subject.. but basically it’s about how modern technology is changing business, and what this means for artists.. or at least that’s sorta what it aims to be. Beyond this I have my own personal take on convergence.. a kind of complex evolving philosophy.. which I regard as having some value.. I think in someways I have a very unique take on what’s going on in these departments.. and if I can ever get the podcast so that its “actually good,” it may just become a must listen.

I think the Asymmetric Biz Cult podcast has faded for a few reasons.. One of which is just the events in our lives.. my mom died, Evan had a baby, and Marks life has grown its own complications. The other reason, I think, is because I’ve been obsessed with this area for a few years now.. and Mark and Evan are sorta new to this stuff to such an extent that.. that I don’t know if they’ve even known quite how they could contribute..

The Matt Searles podcast is another matter. Again, loosing my mom has turned my life upside down in a lot of ways.. and I’m still just sorta struggling to maintain sanity in the wake of it…

My mom’s passing, and the sorta of shifting realities that go along with that.. have really put me in a position where, at least for a little while, I can focus on what I think I need to be focusing on.. in a way I haven’t been able to do for years.. This includes upgrading my studio.. and putting together a tool set that is appropriate for what it is I see myself as all about.

There’s been some real questions for me.. as to what the hell this blog, and the podcast, ought to be about. I think if you want to be successful, and of course it depends on your definition of success, you can’t think of your blog or podcast as being about you.. it’s about your readers / listeners / community. Of course I’m not at a stage where I have an active community.. so its hard to know what a community would want.. so if you have any wants.. do communicate them to me! 

But the point is, I feel like I’m a little to focused on me. I suppose I’m an artist, and my art is what I tend to spend my time thinking about..  and I’m basically just blogging about whatever might be on my mind on any given day.. which, you know, is fine.. but…

Next day sometime:

Well I guess my point is that I want to create a blog / podcast / whatever.. that has value. It’s an odd sorta thing though..  and maybe I’m just speaking from the vantage point of my own anxieties.. It’s almost as if there were certain “strategic considerations” that I’m.. aquatinted with to one level or another.. that have to do with how you gain some success in social media.. but… you know, you gotta be you.. and who I am is in someways antithetical to the strategic stuff.. 

I suppose, in someways, this is the point I mean to get to, and even why I’m here.. in this space. It’s this feeling that we need to harmonize our own internal nature with the external demands of life.. That this is important for our mental health.. and social media might be a way of going about this.. and certainly from the point of view of the artist and the arts.. what a true artist does.. you don’t start from questions of commercial viability.

Here’s the way I would describe it.. and it is perhaps somewhat radical, at least in some ways: You can literally go in any direction you like.. and if you can bring that direction to a certain state of evolution.. of maturation.. you’ll eventually get some place of value.. some place of interest.

A mass media market place has different views on this problem..  and tends to dictate, to one degree or another, what directions could be considered commercially viable, and what directions might not. I tend to believe that if you have something that’s “good art,” wether it’s commercially viable or not has more to do with how we approach the markets then it does the art its self. This might not be 100% realistic, but it’s an idea with some merit. The merit is made more true by the shifting economic realities brought about by our current technological disruptions… This is a shift who’s implications are still only faintly understood today.

This blog, I suppose, is like a journal of an artist trying to explore these new realities.. or at least these ideas of new realities.. as is the podcast. It’s the chronicles of his experience..  often in a very introspective sorta way. That onto its self is interesting, it seems to me… and gives this blog, and the podcast, some value.

Further, I think the challenges I face are not challenges unique to myself. I suppose if I’m looking to nurture a community around this blog.. around these efforts.. what would likely bring us together is the commonality of the challenges we face.

At one in the same time we have both the common and the individual: I’m at this exciting, and somewhat scary, moment.. where I have all this new technology to try and learn.. DP, Kore, Komplete, Adobe CS3, Final Cut Studio, Cinema 4D, and the list goes on… and on and on. My guess is.. when I talk about these technologies.. I’m not sure to what degree we hold these in common.. 

Well I mean I want to write in such a way that a general reader can follow me, even into the most technically challenging of subject matters.. I mean if you want to follow me in there. Sure, it’ll probably be challenging in that you’ll have to learn a good deal in order to follow me so far in there..

See, I read the collected works of Freud and Jung when I was in high school.. And it was wonderful as, in a certain way, I felt like I got to hang out with those guys.. and wrestle with there challenges. I loved that experience.. and I’d love to give you that experience.. to sorta bring you to the challenges I’m facing.. wether or not you’re an artist or not.. or wherever you might be coming from.. I mean if this is something you might find interesting.

Well anyway.. you can subscribe to the Matt Searles podcast via iTunes via clicking on this link, if you like. 

The last bit I want to talk about is the technical challenges..  I have a Zoom H4 that I usually use for podcasting.. its a portable recorder.. with which you can record right onto these SD cards.. trouble is, and I don’t know why, I’m not able to get the files of the Zoom and into my Computer.. so I’ve recorded stuff for the podcast that way, and it hasn’t wanted to work.

Secondly.. I seem to be having some trouble with Digital Performer.. which doesn’t want to export my audio… I finished another podcast episode last night.. but DP doesn’t seem to want to let it out.. 

My mom died Sunday, December 9th 2007, just shy of 1 AM.  I, and my father, found out around 2AM when Beth, a close friend to my mom, woke us up and took us to the hospital to see my mom.  When I got home I recorded this episode.

The approach I’ve been taking to podcasting has been a little bit on the experimental side..  I’m still sorta struggling to find my way to a mature vision so this episode is sorta exploring our way towards that:

I record stuff, put the stuff on my hard drive, and when I go to make a new episode, I take stuff from the growing collection of recordings on the hard drive.  

 From an aesthetic / philosophy of art sorta perspective I’m thinking in somewhat radical ways:  There’s this old idea of a recording as “a record.”  That is a recording as a record of an event, a recording having something to do with something that “actually happened.”  Modern sound production is not about creating “a record,” what you hear is “something manufactured.”  There’s a lot of implications to these two different ways of doing things.. which I’m always exploring..

Deep inside the subject of “a recording” is the idea that the microphone could be a kind of surrogate for Freud:  In classic psychoanalysis Freud sits you down on his coach and you talk..  and eventually we are able to peer into your soul, into the unconscious.  This is one of the ramifications of the “record” approach.

So here we have a recording, of where I was at, just a few short hours after my mom’s death:  Here we have a record of a psychological state.  

One thing, from an artist’s perspective, I find interesting about this recording is the difference between “in the moment,” when it was recorded versus “in reflection,” when editing.  In the moment you’re often thinking “I must make this worth listening to” and you have various judgments your making about the value of what you’re doing that is based on the perspective of the moment….

 I can tell you that 4 hours after my mom died I did not have a lot of perspective!  For about one or two weeks after my mom died I probably didn’t have anything going through my mind but dealing with my mom’s death.  Now that I have a little bit of psychological distance from the moment of the recording (though not really that much) I can see that it’s an intensely powerful recording / moment.  But in the moment I wasn’t even sure of the value of recording it.

I ended up not recording too much during that intense first week or so.. I have a recording made after the first wake:  My mom was big on going to the local 99.  I had always had a sort of snobby attitude towards the 99, didn’t like the food so much, and I guess I’m sorta… I don’t know.. the sort of people who go there aren’t really my people..  But the people who go to that 99 where the people who loved my mom, and so it was sort of an amazing experience to go there after the wake..  all of us sitting at the table.. all the toasts to my mom..  And I found myself feeling sorta attached to the 99 crowd…  

I’m not really sure how to wrap this sorta thing into the podcast, or even if I will, but I have it..  Something interesting to take a listen to. 

 

 MS Episode 11: A few Hours After My Mom Left [14:00m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

This is nothing on nothing, so don’t bother reading it…  I just figure I need to get in the habit of posting stuff..  so here’s stuff.  Here’s something. 

I’m frustrated that my writing seems like shit at the moment.. or my blogging.  My words are painful to try and read..  I’m sure I have stuff worth saying.. and when I really get into it..  seems like it might even be worth reading, but how to get from here to there is a giant question mark.. if for no other reason then for fear that someone might actually read these words.

At Podcamp Boston 2 I had this kind of paranoia.. this feeling that some of the people you are bumping into are reading what you have to say.. or worse still, listening to what you have to say via the podcast..  Some of these bastards even have the audacity to tell you to your face “yeah, I checked out your podcast.”  

My reply is usually one of sympathy.. that they had to suffer through such a thing..  and those bastards have no problem lying to your face.. they tell you things like “no, I thought it was kind of interesting,” or “very unique” (now there’s a passive aggressive comment if I ever heard one!), or um..  I don’t know, they say different things..

 Yeah, ok.. some of these social media folks are just nice folks.. gotta lot of humanity and all that.. but um.. yeah…  I don’t know..  you could say I have a few anxieties about putting myself out there like this.  You could say..  

Well anyway..  So I’m going to try and keep posting..  I haven’t since my mom passed away..  And I think its time to step up to the plate again and start swinging..  now being the end of 2007…  the last few hours there of.. might as well post something..    

 In this episode I play a lot of the music I did for Zar Matt A Thustra’s Deep Space Adventures, as a port of the National Solo Album Month challenge. I’m giving Zar Matt A Thustra’s Deep Space Adventures away for free, and making podsafe. You can find links to this music at mattsearles.com/music  In part, this episode is a moment in time: A moment in confronting the NaSoAlMo challenge and thinking about the future of my music in light of the challenge. Or this challenge pushed into exploring creative production processes that open up new possibilities for my work.. We hear some of the fruits of that experimentation in the episode. The first track we listen to is called Vasperian Blogocombat, an idea from Vaspers the Grate. Vaspers is someone I met via twitter.. and has been very encouraging of me and my work… This track was inspired by him as well as my experiences with social media. Here’s a video clip of Vaspers the Grate talking about being Vaspers the Grate. I think of him as a kind of insane genius. I think his stuff is brilliant.. So Dig it:  

 And while you are at it, check out the Vaspers the Grate Blog. He is pretty awesome after all. The next track in this episode includes a conversation with Mark and his now ex girl friend.. which seemed to work great with the music I was making.. I call this track Herstory as Mark tells a somewhat feminist type version of history.. that is a lot of fun.. Feminist history with a kind of Dio esk metal operatic aesthetic.. How can you beat that? From here the episodes veers off into the subject of my parents declining health. My mom would be emitted to the hospital on the night before Thanksgiving (just after this recording took place) Apparently a conflict in her mediations, internal bleeding, and what have you.. brought her pretty close to death. It would be a little over a week before she would come home.. she’s home now as of this writing, but she’s still terribly fragile.. barely able to lean up in bed on her own strength. It was a very difficult Thanksgiving, the next podcast episode ought to cover this a little more. The final track is.. not really titled yet.. I have a working tittle of something like ‘Electronic Ambient Experiment Adventure.’

 

 MS Episode 10: Plots Thicken & ZarMattAThustra's Deep Space Adventures: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

This is kind of a strange episode.. Me going off into experimental land.. Talking about music production, composition, my work, and stuff related to my struggle to make my art happen.. inside of the social media space. The whole talk happens while experimental electronic music plays in the background.. creating certain strange resonances inside the talk. Perhaps I’ve been listening to too much John Cage?

The electronic music elements mixed beneath the dialog track are all taken from my Zarmattathustra’s Deep Space Adventures CD’s raw materials.. its sorta remixed if you will.. This is a CD I’m working to finish by the end of this month. Also there’s two actual tracks from the Deep Space Adventures in this episode.. one called Red Rum which starts off the podcast.. and another, not yet titled, that ends the epsidoe. For the latter I’m looking for suggestion for track names.. If I use a name you suggest to me, I’ll attribute you for that name.. You can email me at ZarMattAThustra [ at ] Gmail.com with name ideas.

 

 Matt Searles Podcast Episode 9: Red Rum Re Drummed [41:26m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

In his episode I talk about what we sacrifice in order to be a part of civilization, in particular parts of our potential as human beings. This takes us through Nietzsche, Freud, Jung, and Joseph Campbell… I talk about the relationship between human potential and morality / human values.. and existential modes of being.

This is the subject of a track from Indra’s Net, a CDs worth of music that I’m giving away for free. You can find and download Indra’s Net at virb.com/mattsearles/music/albums/19812.

It’s perhaps worth saying something about Indra’s Net: Indra’s Net is, in a sense, about Hindu metaphysics… Hindu metaphysics, and arguably, social media. I say arguably because it’s my contention that to approach social media from the standpoint of Hindu metaphysics gives us a more sophisticated conceptual model for thinking about social media the social media’s current view of its self… Musical composition is about organizing sounds and the organizational principles of this music is deeply routed in eastern philosophy… All be it eastern philosophy reinterpreted.. or dare we say modernized.

 

 Matt Searles Podcast Episode 8: Apollonian Regrets [38:41m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

When origionally published I said this about the episode:

“Psychedelic experimental electronic music that explores the universe beneath our surface… And we explore, to some extent, the music.. and its ideas.”

I should say some words about this: I’m very into depth psychology, in what goes on beneath the surface of consciousness… It’s as if reality, as we experience it, is in someways a construct.. It is a construct who’s construction we participate in.. It has often been said that one of the great discoveries of Freud is that our conscious mind is not really running the show.. We think we are in charge of our lives.. but really there’s a number of things going on beneath the surface that are really driving the unfolding of our lives. So this music, Beneath Our Surface, you can find in the pod safe music network, if you’re a podcaster… is an exploration of this idea.. and the worlds beneath our surface, and of course this episode of the podcast explores this stuff.

 MS Podcast Episode 7: Beneath Our Surface: Download

“When Carl Jung broke with Freud he had “an encounter with the collective unconscious,” in this podcast I share some music I created as a kind of sound art representation of that encounter, and talk a little bit about the challenges Jung faced in this encounter, including aspects of how his encounter related to Nietzsche, and Nietzsche’s eventual decline into insanity…. and Jungian psychology in relationship to existentialism.”

I think this is a pretty good episode.

Again this is an enhanced Podcast so you’ll need iTunes or an iPod to listen to it.

 MS Podcast Episode 6: Jung's Encounter: Download