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Dear New Unit

from Everything Else by David Morrison

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about

This piece was recorded to be used as lobby music for Surfin' UFO,an Electronic Planet Ensemble production at the Vortex Theater in Austin, Texas, in January 2010. These are my notes for the theatrical production.

This song is about decay in a machine environment, personified by a pleading voice. I wanted the voice to be that of a jilted lover or cast-off employee, someone over the hill and behind the curve, pleading for mercy in a self-defeatingly clumsy attempt to sound "with it."

To start with, I grafted new lyrics onto an old song I was tired of, writing the new ones very quickly and accepting words that didn't mean what I wanted them to but had the right sound.

The gear I used is pretty outmoded. Everyone now uses sequencing software with highly graphic interfaces. I have what's called a stand-alone hard drive recorder, with old-fashioned knobs and sliders. (It's a Yamaha AW16G). It was fairly hot shit when it was released less than 10 years ago, but these days it's a real clunker. Devices of its type are now almost pocket-sized and are considered something like musical memo pads, useful for sketching ideas only. The display screen is small, monochromatic and hard to read; it is much less inviting and flexible than any current cell phone. It lacks most of the editing capabilities that have become so common they've transformed the process of recording music. Many musicians, being asked to record on this machine, would be like a blogger forced to use an electric typewriter. No cut and paste, here's a bottle of whiteout. You'll need a lot of paper, because you'll be starting over quite a few times.

All my other stuff is old, too. The beats come from a cheap tambourine and a 20 year-old plastic Casio keyboard my ex-wife had as a kid. (I would like to have played the drums, but I live in a little apartment.) My guitar is from the 80's and my bass is a copy of the famous Hofner model that Paul McCartney used with the Beatles. Probably the most up-to-date thing I have is my Boss multi-effect guitar pedal--basically a computer that you plug a guitar (or any sound-emitting device) into. It's been replaced by two newer models but they're not quantum improvements. The guitar pedal is what produced all those squonks, beeps and hisses. I even used it on the vocals.

Aside from using old gear, I did certain things that increased the possibility of mistakes, like turning switches off and on without listening to the signal. I played the main bass line quite a few times until I was sure my timing was crisp, but the bass overdubs, the singing and most of the guitars I did very quickly, usually keeping the first takes. When you want a feeling of slippery randomness, you usually have to get it quick, as playing repeated takes tends to kill the spontaneous quality.

For the third verse, I recorded the vocal on two separate tracks, singing every other word or syllable into each channel, without listening to the other half. For instance, singing the line "Must not herd spinning dishes" I would first sing "must (...) herd (...) -ning (...) -shes," then pull the volume track down and, on a different track, sing "(...) not (...) spin- (...) dis-." I also improvised as I sang, changing the melody somewhat each time and using the first take that I found passable. I wanted my voice to sound uncertain of its environment.

One aspect of the final mix of this song truly is a random product of machine decay. When I first begin singing, you can hear the Casio drum track creeping up and then cutting out again every few seconds. It was supposed to just be silent during that section, but due to some kind of bleed within the system, it kept leeching back into the mix, forcing me to quickly slide the fader up and down to cut it back out. The effect is more random than I could have approximated.

lyrics

Dear new unit
You are ahead of me in the line
Compliant in drop-down menu
You are awkward to perceive
Dear new unit
You are ahead of me in the vine

Always object relations must synchronize
Always objects relate
All agree to conform checks compliances
Must not herd spinning dishes

Red green memory
Likely protocol not goodbye
Please make access
Without function forced outside

Always object relations must synchronize
Always objects relate
Always please to conform checks compliances
Must now herd spinning dishes

Red green memory
Likely protocol not goodbye
Please make access
Without function forced outside

credits

from Everything Else, track released December 4, 2009
Voices, instruments and electronics by David Morrison. (C) 2009 David Morrison BMI.

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about

David Morrison Wimberley, Texas

Singer, composer, multi-instrumentalist, producer. Occasional guest vocalist w/The Rudy Schwartz Project, Farrago Ensemble, The Able Sea & others. Has played hundreds of solo & band shows & been
featured on Church of the Subgenius show. Coproduced the Glimmer Blinkken's Golden Days & mixed the Mustn'ts EP. Currently w/the Lemon Settlement & the Swangles. Runs Rat Palace Recording.
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