What tunes or sounds conjure the strongest imagery for you?

this is a proper thread, but i'm also benefitting from it as research. i'm particularly interested in what people might visualise when they hear more abstract synthesised sounds. acid/shrooms/sleep deprivation all fair game ;)

some of the stranger stuff; bits of icancuabala got me imagining skinny beige and dull stainless steel multi-limbed creatures, a bit like dali's elephants, and some the tuss basslines i associate with bouncy and moist fibrous gristle (with fuzzbox/distortion as tiny prickly hairs on the surface that sweep up and down like goosebumping flesh).

When I listened to Aphex Twins Cliffs one night before I went to sleep, I actually imagined myself standing on a cliff up high above the water with a grey sky and a bit of sun light trying to escape through the clouds.

I never even associated the name with how I was feeling, when I woke up the next day it hit me. "Cliffs!"

Another song by Aphex Twin (can't remember the name) on 26 mixes for cash had me imagining large Mecha Bots transforming and scraping against walls while moving in a circular fashion. I'm looking for the name so I'll edit this with it when I find it.

EDIT: Yeah so it was Deep In Velvet, Aphex Twin Turnips Mix The drums make me think of the machines transforming in and out touching the edges of metal walls, making a clanging.

polynomial-c usually gets me into a trance where i imagine a fight between some norse gods in the sky

tim hecker's harmony in blue I immediately brings to mind a red flag fluttering wildly on a windy day, framed against a blue sky and dissipating contrails

ive had some great visuals listening to soisongs 'kabuki chop'. the main sound thats used in that track is awesome. i see many different textures and colors all combining into one streak to make up a giant pulsating wall of i dont know what

also, alot of times when im listening to music, in my minds eye ill be playing it to some imaginary scene from some imaginary film

I usually just visualize the artists in their studios, messing around with the gear. But I mostly have memories attached with certain songs, so I visualize that stuff too. I wish I visualized crazier stuff maybe I do and just don't realize it.

the thing about autechre is the album covers visualize the music so well that anything that might pop into my head while listening is just derivative of album art. or maybe im just not very imaginative

yeah, i was going to say that - everything but those bits of incubala for me have been similar to the gantz graf video, like erratic computerised movement.

all of them

when I listens to Paralel Suns, I imagine two suns hitting each other.

It's probaly just because of the title..

drukqs

altibzz

music for airports' first track

saw II

saw I

all of aphex' work basically

rae

corc

especially drukqs though

Aphex Twin - Selected Ambient Works 1 & 2 especially 1 as this was the soundtrack to my first lsd trip

Most of Ae lol

sister ray

For some reason, "Whistleblower" by Vladislav Delay is the album that evokes the strongest imagery to me.

phaedra - tangerine dream

also the second section of xmd5a makes me think of linedancers.

The first time I listened to Skinny Puppy (Last Rights album) I was laying on my bed in the dark and had visions for the first time! I saw a dinosaur stomping/crunching through a dark forest during one of the tracks. Dark visions throughout the album, most of which I can't remember. But it was the first time I had such vivid visions while listening to music. And I hadn't even done drugs yet!

And I agree with the Autechre comments...the album art as well as the Gantz_Graf video are perfect visualizations for the music.

  On 12/4/2009 at 2:58 PM, Berk said:

drukqs

altibzz

music for airports' first track

saw II

saw I

all of aphex' work basically

rae

corc

 

especially drukqs though

please elaborate!

  On 12/4/2009 at 8:15 PM, sidewinder said:

The first time I listened to Skinny Puppy (Last Rights album) I was laying on my bed in the dark and had visions for the first time! I saw a dinosaur stomping/crunching through a dark forest during one of the tracks. Dark visions throughout the album, most of which I can't remember. B

could this have been during the beginning part of the track Download?

lamborghini crystal makes me think of being in 1980, stoned at 4 in the morning listening to the fuzz between two A.M. stations in your car stereo, looking out at some ambiguous city; james ferraro's music overall really evokes a lot of vivid imagery for me, which is a quality i absolutely love about his music

the king tubby/jacob miller album makes me think of england in 80s ska mode, but i might be leaning towards that conclusion because of This Is England

those basement rooms in city buildings, which you can only peer into from those tiny, foot-tall windows that sit at ground level: blank dogs (only the older stuff, everything on Year One really) makes me think of the kinds of people who must live in those rooms

jandek gives me a similar feeling, but instead of a city building basement, it's a living room of a building he just moved into/occupies austerely, and it's summer and he's alone and there aren't any sounds on his rural/suburban block, it's always the mid-late 1980s

the first track on confield makes me think of isolation in an alien place, but in a melancholy kind of way—not very visual, but whatever

a lot of old synth/library music from the 60s makes me think of oskar fischinger-style abstraction mixed with oversaturated, poppy process colors and animated commercials from the 50s

alice coltrane's late chanting music makes me think of a mother figure and really immense omnipresence over some strange retro-futuristic, blade runner-esque noir future

the fourth track on the self-titled release by amon dude (a member of the finnish jam band avarus), makes me think of breaking through the fourth wall of a musical space, something i sometimes imagine in a really literal/spatial, bizaare, divide by 0 kind of way. basically, the track begins with a heavily-reverbed tone echoing out, when the entire track begins warbling, and speeds up and slows down, revealing this reverb-space to be a fragment of magnetic tape

goddammit, now that i think about it, all of these visualizations are so literal, which as a designer is really fucking disconcerting

  On 12/5/2009 at 5:47 AM, Awepittance said:

  On 12/4/2009 at 8:15 PM, sidewinder said:

The first time I listened to Skinny Puppy (Last Rights album) I was laying on my bed in the dark and had visions for the first time! I saw a dinosaur stomping/crunching through a dark forest during one of the tracks. Dark visions throughout the album, most of which I can't remember. B

 

could this have been during the beginning part of the track Download?

Just checked...and it's the right track, but it starts basically at 3:40. Anyway, just about any of their albums up to and including Last Rights is good for a serious mind-fuck if you just sit back and let it take over.

Hmm... I guess I'll make a list off the top of my head.

Autechre: Rae, Dropp, Pir, plyPhon, Slip, Piezo, Second Bad Vibel, Pencha, Parhelic Triangle, 6IE.CR, IV VV IV VV VIII, 777, Fold4, Wrap5, Tankakern, fol3, WNSN, C/Pach, LCC.

Venetian Snares: Szycag, P, Tache, Epidermis, Ion Divvy, Bent Annick, In Quod, Pouncelciot, Kétsarkú Mozgalom, CCUK, Contain, Destroy Glass Castles, Beverly's Potato Orchestra, Plunging Hornets, Calvin Kleining, Sky Painted on Car.

Richard: Lisbon Acid, Polynomial-C, Xtal, Agiesopolis, afx237v7, Ziggomatic 17, Vordhosbn, Every Day, Laughable Butane Bob, Children Talking, Arched Maid Via RDJ, Wax the Nip, Cordialatron, Fenix Funk 5, Bucephalus Bouncing Ball, Rushup I Bank 12, Omgyjya Switch7, On, Fingerbib.

Astrobotnia: Hallo, Esther Calling Jennifer.

Boards of Canada: Music is Math, Julie and Candy, Gyroscope, An Eagle Inside Your Mind, Chromakey Dreamcoat, Sherbet Head, The Smallest Weird Number, The Beach at Redpoint, A is to B as B is to C, Everything You Do Is A Balloon, Kid For Today, A Beautiful Place Out in the Country, Pete Standing Alone, Turquoise Hexagon Sun, Kaini Industries, Twoism, Nlogax, Smokes Quantity.

That's all I can be fucked to list at the moment.

People sometimes refer to certain music giving off certain colors when they listen, is this true for some of you? I visualize less abstractly I guess, mostly I'll visualize sequences of events, stories, memories... autechre though certainly forces me into more abstract imagery

  On 12/5/2009 at 8:56 AM, karmakramer said:

People sometimes refer to certain music giving off certain colors when they listen, is this true for some of you? I visualize less abstractly I guess, mostly I'll visualize sequences of events, stories, memories... autechre though certainly forces me into more abstract imagery

Isn't that Synesthesia? I could say parts sound certain colors, but that'd be basing it off the mood I associate the color with and get from the song.

I often just imagine actions with the songs, much as you said. Autechre often forces ones that are really jittered and abstract, such as rain make of a soft metal hitting rubber.

Bola: usually makes me think of Dagobah (minus Yoda). Sort of swampy, murky, misty, boggy terrain and shit.

Ochre and Freescha (mock away): high up in an atmosphere with a pink sky and wispy clouds, sort of like Bespin. Maybe Star Wars just occurs to me because I've no imagination of my own.

Aphex's On (28 Mix): Foggy, snowy frosty days, which I half remember from when I was at junior school, dunno why.

Gas (Gas album): being submerged under bright blue water with really strong currents rushing all around. I had that from a hypnogogic state when falling asleep on the bus to work one morning.

I enjoy reading through the replies in these types of threads.

A lot of BOC reminds me of my childhood (typical fanboy comment, I know..) - I had a great time in my younger years, growing up in a village, always playing outside in farm fields, making rope swings off tree branches, climbing hay bales at sunset etc.. some how my brain always seems to relate boards of canada's music with these things in the past, things that happened outside when I was a kid, mucking around all the time. Obviously these thoughts + music being related to one another becomes reinforced by the child-like samples Mike and Marcus use in their tracks. Usually happy memories come about when listening to BOC.

Ae is very different for me. Their music conjures up images of "futurism" and technology, obviously these thoughts seem to be reinforced by the fact that the majority of their discography comprises of detailed and complex musical processes. I don't "imagine" scenarios or any specific thoughts with ae's music. As a whole, I hardly have any nostalgia attached to their tracks. I often think of space when listening to Amber, probably because of the huge amount of reverb placed in some of the tracks off that album.

With Aphex, the older tracks become associated quite heavily with the past. For instance, I used to live in a seaside town as a kid, an "On" definitely brings back memories of being on a typical British beach with the stones instead of sand and the murky water, heavy winds, cloudy overcast skies. SAW2 I relate to imagery concerning life in a village when I was in my late teens, because at that time I was so obsessed with this record. Latter Aphex material consists of newer, more recent memories, perhaps nights out in towns/cities, walking back from work at night etc. I seem to associate a lot of night-life imagery to the Analords.

Just as I read through my comments, I'd say the over all imagery my mind seems shape around the music I listen to becomes immediately associated to my own experiences, and not really external, abstract thoughts or thinking up an "impossible" and unlikely scenario when listening to a hectic Confield track for example. Don't blame me, blame my cerebral cortex.

the sound of bit crushing (particularly when i first heard it in the late 90s or whenever it was) immediately conjured up visual imagery of shit from earlier acid trips where the whole of reality looked "bit crushed" by which i mean everything decaying constantly like sand sculptures in the tide (sped up) and everything becoming progressively more holey like swiss cheese or those rocks with the airholes all through them what you find up the end of your garden when your little