Micro-bionic
Radical Electronic Music and Sound Art in the 21st Century
Description:... As mainstream music consumers wait with baited breath for the next major musical upheaval, a small core of tech-savvy, highly mobile individuals are re-shaping the aural landscape without the assurance of being part of any larger movement. Their ideologies, creative approaches, and end products differ wildly; but they do share a common bond of self-reliance, flexibility in the face of information overload, and a desire to take sound beyond the realm of mere entertainment. Starting with the guerrilla media tactics of Industrial music in the late 1970s, the author charts an ongoing trend in electronic music: an increasing amount of sonic quality, recorded output and international contact, accomplished with a decreasing amount of tools, personnel, and capital investment. From the use of laptop computers to create massive avalanches of noise, to the establishment of micro-nations populated largely by sound artists, 21st century sound culture is expanding in its scope and popularity even as it shrinks in other respects. The text of MICRO-BIONIC is built up from exhaustive research into the world of audio extremity, including physical travel to the various hot spots where these new sounds are made, and thousands of hours listening to live and recorded music. Numerous exclusive interviews with leading lights of the field were also conducted for this book: William Bennett (Whitehouse), Peter Rehberg (Mego), Peter Christopherson (Throbbing Gristle/Coil), John Duncan, Francisco Lpez, Carl Michael von Hausswolff, Bob Ostertag and many others weigh in with a range of thoughts and opinions that underscores the incredible diversity to be found within new electronic music itself. MICRO-BIONIC unveils a host of audio phenomena that range from the capricious to the terrifying, and prov
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