Yesterday I released a brand new ambient/noise album called Scars Are Like A Beacon. It’s a completely instrumental re-imagining of ‘The Great Divide’, an album I put out last year.
You can listen to it here:
Here’s what I wrote about it for the press release and Bandcamp page:
“I don’t have a copy of my books, and the degree to which I never read them is profound. I never look. I’m repelled by them. It feels scatological to me, like a turd you just left.” – Mary Karr
Whenever I’ve finished a record, I tend to become so disinterested in it that I often end up hating the very piece of art I’ve worked so hard to create. This time around, I decided to take this unfortunate (but not uncommon) trait of mine and turn it into more music. Taking a cue from Tim Hecker (who explored the idea of “sonic decay” on his album ‘Ravedeath, 1972’) and William Basinski (who juxtaposed disintegrating tapes of ambient music with scenes from the aftermath of 9/11), I took the individual audio stems from ‘The Great Divide’ – mangled, re-sampled, distorted and warped them (in effect, destroying my original record) – to make this new album, which now bears no sonic resemblance to its source material.
As esoteric (and potentially off-putting!) as all that might sound, my hope is that this new album has transcended the unorthodox creative experiment it began as, having now transmuted into something quite distinct, otherworldly and, possibly, even beautiful.
The album is designed to be heard as a cohesive whole (and through decent speakers or headphones!). Thank you for listening.
As a quick reference point, if you like Brian Eno’s ambient output, or the music of Tim Hecker or Susumu Yokota, then you may well hear something you like here.
Enjoy! And if you do, please share it around.
Oh, and this album is only available on Bandcamp – both as a download and/or on ye olde cassette tape – my first! 🙂
