Re: lo tech delays

[Richard Zvonar <zvonar@zvonar.com>]

At 2:23 PM -0800 2/9/01, Alex Stahl wrote:

>A not uncommon problem with the cheap reel-to-reel decks I used to 
>own for this purpose was slight differences in tape speed. As a 
>result, the tape could get progressively tighter, knocking over the 
>coke bottles or whatever, or looser, until it unthreaded itself. 
>This was troublesome but on the other hand, it caused a slight pitch 
>shift in the regeneration loop which can be interesting.

Part of the "art" of the practice was knowing what


>My friend Bob Ostertag dealt with this issue in an amusing way: he 
>used helium balloons as tape guides. The tape between the two decks 
>ran through a loop tied in the string on a big balloon. The play 
>deck ran slow, so the balloon gradually rose up into the air as more 
>and more tape fell slack between the machines.

Brilliant!

This reminds me in turn of a conceptual/performance tape piece by one 
of my students at UCSD. The piece was an expression of some 
jilted-lover hostility and I believe the tape part contained the 
voice of his ex. The single tape deck was elevated several feet above 
a table. There was no takeup reel, and the tape spilled down onto the 
table where a two or three people performed a variety of destructive 
acts on it (painting, scratching, and finally cutting). At the end of 
the table the ravaged bits of tape spilled into a trash bit.
-- 

______________________________________________________________
Richard Zvonar, PhD                     zvonar@zvonar.com
(818) 788-2202 voice                    zvonar@LCSaudio.com
(818) 788-2203 fax                      zvonar@well.com

                 http://www.zvonar.com