Quarantine world has brought me back to the isolation tunes of the IDM genre (preferably listened on headphones):
Aphex Twin - s950tx16wasr10 (Earth Portal Mix)
I have been listening this track on repeat, which I rarely do on any musical piece. In most musical styles I abhor gimmicks, be it a cappella miming percussive sounds or drums in heavy metal beating and "showing off" in a manner that feels out-of-context, but sometimes in the music coming from Aphex Twin the "gimmicks" are playful enough that they turn enjoyable or they work as a contrast to the serene. This sort of thing makes me pleased in the context of music made with machines - someone has managed to turn machines to act out the most playful choreography as opposed to their usual nature of simplified movements without nuances that make it a dance.
In the name of the song is just a catalog or a memory list of the key machines used, but the more poetic element is added in the brackets, the latter which is a "traditional" addition in electronic music. In the music itself I interpret these gimmicky elements mining the earth like some goetic spirits working their pointed corners of the world in tireless, hellish, neurotic ie. machine like manner, while forming a playful relation to each other is about forming the larger whole. There's a will working behind on something specific. Then nearing the last third of the track there's almost like a fulfilment of work the little goetic spirits have been pointed to work. "The Earth Portal", composed of infernal, subterranean parts, is complete and working. This flood of noises is beautifully cleansed further with the following piano track and birds singing in the background on the album 'aisatsana'.
The IDM scene in the British Isles have often made references to surrounding natural environments. The guy behind the Aphex Twin monicker is from Cornwall and in Gwennap there's this
pit that I connects to the Earth Portal idea, and is featured in one of his music videos and in the 90's he was interviewed there by John Peel. The pit is thought to be formed naturally, but also built on by humans for religious purposes. Anyway, I think my interpretation wouldn't be agreed by him fully, but to me these machine-nature juxtapositions and unions points to the sort of pagan way of seeing nature - call it pantheism, fairy faith or whatever it is locally named and seen like - and the spirits within that are in the crass, in the geographic formations, in the machines, in the music.
obnoxion wrote: ↑Wed Apr 01, 2020 2:04 pm
I don't know if any of you make songs your own like this, but I enjoy it.
Most certainly. I've often listened to love songs as statements of devotion to god or goddess, which ever has felt more appropriate at the time. Owning the song like that can make some unwanted radio exposure endurable and more.
