Reconstruction & Rhythm Science: networks and properties of remix culture Christopher Emil tobias van Veen Department of Art History and Communication Studies McGill University, Montréal December, 2004 A thesis submitted to McGill University in partial fulfillment of the requirements of the degree of Master’s of Arts. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc- sa/2.0/ca/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 559 Nathan Abbott Way, Stanford, California 94305, USA. tobias c. van Veen 2004 Acknowledgements – tobias c. van Veen Acknowledgements Kindest and deepest thanks to Will Straw, who through a mountainous workload and an ephemeral sabbatical has offered witty and patient advice as supervisor; to Abe Burmeister, for setting the record straight; to Paul D. Miller, whom without this rekonstruction would not be possible; to cato pulleyblank, for the jaune monstre; to the teachers I have known and loved from remix culture: db, Robby LuvDub, the <ST> crew, TeamLounge, HQ Communications, Colin the Mole, Fishead, technoWest and techno.ca, and all the forgotten souls; to Kieran Kealy, who mentioned one day circa 1999 that this would be an interesting thing to talk about; and finally, with respects to the Great Magnet that bends the whims of us all. 1 Index / Mixes – tobias c. van Veen Index / Mixes: Acknowledgements 1 Index/Mixes 2 Abstract 5 01 – introducing... me, myself and I: Dj Spooky and Rhythm Science 6 Suspended as particle in the sampladelic universe of remix culture: enter Dj Spooky Playing out debates on remix culture—Enter Paul D. Miller—exploring remix culture—(01) the tactile book: hole me, feel me, touch me...—material memories—Miller’s arsenal—grapheme and author (COMA)—kinedramatics and kinaesthetics—(sudden jump cut)—citation and sampling—(02) a theatre of networks: sampling Spooky’s methodology—the matter with sampling—death and vertigo of the name—sampling Spooky—flippancy—(03) confessions of a rhythm scientist—confession and invention—flesh—Endnotes. 02 – “DJ-ING IS WRITING/WRITING IS DJ-ING” 19 On the cultural effects of the digital networks and the tactics of Dj Spooky Viral language and ventriloquism—network as circuit of production of Spooky effect—deferral and binary infections—(01) The Oceanic Network and the Island of Nettime—Nettime and email as call-and-response—the digital—hauntology—the deadly return of the avant-garde (Critical Art Ensemble)—the remixed political (Derrida, Marx, Hardt and Negri)—washed ashore, sea as metaphor—conceptual cartography—virtual relays and postcards—(02) JD Marston “/” Dj Spooky (an email encounter)—flame wars—mixed (and double) responses—the NOW—advertising & the GAP—authority and responsibility—citation and context—heteronyms—(03) Aesthetic Tactics & Hungry Media—effects of omnivorous appetites—heteroglossia—re-media, re- medialization—connectivity as condition of possibility—sampling as tactic—formalization—(04) “Dj tools” (of expression and utility, a.k.a. the post-digital revolution is over)—branding the mix—the tool—phonoplay—the post-digital revolution is over (glitch music & Kim Cascone)—mathematical formalization—Endnotes. 03 – Ocean and Enclosure (Network Time Channels and Rapids) 53 On the concept of the oceanic network as apparatus for analysis and conceptual cartography (01) Prophets of Untimeliness in the Space Age—oceanic network—ideal & utopic dreams—erasure, time, space—temporal conundrums—spatial disciplines—capitalism and (neo)liberalism—questions to time—nature, in/divisibility, quantification—(02) A Revolution in the New Natural Nature Time—metaphor in philosophy (Derrida and Aristotle)—orbit & full circle—(03) “I’ve got some waterfront property for sale...” : space and time in the 21C—a priori space (Bergson and Kant)—Deleuze and the schema—reduction and mastery—immediacy and calculated returns—(04) Enclosed Ports: Oceanic Network Firewalls—elimination and production—power (Foucault)—territory (Derrida)—limits of sampling—responsibility—spatial discourse—(05) Archipelago and Island (“take me to the beach”—Sous les pavés, la plage!)—delay—spacing and 2 Index / Mixes – tobias c. van Veen temporizing—différance—deserted islands (Deleuze)—archipelagos—between Deleuze and Derrida (metaphors)—(06) Zeno did too many lines—motion to space—space to geometry—geometry to line—the one and the many—the same paradox of language—remix of Bergson on Zeno—(07) The end of the line: networks of time—polis—algebra and topology—immanence and the to-come—possibility and potential (Massumi)—the eternal return—Endnotes. 04 – Who Is Dj Spooky? 83 On the positioning of Spooky and remix culture as oceanic network to knowledge, technology, politics, art The question—the artist—sticker and ghost—textual materiality—(01) The burn-out of subculture and the spring of the post-subculturalists—CCCS subcultural studies—remix culture—ephemeral culture—differences of remix culture to post-subculture—(02) [digital signature 1] email, algorithm & database—public and private—archive and database—software and algorithm—fragmentation and narratology (Jameson)—all bytes are equal (ideal dreams)—samples and language—the virtual class (Kroker)—algorhythm— (03) [digital signature 2] characters in a novel that want to get in touch (with you)—virtual and the digital—theatre and stage—viral aspects of deconstruction—Situationism and psychogeography (Debord)—wandering and totality—(04) “There’s room for everything...” (authors & fascists)—Paul and Shipp—rules systems and responses—media and ethics (Baudrillard)—fleeing beyond good and evil—digital progress—infallible identity—(05) transgression and other misdemeanours (such as Nietzsche)—(06) a.k.a. the sample, the simulation, the concept of “art”—Stelarc and the concept (Massumi)—(07) Conceptual authority and other fractal figures of an intellectual’s property—epistemes (Foucault)—rekonstruction—the fractal (Deleuze and Guattari)—topology—Endnotes. 05 – The New Griots: Concept and Art in Dj Spooky 114 On Dj Spooky as simulated conceptual art and advertising Double consciousness—multiplex consciousness and advertising—(01) sampling the image of conceptual art: rhythm scientist—1960’s conceptual art—art as idea as idea—art as commodity—(political) paradoxes of conceptual art—1980’s conceptual art (Baudrillard)—Image as point of network density—conceptual investment as tactic—(02) critique of the malleable function of aesthetics: consumerism and concept—function, memory, narrative—(03) the New Griots: malleable narratology (the logic of recursive storytelling)—density—new griot as advertisement—the function of the idea—the idea of the proper name—reciprocal feedback—the posthuman—density of the designated driver— (04) Advertising as idea of advertising: Rhythm Science as advert—disappearance—paragraph stickers—Condensation: Code is Beats is Rhythm—Endnotes. 06 – the idiot & the zombie (incorporations) 126 On the fractal “I” of Dj Spooky as formalization of network and digital in/divisibility The idiot and the zombie—multiplex consciousness and posthumanity—the work of mourning (Derrida, Abraham, Torok)—cryptomimesis (Castricano)—object and mirror—dancing idiots—the receding virtual—the crypt and the void—Endnotes. 3 Index / Mixes – tobias c. van Veen 07 – the chameleon and the capitalist chimera 131 On the remix artist as chameleon in the heart of capitalism Surface and appearance—transformation of the addressee—chameleon resistance (Wetterwald)—C.R.E.A.M.—on the surface of Deleuze and Derrida—a utopia of their own—the hashasheen—camoflauge—Endnotes. 08 – Rekonstruction 138 On writing and analysing the processes of remix culture (conclusion) Rekonstruction track—plays on the letter “k”—expand—dictionary definitions—Destruktion (Heidegger)—destruction to de-construction—rebuilding the undeconstructible—ex- appropriation and expropriation—the new academic taste-makers—ex- and event—the surface—Endnotes. Works Cited 147 4 Abstract Abstract The following thesis explores the conditions of possibility for remix culture through the work of Paul D. Miller, a.k.a. Dj Spooky that Subliminal Kid. Beginning with the impact and vertigo of Dj Spooky’s language and practice, it explores the reciprocal relation of media to language in the construction of the proper (property) and the author (authority). The context of Dj Spooky as a conceptual artist and the material of his book, Rhythm Science, provides the setting and scenario for extended readings of the paradoxes and cultural effects of remix culture, including the relation of writing to djing, practices of incorporative media, tactics of digital email, combat over copyright, and the sampling of the archive. The formalization of these effects is outlined by writing in-between the theories of Gilles Deleuze and Jacques Derrida. This formalization signals the advent of the network over the territory, the form over the content, the formal over the expressive (while nonetheless recognising the distinction, persistence and difference of these terms). It argues that remix culture regenerates and redefines the parameters of the author and the proper through technological and political forces that nonetheless retain their structures of power. The conduit and context of this formal, paradoxical transformation are the cultural forces of global and digital networks, which is here defined as the “oceanic network.” The oceanic network is elaborated in the ways it fundamentally shifts the