-------------Friday, December 20, 2002-------------
7:12 PM
Having finished work, I will now be turning my attentions more directly towards the process of composition. Which, at first, will involve re-abandoning perfectionism and leaving it to its place. At the end of the process. :::
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-------------Monday, December 16, 2002-------------
11:07 AM
I've decided to move to France in the New Year. Where cross-fertilisation is expected instead of feared, English musicians are considered cool and hip-hop has some presence. So I need to brush up on my French. Je veux faire la dodo. Je voudrais fumer du shit en France. Etc... :::
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-------------Saturday, December 14, 2002-------------
9:48 PM
Putting up extensive(ish) music links to reflect my Cinestatic Ethos (to the right). :::
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-------------Wednesday, December 11, 2002-------------
11:25 PM
Beatmasta Bill (William) and MC4Z (Peter).
My two fantastic brothers. These are pictures so far. But they're both talented musicians. Give Beatmasta DJ slots (you won't be disappointed) and Peter loads of money to make a film. Aww, go on! :::
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-------------Tuesday, December 10, 2002-------------
4:04 PM
I've added a blog to the Smunk page too now. This site is finally starting to grow! :::
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1:29 PM
Just added a new section to this music section for Pete (formerly of Zedovai). There should be a discography and some cool graphics soon. And he's got a blog. Pete's art was the basis of the now extinct hand-having anteater thing that used to welcome people to Cinestatic Research (before making them leave in frustration!). :::
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-------------Monday, December 09, 2002-------------
2:31 PM

On Buffy, Joss and Mycelium
I re-watched the Buffy Musical episode last week with friends. I was reminded about why I love Buffy, and the way I want to use the Buffy approach to writing for the music I make. Let me attempt to explain.

It's about momentum. It's about overwhelming the audience with a barrage of interconnected and mutating ideas. Where expectations are set up and then turned upside-down over and over again. Some of the ideas might make you cringe, or you might not be sure about something, but before you get a chance to complain, everything's changed! I felt that this goal was achieved with Mycelium. I'm still upset that we never played all these songs live (well, we did them once, and I wasn't happy with that performance). It's difficult starting again from scratch. Shit, I never know how personal to make this blog. Then again, nobody's reading it anyway, so I should just say what I feel!
Anyway. Back to Buffy. The 'easy' part about the Buffy method is generating the ideas. So just make every sound possible - light/dark, loud/quiet, electronic/acoustic, complex microrhythms/washy drones, high/low/ north/south/ black/white/ rich/poor/ hard/soft/ easy/hard/ organic/chemical-induced... Um. Easy. The whole spectrum. The hard bit is putting everything together into a coherent form, making use of musical traditions and making decisions about order vs chaos. Joss Whedon was a 'script doctor'. That is, he was given Hollywood scripts where the studio wanted 'this explosion / that sex-scene / this car chase / this cgi manimal morph etc...), and his job was to work it into a coherent story. His approach comes across slightly more clearly in Alien:Resurrection than in Buffy. But my point is, the hard part is putting it all together. Joss is referred to quite regularly as one of the first 'third-generation writers'. I'm aiming for third-generation musician. No genre boundaries (but with the surface appearance of a genre?). No sonic no-nos. No prejudice. Just crazy disparate sonic ideas moulded into forms that induce every human emotion possible, whether the human wants to feel it or not. Earning the silly and easy only by first facing the dark and difficult. Drowning micro-criticisms with overwhelming Love.

That's enough from me for today. Go and read some Buffy. :::
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-------------Wednesday, December 04, 2002-------------
11:33 AM
The little bit of silence the last couple of days is, I'm sorry to say, due to me turning into a big sappy twat over a girl. So it's love all round man!

I've been posting on the Ableton Forum as Smunk, trying to get them to add multiple-time-signature functionality in the next release of Live. Looks like they're not making any immediate promises, but at least they're aware of it... Maybe I need to do things like 4/4 6/4 changes. But I want 9/8 3/4 7/8 6/5 -indivisible prime numbers and all that! Otherwise what's the point?! :::
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