Mysterious Wu Goo
by Von Bark
 |
The year is 1975, and the obsessive techno-nerds Wally Becker and Donny Fagin are ensconced within the womb of their recording studio, hacking out the follow-up to their latest hit album Pretzel-Logic. The sessions are humming along, they have some of their jazz-idols like saxophonist Phil Woods in to jam with them, and they are happily fiddling with the latest in state of the art multi-track recording technology. They are also ambitiously exercising their tendencies towards arcane chart arrangements with complex tonal voicings, in particular, their patented mysterious "Mu" chord, a Major (or perhaps Minor) chord with a strong 2nd over a 9th, creating an edgy tension evoking a tone cluster. more...
|
The Mysterious Wu Goo continued...
Then disaster strikes as if from the heavens, in the form of moisture. An enigmatic faulty air-conditioner or dehumidifier spews a damp lurid decadent Amazonian mist throughout the environment. Then, the sets of multitrack bed tapes begin the horrific process of "shedding": bits of iron oxide attached to the tape medium fleck away, the audio details of their recorded events literally dissipating away into mere handfuls of dust.
The mid Seventies were difficult times for the R & D departments of companies like the Ampex Tape Corporation of Opelika, Alabama. Whale Oil was one of the main ingredients in the fixative "binder" which attached the iron oxide (rust powder, actually, it never sleeps) medium which encoded the magnetic information onto the acetate stock. Global politics intervened as a gradually increasing consumer revulsion against the mass murder of Cetean Civilizations made access to the sources of this glue harder to come by. These developments left audio tape media suppliers scrambling to conjure up replacement fixative blends.
One of these enigmatic substances might have found its way into experimental batches of tape stock which eventually were used on the sessions for the album which became known as Katy-Lied, the mysterious "Grey-Goo."
Drawing by Rob Cruickshank.
This Grey Goo of three decades ago is of indeterminate compostion, although the term is generally used now to describe the theoretical concept of self-replicating molecular nano-technology which succesfully adapt to our environment to the degree that their tidal presence threatens to overwhelm all life. The term was coined by nanotech theorist Eric Drexler in his book Engines of Creation. Years later, he went on to disavow his specualtion: "I wish I had never used the term Grey Goo."
Grey Goo is an idea that many science fiction writers in the last few years have toyed with. Here is a cute little rainbow of variations:
Golden Goo: King Midas fucks up.
Black Goo: bad plague goo.
Red Goo: bad terrorist plague goo.
Khaki Goo: bad military targeted goo.
Blue Goo: nice goo designed to stop bad goo.
Pink Goo: describes human existence, which expands to fill creation.
Green Goo: designed to stop the pink goo.
Actually the concept is prefigured by many years in Kurt Vonnegut's novel Slapstick, where he describes a fragmented set of North American city-states of the formerly United States of America, reeling under the sway of Chinese gravity experiments, and also under clouds of toxic dust similar to grey goo, which actually turn out to miniaturized Chinese civilizations, shrunk down to the microscopic level.
Kurt hated Slapstick, and in an essay self-evaluating his published work he rated it as his least favourite novel (he rated a somewhat similar early novel, Cat's Cradle, as one of his favourites). His perception of this work might have been tainted by what critics slagged as a disastrous film adaptation of the book starring Lily Tomlin and Jerry Lewis (a thought which evokes the rep-cinema double-bill in a Woody Allen scene with Tess paired with Hardly Working). We haven't seen this movie, but perhaps our curiosity is now tickled. Stay tuned for updates.
This plangent thread of disavowel intones deeply throughout this narrative. Fagin and Becker of Steely Dan publically expressed grave resentments of the technical results of the Katy-Lied sessions, and have stated that they have refused to listen to the final pressing of the album to this day. In an interview for Creem Magazine at the time, they threatened to commercially market a Steely Dan Brand of "grey" dog-food.
There is no moral to this story, but if there were it might be some ironic comment about artists who declare a strident distance from specific aspects of their past work. (If Kafka had had his way, many of his masterpieces would have been consigned to the dustbin upon his death, but his executor defied his fickle wishes, to our enduring delight or perhaps at times puzzlement). Also, do not accompany pre-vocalizing infants to Chinese restautrants, or they may inadvertantly request mu goo guy pan from the menu.
"You create new life-forms, about which you know nothing at all.
Your Dr. Wu does not even know the names of the things he is creating."
- M. Crichton, Jurassic Park
Von Bark, "The Mysterious Wu Goo," first published in Grey Goo (Print Edition), Toronto, 2005. Original Artwork by R.Cruickshank. 'Streets of Toronto' adapted from photograph by K.Steele.
|
by Von Bark
- sally mckay 5-25-2006 8:21 pm
The Mysterious Wu Goo continued...
Then disaster strikes as if from the heavens, in the form of moisture. An enigmatic faulty air-conditioner or dehumidifier spews a damp lurid decadent Amazonian mist throughout the environment. Then, the sets of multitrack bed tapes begin the horrific process of "shedding": bits of iron oxide attached to the tape medium fleck away, the audio details of their recorded events literally dissipating away into mere handfuls of dust.
The mid Seventies were difficult times for the R & D departments of companies like the Ampex Tape Corporation of Opelika, Alabama. Whale Oil was one of the main ingredients in the fixative "binder" which attached the iron oxide (rust powder, actually, it never sleeps) medium which encoded the magnetic information onto the acetate stock. Global politics intervened as a gradually increasing consumer revulsion against the mass murder of Cetean Civilizations made access to the sources of this glue harder to come by. These developments left audio tape media suppliers scrambling to conjure up replacement fixative blends.
One of these enigmatic substances might have found its way into experimental batches of tape stock which eventually were used on the sessions for the album which became known as Katy-Lied, the mysterious "Grey-Goo."
Drawing by Rob Cruickshank.
This Grey Goo of three decades ago is of indeterminate compostion, although the term is generally used now to describe the theoretical concept of self-replicating molecular nano-technology which succesfully adapt to our environment to the degree that their tidal presence threatens to overwhelm all life. The term was coined by nanotech theorist Eric Drexler in his book Engines of Creation. Years later, he went on to disavow his specualtion: "I wish I had never used the term Grey Goo."
Grey Goo is an idea that many science fiction writers in the last few years have toyed with. Here is a cute little rainbow of variations: Actually the concept is prefigured by many years in Kurt Vonnegut's novel Slapstick, where he describes a fragmented set of North American city-states of the formerly United States of America, reeling under the sway of Chinese gravity experiments, and also under clouds of toxic dust similar to grey goo, which actually turn out to miniaturized Chinese civilizations, shrunk down to the microscopic level.
Kurt hated Slapstick, and in an essay self-evaluating his published work he rated it as his least favourite novel (he rated a somewhat similar early novel, Cat's Cradle, as one of his favourites). His perception of this work might have been tainted by what critics slagged as a disastrous film adaptation of the book starring Lily Tomlin and Jerry Lewis (a thought which evokes the rep-cinema double-bill in a Woody Allen scene with Tess paired with Hardly Working). We haven't seen this movie, but perhaps our curiosity is now tickled. Stay tuned for updates.
This plangent thread of disavowel intones deeply throughout this narrative. Fagin and Becker of Steely Dan publically expressed grave resentments of the technical results of the Katy-Lied sessions, and have stated that they have refused to listen to the final pressing of the album to this day. In an interview for Creem Magazine at the time, they threatened to commercially market a Steely Dan Brand of "grey" dog-food.
There is no moral to this story, but if there were it might be some ironic comment about artists who declare a strident distance from specific aspects of their past work. (If Kafka had had his way, many of his masterpieces would have been consigned to the dustbin upon his death, but his executor defied his fickle wishes, to our enduring delight or perhaps at times puzzlement). Also, do not accompany pre-vocalizing infants to Chinese restautrants, or they may inadvertantly request mu goo guy pan from the menu.
"You create new life-forms, about which you know nothing at all. Your Dr. Wu does not even know the names of the things he is creating."
- M. Crichton, Jurassic Park
Von Bark, "The Mysterious Wu Goo," first published in Grey Goo (Print Edition), Toronto, 2005. Original Artwork by R.Cruickshank. 'Streets of Toronto' adapted from photograph by K.Steele.
- sally mckay 5-25-2006 9:42 pm