Name: Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird (Wallace Stevens; L Loops) by Sad Iron in Alphabet Loops
Duration: 5 min 1 s
Description: On Wallace Steven's 'Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird'

This album is a constraint-driven experiment infuenced by the French movement known as "Oulipo," which seeks to create works of art while operating under self-enforced constraints (like writing an entire novel and not using the letter "e").

How does that work in this playlist? 

1. This playlist consists of 26 songs, one for each letter of the English alphabet

2.. All songs were made in GarageBand; therefore, each song could only use loops that started with the same, single letter of the alphabet. For example, "Susie Asado" only uses loops whose name begin with the letter "Q." The loops for "Cut" could only use loops that begin with the letter "c." Etc.

3. One exception: there are no loops in GarageBand that begin with the letter "x." To accommodate the letter "x," which is the poem "She Had Some Horses" by Joy Harjo, I selected loops where the first or second word of the loop name included the letter "x," for example "Vortex Beat." I did not count common GarageBand designations such as "mix," "vox," or "FX" as available for use. The "x" had to be present in an uncommon word in the loop title.

4. Each song had to use the words of a published poem for its lyrics. In almost all cases, I selected poems and/or poets that would be immediately recognizable (or canonical) by most people familiar with western poetry. And just because I created this playlist, I used one of my own poems, "Liketown," which only uses loops that start with "a."

5. All of the voices in the songs had to be created by AI (artificial intelligence/algorithms)and be alterable (pitch, speed, style, etc.). All of the voices in the songs were created using murf.ai. Note: There are four exceptions where I used original audio of the poet reading, as they are electronic versions of analog audio recordings--Sylvia Plath, Gwendolyn Brooks, Adrienne Rich, and Lucille Clifton. Also, their voices were too good and musical not to use. (Check out Lucille Clifton.)

6. The artwork for each song had to be generated by an AI image maker. The image for each song was produced by Midjourney, where I used the full (of sometimes partial)text of each poem as the prompt to generate the images. Note: The image that represents the playlist as a whole was generated in Midjourney using lines from Eliot's "Prufrock," specifically, "I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled." Why the algorithm produced this particular image, I do not know.

7. Some of the songs also deviate from the additional text. Any deviations (other than song choruses) were generated by AI (I used "WriteSonic AI Writer"). In these instances, I entered the beginnings of the original poems (including my own)and asked WriteSonic to generate the rest. The best, and most easily recognizable example is Robert Frost's "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening."

8. The playlist had to be spread out as evenly as possible in terms of "beats per minute." There is one song in the 70's range, as well as one topping 130, and those single songs are the margins of where I am comfortable. The breakdown for this playlist's bpm is: 

71-79 bpm: 1 poem
80-89 bpm: 4 poems
90-99 bpm: 5 poems
100-110 bpm: 5 poems
111-119 bpm: 6 poems
120-129 bpm: 4 poems
130-139: 1 poem

9. Because I did all of this on my laptop, the playlist is organized by the left to right order designated by the "qwerty" keyboard.

So there you have it. A weird, musical experiment that was meant to set poety to music, operate under constraint as a condition of creation, and to produce in each instance some form of human and AI collaboration. A lot of beauty in the world in produced under constraint, so I thought I would honor that mode of creation.

for Doug Jankowski, do not go gentle, my friend

--Chuck Rybak

Alphabet Loops

Hope is the Thing with Feathers (Emily Dickinson; E Loops)

On Wallace Steven's 'Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird'

Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird (Wallace Stevens; L Loops)

A musical reading of Theodore Roethke's 'My Papa's Waltz.' Includes a sample from the brilliant Bill Evans's 'Waltz for Debbie.'

My Papa's Waltz (Theodore Roethke; W Loops)

Gertrude Stein's "Susie Asado" to a beat.

Susie Asado (Gertrude Stein; Q Loops)

The Raven (Edgar Allen Poe; R Loops)

Pretty sure most people know "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night" by Dylan Thomas. This is the last track of this project, and given the theme of the poem, it calls for a last surge of energy.

Contains a brief sample from Rage Against the Machine's 'Killing in the Name Of."

Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night (Dylan Thomas; T Loops)

Rocco Magone - Dragon Smoke [Official Audio]

Listen now - https://lnkfi.re/roccomagonedragonsmoke

Follow Rocco Magone
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/roccomagoneofficial/
Facebook - https://m.facebook.com/roccomagoneofficial/
Soundcloud - https://soundcloud.com/roccomagone
Twitter - https://mobile.twitter.com/roccomagone
TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@roccomagone


Music Video by Rocco Magone performing Dragon Smoke. (C) 2023 Greatness Pictures

Dragon Smoke - Single

Rocco Magone - Dragon Smoke [Official Audio]

"You're no daisy"
A tribute to Doc Holliday

No Daisy

Angels Rave - Valentino

Outcast

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4E91iv6ciiQBtsyQaprtug

Paradise

YouTube

Eco Punk / Waste of Time feat Christian Diana and Frank Zozky (Geoffrey SmartPunk Remix in B Key 170bpm)

Original soundtrack ("Eco Punk"): Geoffrey SmartPunk
Bass & Guitar: Geoffrey SmartPunk
Vocals: Christian Diana and Frank Zozky ("Waste of Time") - Check @frank-zozky on Soundcloud

Waste of Time (ft. Christian Diana and Frank Zozky)

songs used:
   EIN MUSIC - EIN RAP - ORO CIOK
       https://soundcloud.com/ema-music-122843576/ein-rap-oro-ciok
   EIN MUSIC soundcloud:
       https://soundcloud.com/ema-music-122843576
   EIN MUSIC youtube:
       https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0ZUmjWH2LA1M-kx0_hcXkg
    
   Power Death Panther Claw - School Is Out Forever
       https://soundcloud.com/powerdeath/amok-d22
   Power Death Panther Claw soundcloud:
       https://soundcloud.com/powerdeath

EIN MUSIC & Power Death Panther Claw - ORO CIOK (dj baubau remix)

If You Want

written and recorded july 2012 by andrew salvner
music on cassette 4-track (2 bass lines, and a fast drum loop off my cheap ass digitech bass pedal)
vocals via audacity

a n o t h e r _  s h o r t _  s t o r y :
You get pushed in a puddle and laughed at.  You run home sad, with wet pants and get your sweet ninja weapons from under your bed.  You hide outside the jerk's house waiting for them, but they don't come home that night, nor early the next day. you stay hidden. waiting...trying to stay awake. When they finally return, you jump out and unleash some quality nerdrage upon the offenders.

t h e m _  w o r d s :
hiding round the corner with my 'chucks and throwing stars
watching you and your friends climbing out your cars
‘cause i’ve been waiting for you..........for like a day or two

see me running towards you spinning 'chucks and tossing stars
watching as your friends all dive behind their cars
‘cause i’ve been waiting for you..........for like a day or two

'chucks and throwing stars (normal speed)

Just an average English professor and writer who spent a lot of my college years behind turntables in order to have a little spending money.

Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird (Wallace Stevens; L Loops)

Sad Iron

Related tracks