We had a revelation today about art, our feelings on creating it and what we want it to do for us. At a base level, the drive to creation could have its genesis in the drive to do something, anything, that itchy spasm toward existing that’s hard to escape. It takes a long time to die, and we have to do something in the meantime. A lot of art has something to say, a story to tell, wisdom to impart. That path seems to make more sense for artists who have something to say themselves, an inner world which fuels what they externalize. I’ve been thinking of it as an aphantasia of the spirit, or maybe it’s just an extension of our literal aphantasia. Even if we could see inside our head, the place where desires dreams and ideas go would appear as a clutter of empty boxes. If you can’t see inside a box it’s easy to think that there’s something inside there. It’s possible to externalize boxes that look like there was thought or intent behind it, but if you could see inside the box you might see that it’s empty. All we have inside are empty boxes, so that’s going to be what we’re able to put out into the world.
The absence of composition leaves room only for improvisation. For us it’s easiest to improvise when we don’t really have to think about where we’re going too often. Improvisational writing is a poor format for us; we can do it, but what we end up with doesn’t feel satisfying and it’s a chore to revisit it. It’s a fine enough way for us to shit out static, but it would be nicer if there were something resulting from it that we’d feel like ever looking at again. Improvisational drawing ends up with largely the same issues. If we had to boil it down to a single thesis it would be that these are mediums in which lack of forethought negatively affects the outcome. Sound is easier, because you don’t necessarily have to think. There are scales you can lean on, simple patterns which are endlessly iterable. We just don’t seem to operate on the level of words and thoughts and ideas. Making sound is simple, soundwaves emanate from your very body constantly, without fail. Try and be absolutely silent, it’s impossible. The best you can do is be quiet enough that the ambient world sounds mask what noises you do make. The barrier to making sound is therefore nonexistent. We love the idea of simple art with a low barrier to entry, being able to make noise without constraint or any expectation of having said anything.
Therefore it feels imperative that we focus our energies into making sound however possible. No, not that; by the simplest means possible. Trying to make electronic music in a DAW is an inertia-killer. What we need is to be handed an instrument so that we can lose ourself. That’s all we really want out of art, a way to LOSE our SELF, becoming an organism of vibration, thoughtless and without human considerations, without meaning or narrative. Writhing and squirming directionless. And when the process of creating it is through, we end up with shit that we can lose our self in time and again.