Noise du Jour’s Poignant as Fuck: “Big Ideas (Don’t Get Any)” by James Houston
Posted by E. G. Gauger
Big Ideas (don’t get any) from James Houston on Vimeo
Based on a remix contest by Radiohead for the song “Nude”, James Houston assembled an elderly choir of obsoletia that grinds, beeps, and chirps their way to something unexpectedly haunting.
Sinclair ZX Spectrum – Guitars (rhythm & lead)
Epson LX-81 Dot Matrix Printer – Drums
HP Scanjet 3c – Bass Guitar
Hard Drive array – Act as a collection of bad speakers – Vocals & FX
I was scrambling for this week’s NdJ theme, not having been brung low by any songs lately, and was blessed by this today. I admit freely that I choked up. Not just for nostalgia, though the dot matrix is an old friend and the scanner knows me yet, but for the pathos of pastured machines.
It solidifies for me, this video, that the early consumer-computer era has really passed, can be patted into a packaged time, a turned page. Out of etymological playfulness, what would we call it? Pixelpunk?
Thanks to Fixer667, who I believe Ectotweeted this.
Categories: Asteriskpunk, Music, Noise du Jour, Technology
Posted at 7:01 pm on June 8, 2008
11 Comments -
- That is bloody creative and freaken awzum. I ZO wish I could have been there to see that.
Comment by Kat / TW / MS / CG — June 8, 2008 @ 8:25 pm
I think I choked up a little bit, too. ;) Maybe not for the exact same reasons, but similar ones I think. It’s a reminder of how fast the world seems to be moving, so fast that people forget themselves, each other, and everything beautiful. Even dot matrix printers. Thanks for sharing, I love this.
Comment by Aubrey — June 9, 2008 @ 12:39 am
Beautiful. I think that there could be a whole covers album in there.
Comment by Jono Ellis — June 9, 2008 @ 8:01 am
Not to mention that the hard drive array is much easier on the eyes than Yorke’s face.
Comment by FiXXXer667 — June 9, 2008 @ 9:29 am
Those HDs positively wail. I will probably sit around listening to this all day long.
Comment by Rit — June 9, 2008 @ 3:26 pm
i wish i thought up somthing like this for my final project! its so creative :D we need more of this!
Comment by Breezy — June 9, 2008 @ 5:09 pm
That’s Epson LX-86 and HP Scanjet 4C, I think. I mean, credit where credit’s due.
Comment by zozo — June 9, 2008 @ 5:47 pm
Can we just skip naming this one for now? Let it develop into an actual movement before genre-fying it to death.
Comment by mkb — June 9, 2008 @ 10:41 pm
When I first read the post (having not actually heard it, as I was reading on my phone) I was going to suggest that this would just be a subset of chiptunes, but I think it is so much more awesome than that.
At any rate, it is gorgeous.
Comment by chesh — June 10, 2008 @ 2:37 am
my family *owned* one of those printers.
i remember thinking, when a sample of such a device showed up in a ministry song (thieves, maybe?), “that’s not scary or menacing, that’s my homework printing out.”
Comment by buzko — June 14, 2008 @ 7:17 am
That is honestly moving. i’ve owned each and every one of these devices (apart from the oscilloscope) and to see them put to work like this is magical.
Comment by SildarGod — August 7, 2008 @ 11:07 am