Sampling Energy

I've been thinking and researching a lot about energy and all the forms of energy. Counting the energy that I feel and give out and the wider energies around us. It's something I have never really considered the presence of, but something I have always felt was there - swirling away in some invisible ether. Taking the time to listen to this and acknowledge this energy, has become something of a daily ritual in my practice. I know that sounds very spiritual and deep, but the research process has become integrated into the way I think about energy. I was also thinking about how I use electricity to use my laptop, to then research and watch and interact with things online, through EMF and energy. There was this whole combination of things that circled around that put me into this state of flow and made the research into EMF, electricity, bills, and the energy and cost of living crisis, with their links feel more connected. 

I have been taking sounds of energy, mainly electricity and frequencies, and putting them through a sampler. I thought about being able to harness the sounds and remix them into a composition of sound like an aura or this looming drone of frequency and energy that surrounds us constantly; how this affects our daily live and how I contribute to it and consume it daily. I was using my own energy to construct and arrange these sounds like a composition, harnessing these waves and creating something alternative, to observe and question the research and the practice and the meanings they have. 

I have just been using GarageBand to sample and create these sounds and pulling clips from online sources and then morphing them through plug-in effect and EQ Channels. GarageBand is super easy to use and most importantly free!

This is the sampler that I have used to insert the sounds, I can then use the sounds on the keyboard to use them at different pitches and speeds and create unique alterations of it. The sounds I was working with, were sparking electrical lines, powerline hums and emf signals and waves. 

Being able to manipulate these in a new way was exciting and interesting to think about for a soundscape and an experience. 

I have been enjoying experimenting this and have made multiple edit and composition with this sampler, to make the final sound work. I have been preferring to work this way, making the sound first to inform the visuals. I had a feedback session yesterday with everybody and they had an interesting visual experience while listening to the videos as if it was this intangible contrast to the audio, something like waves or an aura, or a flow. Something super delicate to contrast the intensity of the audio. 

We spoke before about visible EMF and the aurora borealis and how thats visible. The audio felt like this space in between, something that didn't exist. The aurora borealis feels like this state in between, somewhere between space and earth. It also links deeply to energy to frequencies and these interesting intangible states of the in between. I think visually this where I want to go, somewhere as visually powerful as aurora borealis but equally as delicate and subtle as aurora borealis. 

That is my next stop and my next integration. How I'm going to let the sound inform the visual content.