Experimental Audio Demos

Here are the two demos that I recorded for my experimental audio.  I hope to produce something along this line when creating my experimental audio.

Experimental Audio by Daniel Earnshaw
Experimental Audio 2 by Daniel Earnshaw

Nightwalker

Ive recently been researching experimental audio artists that I feel will influence my work.  I was exploring the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, and people who worked there, when I came across Delia Derbyshire.  I decided to look into Delia Derbyshire's work because I was familiar with one of her pieces, the original 'Doctor Who' theme tune.  I continued to listen to more pieces of her work when I found a piece of audio that I found interesting.

Experimental Audio

Recording audio is something that I am very interested, especially when instruments are involved.  At home I spend a lot of time demoing and recording onto my 8 track recorder.  I want to be able to explore new areas of audio that I haven't visit before.  Although I have been aware, and previously recorded experimental demos, I have never really researched any experimental artists that work with audio, other than musicians. 

Dr Robert Moog is somebody who I feel will be a huge influence on me whilst I am producing my own experimental audio piece.  Moog, form New York, was the pioneer of electronic music, as he invented the first synthesizer, The Moog.

 

Before I decide what I want to focus on for my experimental audio piece, I thought that it would be wise to sample a few ideas that I had in mind.  Originally I wanted to hook up my electric guitar to my synthesizer to create an experimental audio piece, but unfortunately due to the equipment that I had I was unable to do so.  My second idea was to hook my guitar effects pedals up to my synthesizer and work with them, then run the synthesizer through one of my guitar amplifiers.  I used a Boss 'DS-1' distortion pedal, along with a Electro-hamonix 'The Worm', which is an All-analog multi-effects processor featuring Phaser, Tremolo, Vibrato, and a Neo-modulated Wah.   


Boss 'DS-1 Distortion' & Electro-harmonix 'The Worm'

When I was recording my demos I set up the effects so that they were on manual so that I could change the effects being produced.  To change the sound being produced I just experimented with the range and rate on the effects pedal.  I also played around with the modulation, arpeggiator, pitch and octave setting on the synthesizer to see what different sounds I could create.

Effects pedals, 'Mirco-Korg' & Tascam 'DP-02'

When it came to recording my demos, I set one microphone up facing the speaker in the amplifier to pick us as much sound from the amplifier and as little background noise as possible.  I recorded two different demos changing the synthesizer setting on both to see what different sounds could be created from each setting.



 
http://soundcloud.com/daniel-earnshaw/experimental-audio-2#2/QqVMwyjqjH0WtrMLiK_pCqDIpP37wTXi-TcqCLfJ9y0

Introduction to confessional art

I've recently been delving into many new areas of art that are completely new to me.  Confessions are something that I have always been aware of, but I have never seen them as a form of art.  A few days ago I was introduced to two artists who I had heard of, but never been aware of their artwork.  Gillian Wearing and Tracey Emin are two artists who have worked closely with confessions in their artwork.  First of all I shown some of Gillian Wearing artwork called 'Signs That Say What You Want Them To Say and Not Signs That Say What Someone Else Wants You To Say'.  For me the title of the work says exactly what it needs to say, write something on a piece of card that you want to say!  From looking at the photography, and what the people have got to say, it is clear to see that people are saying something that they can’t perhaps say to somebody else, and are confessing on camera.  One 'Sign' that stood out to me was an image of a man dressed in a black suit, who was in fact a banker.  The man held a sign saying 'I'm desperate'.  When I first saw the sign I presumed that the man was desperate for love, but each time I look at the image I think of something else.  For example, desperate... for a new job, to lose weight, or even for the toilet.  I feel that Gillian Wearing challenges the audience to try and guess what exactly the sign is all about, and also gets the audience to question themselves to why they have said that. 

Gillian Wearing 

"A great deal of my work is about questioning handed-down truths"



'I'm Desperate' 1992-93



Tracey Emin, another artist who I have been introduced to in the past few days.  The first piece of her work that I was shown is called 'Everyone I have ever slept with'.  This piece of art is a tent with several names all stitched in, the names of people who she was slept with.  As part of an audience myself, seeing this for the first time, the first thing that I thought when saw this was 'who would be stitched into my tent?' I also thought does it have a sexual reference to it, because when I first saw it that was exactly what I presumed it to be, but from looking further into the piece of art I understood that not every name had a sexual reference to it, some are family and friends.  I think what helped me understand that is the fact that the tent is quite colour and 'child-like', I then realised that the year1963 was when we was born.



'Everyone who I have slept with' 1963-1995


From exploring confessional art I have realised one main theme.  Confessional art is all about challenging the audience and putting them in the shoes of the artist to make them think what the art is actually about.  After looking at several pieces of confessional artwork I feel as if I can produce a piece of work that can reflect the big name artists by challenging my audience.

Studio Session with The Dead Trees

The Dead Trees setting up in the studio

On 22nd September, we had our first client in the studio, The Dead Trees.  Formed in Boston, The Dead Trees are a five piece alternative rock band signed to independent record label 'Affairs of the heart'.  Having worked on previous studio sessions on my last course I knew what to expect and how the day would pan out.  I also saw this as a key opportunity to explore some of the other roles available.  On previous studio sessions I had stuck to vision mixing, so this time I decided to have a change of role and have a go behind the camera.  Working behind the camera is something that interests me so I feel that it is vital that I get as much experience as possible to enhance my skills and confidence.  During the studio session my role was operating camera two, the establishing shot, which meant that I had to frame the shot so that all five band members were all in.  Although I was operating camera two, a role that I wanted to do, I think that next time I will put myself forward to operate either camera one or camera three as I feel that operating these cameras offers a lot more than camera two due to the fact that the shots are not always static, and you always have to be on look out for potential shots.  I feel that working behind either camera one or three will allow me to work with more than one shot which will help develop my skills and confidence. http://www.myspace.com/thedeadtrees