reekloose

oblique strategy: 06.14.2010, by Brian Eno & collaborators. Desktop screenshots: Oblique Strategy Toolkit/Daily sampler.

There are close to two hundred examples in all, and a person reading this may opt to make their own makeshift version of the Oblique Strategies deck by purchasing some index cards and writing the following down by hand. Adding to or removing them as one so desires.

“These cards evolved from separate observations of the principles underlying what we were doing. Sometimes they were recognized in retrospect (intellect catching up with intuition), sometimes they were identified as they were happening, sometimes they were formulated. They can be used as a pack, or by drawing a single card from the shuffled pack when a dilemma occurs in a working situation. In this case the card is trusted even if its appropriateness is quite unclear…”

• What is the reality of the situation?
• Pay attention to distractions
• Imagine the music as a set of disconnected events.
• Destroy nothing; Destroy the most important thing.
• Find a safe part and use it as an anchor.
• Would anybody want it?
• Spectrum analysis
• Bridges -build -burn
• It is simply a matter of work.
• Emphasize differences
• Only one element of each kind
• Disciplined self-indulgence
• Cascades
• Do the washing up
• Emphasize the flaws
• It is quite possible (after all)
• Always the first steps
• Call your mother and ask her what to do.
• How would someone else do it?
• Remove specifics and convert to ambiguities.
• Your mistake was a hidden intention.
• Do nothing for as long as possible.
• What do you do? Now, what do you do best?
• Picture of a man spotlighted
• What wouldn’t you do?
• Remove ambiguities and convert to specifics.
• Remove the middle, extend the edges.
• Shut the door and listen from outside.
• Use ‘unqualified’ people
• When is it for?
• Honor thy error as a hidden intention.
• Do something sudden, destructive and unpredictable.
• Adding on
• Allow an easement (an easement is the abandonment of a stricture)
• State the problem in words as simply as possible.
• Water
• Reverse
• How would you explain this to your parents?
• What were the branch points in the evolution of this entity
• Magnify the most difficult details.
• Move towards the unimportant.
• Short circuit (example; a man eating peas with the idea that they will improve his virility shovels them straight into his lap)
• Take away as much mystery as possible. • What is left?
• Balance the consistency principle with the inconsistency principle.
• Humanize something that is free of error.
• Take away the important parts
• Is the intonation correct?
• Do something boring
• First work alone, then work in unusual pairs. (8 September)
• Slow preparation, fast execution
• Display your talent
• What were the branch points in the evolution of this entity
• List the qualities it has. List those you’d like. (9 August)
• Destroy -nothing -the most important thing
• Abandon normal instruments
• Work at a different speed
• Who would make this really successful?
• The most easily forgotten thing is the most important
• Instead of changing the thing, change the world around it.
• Use filters
• Do the last thing first
• Tape your mouth.
• What would make this really successful?
• Make a blank valuable by putting it in an exquisite frame
• Imagine the piece as a set of disconnected events
• A very small object -Its centre
• Be dirty
• What are you really thinking about just now? Incorporate
• Simple Subtraction
• Make an exhaustive list of everything you might do and do the last thing on the list
• Faced with a choice, do both
• Think of the radio
• Put in earplugs
• Accretion
• Only a part, not the whole
• Make what’s perfect more human
• Look closely at the most embarrassing details and amplify.
• The tape is now the music
•Abandon normal instructions
• Just carry on
• Give the game away
• Use an old idea
• Remove a restriction
• First work alone, then work in unusual pairs.
• From nothing to more than nothing
• Use fewer notes
• Discover the recipes you are using and abandon them
• Revaluation (a warm feeling)
• Is something missing?
• Tidy up
• Remove ambiguities and convert to specifics
• Fill every beat with something
• Children -speaking -singing
• Ask your body
• Ask people to work against their better judgment.
• Mechanize something idiosyncratic
• Describe the landscape in which this belongs.
• Use cliches
• Feed the recording back out of the medium
• Are there sections? Consider transitions.
• What mistakes did you make last time?
• Convert a melodic element into a rhythmic element
• Is it finished?
• Take away the elements in order of apparent non-importance
• Remember those quiet evenings
• Use an unacceptable color.
• Fill every beat with something.
• Consider different fading systems
• Is the tuning intonation correct?
• Emphasize repetitions
• Don’t break the silence
• Don’t be afraid of things because they’re easy to do
• Look at a very small object, look at its centre
• Infinitesimal gradations
• Don’t avoid what is easy
• What most recently impressed you? How is it similar? What can you learn from it? What could you take from it?
• Change specifics to ambiguities
• What to increase? What to reduce? What to maintain?
• Change nothing and continue with immaculate consistency
• Be less critical more often
• Go outside. Shut the door.
• Disconnect from desire
• From the introduction to the 2001 edition:
• Don’t be frightened of cliches
• What most recently impressed you? How is it similar? What can you learn from it? What could you take from it?
• What are the sections sections of? Imagine a caterpillar moving
•( Picture of man spotlighted)
• Not building a wall; making a brick
• Left channel, right channel, centre channel
• Discover your formulas and abandon them
• Steal a solution.
• Listen to the quiet voice
• Use an unacceptable color
• Think - inside the work -outside the work
• Which parts can be grouped?
• Give way to your worst impulse
• Is the tuning appropriate?
• Always give yourself credit for having more than personality.
• How would you have done it?
• Remember quiet evenings
• Work at a different speed
• Accept advice
• You are an engineer
• Imagine the music as a moving chain or caterpillar
• Change ambiguities to specifics
• Assemble some of the elements in a group and treat the group
• Look at the order in which you do things
• Always give yourself credit for having more than personality
• Openly resist change
• Is the style right?
• Don’t stress one thing more than another.
• When is it for? Who is it for?
• Use “unqualified” people.
• Change instrument roles
• Turn it upside down
• Define an area as `safe’ and use it as an anchor
• Describe the landscape in which this belongs.
• Feedback recordings into an acoustic situation
• In total darkness, or in a very large room, very quietly
• (Organic) machinery
• Assemble some of the instruments in a group and treat the group
• Take a break
• Towards the insignificant
• Ghost echoes
• Cut a vital connection
• What do you do? Now, what do you do best?
• Overtly resist change
• Always first steps
• What is the simplest solution?
• Use something nearby as a model
• Lowest common denominator check -single beat -single note -single riff
• Question the heroic approach
• Lost in useless territory
• Once the search has begun, something will be found
• Voice your suspicions
• Be extravagant
• What context would look right?
• What to increase? What to reduce?
• Try faking it (from Stewart Brand)
• Describe the landscape in which this belongs.
• Consult other sources -promising -unpromising
• Make a sudden, destructive unpredictable action; incorporate
• Faced with a choice, do both.
• Question the heroic
• Retrace your steps
• Honor thy error as a hidden intention
• Distorting time
• Emphasize repetitions
• What else is this like?
• You don’t have to be ashamed of using your own ideas
• Go to an extreme, move back to a more comfortable place
• Back up a few steps. What else could you have done? (20 August)
• Twist the spine
• Is there something missing?
• Cluster analysis
• Simple subtraction
• Consider transitions
• Decorate, decorate
• Emphasize differences
• State the problem as clearly as possible
• Take away as much mystery as possible. What is left?
• You can only make one dot at a time
• Listen in total darkness, or in a very large room, very quietly
• Don’t stress one thing more than another
• Not building a wall but making a brick
• Idiot glee (?)
• Discard an axiom
• A line has two sides
• Go slowly all the way round the outside
• Into the impossible
• Do the words need changing?
• Simply a matter of work
• The inconsistency principle
• Intentions -nobility of -humility of -credibility of
• What were you really thinking about just now?
• Courage!
• Breathe more deeply
• What would your closest friend do?
• Define an area as ‘safe’ and use it as an anchor
• Make it more sensual
• The most important thing is the thing most easily forgotten
• Trust in the you of now
• List the qualities it has. List those you’d like.
• Get your neck massaged
• Use your own ideas
• Would anyone want it?
• What else is this like?
• Don’t be frightened to display your talents
• Don’t stress *on* thing more than another (sic)
• Distort time
• Lowest common denominator
• Faced with a choice, do both (from Dieter Rot)
• Be less critical
• Ask people to work against their better judgement
• Remember .those quiet evenings
• Children’s voices -speaking -singing
• State the problem in words as clearly as possible.
• Imagine the music as a series of disconnected events
• Abandon desire
• Mute and continue
• Tape your mouth
• Emphasise the flaws
• Remove specifics; convert to ambiguities
• Go to an extreme, come part way back
• Only one element of each kind.
• Where is the edge?
• Intentions -credibility of -nobility of -humility of
• Who would make this really successful?
• Do we need holes?
• Are there sections? Consider transitions
• Instead of changing the thing, change the world around it.
• What were you really thinking about just now? Incorporate
• Back up a few steps. What else could you have done?
• Change nothing and continue consistently
• Repetition is a form of change