In 1969, composer Alvin Lucier created a work that’s half science demo, half wonderfully creepy art: he recorded and then re-recorded, his own voice, over and over, until it turned into nothing but noise. It’s the coolest thing you’ll hear today.
Lucier’s recording — “I Am Sitting in a Room” — banks on the fact that for any given room (the one you’re in now, your bedroom, the mayor’s office), there are certain frequencies of sound that’ll resonate above all others. Every time a recording is made inside this room, these frequencies slowly creep in over everything else — namely, Lucier’s voice. With each successive version, Lucier sounds more like a robot trapped in a tin box, until he sounds like nothing at all. It’s the audio equivalent of a xerox made of a xerox ad infinitum, and unlike anything you’ve heard. [Vimeo via Jad Abumrad]