So this thursday is the screening of the Finished with the War Piece as part of this years “New Vibes”. It’s a dance on film piece choreographed by Lucy Nicholls, directed by Liam D’Authereau, with performances by Saffy Setohy, Pippa Lund, and Krista Vuori, and also features my first 12 minute soundtrack.
This is the first time i’ve been asked to compose a track for a dance on film piece, yet this will be my second outing as part of new vibes, as a dj/vj/dance piece i worked on with Birmingham Dance Collective (originally for our peace not war room at drop beats not bombs) was featured at last years New Vibes.
This has been a really good experience for me, and again i’ve learnt a lot from working in collaboration with some real talented people, in areas that are relatively new to me. I’ve been learning quite a lot from the studio point of view, and seem to be constantly reaching new levels with my music. While i still feel i’ve got a long way to go, i’m pretty excited to be previewing the finished piece of our collective efforts in such a forum, (especially as i didn’t get to see last years, as i was djing at the Anti-World Festival.)
The piece was inspired by a poem from 1917 by Siegfried Sassoon, entitled “Finished With the War”, and there is a description by its creators here. Lucy and Liam suggested early on, that the piece of music should have a building nature, whilst in someway subtly reflecting the feelings of anxiety, and powerlessness we can feel as a society with the current iraq situation. They were also leaning towards an organic yet glitchy breaks sound, and were keen on using different layers and dynamics, whilst still allowing something that works musically as well as a dance piece.
With that in mind, I thought it might be interesting to share the process thus far of creating the music.
I began working on the music for the piece a few weeks ago, collecting everyday sounds from around the house, by using my binaurul microphones and an mp3 recorder. (Samples ranged from opening and shutting the window to the rain, to recording the kettle boiling!), and it was interesting to note just how varied our everyday soundscape is, and just how much i miss.
After some selective editing, i then sourced a few layers of noise from various vst instruments, ran them through some effects, and layered them in cubase, alongside various sourced samples of everyday, industrial and film sounds. This very quickly generated a narrative within my head, which is something i find interesting when creating music.
Firstly it seemed to be from the point of view of an old war veteran, trying to finish with the war, and then it quickly became more geared towards expressing the corruption of war, using some recognisable samples which seemed to subtly reflect where the power lies, and how size and power so easily stifles any opposition.
The samples also led me to think about chompsky esque suggestions of corporations and the media can dull down the nation, and the contrast of the binaurul recordings made me think about how much everyday thoughts and distractions can play its part in the bigger picture.
Obviously I don’t know if these things will come across, but it helps me when writing music to have interesting things to work with. Thankfully early drafts of the piece generated positive responses from Liam, Lucy and Pyn, so i got down to working on the glitchy breaks side of things.
I began with a few glitchy loops, and a few plugins and effects to generate a basic style, and then built up the track using drum and sound efx samples, bass and synth instruments, and the binaurul samples. I then found and sampled a recording i found of someone reading the poem out, and tried scratching that in over the top. My needle (and my scratching!) isn’t the best, so i began to chop and refine the samples, trying to leave in whats needed, (whilst also keep it quite random and disjointed)
After some experiments with my kaoss pad, tempos changes, and midi automation, i had a fairly solid structure for the dancers to work around ready for a week of rehearsals and filming, and then the production week.
After laying out a basic structure for a track, i normally like to go back and edit what i’ve done, being free to move parts around as the mood takes me. However i found having to keep to a basic structure (for obvious reasons), allowed me to move forward with the track in a much more structured way.
The other thing i learn was that something which might sound and work much better musically, doesn’t necessirily work better from a dance or visual perspective. Often when the parts come together, things become apparent, and i like the way everyone has dealt with changes on this project, as its been a real pleasure working together.
Today i’ll be turning my ears to those of a sound engineer, and Liam and Lucy have their final all night editing session, ready for the showing tomorrow.
There will be a range of pieces on the night, all shown from the comfortable Patrick Centre at the Hippodrome. If your on facebook, you can check out the event here, and advance tickets are only a fiver, and available from www.dancexchange.org.uk/shows
Hope you can make it 
July 10th, 2008 at 9:53 am
looks like an awesome project - congratulations to all concerned.
Xx