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The 4th Smart Dust release, The Continuous Present, is a study in sound sculpture. The melodic elements are often hidden in the drumming/electronic percussion, though there are obvious Warr guitar and piano melodies throughout. I haven't yet arrived at a place where "noise is melody", but I am certainly heading in that direction.
As I worked on the pieces separately, I began to realize they were strangely connected to each other and they were each part of a whole. Interestingly, the succession of pieces created a pattern of pairs written almost a year apart:
The Continuous Present depicts the flow of movement from emotion to emotion over the course of a lifetime - or perhaps in a single day. The title stems from conversations I had with my dear friend and drumming Brother Michael Zack (RIP). Mike once told me of an architect he read about who said something akin to "There is no past and no future. The only thing that IS is the Continuous Present." I found it profound enough to write down in 1997 and have never forgotten it. Sadly, I've not found the architect who said these words in years of searching, though this concept is hardly new, perhaps best described in Hermann Hesse's novel "Siddhartha":
"That is it," said Siddhartha. "And when I learned that, I took a look at my life and saw that it too was a river, and the boy Siddhartha was separated from the man Siddhartha and from the graybeard Siddhartha only by shadows, not by anything real. And there was no past for Siddhartha's earlier births, and his death and his return to Brahma are without future. Nothing was, nothing will be; everything is, everything has essence, is present."
As I grow older, this sense of "present" becomes stronger in me every day. Perhaps it's only natural as we age. Perhaps it's an impending sense of freedom. Strap on your headphones, press play, close your eyes, and see if you can find it for yourself.
credits
released July 15, 2022
Compositions, Instruments, Sounds: Timm Biery
Performances captured at
Church Of The Monkey, OPKS, USA
Recordings mixed and mastered at
Church Of The Monkey, OPKS, USA
Timm hits Remo heads on Premier drums and a variety of metallic instruments with sticks from Pro Mark, Vic Firth, and Dem' Sticks
Warr guitar designed and built by Mark Warr (warrguitars.com)
Touch-style guitar designed & built by Kevin Siebold at Krappy Guitars (krappyguitars.com)
Monster drummer and multi-instrumentalist Timm Biery has worked with guitar greats Danny Gatton, Frank Marino, & Nils Lofgren. He now focuses on recording, composing, bending time and playing touch-style guitar.
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