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Wednesday 28 May 2014

The Furry Gamble - Part One

Over the coming months I plan to elaborate on a number of experiments that play with the idea of chance (or aleatoricismif you like) and its role in the creative process. Usually when starting a creative endeavour, be it doing a doodle, writing a story, or putting together a piece of music, I'd begin with a fixed idea on how something is going to be, or a concept in which to work up from, rarely is something left to chance. But what if these decisions were already decided by the throw of a dice or a pick out of a hat?

My first experiment draws from Brian Eno and Peter Schmidt's Oblique Strategies - a set of cards with artistic directions, that encourage lateral thinking towards creative dilemmas - and The Wasp Factory from the novel of the same name by Iain Banks - a crude future telling device, in which a wasp is placed and forced to choose one of twelve trapdoors. Behind each trapdoor there's a deadly end for the wasp (fire, spider, being pissed on, etc.) and the way it dies has significant meaning to the Factory's maker, Frank.

Before you start, I don't intend to wizz on any wasps, but the thought of a creature making choices for me, well that could work couldn't it?

So without further ado here are the felines that are going to aid me in my first test, and the undisputed stars of this post: Bootsy Mann (Left) & Mousey Brown (Right)...


Bootsy Mann (Left) & Mousey Brown (Right)



Yes they've got surnames, what of it?

Anyway, by merging the theme of the Oblique Strategies and running with the idea of my cats giving me creative direction, I came up with The Furry Gamble: A creative problem solving exercise which puts creative direction in the hands, or should I say, paws, of animals. The process involves placing a handful of treat enclosed envelopes, each with its own creative direction, in front of a co-operative critter and waiting to see which envelope it chooses.

The directions I picked for my first test are: make it ugly, make it pretty, make it simple, and make it complex. Why? Because they feel both broad enough to work with and specific enough to be constrained by.



The "Creative Directions"


As for the all important creative "dilemmas":

Dilemma a.) I plumped for the I-V-vi-IV chord progression, in a attempt to do something interesting with a common musical formula.


As my cats are helping me out, I figured for dilemma b.) I'd do a portrait of them. Which if I'm honest, doesn't sit easy as I personally find the idea of it a little too cute, and dare I say it, naff. But "Wou-Wou..." is about pushing myself into uneasy territory, so I guess it's the right thing to do.


And to prove chivalry isn't dead, the direction of dilemma a.) will be determined by Mouse, and dilemma b.) Bootsy. 


Right then, enough blather, it's experimentin' time...




That's that then. Do something pretty with the ol' I-V-vi-IV and do an ugly animal portrait... that shouldn't be too hard. 

Come back next week for the results, if you like.



- The Wormling


P.S. In case you enjoyed it, 'Sassafras' (the track on the vid) is now available as a free download from the 'Wou-Wou & The Wormling' SoundCloud page here, or if you're feeling lazy, at the bottom of this blog.

Monday 19 May 2014

The Result

And so the dreaded first post. The blank page. The void. It wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that I've written this in my head a hundred times, and attempted to physically write it just as many. Still, nothing seems to suffice, and it's all to do with my obsession with "the result".

Y'know, for as long as I can remember I've had a constant stream of ideas whizzing about my head, but when it comes to committing to any of them, I crumble, all because the projection in my bonce rarely reaches my high expectations when it makes it into the physical world.


This happens to pretty much all of us in one way or another. We're all drawn in by the potential, the dream, the what ifs. But time after time it never lives up to the gravity to which we've given it. In the objective sense it's the kitchen gadget that was meant to save minutes chopping garlic that now collects dust in the cupboard brimming with the other timesaving gadgets; the convertible that you've never driven around the countryside in homage to those slick car ad's.


Yes, these are pretty cliche, but the creative process I go through isn't far detached. The grand ideas (regardless to how much effort goes into them) never reach their cognitive greatness. So the song that I think to be the best I've ever written, isn't; the illustration that I've been imagining is impossible to draw; and the concept for a new poem I have becomes messy, flawed and without emotion or rhyme.


So what to do, lower my expectations?... Not yet. 


Although I sometimes struggle with the above, I still don't see it as my enemy, just part of my make-up, my nature, something to be worked at. And through reflection I am learning to control these destructive tendencies by experimenting.



For example, when I moved from my cassette four-track to a DAW (digital audio workspace), recording my music was a largely arduous ordeal on my ego. I focused far to much on the sounds and images in my head, and on how something "should sound" or "should be" according to online sources and expert opinions. The result ended up being far too safe and conscious. Then I stumbled upon some of my old recordings, and although very crude, I felt they had more about them, more life. I quickly came to realise that because I was still learning to play the basics during those first recordings, everything I did was a constant experiment. After I'd had the time to digest this concept, my recordings slowly freed up in the name of experimentation.

All in all, I reached the conclusion that it's fine to have fixed creative ideas, the image in your head or whatever it may be, but it's more fun to be spontaneous and unruly. Fixed ideas come with the baggage of ego and expectation, but there's little room for them when you're just doing something for the hell of it. And even just leaving space for a mess about in your fixed idea will open up whatever it is your working on to happy mistakes and nuances that will better represent you.

Which leads me to what 'Wou-Wou & the Wormling' is about. From where I sit it's about me growing creatively through playing and experimenting with child-like abandon; about learning to love my faults and inabilities, and working with them as if they were a talent; about doing things upside down and back-to-front so to get to a state where I don't judge what comes out of me; about choosing the difficult path and not resting on my laurels. 


I cannot promise that if you come back in a week or so, you'll like or enjoy anything that I've done, nor that it will be of a certain "professional" quality, because where I stand, those things don't stand for much. 


That said, and depending on what I stumble across on this ongoing odyssey, there may be the certain creative exercises or methods that could be of use to you in times of block, or even just for plain old fun, to do for the sake of creating.


Truthfully though, s'all up in the air at the moment... and that's just where I plan to keep it.


Many thanks,



- The Wormling