Joshua Van Tassel

I’ve been reading a great Oliver Sacks book lately called “An Anthropologist on Mars”, and decided that it deserved a bit of musical treatment. All the sounds in this one come from the book itself, teased and cajoled of course. The book itself is a bit of a case study of 7 different neurological mysteries, and it really brings home how much I take my senses for granted. For example, the first story is of a painter who has a car accident, and is now only able to see in Grey scale. He not only lost the ability to see color at all, but the memory of color itself is gone. Scary stuff.

Anyway, to any higher power that may or may not exist somewhere in the cosmos or otherwise, thanks for letting me wake up having everything intact today. I’m not saying we all need to drop to our knees and say 87 hail someones, but maybe we should just be more aware of the fact that being able to see what we’re typing and hear what we’re making is pretty cool. Not to be preachy…..not trying to lecture……..you know what I mean….

Due to modern technology, all of us have now been given the gift of foresight, or in pop culture terms spidey sense. We know when our cell phones are about to ring. How? Any electronic device that we happen to be within 4 feet of that has speakers starts to buzz like a swarm of angry hornets, and we immediately look around at the people close to us and everyone makes a very overused and generally terrible joke about whose it is.

It really isn’t enough to put your phone on silent; I have a good friend not only turns his phone off at concerts/events, but actually takes the battery out. That’s dedication, or, a paranoid obsession. either way, I think it’s cool.

I however am not usually that clever, and while working on music this morning my phone began the pre ring which went directly into the track I was recording. As my homage to the phone gods and radio waves, here’s a short kind of annoying piece using that buzz. I’ve learned my lesson and have been listening to the same sound in various forms for about 45 minutes. Check it out for 1:30 and give yourself a reminder.

They’re in your phone and they want out.

So today I made some “computer music”. It’s kind of electronic I suppose, sounds were transferred into electronic signals to be recorded, but it’s still technically computer music, whereas all the sounds were taken from the sounds my computer makes while doing stuff, ex; importing a cd, typing, etc. The stuff that sounds like a big synth is just 3 typing sounds together played at a repeat rate that goes so fast that they blend together to make one big note, at which point I layer that note on top of another note from a different sound so it eventually turns into something big and fuzzy and usable. Here’s a clip of it -

This isnt a new idea, there’s some fascinating work like this done by people mentioned in a great book called “Haunted Weather” by David Toop. Alllll sorts of freaks have been doing really wonderful sound things for years, and this book has been sort of a guidepost for me in terms of making sure I’m not completely ripping ideas off of other people. Check it out

Your computer wants to record it’s own album.

it’s been a nice weekend of recording with my good friend Devo, and while we’re waiting to do takes, we play instruments that sound nice but that we don’t actually know how to use….

Todays music maker is dish soap. Long have I gazed on the little bubbles it sometimes makes as I squeeze it just so to hear that sweet little whistling, and a slight pop. As I washed a mug this morning it cried out to me, ” I have a song in me!!! Take me!!!” I did the best I could to capture everything it was saying in it’s watery squeaky voice. I’ve also had too much coffee to early without anything to eat. I may be hallucinating.

Anyway, here it is. The goal with these things is to take just one otherwise “ignored” item and to try and milk it for all it’s interesting sounds, or at least enough to make some sort of music. Anything in the piece comes from that object specifically. It’s a lot of fun to try and do a few of these a week, it’s like doing push ups in morning. Geek push ups. If you have an something interesting sounding at home and you make something with it, send it to me and I’d be proud to post it here. Then again, I think everything sounds interesting, so just make music.

This is a man I recorded accusing everyone in the Ontario government offices of taking part in racist behavior. This is kind of an awkward recording, but interesting to have something like this documented….

Today’s music is made out of cornflakes box, shook, tapped, rubbed the wrong way, and generally accosted. It yielded some good sounds, but not without a fight and some manipulation.

Cornflake gave me the best they could this morning, nourishment and at least 40 minutes of entertainment.

…but that’s because I was having fun outside. I discovered the wonders of the DVP bike paths, the great GO train ride to Whitby, and boccie ball. I met a great dog named Hanna and recorded her snoring

and got to hear my good friend Devon whistle me a little tune

and then I made a little tune out of my sounds from my night last night.

Talking to various people about this site has made me realize that the sounds themselves are interesting, but actually doing something “musical” with them is interesting as well. I’m going to try to be making more music with everything I find, and I’ll put it all up here.
ps – Dear TTC – thank you for not striking……..

even the sun and the moon get along in the east end when the weather is nice.

This is by far the most grating noise I’ve made all day, maybe all week. I kind of like it. It makes me uncomfortable, and it makes me appreciate all those other noises that aren’t so hard to listen to.

frowning frowning frowning at my sounds.

For some unexplicable reason, Canadians looooove to hang out in the kitchen. I used to think it was possibly just a Maritime thing, but I seem to be proven wrong party after party, day after day even. When you get musicians in a kitchen together, it’s inevitable that some for m of music will go down. such was the case last weekend when our gracious host of 6 people, Willa Rutherford, took advantage of our kitchen dwelling, busted out the accordion, and counted us in en francais. Featuring Christine Bougie on the snake skin banjo, Ronley teper on pops and espresso maker, Willa and her wonderful sister Cassandra on vocals, and me on shaker and pot. I love our country……..