{"id":5913,"date":"2024-02-06T17:40:11","date_gmt":"2024-02-06T23:40:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/socc\/?p=5913"},"modified":"2024-02-06T17:40:11","modified_gmt":"2024-02-06T23:40:11","slug":"some-solace-in-the-beeps-and-boops-of-aphex-twin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/socc\/2024\/02\/06\/some-solace-in-the-beeps-and-boops-of-aphex-twin\/","title":{"rendered":"Some Solace in the Beeps and Boops of Aphex Twin"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Linnea Anderson<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
photo: Linnea Anderson<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf aliens heard it, they\u2019d know it\u2019s music,\u201d my brother once described his favorite band, Shpongle. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Like those aliens, Shpongle feels foreign to me. A quite barren terrain. Maybe a hair too niche.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maybe one day I\u2019ll get on my brother\u2019s level. But for now, I listen to my preferred beeps and boops. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Leave out the lyrics, sure, I like that. But how about a couple ad-libs here and there. Not in every song, but just enough. Maybe the tones are the star of the show, but not without a touch of commentary. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Boards of Canada does this well, and Brian Eno or Kraftwerk might be the fathers of it, but no one masters it quite like Aphex Twin. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe are the music makers,\u201d his song signals. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is what music becomes when it means nothing at all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Make a hundred old computers jabber in some encrypted code. And make it all happen in one room. And make it a touch too loud. A little overwhelming. And curiously synchronized. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Slap a grimacing face and gibberish name on it and there you have maybe every Aphex Twin song ever made.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And so I understand why it may not click with some folks. But in that way, its inaccessibility becomes universal. What is heard is not on the same plane as the singer-songwriter familiarity that intrigues me and many others. It is remote and distant, even detached from humanity. Somehow, that makes it all the more intriguing. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It gabs with an eerie dormancy, that despite despondent, simulates life in some peculiar way. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

On paper, my love for Aphex Twin makes absolutely, without a doubt, zero sense. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maybe it\u2019s hard to explain what is so great about something so disastrously artful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the same way that Shpongle connects my brother to some vision of dancing extraterrestrials, Aphex Twin disconnects me from the grudgingly anatomical task of being human. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It might be the last thing humans were ever supposed to listen to. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It might be completely rewiring my neurotransmitters. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It could be absolutely frying my brain. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But what I know for sure, is that the chaos offers so much quiet. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Because between me and those sounds is a whole world of complete illusion. One I will never grasp. And maybe it reminds me that I don’t really have to \u201cget it\u201d to enjoy it. And in that, I find solace. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Linnea Anderson \u201cIf aliens heard it, they\u2019d know it\u2019s music,\u201d my brother once described his favorite band, Shpongle.  Like those aliens, Shpongle feels foreign to me. A quite barren terrain. Maybe a hair too niche. Maybe one day I\u2019ll get on my brother\u2019s level. But for now, I listen to my preferred beeps and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1098,"featured_media":5915,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[157,12],"tags":[250,251,234,112],"class_list":["post-5913","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-artist-spotlight","category-music","tag-aphex-twin","tag-artist-spotlight","tag-review","tag-reviews"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/socc\/files\/2024\/02\/Screenshot-2024-02-06-at-4.38.58-PM.png?fit=1288%2C1304&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pa7fJU-1xn","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/socc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5913","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/socc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/socc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/socc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1098"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/socc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5913"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/socc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5913\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5918,"href":"https:\/\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/socc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5913\/revisions\/5918"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/socc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5915"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/socc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5913"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/socc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5913"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.coloradocollege.edu\/socc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5913"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}