The last days of Radio Eris

Radio Eris is still burbling away, but it will shut down for good at midnight on Friday.

If you're not familiar with Radio Eris, it's an algorithmically generated audio stream that takes a bank of samples and the text of KLF: Chaos Magic Music Money, and generates a mix of synthetic readings and cut-up soundscapes as it sees fit. It was built by the artist Shardcore, who talks about it here.

If you are familiar with Radio Eris, then you might like to see what it physically looks like.





As you can see, Radio Eris is running on a cronky old 2006 MacBook sitting on a windowsill in Shardcore's home. The stream, therefore, is entirely dependent on this laptop not being knocked to the ground by the cats that prowl around his house, and its continuing ability to broadcast is very much dependent on the whims of fate.

The existence of Radio Eris has been described as a "bloody clever" and the "best book promo in a long while" which demonstrates a "clear understanding of viral marketing and the target audience." This is all very nice but it is more truthfully the result of a purely reactive marketing non-strategy that consists of saying yes to most things, and very little else. Using this method, it is not necessary to go out and proactively pitch the book to all suitable magazines and blogs. Instead, you go to the pub and, when an artist asks if they can build an algorithmic radio stream based on the book, you respond "Sure," and the next thing you know thousands of people have heard of your book.

Followers of the Church of the Subgenius will recognise this approach as 'Slack,' and it is very effective.

There's been a lovely unpredictable air to the whole thing. People and blogs we thought would love it have paid it no mind, whereas others who we never dreamt would mention it have plugged it like crazy. Even the broadcast itself, which is entirely automated, has been constantly surprisingly. It has refused to pronounce the Discordian word 'catma', for example, and instead replaced it with a barely audible grunt as if to suggest that a catma was a fnord. What's that about? The damn thing acts like it's got a mind of its own.

I highly recommend that you explore the other work of Shardcore, for he has created many strange and memorable things. I personally enjoy the flashing eyes in this portrait of Aleister Crowley:



And enjoy the last few days of Radio Eris, for none of us can say exactly what they will bring.

Comments

  1. Nice video and version of the song too.

    Ozzie's knowledge of Crowley seems to have been limited. This is Zakk Wylde one of his guitarists:

    "...A while back, Ozzy comes into my studio and he sees these posters on the wall...Then he looks up at this poster I have on the wall of Aleister Crowley, and he goes, “Zakk[assuming Ozzy's voice], who’s the f***ing bald-headed c**t on the wall?” And I’m just f***ing cracking up. So Ozzy says, “What the f**’s so funny?” And I said, “Dude, you don’t know who that is?” Ozzy goes, “Why the f*** should I know who he is? Who the f*** is it?” So I said, “Ozzy, you’ve only been singing about him for the last 30 f***ing years! It’s Aleister Crowley, bro!” There’s a pause, then Ozzy says, “Oh, is that what he looks like?” I kid you not, brother."

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    Replies
    1. Ha! That's great. I can't say I'm that surprised, though. Knowing Ozzy, he could as easily see a picture of Iron Man and say the same.

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    2. Ozzzie doesn't come across aa very bright! It was still rather a good song, at least capturing what a popular idea of what Crowley was like. I expect he would be baffled to find himself the subject of so many heavy metal/speed metal songs. Some people trace that back to the the underrated Graham Bond.

      Coph Nia did a good cover:

      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78xQgJTxqdY

      He even tried to pronounced Crowley properly.

      Delete
    3. Ozzzie doesn't come across aa very bright! It was still rather a good song, at least capturing what a popular idea of what Crowley was like. I expect he would be baffled to find himself the subject of so many heavy metal/speed metal songs. Some people trace that back to the the underrated Graham Bond.

      Coph Nia did a good cover:

      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78xQgJTxqdY

      He even tried to pronounced Crowley properly.

      Delete
  2. This is fascinating, because I have a band named Radio Eris, and I just got interested in Drummond in the last year. I'll push this around and see if we can drive you some listeners by Friday. I wanna read your book.

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    Replies
    1. Oh yeah, if you're calling yourself Radio Eris, you should definitely read it...

      Delete

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