Instinct (Transcript) (Patreon)

There has been a request for transcripts from the text-only videos, specifically the OP-1 videos. I'll be posting them here for free.

From this video: https://youtu.be/WSP36Ecmk0Q

Hello, how are you?

I’m gassy.

Today we’ll be making a sort of future garage house track with vocals. I’ll build the bones of the track here in the op, and then I’ll send it to a friend, Aran, to collaborate. She’s an incredibly talented producer and vocalist I’ve been working with on her tracks. She thought it would be cool for us to work on these op tracks together.

You’re currently hearing a bunch of samples I prepared from Playbox and Output Arcade. The drum loops are from a Black Octopus Garage sample pack. I'm programming a shaker to add to the beat we just recorded.

We’ll make a plyometric dotted eighth-note sequence. Now we can play it back on any note we want. If only life were so simple.

Programming the first beat using the finger sequencer. I’m going to play the filter cutoff as this sequence plays to increase and decrease energy. At some point, I want to talk to you about something I’ve been thinking a lot about lately. The concept of free will has been bugging the heck out of me. After reading comments from people telling me not to complain about anything I do because they claim that “I CHOSE TO DO THIS” and therefore have full agency over it all.

We’re recording each Playbox chord sample one by one to the start of each 2nd measure. Stopping and starting the tape to record makes sure the chord lands perfectly on beat.

I spent a lot of time in therapy, and one of the things that came up was whether I might be autistic. My therapist suggested the book ‘Unmasking Autism’ by Devon Price. So, I got it on audiobook and listened to it when I was running.

Oh, before I forget, I have a new album coming out on February th. It’s called ‘Determinism’. It is a vocal-heavy electronic pop album with new and spruced up older tracks. The art is by Wren Farren, who rocks. In terms of albums I’ve done with vocals, it's the most coherent thing so far, I think. Check the video description for a link to pre-save the album or get it after the release date on February th if you want. Thank you.

So, I started digging into this ‘Unmasking Autism’ book, and oh boy did I feel seen. Like fully see through, in almost complete agreement, especially to the masking aspects. Masking is when you consciously or unconsciously find a way to mask a behavior so that a behavior no longer presents as something that can be recognized as abnormal within the context of the neurotypical gaze. You may not even realize you’ve created a mask for a behavior, but it’s not unlikely that trauma of various severities can exacerbate masking.

Masking is exhausting, at least when it’s still a conscious act, but just because it becomes practiced enough to not be exhausting doesn’t mean it’s healthy. This piano sample will be the main verse riff in our song, by the way.

BASSLINE TIME. I’ve been using the new dimension synth almost exclusively since getting the op-f. Low pass filter, stereo widening, big juicy waveform, and a huge forever reverb. That’s all I really need to be happy, for a few minutes.

Adding a sustained choral sound from Output Arcade’s Aura’s sampler. We’ll get back to autism in just a second. First, I need a drum fill. Even though I’ll be doing a lot in Ableton with this, you can have a little fill, as a treat. And so, I can show you how even the simplest things can be very tedious in the op-. Still, I have to adjust it a little bit after all that. Add just a little swing.

Okay, back to autism. So here I am, having my whole life felt very ‘wrong’ and unable to fit into almost any situation. Having felt that so many things I’ve done were, in a way, out of my control. Not being able to control my anxiety, my confusion, my reactions, my interests, and having always felt severe shame because of this inability to understand myself and others.

This book gave a context to almost all of that, a reason for it, and permission for it: Autism. So, I decided to try and get a professional to offer an official diagnosis. I wanted to KNOW for sure, to have a professional tell me so I could tell others with confidence. I tried to find a local service for this, but they were booked out for the next six months. On top of this, they required speaking in-depth with my birth parents. For reasons I won’t get into, I didn’t feel comfortable with that.

I started to get cold feet, and the more I listened to the book, the more I felt like maybe I was wrong. There was also the issue that the book described very specific autistic traits I don’t have, specifically the ‘bottom-up’ vs ‘top-down’ way of thinking about things. Autistic people are “details-before-the-concept” thinkers, while non-autistic people are “concept-before-the-details” thinkers. So despite feeling like an entire life’s worth of choice and thinking had suddenly been given a framework, and in that sense, an explanation and purpose, it still wasn’t the right thing to help me understand why I felt so out of control all the time.

When someone tells you “you chose this, so you have to deal with it,” where does that stop? Where does your ability to meaningfully make choices about your life start and end? What control do you really have over your mind and your material condition? Is having free will as simple as being able to choose what to watch on Netflix? Where to live? Where to work? What do you think? When to die? If your brain makes you act in a way you wish you didn’t, where is free will? If an economic system forces you to oppress yourself, where is free will? If I do not have agency to be my true self and live a healthy life, where is free will?

I will end up throwing this bassline out before this session is over, but I had to try. Trying to find the control to add a little swing to the mix. This will be one portion of our chorus drum line.

I want something punchy for a four on the floor kick snare. In the end, I’ll return to the original sample from the start.

I want a stronger backbeat, so we’ll use this hat and snare.

We’ve only got a few minutes left, so let me try and bring this home. I have at no point ever felt in control of my life, not mentally, emotionally, or materially. The choices I make are to avoid my suffering and are, at best, harmlessly selfish. At their worst, they hurt me and other people. Sometimes I know they will, and I do them anyway. I have seen no indication that anyone is living differently.

If I didn’t get to choose whether or not I was brought into this world and I didn’t get to choose my brain and my body, and I didn’t get to choose my material standing or class, then what is free will but deciding what to put on Netflix at night? And what is the point of being able to think about any of this?

It’s funny that the best I can do as an artist is give a name to a horror you’ve always felt or give you just enough hope to get by another day but can’t ever solve any of this permanently.

In case you missed this from the last video, I have a strong desire to be an animal, which is a manifestation of anxiety around what being human feels like. I’m making an alternate chorus section now, by the way.

Being human should be about transcending our animal nature, but time and time again, we show that we’re worse than animals.

So bring me back as a bird, or a snake, or a cat because if I have to be alive, I would prefer instinct over free will.

I’m going to take what we’ve recorded into Ableton, gut it, and rebuild it almost from the ground up. Then I’ll send it to Aran, who will write the chorus and the first verse. Aran will send it back to me, and I’ll record a verse and backing vocals. And produce it to almost completely finished. Then Aran will get it back to polish my vocal takes. This entire process will take days but feel longer. I am not used to collaborating, especially on the op videos, but I think by the end of the year, Aran and I will have something much better than a solo Jeremy project.

Remember the greatest gift a creature can share is kindness.