January 22, 2013 Update: I posted this back in 2010. This music-video collage is still just as impressive as the first time I had the pleasure of watching it. I'm sure there were plenty of people who missed this post the first time around, and since we're in the process of re-uploading content for the blog, I thought I would bump this post to the top of the blog so that it can be shared with an entirely different group of visitors. Unfortunately AK_Alias seems to have disappeared since then. I last heard from him back in 2010, a few months after this was posted. I have yet to see him appear on the internet under this alias. AK if you happen to see this, or anyone who knows him, please contact me.
While searching for Delia Derbyshire videos, I recently stumbled across this amazing video, "Delia Derbyshire, Loop Composer". AK_Alias is the artist behind this project. He likes to refer to his creations as 'sync|sound' music videos, stating "the audio and video are treated as a single chunk of media." Upon watching his first video, I was immediately reminded of Negativland, the infamous plunderphonics group which have made a few appearances here on Meltd0wn in the past. AKA's videos are a form of visual plunderphonics, as he cuts up various scenes, images, sounds, and samples, and then arranges them into a collage that entices both the visual and aural senses.
AKA goes on to further describe his videos as being the result of taking a hip-hop approach to music and video. This thought also crossed my mind while watching his videos, as "video scratching" is made use of in much the same way a DJ would use turntables to manipulate the sound of a vinyl record. Clips are often brought forth throughout, accompanied by music and spoken word samples, then promptly altered by being "scratched", expanded, shrunk, thrown in reverse and rearranged. Each small clips helps to build the collage, whether it is incorporated into the beat, or to introduce various sound effects.
While AKA prefers to describe his creations in a nutshell as "instrumental hip-hop using videos as samples", he doesn't spare any genre from being sucked into his cacophony of visual and aural delights. The hip-hop element is present, but it is also subtle, as AKA brings so many other elements into the fold. Classical, jazz, rock, library music, tv show clips, spoken word bits, standup comedy and many other types of samples are used extensively throughout his videos.
The subject of this video is Delia Derbyshire, a member of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop who pioneered several magnetic audio tape editing techniques. She is another artist who has appeared on Meltd0wn in the past, and her albums can be found here. I believe the footage of Derbyshire seen in this video is taken from the amazing documentary "Alchemists of Sound". Others sampled include: Tristram Cary, Milton Babbitt, Chuck D, Aretha Franklin, Dennis Chambers, Jaco Pastorius, Joy Division, James Brown, Bernard Herrmann, David Lynch, Piano Tooners, Jimmy Page, Charlie Parker, Elastica, Homer Simpson, and Richard Pryor.
I hope you enjoy AK_Alias' work. Please be sure to check out the links below to his profile and channel on Vimeo, and take the time to leave him a comment regarding his work. He is taking a break at the moment to work on other projects, but I have a feeling you will be seeing his work again on Meltd0wn in the future.
AKA goes on to further describe his videos as being the result of taking a hip-hop approach to music and video. This thought also crossed my mind while watching his videos, as "video scratching" is made use of in much the same way a DJ would use turntables to manipulate the sound of a vinyl record. Clips are often brought forth throughout, accompanied by music and spoken word samples, then promptly altered by being "scratched", expanded, shrunk, thrown in reverse and rearranged. Each small clips helps to build the collage, whether it is incorporated into the beat, or to introduce various sound effects.
While AKA prefers to describe his creations in a nutshell as "instrumental hip-hop using videos as samples", he doesn't spare any genre from being sucked into his cacophony of visual and aural delights. The hip-hop element is present, but it is also subtle, as AKA brings so many other elements into the fold. Classical, jazz, rock, library music, tv show clips, spoken word bits, standup comedy and many other types of samples are used extensively throughout his videos.
The subject of this video is Delia Derbyshire, a member of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop who pioneered several magnetic audio tape editing techniques. She is another artist who has appeared on Meltd0wn in the past, and her albums can be found here. I believe the footage of Derbyshire seen in this video is taken from the amazing documentary "Alchemists of Sound". Others sampled include: Tristram Cary, Milton Babbitt, Chuck D, Aretha Franklin, Dennis Chambers, Jaco Pastorius, Joy Division, James Brown, Bernard Herrmann, David Lynch, Piano Tooners, Jimmy Page, Charlie Parker, Elastica, Homer Simpson, and Richard Pryor.
I hope you enjoy AK_Alias' work. Please be sure to check out the links below to his profile and channel on Vimeo, and take the time to leave him a comment regarding his work. He is taking a break at the moment to work on other projects, but I have a feeling you will be seeing his work again on Meltd0wn in the future.
AKA_Alias on Vimeo:
http://vimeo.com/aka
Sync|Sound Music Channel:
http://vimeo.com/channels/syncsound
http://vimeo.com/aka
Sync|Sound Music Channel:
http://vimeo.com/channels/syncsound
With this video I plan to start sharing at least one video a month, if not more, here on Digital Meltd0wn. Some of you may remember that at one time I regularly posted videos here. It wasn't a concept that I purposely abandoned, but one that I was forced to slowly filter out as the amount of free time I had available to me dwindled to a virtually nonexistent level. I have also created a Youtube channel for Digital Meltd0wn, which you can find here: http://youtube.com/digitalmeltd0wn I haven't uploaded many videos yet, but I will host the majority of the videos featured here, as well as a few that I have yet to share. If any of you would be interested in contributing to the Digital Meltd0wn Youtube channel, please leave a comment and let me know. I'm just looking for someone who would be willing to upload a couple of videos a month.
Thank you for the video.
ReplyDeleteEspecially the first part with lady Delia at work is so inspiring.
Thx, Rob
@Rob: Thank you for the feedback Rob. It's always great to hear from people visiting here. I hope that you'll take the time to drop by Vimeo and let AK_Alias know what you think of his video also. Hopefully he'll pop in here and leave a comment also. If you would like to see the video that clip of Delia working is taken from, then go to Google Video and search for "Alchemists of Sound", which is an amazing documentary that I couldn't recomment watching highly enough. Take care.
ReplyDelete