{"id":1094,"date":"2009-12-10T16:03:40","date_gmt":"2009-12-10T16:03:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.timdefenderoftheearth.com\/news\/?p=1094"},"modified":"2010-12-21T17:48:48","modified_gmt":"2010-12-21T17:48:48","slug":"the-sound-of-muse-sick","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.timdefenderoftheearth.com\/news\/?p=1094","title":{"rendered":"The Sound of Muse-Sick"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

You know, in some ways being kidnapped by monsters and held prisoner in a cave<\/a> for nearly a year<\/strong> isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t quite as bad as it might be.<\/p>\n

\"TheBeaverBroughtPaper\"<\/p>\n

For one thing (and maybe I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m reaching here, but\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6) thanks to the monsters\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 internet connection, I haven\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t been deprived of music<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Not at all long ago, a music collection was something that had to be confined to a physical location: a stack of cd\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s, say (don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t get me started on records and tapes). Now, of course, that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s no longer the case. And I can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t tell you how grateful I am.<\/p>\n

Music is an essential part of my daily life. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s also an essential part of my writing process<\/strong>. I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t listen to music while I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m actually writing (or not usually \u00e2\u20ac\u201c for me it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s too distracting) but I use music all the time in other ways: when I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m getting myself ready to write, when I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m thinking myself into a different frame of mind for a particular scene, and when I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m trying to come up with ideas.<\/p>\n

I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve found that all sorts of music can help with this stuff. But I thought I might share with you a few specific things that have been making my story-brain twitch and bubble over the last month or two\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p>\n

\"Layout<\/p>\n

Broadcast And The Focus Group Investigate Witch Cults Of The Radio Age<\/strong><\/a> sounds like it was recorded forty years ago, but it wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t: it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s only been out since October. A series of short experimental pieces (none longer than a few minutes), this mini-album plunges you straight into the woozily sinister atmosphere of a 1970s horror film<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

I liked where that took me so decided I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d stay, with the newly-reissued soundtrack to a genuine horror classic from the era, Blood on Satan\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Claw<\/strong>, composed by Mark Wilkinson. Disarmingly cute and massively ominous both at the same time<\/em>, you can hear some samples of it here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

On the same label (Trunk Records) I found this incredible story<\/a> about the rescue of another soundtrack from the era, in this case that of a nature documentary: Life on Earth<\/strong>, composed by Edward Williams. Imagine a whole album about living creatures and their biological processes. The Sex Life of the Fern<\/strong>, I can tell you, is a particular highlight. Comb Jellies<\/strong> is dead good, too.<\/p>\n

\"LOECD1\"<\/p>\n

Finally, here\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s something really<\/em> odd: twenty-two pieces of experimental techno created by various artists Twitter<\/strong> style \u00e2\u20ac\u201c allowing themselves a maximum of 140 characters of code. Click here<\/a> to hear sc140<\/strong>, and even download it free for you to own if you like.<\/p>\n

Febrile psychedelia, rustic English horror, music for jellyfish <\/strong>and what sounds like the stomach rumbles of computers<\/strong>. There are all sorts of weird noises to be heard in these caves. But it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s great to be able to choose them for yourself<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

If you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re interested in what else I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve been listening to, you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re welcome to take a look at my LastFM profile<\/a>.<\/p>\n

[PS: The first illustration in this post is by Henry Holiday<\/a>, from Lewis Carroll\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s The Hunting of the Snark<\/em>.]<\/p>\n

——–<\/p>\n

EXTRA NEWS FLASH! <\/strong>It gives me no small measure of enchortlement and glee to announce that we have another winner <\/strong>for the ongoing Black Tat NMWHITMOTWC<\/a><\/strong>, or No Monsters Were Harmed In The Making Of This Website Competition<\/strong>!<\/p>\n

Take a bow Bryan Lopez<\/strong>, for this wonderful winning entry<\/a> made of motor oil, pudding and rocks<\/strong>. \ud83d\ude00<\/p>\n

Bryan wins Round Nine, and the unabridged audio edition of The Black Tattoo<\/strong> on CD. Round Ten has now commenced. Come on, disgust me<\/a>!<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You know, in some ways being kidnapped by monsters and held prisoner in a cave for nearly a year isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t quite as bad as it might be. For one thing (and maybe I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m reaching here, but\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6) thanks to the monsters\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 internet connection, I haven\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t been deprived of music. Not at all long ago, a music […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1,11],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.timdefenderoftheearth.com\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1094"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.timdefenderoftheearth.com\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.timdefenderoftheearth.com\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.timdefenderoftheearth.com\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.timdefenderoftheearth.com\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1094"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"http:\/\/www.timdefenderoftheearth.com\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1094\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1466,"href":"http:\/\/www.timdefenderoftheearth.com\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1094\/revisions\/1466"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.timdefenderoftheearth.com\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1094"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.timdefenderoftheearth.com\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1094"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.timdefenderoftheearth.com\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1094"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}