We now begin the final countdown of clinical trial listening sessions. I’m really not happy about that. Monday I shall put my best begging shoes on and attempt to at least find out how to get the lighting equipment for myself. I’ve seen several other options, which I believe I’ve mentioned, but none of them can be controlled by a music input. Also, I really don’t know what kind of light this is! I’ve seen LED lights, and 40hz lights in white, red and green all of which claim to stimulate brain function just by their own flickering. Perhaps the novel part of this trial is that nobody is doing the combined music/light stimulation and that these lights are custom made for the trial - and are in fact the “unknown” drug. If that’s the case, I’ll have no luck at all, and will try some other way to make it work. I did see a version of the light helmet that actually has a nodule that goes up the nose because they claim it’s the quickest route for light to hit the brain. Not sure I’m ready for that yet! (And yes, it does come with antiseptic pads to clean it after each use!)
Day 6:
Today, I deviated from the routine that has become normal for me, and didn’t do my music/lights program until evening. In keeping with the pledge from last post, I continued on with my exploration of Zen Funk with music by the grand master himself, Nik Bärtsch, with his band Ronin. I chose to listen to an early offering of theirs called Rea from 2004. The highlight of this listen for me today was the second track - Modul 22 (All of Nik’s compositions are Moduls, and all numbered.) Modul 22 starts with a period of steady quiet beats on a cymbal of some sort. I tried counting, and I believe it was in 4, with repeating groups of 8. About a minute in, (more or less) the piano, drums, bass and percussion kick in - each one presenting in a different meter. The light started to pulse madly. By the middle of the track, the Saxophone has joined in and you realize that each instrument is being used as a percussive. The melody doesn’t arrive until the song is nearly over, but in reality, the percussive elements have created a melody all on their own. You’ll find this music filed in the Jazz section, but I don’t get a sense of any improvisation - which is a hallmark of jazz to me. That’s one of the reasons I hate the entire concept of genre in music. I’ve seen Nik play live three times now, and each has been an amazing experience - from a castle on the shore of Lake Geneva to a small club in Zurich to a sardine can packed room in Boston. The music transports you right onto the stage. This is super engaging stuff that is not meant for the background at all. But for mind/light stimulation, I can think of nothing better.
Day 7:
Stephan Thelen, if you remember, is the wizard behind Fractal Sextet and Sonar. He also has a slew of albums under his own name on various record labels, which you can find here. This morning, I started with the MoonJune records release Fractal Guitar Remixes Including Urban Nightscape (Bill Laswell Remix) - Which is a shortened version of the one currently available on Bandcamp. These remixes, of course, are from the album Fractal Guitar, also on MoonJune. I listened to the original cuts while writing (but not with the lights running) in order to get a sense of what the remix entailed. It’s very hard for me to do this, I’ll have to say, because my short-term memory is so shot that now, 30 minutes after listening to the remix album, I really can’t concretely talk about what I heard. It’s very distressing, and I probably won’t do this again. For now, I’ll say that these are completely in your face guitar based albums - still within the polyrhythmic world I’ve been exploring, but the farthest thing from Zen-Funk I can imagine. This is driving, sometimes nightmarish, music. Look at the song titles. This ain’t stuff designed for an ashram, my friends. Nonetheless, it’s astoundingly complex music, and was a great complement to the gamma lighting in an otherwise darkened room. Both the original album and the associated remixes are dark. Fuzzed guitars, throbbing bass and pounding drums. I’d take these albums out on my viking dance party - mentioned in the sanscreed kanon review from last post. While not at all similar, they come from the same conception of mathematical possibility in dark music.
Day 8:
Today I mixed it up and listened to two different albums - at least in part. The first was Part 52 by Kaspar Rast - the drummer behind many of the Zen Funk albums. The second was Solo, by Nocolas Stocker - the percussion player in the same gang. Both of these are interesting in that they seemingly approach time from a very different perspective. Rast includes a lot of space. If you picture, in your head, a typical drum solo, it’s often bombastic and filled with cymbal crashes and pounding beats across myriad tom-toms. This is, while by no means at all simplistic, a quiet album, far more devoted to the odd meter and time. Ultimately, it’s an academic exercise - interesting to hear, but not something that will bring return listens. Stocker plays a percussion kit, with tuned instruments, bells, cymbals, etc. While the timekeeping was similar - intricate and detailed, there was a lot more going on to hear. A more explosive album. Both albums did their job in keeping me occupied while attempting to count along. Neither album did much to excite me in the long run. I was hoping for more.
Day 9:
Tomorrow I return the lighting gear and officially leave the trial. I’m sad about that. I’ve also got several other frustrations brewing in my life that colored this final experience. Today I played the completely solo album by bassist and multi instrumentalist Jeremias Keller called Alloy. Alloy is based on significantly reworked moduls by Nik Bärtsch. Keller is the current bass player in Ronin, which brings it all full circle! While the original modules are more sparse in nature, these are full of sound. Keller plays many instruments on each track - this is a studio project - and is seemingly not interested in space as an instrument to be explored. (If you want to listen to a record that uses space perfectly in context, please try out the absolutely brilliant self titled album by Mark Hollis - which is too beatless to have made the playlist for the lights. This album and the final two records by his band Talk Talk remain consistently in my top 10 all time favorites.) Back to Keller, though… This is a good album, and I would purchase more by him - but mostly because I’m a compulsive completist. My overall reflection on this Zen Funk project is that the big names - Bärtsch, Thelen and Li have created the most consistently engaging music, so stick there, unless you’re like me and need it all - even if you never really listen to it!
Day 10:
No music and lights today. I drove to Boston to have the final day of my clinical trial. An ugly drive on an ugly slushy day. Minor traffic in the usual places on the pike and a complete mis-direct from Waze in Boston that caused me to be stuck behind a stalled city bus. Got there in time though, so no big issues. The best news of the day is that they told me I could keep the light gear. I didn’t even have to beg. I couldn’t be happier about that. No more searching for a replacement necessary. The bad news is that for some reason they couldn’t do the MRI, and I have to go back for that. I did find out that the bad music played during the MRI that I mentioned in an older post was bad on purpose. Some sort of psychological test. At least I understand that choice now. I still had to listen to Graceland during the EEG though. So, I go back on Friday to complete the MRI (and try the blood draw again).
On the flip side, I had such a negative experience with my Neurologist that I am going to change providers. No matter how long it takes to get in to see a new one. I need a letter written detailing my diagnosis and prognosis. The letter needs to be both factual and detailed. 5 questions. My Neurologist “offered” to do that for me for the sum of $1,000. But insisted that we still consider him a partner in my care. What kind of everloving bullshit is that? How did our medical system devolve to such a state? Where is the humanity in a charge like this? This type of letter seems like it should be a normal thing not a grudging thousand dollar task. I just fail to understand…
Thanks for reading,
Dy
Sweetie, your details about music and the listening experience are profound and deep. I've always known how personal music was for you, but I never grasped this depth until reading your offerings here. I'd like to listen to some of these with you during our next Scrabble game or while we are sitting in front of the fire. I need to fully immerse myself in this...you are inspiring. How lucky am I to live in this world at your side? Oh, and your neurologist is a dick.
Congrats on the lighting gear! I would like to see it in action some time. And thanks for the music. We have been enjoying sampling some of your recommendations.