24 Hours of Radio Art with Joshua Fried

http://radiowonderland.org/serendipity/index.php
Radio Wonderland "bio"
RADIO WONDERLAND is me, Joshua Fried, performing solo live sound
processing by drumming on old shoes (I'm a drummer) and
manipulating a steering wheel (I'm a, er, wheel player). RADIO
WONDERLAND turns live commercial FM radio into recombinant
funk.

All the sounds originate from an old boombox, playing radio LIVE.
Nothing is pre-recorded; anything picked up during the performance
is fair game until the end. All the processing is by custom
software I wrote in the MaxMSP programming environment. But I
hardly touch the laptop. My controllers really are a vintage Buick
steering wheel, old shoes mounted on stands, and some gizmos.
You'll hear me build grooves, step by step, out of recognizable
radio, and even UN-wind my grooves back to the original radio
source.

I walk on with a boom box, playing FM radio LIVE. Once onstage, I
plug it into my system and start slicing up radio. I arrange those
slices both rhythmically, and, by playing them at different speeds,
melodically as well, all according to what I hear. I call this
process the RE-SHUFFLER. With another algorithm, which I call my
RE-ESSER, (studio nerds will recognize this as a joke on de-esser),
I isolate the sibilance, so I can compose on the spot with those S,
T, K, Sh, etc. sounds, just like programming a drum machine. The
ANYTHING-KICK morphs a bit of radio in the direction of a kick
drum.

The sum total is dance music. I ham it up like mad, using the
theatricality of the objects. It's great fun, and more musical than
the video suggests. Every show is rather different, naturally,
because the source material is entirely different each time.

So what's it all about? What is the art-speak that goes with RADIO
WONDERLAND? I want to show that we ALL can interrupt and
interrogate the never-ending flow of commercial media. So my
transformations, taken individually, must be clear and
simple?mostly framing, repeating and changing pitch?although when
everything is put together the whole is indeed complex. My
controllers are simple too: the wheel merely a knob to take things
up and down (frequency, tempo) or play radio loops like a
turntable, the shoes just pads I hit softer or louder. The surreal
quality of using such ordinary objects underscores the absurd
disconnect between digital controller and sound, as well as the
congenial nature of the aural transformations themselves. So, too,
my riffs must be vernacular and not elite. (We need the
funk.)


How did this all happen?

I discovered dub, punk, and Eno in 1978 and by '79 I was making
music. I soon realized that I wanted it to dance.

1980s:
Performed as my own-person--uh, that's one-person--dub band at
clubs such as The Pyramid, Danceteria, Mudd Club, Irving Plaza,
Limelight, Tunnel, Limbo Lounge, while still collaborating with
choreographers and performance artists including the great Iris
Rose and Watchface.

Did remix work for Chaka Khan, Ofra Haza and They Might Be
Giants.

Had a record deal with Atlantic, releasing "Jimmy Because" produced
by Joe Mardin and Arif Mardin (Chaka Kahn, Nora Jones, Bee Gees,
David Bowie, Bette Midler, Aretha Franklin).

1990s:
Skewed meself towards the concert hall and theater, doing Bang On A
Can, Lincoln Center, The Kitchen, etc. Did a big collaboration with
the great choreographer Douglas Dunn. Had a 16 week run of a
gibberish operatic suite, Headfone Follies at HERE Arts Center.
Made this web site:

Composer Joshua

2000s:
Radio Wonderland is (slowly) born! And is my way of
Bringing It All Back Home.

Posted by Joshua Fried in Bio at 08:22