Drawing while in a state of meditational trance can yield interesting and unexpected forms. Some may say that drawing itself is a meditative state. Single pointed focus channeled through a fine nib. One could possibly say that this is a form of automatic drawing. I tend to personally view these visions as ‘nimittas‘, signs or mental images. Nimittas can be visual, kinesthetic, or even auditory. Bodhipaksa’s blog on this subject is very helpful as is Ajarn Brahm’s warm and highly engaging lecture on the ‘9 Nimattas‘.
These unearthed artifacts speak with their own peculiar wisdom and can offer just slight glimpses of the wiring under the vast and never-ending electrical board of consciousness. Allowing the unconscious mind full sway can yield deeply satisfying glimpses into worlds hitherto hidden by the five senses and the mind and its array of censoring guardians. The album When You Look into a Hole the Hole Will Look into You offers two examples of audio and visual channeling whilst using two different techniques and approaches. The first title track of the album takes its beginnings from a meditational trance drawing that was done some time ago. The language to access the name of the track opened up to me and along with it a poem, transpired through internal divination, which has been recited in a rare vocal by myself within the track.
Was this image a portal to another dimension? An exit of detritus from a body? An unborn child’s view of its slow but traumatic entry into being? Or could it be a journey into a dense and impenetrable cave system underground to be met by some form of spirit presence? Has my admiration of Coil’s or HR Giger‘s work yielded further influence on my own work? Maybe the resonance from my visit to the immense and awe-inspiring and beautiful Chiang Dao Meditation Caves in Northern Thailand last year have imprinted a tract of infinity deep within my isness. Is it my position to explain the unexplainable? Life, as one of my friends said to me, is an enigma. Everyone has their own view of what is tentatively called the truth and there are as many truths/non-truths as there stars in the night sky. Embrace your nimattas for they are there to be embraced and accepted.
The second track of this album was created and inspired after an interaction/experiment with artist, author and animist Charlotte Rodgers. “Conducted a very interesting experiment with surreal results late last night. I actually pulled your book ‘P is for Prostitution’ off my shelf. I then randomly flicked through it quickly. I then put the brakes on a random page and placed at speed my finger on a sentence. The result was “Stand by the Piano and Sing Hymns for Them in My Distinctive Monotone” How bizarre is that? I took these words as instructions (as I saw them) and started to build up a track using piano and voices.” – 21st March 2018. And so began another experiment. In the space of a few hours this second piece had manifest itself before me. This track can be heard in full as an installation piece to be part of an exhibition of Charlotte Rodgers and Victoria Musson’s work called ‘Gathering’ in Bath, England which will take place from the 29th of July until the 5th of August 2019. Do follow their social media sites for the details of this exhibition. An embedded excerpt of this installation piece can be heard here in the blog.
So here stand two tracks with two different techniques of approach on one album. The release will be available on numerous digital platforms across this remarkable planet.
Release Date: 7th June 2019
Production, Poem & Artwork: Sheer Zed.
Mastering: Steve Kitch Mastering.
Genre: Ambient, Dark Ambient, Electronic, Experimental, Drone.
Tracks:
1. When You Look into a Hole the Hole Will Look into You – 21 mins 26 secs
2. Stand by the Piano and Sing Hymns for Them in My Distinctive Monotone – 20 mins 27 secs
Poem: When You Look into a Hole the Hole Will Look into You.
When you look into a hole the hole will look into you x 3
Outward signs of eyes that see,
Reflect back all the possible ways to be.
Remnants of time flake away memories of soul.
Nothingness and emptiness weave arrested textures into a whole.
When you look into a hole the hole will look into you x 3
Sheer Zed • Writer • Buddhist Shaman • Musician • Artist • 