Project Summary:
For “Hindsight 2012″, I made a step toward modern sound composition and made use of theories such as sound collage, chance, and adapted found sound. This song was featured on The Mugs album Here Tomorrow, and here is the final piece:

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Full Description:
I read the book dadaism by Dietmar Elger, and I was heavily influenced by a quote by the artist, Kurt Schwitters. Schwitters states, “you know exactly as I do what art is: it is nothing more than a rhythm. But if that is so, I shan’t bother myself with imitation or the soul, but purely and simply produce rhythms with whatever takes my fancy.” It was important for me to convey my beliefs in awareness, our common journey in life, and using rhythm as a constant wave, so with Schwitters statement in mind, I chose this experimental piece to express it.

“Hindsight 2012″ started as a 20-minute piece performed on a Fender Rhodes keyboard played through a delay box and bass guitar. I had been experimenting with drones and overtones, and this was one that happened to be recorded. After listening to the performance in its entirety, I decided that I would make use of the following approaches:

• sound collage
• chance
• adapted found sound

I was not interested in making music or anything that would be described as listenable. I wanted to apply certain approaches to sound and see what the results would be. Here is the original 20-minute performance that was used to create Hindsight 2012:

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The first step of the process was creating the blocks of sound that would be used for the collage. I imagined each block would be able to receive the previous sound as well as carry that sound forward through time to the next block. The destination of the sound was not important, but I paid special attention to breaks in tone.

I listened through the original piece and cut out fragments. The length of the fragments varied from piece to piece, and the original sequence of the pieces was maintained. I pulled each of the fragments together so that they would overlap in time.

The space where the performance was recorded resides in Dumbo, Brooklyn on the 3rd floor of a self-storage building.  The BQE runs right up to the building, and the steady stream of traffic that is just outside the windows creates a steady droning.  I recorded and used these traffic sounds as a bellowing, low-end rumble.

I also took a mic-feedback experiment, diced it into approximately 40 single second fragments, and placed them throughout the piece as if the sound had been dropped, and had broken and scattered onto the ProTools track.

Because of the emotional arch of the original performance, the traditional build, climax, and ending became apparent.  The final running time is just over 4 minutes and 8 seconds.