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Brion Gysin
Hello all! This thread will discuss Mr. Brion Gysin's and William S. Burroughs work in relating to audio tape montage, and any paranormal effects of such method.
Cut from interview.
I'll have to get the full story later today from my friend who introduced me to this method, but the album is called 'Break through in grey room' if you wish to obtain it yourself.
Basically you take any media, newspapers work great (albeit a bit depressing, everyone dying on the news and all) and cut up, re-arrange, and totally mix it up. Then, you read sections of this mix- up to an audio recorder, at various places in the tape, back and forth. Some sentances would get overwritten. It was belived that the operator did not know exactly where the recording was going to, but at a more deeper fundamental subconcious level, you know where things were and your subconcious, trying to speak, would use your automatic hand motions and various tape effects to make new words and sentances, which would be messages of future events.
I tried 2 or 3 demos of TRV and to be honest I think I was in the wrong place and setting... I think I flopped... but I am sure that others do well. This tape recorder method really smacks of TRV to me, just a diffrent method (and without the whole subconcious code).
I'm sure that diffrent operators would give different results and messages tuned to them, so even if you used the same source information, the end result would always be tuned to what your subconcious is focused on.
He also designed a dream machine, stroboscopic treatment. If anyone has anything to say about that I'm all ears too.
So, seeing how the forum here didn't bring up any results for mr. Gysin, I thought I would give his work a space for scrutiny.
Here are some basic examples.
Amazon.com's listing Amazon.com: Break Through in Grey Room: William S. Burroughs: Music
"burroughs called the law" YouTube - "Burroughs called the law"
"The cut-ups" YouTube - William S. Burroughs & Brion Gysin, the Cut-ups (weird)
YouTube - THE CUT UPS
FLICKER - explain the dream machine YouTube - FLICKER
Cut from interview.
Q: Did you use the techniques of fold-up and cut-up for a long time before moving on to the use of the tape recorder? What were your most interesting experiences with the earlier technique?
A: The first extension of the cut-up method occurred through the use of tape recorders and this extension was introduced by Mr Brion Gysin. The simplest tape recorder cut-up is made by recording some material and then cutting in passages at random--of course the words are wiped off the tape where these cut-ins occur--and you get very interesting juxtapositions. Some of them are useful from a literary point of view and some are not. I would say that my most interesting experience with the earlier techniques was the realization that when you make cut-ups you do not get simply random juxtapositions of words, that they do mean something, and often that these meanings refer to some future event. I've made many cut-ups and then later recognized that the cut-up referred to something that I read later in a newspaper or in a book, or something that happened. To give a very simple example, I made a cut-up of something Mr Getty had written, I believe for 'Time and Tide.' The following phrase emerged: "It's a bad thing to sue your own father." About three years later his son sued him. Perhaps events are pre-written and pre-recorded and when you cut word lines the future leaks out. I have seen enough examples to convince me that the cut-ups are a basic key to the nature and function of words.
Q: For you the tape recorder is a device for breaking down the barriers which surround consciousness. How did you come to use tape recorders? What is the advantage of that technique over the fold-in cut-up technique?
A: Wel, I think that was largely the influence of Mr Brion Gysin who pointed out that the cut-up method could be carried much further on tape recorders. Of course you can do all sorts of things on tape recorders which can't be done anywhere else--effects of simultaneity, echoes, speed-ups, slow-downs, playing three tracks at once, and so forth. There are all sorts of things you can do on a tape recorder that cannot possibly be indicated on a printed page. The concept of simultaneity cannot be indicated on a printed page except very crudely through the use of columns and even so the reader must follow one column down. We're used to reading from left to right and then back, and this conditioning is not easy to break down.
A: The first extension of the cut-up method occurred through the use of tape recorders and this extension was introduced by Mr Brion Gysin. The simplest tape recorder cut-up is made by recording some material and then cutting in passages at random--of course the words are wiped off the tape where these cut-ins occur--and you get very interesting juxtapositions. Some of them are useful from a literary point of view and some are not. I would say that my most interesting experience with the earlier techniques was the realization that when you make cut-ups you do not get simply random juxtapositions of words, that they do mean something, and often that these meanings refer to some future event. I've made many cut-ups and then later recognized that the cut-up referred to something that I read later in a newspaper or in a book, or something that happened. To give a very simple example, I made a cut-up of something Mr Getty had written, I believe for 'Time and Tide.' The following phrase emerged: "It's a bad thing to sue your own father." About three years later his son sued him. Perhaps events are pre-written and pre-recorded and when you cut word lines the future leaks out. I have seen enough examples to convince me that the cut-ups are a basic key to the nature and function of words.
Q: For you the tape recorder is a device for breaking down the barriers which surround consciousness. How did you come to use tape recorders? What is the advantage of that technique over the fold-in cut-up technique?
A: Wel, I think that was largely the influence of Mr Brion Gysin who pointed out that the cut-up method could be carried much further on tape recorders. Of course you can do all sorts of things on tape recorders which can't be done anywhere else--effects of simultaneity, echoes, speed-ups, slow-downs, playing three tracks at once, and so forth. There are all sorts of things you can do on a tape recorder that cannot possibly be indicated on a printed page. The concept of simultaneity cannot be indicated on a printed page except very crudely through the use of columns and even so the reader must follow one column down. We're used to reading from left to right and then back, and this conditioning is not easy to break down.
Basically you take any media, newspapers work great (albeit a bit depressing, everyone dying on the news and all) and cut up, re-arrange, and totally mix it up. Then, you read sections of this mix- up to an audio recorder, at various places in the tape, back and forth. Some sentances would get overwritten. It was belived that the operator did not know exactly where the recording was going to, but at a more deeper fundamental subconcious level, you know where things were and your subconcious, trying to speak, would use your automatic hand motions and various tape effects to make new words and sentances, which would be messages of future events.
I tried 2 or 3 demos of TRV and to be honest I think I was in the wrong place and setting... I think I flopped... but I am sure that others do well. This tape recorder method really smacks of TRV to me, just a diffrent method (and without the whole subconcious code).
I'm sure that diffrent operators would give different results and messages tuned to them, so even if you used the same source information, the end result would always be tuned to what your subconcious is focused on.
He also designed a dream machine, stroboscopic treatment. If anyone has anything to say about that I'm all ears too.
So, seeing how the forum here didn't bring up any results for mr. Gysin, I thought I would give his work a space for scrutiny.
Here are some basic examples.
Amazon.com's listing Amazon.com: Break Through in Grey Room: William S. Burroughs: Music
"burroughs called the law" YouTube - "Burroughs called the law"
"The cut-ups" YouTube - William S. Burroughs & Brion Gysin, the Cut-ups (weird)
YouTube - THE CUT UPS
FLICKER - explain the dream machine YouTube - FLICKER