In an ever noisier world, initiatives like this are increasingly necessary and laudable, even if the battle against noise seems always to be a losing one. It is simply astonishing the amount of 'background' noise we tolerate and take for granted now, especially those of us who live in and around cities. Even on the more frequented roads of that suburban demiparadise I call home, it's often all but impossible to hear ordinary human speech or conduct a conversation at much below shouting level - and that is just from the sheer volume of traffic driving by. Add to that the range of pernicious new nuisances we now have to live with - especially the various forms of electronic noise pollution and the bellowing of the ever-swelling army of those who conduct their business and vent their feelings at maximum volume, regardless of their surroundings - and it seems to me that our poor battered brains are being subjected to something barely tolerable, which must at some deep level be doing us serious harm. What is that thumping, bone-shaking 'music' that escapes from passing yobmobiles doing to those inside the car? It cannot conceivably be good.
When the mode of the music changes, the walls of the city shake.
Let us seek quietness, and treasure it when we find it.
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
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A blog about, among other things, imaginary ideas - What ifs? and Imagine thats. What if photographs looked nothing like what we see with our eyes? Imagine that the Berlin Wall had never come down. What if we were the punchline of an interminable joke? All contributions welcome.
"The amount of noise which anyone can bear undisturbed stands in inverse proportion to his mental capacity."
ReplyDeleteArthur Schopenhauer.
Thanks for that, Anon - old Arthur spot on as ever.
ReplyDeleteBy the way, can anyone spot where my quote 'When the mode of the music changes...' comes from? Not you Bryan, you're barred.
Nige, close to where I live are the Cheviots, park at the end of the Hownam valley, one hours walk to the border ridge (the Penine way as J.Noakes had it renamed) stand where Deere Street crosses, looking down on the Chew Green Roman fort and down the Coquet valley, these are the sounds.
ReplyDeleteThe wind blowing through the long grasses, like the wind in the willows, curlew will be calling, grouse are active now, buzzards are mewing. The sound of lambs drifts up from the valleys, now and again the odd merlin can be seen, deer roaming in and out of the woods, calling with a coughing bark the skies are high and wide, like the Hunsruck, to east, the Cheviot, old round top, to the west, the lakeland hills, to the north the Lammermuirs and to the south the Northumberland fells.
I first roamed these hills with my father in the early nineteen fifties, the only sound missing today is the lark.
Ah Malty you are blessed - good to know such peace can still be found...
ReplyDeleteI guess noise becomes a problem if you think there is such a thing as silence. There isn't really, except in outer space.
ReplyDeleteFor those unavoidably bad moments, may I suggest E.A.Rsoft FX, "the highest protecting earplug on the market today (SNR 39). Its smooth tapered finish makes fitting easier," you'll note appreciatively. No need to risk embarrassment by having to visit a "Health and Safety" shop. Your friendly local motorcycle dealer is bound to stock them. I buy 'em 50 pairs at a time.
Not sure of the source of the quote. Elton John? Or maybe a shade like him.
Those earplugs look very fine, Mark - I'm tempted...
ReplyDeleteI think the silence we seek is edged with a little sound - birdsong, say - to make us conscious of it. Pure silence is a rather terrifying idea - they say you can hear your nerves singing, which on the whole I'd rather not.
I'll leave the quote open for now - it has a curious double origin...
A long time since I looked at it, but the quote brings to mind the Tao te Ching. And while the point about ugly music may hold and it is a cause of people being out of balance, overall it is arising more as a symptom of a culture out of balance with reality and truth. When young people are born into a culture utterly defliling itself with such vile phenomena as the attack dogs of the tabloid press, then many members of that society cannot but end up ignorant & screwed up. It is the natural corollary to the Strictly Come Lobotomising idiot culture foisted on people. There isn't a while lot of point in trying to treat the branch of a diseased tree, rather than the root.
ReplyDeleteSo the more necessary question is why are people's consciousnesses so brutalised that pure noise is required as a stimulant? If the quote is from the Tao te Ching, why are we departing from the Way to the degree where such under-nourished minds arise?
My mother suffered from tinnitus, what did the consultant suggest ? you guessed it, headphones and a walkman, "to help disguise the hissing noise" This twerp was described as "eminent". Imminent more like
ReplyDeleteComplete and utter silence is really creepy to my urbanised ears. About 25 years ago I cycled with a couple of friends through the Valley of the Kings just before sun-up and the arrival of tourist coaches, hawkers etc. We stopped to mend a puncture and realised that if we didn't speak there was absolute silence - just us and the desert. It was as if something had sucked all the noise out of the world and I felt profoundly uncomfortable. I wonder if Bryan, in his desert wanderings, has encountered that feeling. Give me good old background noise any day, whether it's birdsong or a door slamming or, God forbid, a booming car full of idiots.
ReplyDeleteSophie, never seen urbanised ears, are the like vulcanised tyres ?
ReplyDeleteSophie, did you see a creature, its gaze pitiless as the sun, slouching toward Bethlehem to be born? I had a sudden intense image of Yeats' poem reading your comment. And I remember as a little girl when I asked a nun to describe what she thought hell would be like, she said a barren, silent desert.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, my husband spent his formative years in the desert of Barstow, California, and he loves that landscape. There's a great deal more there once you begin to really pay attention but, as a person who loves forests, I've never been able to fully appreciate a desert landscape. (Hence, we are already arguing about where to retire, though it's years down the pike. he's hot to go to Arizona or New Mexico whereas I'd rather a lush forest area in the Southeast.)
Sorry that I'm blathering. Popped a Percocet for an injury and it's made me prolix.
Malty, I'm not sure I like the use of the word 'vulcanised' in the context of ears....
ReplyDeleteNothing serious I hope, Susan?
ReplyDeleteThe double srouce of the quote, for anyone who cares, is Plato, via The Fugs. What are the chances?
Aaaah, the Fugs, I remember "The Breadcrumbs of Paris", or I think I do.
ReplyDeleteI believe I still have somewhere their lavish gatefold album, It Crawled Into My Hand Honest...
ReplyDeleteNige, don't be ashamed of your collection, we still have Brian Poole & the Tremeloes, originally the wife's, of course.
ReplyDeletemy friends,
ReplyDeletethat is not at all what plato meant. plato didn't mean "mode" as in the fashion mode, or the mode of delivery, or the mode of style in which it's presented. he meant Mode as in musical modes. ionian, dorian, phrygian...etc. and he meant it very literally, that societal upheaval takes place when the mode of popular music changes. you won't change anything by dressing differently, or wearing safety pins in your ears and duct tape on your shoes. if you would like to change something through music, and if this quote is relevant to you, then learn about music. REALLY learn about music, not just how to flex your ego while holding a phallic shaped object. changing the popular musical modes i believe does have an intrinsic relationship with the mass conciousness, but you have to know what modes are in order to change them.
i wish you well,
Dylan
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