Today I worked on some of the files I recorded during Storm Calllum mentioned in my previous post. I always find it difficult to start; in this case, what to select, filter, edit. Uncertainty at the beginning can be disorientating… and alluring.
It is a moment for decisive action. Each edit is unique, like a drawing it is irreplaceable if lost. There is an excitement in untraceability; it avoids predictability. To note down every detail of the process creates friction and can impede experimentation. After all, if I were painting, would I note down every brush stroke, how each colour had been precisely mixed? No, I make it my own through experience, and so it must be with everything else if I am to be inside the making.
How I get to a particular point is a matter of working from within the medium. If the work is lost for some reason, as happened today, the creative process has to recommence. It is easier the second time round; I already know the path. The result is not a facsimile of the first but a retelling, and something changes almost imperceptibly. Those small differences are as fundamental to evolutionary change as are punctuated shifts.
I aim to create a library of experimental recordings and processed tracks that act as aural sketches for works in other mediums. One modality pointing to another.
A 2 minute excerpt of the first rough edit; best heard with earphones