Experiments With Tape

I have started to experiment with tape. The playback of cassettes and the altering of the sound that comes out of it. It is still early days and I am currently only doing it for my own pleasure, Maybe if I set myself the deadline of completing an album of Tape works I would have to meet the deadline out of pure stubbornness? It is a tempting proposition.

It is mid-March and Greyson Perry is back on the telly – telling everyone that they all have the capability to be an artist. I agree with them. I passionately agree that everyone has the right and the capability to create art. I agree with Perry & Joseph Buoys. Everyone is an artist.

This does not devalue the act of creating art nor does it devalue the title (if there is such a thing) of ‘Artist’. If anything it elevates the everyday to an aesthetic euphoria and makes gods of men.

I like to create. In a nutshell.

I am a designer by trade and some would argue that the two disciplines of Art and Design are diametrically opposed. The former being form over function and the latter being function over form.

But, when I cut loose, I create for the glorious act of creation. I am free from shackles because I will never earn a crust as an artist; therefore I only have myself to please when I am making art. I have nobody else to please but myself. And, I am the richer for it. I am my own master. I am doing it for the fun of it and if Kathryn doesn’t get embarrassed by it then all the better.

Below you will find the latest project. I have started playing around with the speed that cassette tapes are played back. Yes, I will never play Top Of The Pops but then I am too old for groupies anyway.

I have made the above track and I embedded it on Soundcloud for folk to listen to. The cassette playing through the system is a narrative, a spoken word recording about horses. What do you make to it?

I hope to make more of the Tape Works in the future. It was a good process and one that was enjoyable – it was an experience. The cassette is sat in front of me as I type up the notes about the experiment. Will I ever have the chance to sell out? Never. Will I keep on doing what I love doing and therefore ploughing my own furrow? Definitely….