pastagang blog
on the 9th april, pastagang will have a long slot at the London algorave.
the only “problem” is that no one is in charge of pastagang so there’s no one to decide what to do or who should be there or anything
HELLO - I’m organising a gig in Sheffield on 18th April… pastagang is invited to play… no idea how that works!!!
here’s a link with (a bit) more info: Sheffield Algorave
over the last few days i’ve been mulling this over… i think there are load of different approaches we could take here. i want to find a balance between:
- keeping the spirit of the jam. keeping it collaborative.
- avoiding complete unpleasant chaos.
ideas
- three to four laptops at the front? four people start up there, but invite others to come and “have a turn” at times. get vocal samples from randomers.
- connected to the internet? or local server only? internet is fun. but also… i think its good for the performers and the crowd to share the same space/room.
- if this is open to the internet then good to put some kind of notice in nudel so people know there is an audience :)
- good idea! Will made a nudel issue and post this on masto
- mad idea: put the laptops in the middle of the room in-the-round and hope no one spills beer on them.
- This seems more pastagangy then having 4 in front, it’s all about participation right?
- i also think this is good
- having done one algorave now, i think i should write up what we learned about this
- set up chairs and things in different places in the room (or venue) and let any visitor connect and jam. but this could get very chaotic right? jamming with large numbers is quite hard. but maybe thats okay.
- i feel like someone should give a little intro at the start. like “this is pastagang. anyone can join. there is no pasting or undo. advice: make room for someone else. if something needs doing, do it. if something doesnt need doing, dont do it. if something sounds good, let it shine. if something sounds bad let it die.”
- lucy:
pastagang manifesto? i am thinking of alex’s generative manifesto but ‘manifesto’ doesn’t feel very pastagang… but maybe more like pastagang welcome message - to invite/excite people rather than a set of rules.
- a lot more emphasis is put on “mantra” then “manifesto”. this is largely rooted in natural code, as a way of influencing people positively - but crucially, in a distributed way (bottom up, not top down)
- Yeeeeeees mantra is a lot more what I was thinking - thanks for sharing this idea! <3 your paper looks exciting, I will read it later
- some occasional moments of silence could help to reset the madness. pause for silence. record some samples. and repeat - starting from scratch
- QR code on screen for people to join with phone? hmm nah
- mad idea: implement a way of letting people stream their cameras into the visuals. then lots of people at the venue could whip out phones or laptop cameras, and let the internet-connected people feel more present in the jam. this also centers the jam on the crowd, not the performers. as hopefullly.. there would be lots of footage of the crowd etc. i dunno
- reckter: I LOVE this idea.
- lucy: i love this too!!! so fun and a good way to get people involved
- reckter: Probably have a more beafy PC for audio. Maybe even a dedicated one that has only audio enabled for the room. (but ofc needs organization)
- If we wanted to let people join on nudel but avoid having everyone make a big mess, could we have special panels that are limited to like 64 or 128 chars?
- could be fun. i would love us to figure out a solution that doesnt need this tho. good vibes might be enough.
- lucy: some pastagangers could volunteer for code pruning duties? could rotate this duty?
- at one meetup, i felt like i did 10x more deleting them adding, and that felt like the right thing to do
- the same in TYPE i was the dedicated deleter, i think it’s important to keep things on track and leave space for people do do stuff. I also think it takes a bit of confidence to go round deleting code (especially other people’s!) so it can be hard for people who are new to the jam. maximalism is also good sometimes though - 20 drum beats!!! yeah!!!!!
- maybe we should have different “marketing” for local-only: lasagnajam (with a “by #pastagang”). That comes from a place that might be too gatekeeping for pastagang actually.
- thinking about it more: yes, why shouldn’t it be pastagang. But I still like “lasangajam” as a name for something haha
- an emergency “lasagne mode” might be a good backup to be honest
- we have now added the option to choose a custom room. it was mainly intended to be a backup plan
reactions
many events have a big table in the middle that people gather round, including a lot of algoraves. In fact that’s what I was thinking. As long as there is at least one ‘responsible’ person in the room at any one time? Could rotate this person (axially and temporally hehe)
There are ways to discourage beer ingress, but participants can just be asked to be respectful as they join.
An intro sounds great, could also print/display info.
Everything else sounds totally awesome.
Would be lovely to have a live stream that the online participants could catch the vibe from.
My main thing I struggle with is not getting too excited/stressed. A good goal is to relax and enjoy as much as possible.
alright sick, tables in the middle would be amazing then!
printed / displayed info is also a great idea. didnt think of that!
for livestream… im more and more thinking there could one endpoint we all stream to, and it somehow combines them all together. that means it doesnt fail or fall on only one person…. damn i gotta go make this now
I think the biggest deciding factor, that will guide a lot of implications:
With online participation or local-only. (as someone, who cannot attend in person: online so far did go pretty well imo, at least from the online perspective).
yes the meetups have been fun but have been a very different vibe - more casual. i imagine an algorave-style event might be different?
Haven’t been to any algorave. But If it’s more rave and less metup, than anything that pastagang does is probably very experimenal in that space, I would assume.
I have no idea what represents value for money for people who have paid up to £15 to attend the event.
I think it will feel very exciting ✅
fresh and interesting ✅
experimental is cool for algorave trust me ✅
live coding makes it easy to add beats over anything ✅
online participation would be so cool ✅
audience engagement incredible if it happens ✅
one other thing - there will be up to two AlgoRhythms before April to have pasta fun at
AlgoRhythms 1 done
AlgoRhythms 2 soon!
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