Conformity Cult

      This is kinda like an announcement to an announcement. In 2021 I will be launching Atrocious Records. This is in a way a life long passion project of mine. I originally started the label back in 2007, but quickly began overworking myself with to many releases. The plan this time around is to keep things a little more under control. I am giving myself a few months lead time to both prepare first releases and future releases after that. My initial plan is to release my own music, with no restrictions.      While the full roll out isn't expected until February 2021, the website has already been launched ( www.atrociousrecords.com ) and there you can find a sign up for the mailing list. Everyone that signs up will be among the first to know about the official launch!     Excited for the future. Now its time to get started on making some noise!

1. Search for bulk cassette buys at garage sales, online and at thrift stores. When buying tapes individually try to look for tapes that have screws. 2. Rewind and di sassemble your cassettes. Save all the screws, wheels (check for metal brackets), and plastic side pieces. You also want to save the felt pads if they are in good condition, some are old and covered in crap. I like to keep all of these pieces in separate containers for easy future access.  3. Cut the tape at the leader. Save these pieces still attached to the wheel. You can quickly attach these to new pieces of cassette tape later on.  4. Clean the cassette shells completely, you can use a magic eraser sponge to easily remove writing on the shells. I like to wash the shells inside and out with hot water and soap before drying them or stacking them to dry. 5. (Optional) Paint the shells! If you do this you will want to tape off the clear windows on the tapes; if painting a clear tape I recommend taping a small win...

Some on the shells I painted recently           A little over a year ago, while in the midst of watching videos about circuit bending, I remember seeing the famous Amulets video about making tape loops and my focus started to shift. My thrift store runs and garage sale weekends were starting to including me looking for tape players. I started looking for bulk tape buys on eBay and one day came across a box of about 50 cassettes that came in 2 packs for $20. From there I started messing around with loops a little bit, but was never fully happy with my results for the amount of time and effort put in so the loop making started to fade out. Some tapes from my original eBay purchase      Flash forward to today and something has fully reignited my interest in cassette tapes and loops. I’ve had some recording ideas but I've also had allot of ideas on recycling old cassettes into brand new works, more than loops. Not as in using old recorded tape, ...

     In a growing attempt to both make “music” and “art” that are my own, I’ve started working on these new sound monstrosities I call “Conformity Boxes”. The first is done (except for needing some paint in the future) and I will be making a demo video over the next few days to show off some of its noises and possibly making some samples available!

     Around the summer of 2019 I was asked by some friends if I wanted to join a, I guess “Noise Rock” would be the best genre, band they were working on. I was excited by the idea, having made some ambient and noise music in the past, and got to work on a set up. They said they wanted me to be in charge of the noise, so my original idea started to look something like this:  A mixer, some iPads, an old phone and my laptop. I always knew I wanted to incorporate the tape recorders into the set up to but I did t know how          After having an idea of what was going to be included in the set up, I knew I needed a portable “Station”. So I started to look at the scraps of wood around my house and came up with the outline of the original deign:      While it was coming together I knew this wasn't quite enough, so I got to work making a design with two main requirements in mind. 1. I wanted a shelf jus...