DAY TWENTY-EIGHT

Did a cover for the drone n bass project I've been working on. Faburden is a 15th century musical term for bass drone.

This started off black and white like this:

...and ended up like this:

Basically, I go through iterations of saving in Paint, opening in Picture Viewer, enlarging, print screen, paste into Paint, resizing, saving in Paint. I gradually distorted the size so the main bit ends up cassette box size.

Paint pixelates the image and reduces contrast, whereas Picture Viewer smooths the pixels and creates a black border, so over a large number of iterations you get non-uniform blurring (the A's started off the same), and mixing of white and black borders (creating shades of grey).

So, in the same way, sound sources are distorted creating noise that was not there initially.

DAY TWENTY-SEVEN

The tap in my parent's kitchen creates a beautiful lattice effect when water resonates at the right flow. You can't really see this here because of the inherent noise in a complex system. But in this instant it looks like a bubbling fluid metal or crystallized ice.

DAY TWENTY-SIX

Had a quick go with the watercolour paints. Relatively pleased with what amounts to the first time I've tried to paint something since childhood.

DAY TWENTY- FIVE

I got some watercolour paints, and all the accessories, from my parents today. But I didn't feel like painting.

Just did some strumming on the guitar.

DAY TWENTY-FOUR

Just played the guitar today. Again the same track, as I can't tune it in properly. Damn my reliance on technology. But at least it means I can practice it. It's too finger-picking complicated for my cack-handed fingers.

DAY TWENTY-THREE

Made my brother a christmas card and cut out a tree to stick in mums card because it's not actually a christmas card, but it has butterflies on it so that'll do.

This is the leftover cutout bit and the words for my brothers card.

Mum got a new string put in her guitar, which was nice. The guy in the shop wanted to put in all new strings because the strings are 20 odd years old, won't tune in, and are ready to break, but I was having none of that.

DAY TWENTY-TWO

The sun was really bright today. I liked the way it shone through this cafetiere, creating a clear image, and shadow, on the telly.

Also, the brightness meant that you could see the individual droplets of water vapour in the steam of the coffee.

DAY TWENTY-ONE

This is the guitar I've been playing last couple of days. You can see it's a bit battered.

DAY TWENTY

At my parents for Christmas. Dug out mums dusty old guitar. The D string is missing, but that doesn't matter. I like the highs and lows. The middles are boring.

Surprisingly some of the strings are in tune. The ones I use most for the solstice track, so just been playing that. It's got quite a nice tone, but recording it on camera or phone doesn't really work.

DAY NINETEEN

I was in Borders for their closing down sale. Something about the clamour, chaos, queues, empty shelves, and ugly shouting '70% off' signs put me off looking for anything.

I wandered round instead trying to find photos that encapsulated these elements.

People were laden with books like the world was running out. I didn't get a good shot of the pushchair full off books. I had to take the flash off because,  as my friend pointed out, 'there are laws against that'.

The chaos is illustrated in these two pictures. In the mis-spelling of Psychology next to the correct spelling, and in the back left/front right confusion on this sign:

This member of staff found a quiet corner to hide. I like how the empty shelves render the scene devoid of context, almost abstract.

 
I was looking through a book, and an included postcard fell out, so I defaced it with a nice goodbye message. It seems more creative if I take an active role in what's being photographed.

DAY EIGHTEEN

Another quick one this. Got to leave for a train in an hour, and last minute preps.

Made from the detritus of a christmas card:

The next 10 days are gonna be really difficult to do something creative every day. I'm gonna be with friends til monday, so it might be things like vomiting up in a nice patten. My mums got an old spanish guitar that I can play around with. Hmm we'll see.

DAY SEVENTEEN

One of the benefits of this project is it really lends itself to immediacy.

I was lying on my bed earlier, close enough to the window that it felt the snow would engulf me, yet I was safely ensconced in warmth and comfort.

What better way to replicate this feeling than with a noisy, jarring, atonal, disjointed blues track?

sevenism - first snow

I picked at the bass until I had a nice rhythm (3/4 tempo - time signature fans) and then just played guitar to it. I really like the idea of getting to know the track while you're recording it. Of working out how to play it the first time you're playing it. It's obvious I've done this.

DAY SIXTEEN

In preparation for today's act of creativity I went out, got a bit drunk, then drew something while writing my diary. I think it's good how it looks like I've just drawn something really quickly as an afterthought.

This is Ondy, an evil demon cat. Look at those eyes. Look at the arrogance in that tail.

Coincidentally, 'ondy' is also the word that will supersede 'blog'. Thus it is decreed.

DAY FIFTEEN

Tried to record 12 string again, normalizing, then editing hiss out but without distorting it there was too much hiss. And I love hiss.

Recorded it instead on my trusty semi-acoustic, which I've been neglecting recently. Well I tried to but I can't get it right exactly. It sounds better on the 12 string because there's a false impression of intricacy, and there's notes you can't actually play.

sevenism - solstice (pt. II)

DAY FOURTEEN

So today's creative thing is I wrote a blog, but hey hey, before you say 'what? this dont count, you did nuffink' little do you know that I only started writing today, and all the previous entries were written just now in the present tense. The way I used 'today' all those times! Oh and I've created the character of 'you' when clearly you don't exist and no-one is reading. Hooray.


A friend said I should keep a note of what I've done and my initial reticence was only because I hate the word 'blog'. But then I'll scrobble on last.fm, tweet on twitter, and facebook on that other one. The internet knows that a stupid word is a memorable word.


Christ, I'm glad I've finished writing all these. It's taken the last hour and a half and my eyes hurt. I need to do something relaxing like play the guitar.

DAY THIRTEEN

I recorded my voice as a bassline today. I made a great tone in my guitar effects software that makes it sound like d&b and humming through the mic sounds great. i can't be bothered to upload it though, sorry.

I did this as well:

Humans are innately programmed to recognize faces, and this has the side effect that even simple designs can be viewed as a face gestalt. When I was a kid I always used to see owls in light switches.

DAY TWELVE

i GOT CARRIED AWAY

Not again.

I got carried away doing music on the pc. I was searching for an old d&b track that was in my head that i knew would be good. I could only find it on cassette. But tape hiss is great for drone music!

Here we go

I didn't really do much, just added some extra effects. was planning to strip down to bass and filter that, but the beats aren't too hectic.

DAY ELEVEN

There's loads of fake profiles on facebook. I'm playing a game on there where you need loads of neighbours so loads of people ask to be friends with people they don't know. Ridiculous, it's bad enough being friends with idiots you barely know. It's ok though because I only befriended hot girls.

Or those who change their picture to that of a hot girl in order to get friends.. Now I don't think this is Anna Fung. She only has 1 photo, and the name is a giveaway. I disintegrated the photo. Maybe it looks more like her.

Someone had posted 'so beautifull' (sic) under the original photo. His name is 'Savage Garden'. Bless him.

DAY TEN

I played guitar at breakfast, lunch and this evening. [insert joke about difficulty of playing guitar with knife and fork]

I conceived of a new musical project. Drum & Bass drone. Drone music tends to be an experimental logical progression that I've seen from a number of different routes - post rock, ambient, metal. And I was wondering how it could be done for D&B. I think distorting and filtering the separate elements in individual tracks (fx, drum, what else ah yes bass)

I used to make alot of D&B 10 years ago or so, and now I'm listening to lots of crazy ambient noise drone stuff, so I'm mix up a load of my old tracks, into a horrible mulch.

DAY NINE

I thought of the couplet 'goodbye six pack / hello heart attack' in reference to eating 4 pork pies and toast and not going to the gym.

Some people on facebook 'liked' it and someone did a 'lol', which made me think of people saying 'you're funny' straight-faced.

DAY EIGHT

Hey, I held down the shift key for the title so no erroneous capitals today.

I read The Portable Frank by Jim Woodring today. Wonderful, life affirming, simple yet clever. And very individual.

I tried using a compressor and noise gate on the 12 string (the old git-ar) to record it better. Didn't work.

DAY SEVEN

All I did was this:

It's meant to say fuck compromise, but hey, it is in itself compromised. Ah well.

I think I'm fed up with compromise in art, with loss of individuality, with bullshit hollywood brainstormed demographic mulch. That sort of thing.

Oh also, I changed the font colour to a nicer blue. Ahhh.

DAY SIX

tODAY i WATCHED oh for fuxake.

Ahem.

Today I watched 15 episodes of Japanese manga series Deathnote. A creative use of my time? No. OK.

I played guitar.

Oh i made a xmas card for someone too.

DAY FIVE

mY DAMMIT ..My boss gave me a microphone so I hooked it up in the studio (ok my front room) and tried to record my 12 string guitar. I say 'new' but its a beautiful old sigma gutar.. about 30 years old I think.

aNYWAY, Anyway, it's a vocal mic so doesnt pick up the high strings very well. no matter how close i get the mic.

I did record myself singing though. Please don't listen. Bon Iver - Wolves (cover)

DAY FOUR

i DREWQ A TURKEY. aGAIN, COPIED FROM ANOTHER . Arghh stupid caps lock.

Today I drew a turkey. Again it was copied from another 'photo'. I think I captured his sadness pretty well. Soon he will die.

DAY THREE

Oh yeah, Suppose I should say what I'm doing. Josie Long is doing this thing where she's spending 100 consecutive days doing something to be a better person. And encouraging others to do so. Yep, thats good explaining. Click one of those links up there to find out more.

Today, I had a piece of art on a wall in a pub. I got an email a copuple of weeks ago asking for peoples 'interpretation of an orange' winner goes on a beer bottle yadda yadda 10,000 bottles. So because I was onlione at the time I sent my entry back as quickly as possible, as a joke. No message just pow, orange. 5 minutes it took me.

Yep, thats it.

It didnt win. But it was in a shortlist of 13 out of 'nearly 200'. Some of the 13 were fucking awful, and I'm not saying that out of bitterness.

OK, so I didnt do that today so it doesn't count.

I played guitar.

DAY TWO

On this day, day 2, today, I played guitar. Hmm interesting. Hey though, it's a 12 string guitar, you can play different octaves at once. I didn't record anything because as yet I don't have a microphone.

DAY ONE

Today, I drew a baleen whale that I copied from another photo. I say 'another' because my arrogant, narcissistic subconscious thinks my picture is so good as to be comparable to a photo.