the wheels that sometimes grind
I
‘tuned_out_atypicals’
(feb. 2025)
over several weeks the revised MeFog project has attempted to rationalise the task in hand while accepting that organisation & methodical application are not perhaps our strongest suit. so, having unearthed scribble books, charts & hundreds of often forgotten tunes & arrangements it is time to bring a sense of order.
it seemed sensible to take it ‘a bit at a time‘ with a hint of long term structure thrown in for good measure. by dipping into the the sections ‘equally’ the old & new might sometimes work together or, if not, then each of the sections have the potential of being intensively mined.
| Vol.1 | The Lesser UnAmerican Songbook (part I) [which will consist of events & compositions that might have happened but in the end probably didn’t for various reasons] this is currently a work in progress |
| Vol.2 | East-Atlantic Murmurs & the Post Wireless Underground [issues with technology and our now limited access to ‘old skool’ resources has in turn forced us to fall back onto our own means.] |
| Vol.3 | Misunderstood Broadcasts & Other Misinterpretations [the central premise of ‘short wave shack’ is that we need to be able be confident of HOW to get things right via a number of routes or connections simply in order to benefit from getting things wrong in the first place] |
| Vol.4 | An Overview of Pre-Codex Art Movements [another Ars Nova or the importance of real smoke in society? perhaps reimagining johannes symonis hasprois, or solage, or jean fumeux, or ‘the society of smokers’ (‘les fumeurs’?). ‘puisqe je sui fumeux’ or ‘fumeux fume par fumée’] |
| Vol.5 | Magnetic Domains & Imagined Freedoms [a practical thesis in which culture slowly becomes subculture but gains keep vanishing in the process] |
| Vol.6 | Post-Codex Rebellions & Subsequent Struggles [ars subtilior revisited?] |
| Vol.7 | Secretive Filters & Whispers [must all remain occult?] |
| Vol.8 | Towards a Restoration of Paper & Error [a thread that runs through all 12 (projected) volumes and that we hope will find some semblance of tangibility by vol.8. if so this volume will be dedicated at that time to re-establishing the importance of the discarded] |
| Vol.9 | Decyphering those Tunes that not many would sing [tbc] |
| Vol.10 | Anachronisms, Accusations & Melodic Faux Pas [tbc] |
| Vol.11 | Those Things that thus far proved Unalterable [tbc] |
| Vol.12 | The Lesser UnAmerican Songbook (part II) [tunes that probably didn’t happen but might well have happened and been recalled if not for negligence, or lack of belief] |
so at some point we draw a line and start scattering familiar, half remembered and sadly completely forgotten ditties into each of the 12 (projected) recipient containers, 12 (plus or minus) at a time.
II
‘tools_o’the_trade (#1)’
(feb. 2025)
at what point does a project either dictate the necessary tools or concede that the tools themselves (above all the available or preferred tools) must define the project?
I don’t wish this short thought to preface an avoidable descent into morbid toenail gazing (something at which musos – and gut pluckers in particular – are wonderfully adept, as a quick peruse of the short-trousered sect on YT will confirm) but where there’s smoke… instead think in terms of ridding an instrument of expectations, and in particular expectations of style that invariably give way to being those of enforced but soon to be irrelevant content.
such, however, has been the impact of the soft-power americanisation of music, and indeed of musical instruments (whether or not said said instrument is of american origin).
it could be reasonably argued, however, that the process identified has much deeper roots, and from a european/western dates back to the music of the post-renaissance. in fact one can keep going backwards into the imposition of arbitrary but nevertheless cleverly justified rules by the all powerful (and still enduring) multinational roman corporation on matters of harmony, rhythm and indeed musical instruments.
secular music (despite its supposed innovations) never quite shook off an addiction to such rules. and within this was the old power pyramid that proved to be so easily transplanted from church structures to other (often allied) institutions thriving under political, academic & financial aliases.
and so for the moment I must stop here, because nothing has essentially changed over seven or eight hundred odd years. and it is only in understanding this ‘permanence of process & reasoning’ (disregarding protests overstating the various roles of industry, education, technology, enlightenment etc.) that we can get a grip on this and many other things.
in other words, technology, using one example, will ALWAYS be temporary wheareas reasoning, logic and process is permanent. as such I suspect a reasoned discussion from the 13th or 14th century would consider a far wider set of paremeters at a far greater depth than our own society seems capable of. it matters not a jot that we have more advanced equations, for only because of the reasoning of earlier centuries have we arrived at them. and in so many cases the applied logic of past times remains with us, immutable, just as the apple falls or a contiguous body of water maintains an equal surface elevation.
in this context it must be pointed out that the Ummayad dynasty, the ruling family of the Syria-based Umayyad Caliphate in 661–750 as well as the Emirate (later Caliphate) of Córdoba (Spain) in 756–1031, played host to mathematical scholars who in turn developed the key equations on the earth’s curvature (and which still allow today’s aircraft to navigate). all this while feudal & roman europe remained several centuries away from even accepting the earth was not flat.
Columbus merely stumbled upon knowledge already well known, but deliberately kept obscure. and in that way nothing has changed.