Boring Formless Nonsense: Experimental Music and The Aesthetics of Failure

327 Pages·2013·2.95 MB·English

by  Eldritch Priest

Boring Formless
Nonsense

Boring Formless
Nonsense
Experimental Music and the
Aesthetics of Failure
ELDRITCH PRIEST
Bloomsbury Academic
An imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
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www.bloomsbury.com
First published 2013
© eldritch Priest, 2013
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted
in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying,
recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior
permission in writing from the publishers.
No responsibility for loss caused to any individual or organization acting on
or refraining from action as a result of the material in this publication can be
accepted by Bloomsbury Academic or the author.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Priest, Eldritch.
Boring formless nonsense : experimental music and the aesthetics of failure / by
eldritch Priest.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-4411-2213-1 (pbk. : alk. paper) -- ISBN 978-1-4411-2475-3 (hardback :
alk. paper) 1. Avant-garde (Music) 2. Music--Philosophy and aesthetics. I. Title.
ML3877.P75 2013
780.9’04--dc23
2012030063
ISBN: 978-1-4411-2408-1
Typeset by Fakenham Prepress Solutions, Fakenham, Norfolk NR21 8NN
…so the other pirates don’t see it.

Contents
Pretext ix
Introduction 1
1 Boring 33
Introduction 33
On being bored 37
A boring history 44
Cage, Fluxus, and inclusion 53
Duration 62
The aesthetics of boredom and the art of waiting 65
The premises/promises of aesthetic boredom 74
A less promising boredom 75
Uglier feelings of the stuplime 81
Post…death… 96
Afterthought… 99
2 Formless 103
Pretext 103
(Informe) 108
How to read this chapter 113
Story 114
Becoming formless 124
Music noise 128
Recording distraction 139
---Multitasking 148
Capture and escape 151
Lull ))) ))) ))) 157
Listening to SoS#16’s lull ))))) 161
viii ConTEnTS
(((((Listening away))))) 165
Muzak’s way of dreaming ubiquitously )))) 168
---Notes on muzak 168
---Quantum modulation 169
We don’t (((listen))) anymore 173
The (((sound))) of habits 175
Artifice and the artificial 178
))))) Desire and dissatisfaction 181
Last))))) 191
Another again 194
3 Nonsense 195
(Voodoo 195
((Metareferentiality, metamusic, and hypermusic 203
(((Grúpat and pseudonymity 207
((((Symptoms, syndromes, and hyperfiction 217
(((((In a Sedimental Mood 222
((((((Hyperstition, magick, and nonsense 225
(((((((Becoming Karen et al, a Real-Time Hyperstition as of March 30,
2007 by Karen Eliot 233
((((((((Of lies 241
(((((((((What does music feel like?  (or, “on the refrain of pain and
imagining”): Discursive remainders from glossolalia (stress positions)
by Engram Knots 248
((((((((((glossolalia (stress positions) 255
(((((((((((Occult dualism 262
((((((((((((Illustrative interlude: Practicing 264
(((((((((((((The sleep side of music and dream-work 267
Nonsense II 277
Inconclusion/This chapter is false 277
Appendix 285
Bibliography 293
Index 307
Pretext
Ia m extremely grateful to Geraldine Finn whose support and counsel
during the research of this work, as well as her commitment to
the pure adventure of thought, helped make the morass of my own
thinking, if not entirely clear (to me), then at least (partially) inter-
esting. I am also grateful to the composers who were kind enough
to discuss their work with me and to provide me scores, recordings,
and images of these, which, for the most part, are not commercially
available.
Thank you also to Timothy Murray and The Society for the
Humanities at Cornell University, and to Brian Massumi for allowing
me to crash his course and entertain my questions during a short
stay in Ithaca, NY, while I was in the middle of writing this book.
Paul Hegarty also deserves thanks for reading an earlier version of
this work and accommodating the text’s special blend of irreverence,
sincerity, and auto-discombobulation.
Numerous friends and colleagues have also supported this work.
Special thanks, however, must be made to David Cecchetto who
takes things like this seriously (mostly), Marc Couroux for encour-
aging my dare and being part of its strange feedback loop, and John
Mark Sherlock for his moments of therapeutic lucidity and staunch
refusal to say “simulacrum” properly. My folks, of course, must be
acknowledged, if not only for their boundless supply of emotional
and financial support, then for having the courage to not completely
understand what I’ve been up to all these years, yet love and
encourage me anyways.
And while it’s perhaps expected that friends, family, and colleagues
will support, if not actively promote one’s gambles, there is no such
expectation that a stranger will. In this respect I have to give props
to David Barker whose immediate enthusiasm for this work was not
only unexpected but a sustaining device.
Thank you to Penelope whose wish is my command and unbridled
success is my wish. And lastly, my immense gratitude to Claudette