This is a data track and contains a large number of data files to explore. This CD-ROM track is in Macintosh format and can be explored on any Mac with a CD-ROM player. It contains artwork and other materials by or relating to X. J. Scott, and perhaps the art patron. Every one of the autographed early releases (Serial Numbers 1-20) of this CD contained a slightly or greatly different set of files here. No two CDs were alike. Each was an original and unique work of art.

The currently available re-released version has no data track, and so Directed Call is the first track.

Meaning:

Introduction to State of Mind.

This piece is derived from the first call I received on my answering machine after going without a phone for six months. The phone company wouldn’t let me have a phone (even though I had one six months before) unless I gave them the national identification number over the phone, or appeared in person with an identification document which required the indentification number. They said that otherwise they couldn’t be sure who I was.   Of course it’s obvious that (1) since I don’t have to come in and show identification documents unless I refuse to acknowledge the number; and (2) since the numbers are readily obtainable; that I could really be almost anybody over the phone. Knowing and speaking someone’s indentification number over the phone proves nothing. Their concept of identification is odd. Why do they need the number or a picture card linked to the number anyway? What’s the real reason? Is the identification number required to tell who you really are? The answer is that it depends on who you really are. If you are a parent-less machine that was manufactured in a factory, your serial number is proof of your existence. You just have to decide whose side are you on anyway. Eventually, someone else (a friend) got the phone for me.

The first message I received on this phone line was from a woman who thought she had gotten her boyfriend’s answering machine. She did not even notice that the voice on the message was mine. She simply and easily trusts that the number she has called forth is correct.

This track examines the interaction between intimacy and anonymity in Western technological culture. With a phone, I can now be reached. I am no longer as isolated as before.

Without a phone, no friends visit since they do not know when I will be home. My neighbors are not known to me— all my friends live across town or in other cities. This contrasts with tribal cultures where a network of friends lives nearby. Not having a phone is symbolic of hermitage and spiritual isolationism. A required test of resolve for those who wish to deny the beast, it strengthens.

A family member would never fail to recognize your voice. Although the woman who calls “loves” her mate, she does not know what his voice sounds like.

Feel:

Starting with an isolated yet integrated and broad mystical Eastern wailing, it becomes frentic as ascending one-shot arpeggios burst forth and the general funkiness of living in the artsy part of downtown — in a apartment overlooking the ocean, the downtown skyline and the airport — breaks forth. The general feeling is positive and whimsical.

The previous track called out a question to be answered. This track continues to ask, what is the meaning of technology in our lives? People hear things on machines. They trust the machine — whether it be a television, a printing press, a network, or an answering machine to give them truth. In many ways, technology has replaced human relationships. People communicate through one-way directives. People watching TV expect to be entertained. They do not need to react or interact in any way, but only listen. This form of listening is different from that found in relationships where empathy and interaction are required by the direct face-to-face contact. Since most time is spent interacting with machines, people then begin to treat others as they do the machine — wanting to control them, turn them on and off at will without regard to the humanity and free-will of the other. Also, technology is a demanding talker. Talk, talk, talk,— it never listens to you but it demands to be listened to. There is a limit to the amount of time each day we can stand attentively listening to something without interaction. Technology such as TV and the Internet leaves us tired and feeling unreal. When real people do arrive, we are too tired to listen to them. Yet we want them to listen to us and when we do we demand they give their attention. Our tendency is to talk to another as the TV does without pausing or caring how the listener is taking it all in or whether or not she understands. What passes for communication in our culture has become a form of self gratifying masturbation that does not require a partner’s interaction, nor make demands of our time or consideration or timing other than whenever an urge arrears its head.

The responses heard in this piece were given by people who encountered my answering machine prompt “For a list of ways in which technology has failed to improve the human condition, press 3 now.” When 3 is pressed, nothing different happens. It beeps as a regular answering machine, but is hyped through advertisement to appear to be something it is not. The callers are blissfully unaware of the point, and instead pleasantly wonder why pressing 3 failed to deliver the list. Technological failures are ubiquitous and invisibly expected. These failures are not perceived as extraordinary.  These failures are so normal they are not even perceived; they are part of the background noise of everyday life. They have become invisible even when noticeably calling attention to themselves as part of an artistic criticism. The point is lost. We must ask at some point it it’s such a good idea to trust the technology and to abdicate relationships. It seems easier and less trouble to deal with predictably unreliable technology than on unpredictable, reliable people.

Meaning:

As a result of not interacting with others, people emulate the acting of TV and media and each adopt massks. People relate to each other through scripts based on shows they’ve seen and books they’ve read, rather than based on how they want to be treated themselves, or upon feedback they receive from others. Everyone develops a set of massks which they present on different occasions. But the massks are worn at all times! The danger is that the real self is never developed and only the façade receives obeisance. The massks inextricably merge with the identity and the soul dies. All that is left is an automaton, predictably unreliable and thus very satisfying.

Feel:

Familiar, wandering, dawdling, call-to-questioning, commenting.

Meaning:

The log drums are reminiscent of drums signaling to me calling me from across a great distance. The inharmonic, distorted instrument that begins half-way through is like a clock’s chime or alarm saying that it’s time to get up.

Feel:

Transitional. Storytelling. Soundtrack like.

Intonation Notes:

Note the intriguing, yet well-fused harmonies exhibited in the jazzy brass sections in the middle.

Meaning:

This is about traveling across the ocean. A sense of movement, of water and smoke is very noticeable through swells and motion. The Rainstick reminds us of water. The Nigerian ceremonial Graps rattle suggests magic or ritual.

Feel:

Classical, but with indeterminate meter and odd modulations and melodic turns.

Intonation Notes:

The arpeggios actually make use of the 88cET pseudo-octave present at 1232 cents. This is far enough off from the 1200 cent pure octave as to appear to be unusable as a consonance. Yet it passes as an octave because the natural/pure octave is not intrinsically wired into your brain; only its approximate size is learned through extensive exposure. The approximation of the common and familiar tonic-fifth-octave sequence in the arpeggios serve as a further cue to get the brain to accept the sharply augmented octave acceptable, or at least passable. I submit this tune as proof that the 2:1 ratio is irrelevant to the brain’s recognition of the octave-class interval.

Meaning:

Having arrived at a new place, old things have been left behind. A new life has begun.

Feel:

Classical. Transitional. Structured, yet free. Logical, yet unpredictable.

Intonation Notes:

This tune has the most sophisticated harmonies of the sections. Of particular interest is the intriguing harmonic transition that occurs near the end when the log drums return.

Meaning:

Completely acoustic, the most natural of all the tracks, signally a successful return to a more real form of existence.

The rainstick from “Sulphrous Smoke..." has become the sound of a disintegrating, crumbling, salt pillar. Pretty, crystalline and exceptionally clean and clear. The sound of the rock pillar only comes at the end; before this the rain stick is more ambient. Again, the use of the Nigerian Graps suggests that magical forces may be involved.

The sounds of those who are left behind are largely ignored except to relate their state as disintegrating pillars of salt. Most of this track deals with simple, joyful, pure percussive elements of the unpretentious celebration of daily life.

Feel:

Transformational, pure. Unpretentious, natural.