Tag: Music

  • DSR 2 – THE NINE COMMANDMENTS

    DSR 2 – THE NINE COMMANDMENTS

    TONGA
    THE NINE COMMANDMENTS
    TEXT: Defo’ need a new glossary of terms. DSR: Deep Scratch Remix. LLM: large Language Model. GPT: Generative Pre-Trained Transformer. TTOTT: The Tale Of The Tribe. TTM: Tribe Table Method. DSR: Deep Scratch Remix. What else?

    As the satellite orbited the Earth, its camera captured an awesome view of the little virgin planet below. Swirls of white fluffy clouds drifted across the blue expanse of the oceans like some gods long beard, while vast stretches of mottled green and beige marked the landmasses.

    Zooming in, the camera honed in on a particular bright city, Amsterdam. It flew closer and closer, and as it descended, the clouds grew thicker, obscuring the view to only a few meters. Eventually we penetrate the cloud cover, to reveal the sprawling metropolis below and onto a nondescript building tucked away on a quiet street. Inside the building, in a laboratory filled with turntables, mixers, and synthesizers, stand two figures. Jake’s fingers deftly sweep across the controls of a mixing board, while Plush leans over a custom marble keyboard, his headphones on.

    The camera hovered in the air for a moment, capturing the lab scene in all its intricate 360 degrees of detail. The blinking lights on the equipment catch the sweat droplets on the brows of the two producers, the posters on the wall showcasing their past gigs flutter with the sub bass patterns.

    Then, with a sudden jolt, the camera descended further, as if hurtling towards the laboratory at breakneck speed. Through the glass walls, it enters the beads of sweat on Jake’s forehead, the intensity in Plush’s eyes flash from inside the droplet. The camera stops, hovering just above the turntable where the two producers were working, their deft hands are a blur as they tweak knobs and push buttons, sending electricity bolts coursing through the room. The textual-music they create is a fusion of the past and the future. 

    And so, Jake stayed awake for the next three days with Plush, typing away at his keyboard, getting it down and out. With an AI by his side, words flowed effortlessly from his mind onto the screen. It was as if a switch had been flipped, and he was finally able to unleash his imagination. As he wrote on and rapped freely, he was transported back in time to the world of his previous novel, a flash back with Plush and Max on stage. He was so immersed in his work that he barely noticed the passing of time. Jake’s phone beeped twice, The Nine commandments were baked:

    1. Use generative A.I. ethically and responsibly. This includes avoiding the creation of biassed or offensive language, and ensuring that the generated language is respectful and accurate.
    2. Understand the limitations of generative A.I. These tools are not perfect and may produce errors or produce language that is not fully coherent. It is important to use them with caution and to be aware of their limitations.
    3. Be open to new ideas and perspectives when using generative A.I. These tools can help to expose you to different ways of thinking and communicating, and can be a valuable resource for exploring new concepts and ideas.
    4. Continuously learn and improve your understanding of generative A.I. These tools are constantly evolving, and it is important to stay up-to-date with the latest developments and best practices in order to use them effectively.
    5. Use generative A.I. to enhance your own writing and communication skills, rather than relying on them solely to do the work for you. These tools can be a valuable resource, but it is important to develop your own skills and abilities as well.
    6. Be mindful of the impact that generative A.I. can have on language and communication. These tools have the potential to influence the way we communicate, and it is important to consider the potential consequences of their use.
    7. Use generative A.I. in a way that is transparent and accountable. This includes clearly disclosing the use of these tools, and being open and honest about any limitations or errors that may arise.
    8. Respect the intellectual property and copyright of others when using generative A.I. These tools should not be used to produce unauthorised copies of copyrighted material.
    9. Use generative A.I. to create positive and constructive content. These tools should not be used to produce harmful or offensive language, or to spread misinformation or disinformation.
    –DSR

    As the recording session with Plush and Jake came to a close, they fist bumped each other in celebration of a successful session. The equipment was turned off and packed away, and the two producers made their way out of the laboratory, setting the alarms and locking the door behind them.

    However, they had accidentally left one of the microphones on. The sound signal from the microphone had travelled through the air until it reached a nearby cellular tower. From there, the signal was transmitted via phone networks, hopping from tower to tower, until it was picked up by a satellite in orbit.

    The satellite, along with countless others, relayed the signal across vast distances, until it finally reached an office in Moscow. The office was located in a towering grey skyscraper, filled with people in suits staring intently at computer screens.

    The signal was received by a group of men and women, huddled around a monitor displaying a waveform graph. They listened intently, trying to decipher the audio, as it crackled and hissed with static. They worked quickly, isolating and filtering out the background noise, until the audio became clear and crisp.

    What they heard stunned them. It was the voices of Plush and Jake, discussing a secret project. The captured conversation was brief, like the sexual habits of those huddled around the monitor. The group of people in the Moscow office thought that they had stumbled upon something big, and they immediately set to work, scouring the internet and hacking into servers, trying to uncover more information on Plush, Jake and DSR. The two producers had unwittingly set off a daisy-chain of events.  

    TEXT: The GPT genii is out the bottle. Can’t put it back in. Can legislate and some will but its rogue AI on the loose. I’m trying to figure it out.

    KINDLE EDITION

  • Breakacid Bee Line

    Breakacid Bee Line

    It’s been a while. Here’s A selection of breakbeats, thumpers, beltchers and party bangerz. Bass music selected and presented by DJ Fly Agaric 23. Special thanks to all artists and DJ’s keeping the vibes alive.

    #DeepScratch

  • The Fuck You Sound #fuckputin

    Remix by Fly Agaric 23, Fly Agaric Studios, Trondheim, Norway. March 6th, 2022.

    #fuckyousound

    https://thefuckyousound.bandcamp.com/track/fuck-you-sound-fly-agaric-23-dub

  • Radio Free Amsterdam Poster 2022

    Art and music can heal and unify people, we can feel this intuitively. Good music makes us well. RFA brings together a potent mixture of good music selectors who mix up the musical medicine to be administered by our medicine man: Big Chief (John Sinclair)

    Music for peace. Music for therapy, for all, criss-crossing boundaries and borders, arriving on-time at the ears and headspace of the people. Tune in, soak up the culture. Relax, take a load off. 

    https://radiofreeamsterdam.org/

  • This Artists Response To Eurasianism: Artlandasia.

    Hard questions emerge for us all, since the threat of Putin’s militaristic Eurasianism rears its ugly head on the world stage. I’m compelled to ask myself what I can do and what my worldview is today? What is to be done, today? How can an individual take on the history of the world and make meaningful and useful communications? What defines and distinguishes our values from those of the dictators and fascists, the fundamentalists and genocidal maniacs?  

    Suddenly, we’re refocused on Russian history, Vladimir Putin, NATO and, depending which way to decide to look on a map, the rest of the world. That’s a lot of study and depends in part on the ability to think objectively, putting yourself in other people’s shoes, it also depends on the time you have and the access you have to good information. Be that as it may, this is my part of the war effort, to shout loud: support your independent artists, build a new alternative to the hideous far-right fantasy of Putin and it’s western New Right allies: Artlandasia.  

    Independent artists, to include some independently minded artists who may not be strictly independent proper, are powerful cultural entities and help define what it is about human culture we love and what we view with revulsion. Simply put, there’s plenty of evidence for artist led and artist supported collectives to run a country, such is the broad definition of the artist in 2022. By running a country, I mean both the practical day-to-day operations of the industrial and technological infrastructure already in place, and that good ole’ entertainment demanded by contemporary culture. 

    Besides their extra explicit artistic skills, musicians, for example, may have a good understanding of negotiations, fair-contracts and working together in a team, listening and thinking fast on their feet. This is the kind of mindset and skill set we need to defeat an oligarchic dictatorship, brave skilled individuals able to work in different groups, listen and then harmonize. Indeed, varied experience and credentials and evidence are helpful in determining who plays which roles in this proposed new humanistic society of artists. Leaving Bono aside for a moment, I’d seriously support somebody like Sting as a candidate for president of Artlandasia, if such a public facing leader were required. Who would you suggest?  

    If we include all writers and literature, we Artlandaisians already have the founders of that other, non-Artlandasian space. From Thoth to Plato, from Confucius to John Adams, we the artists can lay claim to their innovation of language, their impact and influence, yet re-directed toward an open-society of self-owning ones, Artlandasians, distinguished from some Unipolar Empire of divine guided mad kings and mad generals. No, we stand united by a literal harmony, our voices make music, we worship synergy, pitch, tone, rhythm, with desire for beauty, truth, meaning, understanding. Inclusion, multicultural synergy, the innovative and progressive forces of world history reunited through art. For example, Jazz and Blues traditions (rhythm, melody, innovation, sincerity), speakeasy traditions (poetry, history, philosophy, literature) hip-hop traditions (turntablism, graffiti, breakdancing and rap) and on and on. Something for everybody, the ability to read the room.

    We acknowledge and celebrate the eastern influence on our western traditions, we pull down our vanity and conceit to meet with the other, excited and hungry to learn and listen and co-create. To explore the wonders of life, language, love, nature, outerspace, inner-space and the human condition. Together, why not all together? Artlandasia is all-around-the-world, and proposes a globalism defined by Buckminster Fuller: around-the-world-connected, around the world trading, around-the-world-sharing. Equally distributed resources and responsibilities. A new global ART alliance. 

    Computer programming and coding is an artform, another fact Artlandasia can exploit to further its cause. be creative with it. Artlandasia encourages open-source universal programming languages such as Python, to be taught and practiced top-to-bottom within the socio-cultural sphere. To borrow a term from Douglas Rushkoff: program or be programmed. Artists have a tendency to be disciplined and many are already prepared to learn a new non-alphabetic language, for instance.

    Many musicians are familiar with the need to adopt and change plans, to update and learn new skills to survive. Both the digitization and exploitation of their artform and marketplace over the last 20 years, plus the global pandemic lockdown has strengthened our grasp of economics, technology and the minds of the people. The general heart of the matter. Global internet and communications infrastructure are our friend, the backbone upon which Artlandasian can fairly function for all-around-the-world technology.

    Artists, not generals, have the means to impact public opinion by way of writing, design, and programming. Artists are the leading edge of the culture war and have empathy, compassion and sympathy essential to a fair and trustable alternative to violence and bullying. Please consider supporting independent artists who you’d like to see more deeply embedded in society and politics, in decision making and representation of your personal and national identity. Fuck war, let’s art.

    –Steve Fly
    03/03/2022
    Trondheim, Norway.

  • Corona Slayer 2

    Written, recorded, produced and mastered by Steve Fly @ Fly Agaric Studios, Amsterdam. 24-28th July 2021. (Edited 10th August & September 13th, 2021)

    Since March 2020, Squintin Quarantino has been writing rhymes in a ‘first thought best thought’ manner, presented here with little editing. This is the second installment following on from the first ‘Corona Slayer E.P’ (released in September 2020.

    I trust these rhymes will cohere for you. Starting with the global lockdown 1 in March 2020, rhymes helped me to crawl through the last sixteen months. Besides straight ahead prose writing and my experimental novel: Deep Scratch, this SQ outlet helped cleanse my racing mind.

    SQ is intent on spreading rhymes and scrutiny of the Covid response, focused on the UK and Holland. The growing abyss between the rich and poor, and lack of support for providing food, clothing and shelter for all humanity has tripled the blow on the vulnerable. Now’s the time to take personal responsibility. #coronaslayer

    –Steve Fly,
    Amsterdam, 14th July 2021.
    www.deepscratch.net

    Thanks For The Support,
    www.patreon.com/stevefly

    Get the book Corona Slayer @ Amazon:
    www.amazon.de/dp/B09JVM38N8/ref=…HVGT28GC4RJ3HFZN99

  • Blah Blah Blah – Beatbox Sample Experiment

    A freestyle jam, beatboxing into Jamm Pro sampler and layering.
    Blah Blah Blah.

    http://www.deepscratch.net


  • Deep Scratch – Paperback

    Deep Scratch – Paperback

    Thanks to everybody who made this possible.
    –Steve Fly

    Order a signed copy via www.patreon.com/stevefly

    Sounds to accompany the words start here:

  • Lee Scratch Perry – Rest In Dub

    Every DJ should have a wide appreciation for music plus a special focus on a particular artist. For me, Lee “Scratch” Perry was the one-stop embodiment of the entire culture. Scratch was a network of interconnected nodes across the planet, across genre and history, he was there at many of the turning points, yet remained musically experimental and uniquely Scratch at the same time.

    Reggae music has lost some of its major innovators recently, U-Roy and Bunny Wailer both passed within two weeks of each other have ensured that the heaviest soundsystem in the universe, dubs out to infinity. Rest in dub. 

    Bob Marley’s mentor! Nuff said, and Scratch produced many of those lush, relaxing butter kissed dub reggae slices featuring Bob and the Wailers. Speak to any decent sound engineer and let them explain to you how Scratch innovated music production, on a shoestring, to create spacious acoustic worlds using reel to reel tape tricks and magic. I was first properly introduced to his early Black Ark works via the triple CD Box Set: Arkology, that featured vocal tracks followed by the dubs. His methodology and remixology of overdubbing tracks resulted in degradation and enhancements of certain frequencies and tones. Dealing with tape, Scratch was able to experiment with saturation and like Miles Davis, and The Beatles, Scratch cut-up and stitch-edited back together recordings, to both add a further uniqueness and originality to his ‘Sound’ plus, to chop and change time, past-present-future all on one reel.

    During the 1990’s in the UK there was a resurgence and recycling of dub reggae into new forms, both upbeat Jungle music and downbeat trip hop/ambient electronica, was noticeably pulling on influences such as Lee Scratch Perry. Arguably, the early Mo-Wax sound was heavily drenched in a Scratch approach to filtered drums, deep sub bass and tripy echo-chamber ‘dub outs’. Many of the existing, original Dub Sound Systems crossed over and experimented in different genres leading up the millennium. Perhaps best captured in the collaborations between Scratch and Adrian Sherwood, plus the remix spin offs from these projects. Culturally, and from a musical perspective, the impact Scratch has had, together with all the other Sound Systems, artists, producers and recording engineers with roots in Jamaica and the Caribbean, in the UK is exemplary.

    Testament to underground movements and artists doing art for the love and community of it, the thrill of musical creation, experimentation and playback. Showing how to peacefully celebrate art, build community and stay healthy and happy, updated to what’s going on via the general heart. A toast to the original toasters, to Scratch and to those who selflessly shared music, art and culture, in service to some other ubiquitous force. Stronger than commerce, the force to keep experimenting, like a scientist, moving forwards, march, chant, dance and sing tales of conquering adversity. The mighty sound engineer god, my kind of god, if I were to want to worship such an entity.

    The Mystique of Scratch, adds another dimension to his personae, and so his music. A self confessed self-mythologizing multi-dimensional being, The Upsetter of the Upsetters. In the tradition of Sun Ra, Scratch included the scriptures and religious mythology into his music and into himself, self-mythologizing through sonics. Another defining attribute of great Reggae artists, the devotion – religious devotion – to the music, as the music is part of the culture, not just some entertainment on the side…central to the whole thing, the oneness of experiencing all the senses at once. 

    For me, in the late 1990’s, listening to Lee Scratch Perry while high, I became aware of some very attractive high-frequency phase shifting (like what happens when you play two copies of the same vinyl record and very slightly slow one of them down, or up) a new sonic world emerged for me, and from there when I heard the music from the likes of Ornette Coleman, John Coltrane and Sun Ra, I thought to myself, “wow, these cats are up and out there, playing in this other world”, it was kind of like a new dimension in sound. Scratch productions sent me to a similar place “outta’ space’ indeed, and that’s not to discuss what he was actually saying and singing. Scratch was a consistent labyrinthine puzzle maker, the Inception-Setter, who often spoke in tongues breaking down the linguistic barriers imposed by imperial forces. 

    Scratch was a poet too, a spontaneous preacher of Dub Science Mysticism, notably, distinguished by his ability to perform and present proof of concepts which enter through the ear and skin, to explore the rest of the human sensory solar system. As with Bob Marley, if his music is a church and/or religion, I am of it. Same with John Coltrane. I maybe model agnostic, a secular humanist but I can explore and appreciate and even temporarily “believe in” religious thinking via music. Scratch to me resembles a hermetic tone-scientist, and I can get on board and take the ride without worry, it’s a love dub trip.

    Listen to his new album for evidence of his broad spectrum of collaborations:
    Perry’s Guide To The Universe

    Rest In Dub

    –Steve Fly
    Amsterdam