Spiders
I was recently asked which was my favorite Residents show.
I have always had a problem with live music because my studio world allows for delicate tuning of harmonics and tonalities. The Corpus Callosum, the connection between my left and right brain hemispheres, is very sensitive. Performance influences a completely different set of nerves as well as the psychology of hysteria. I do not have as much experience experimenting with that process simply because I can't sit in a room alone and generate it. I am a great admirer of Randy who is very intuitive with that. I am a bit of a spastic and am better directing response via mental movement than physical movement.
I can hardly deny the regenerative qualities of live music. I have seen it transform the psyche of listeners. I don't always understand the process to get there. Whereas in recordings… if one is wearing earphones, then watch out. I can wrap my fingers around his corpus and give it a tug and he won't even know what happened. I have explained that I am not a musician in a traditional sense. To me music is really all about synapse reactions. It is about transference of minor seizures from me to the listener. I can do that in recordings, assuming the listeners give permission. I cannot be certain that the tonalities are what they should be in a live environment. Instead, the phenomena of mass hysteria takes control.
But of all the tours, the one which had the best balance of corpus and hysteria? Talking Light. The reason is spiders. The music that makes the most sense to people who do not actually think about music is a march. 2/4 is the timing of walking. Centipedes would not comprehend marches at all. Talking Light did not do centipedes. It does get into spiders. The pattern of 8-leg walking.
This album goes beyond spiders, and depends on a formula for how and when a pattern repeats, or if it repeats. Our brain says, "that sound appealed to me, do it again." This album says, "Beg for it. I'm not here to press your pleasure sensors." In that way, it is more like life. In other ways, this album is completely unrelated to anything natural other than seizures. The listener is simply along for the ride.
