Asteroid 2012 DA14: Shortwave Radio as Ear; on the Rattling of the Solar System, a Cosmic Wind, or the Shadows of a Shard of Time

  radio-magnetic archives: listen to the full 4 hours (piece by piece):
asteroid-2012-da14 audio album (cut into smaller tracks)

   On October 3rd, 2019, I introduced these sounds for the very first time to a public audience during a live quadrophonic performance at Murmurans Mundus Conference in Usti Nad Labem in the Czech Republic in the old Hranicar theater complex. Although deployed only in the first 10 minutes of a 32 minute set, they caused some stir, since the delivery system was more than adequate, the sub-woofer rumbling under my feet, until a gentler sound of Black Sea waves over-lapped me, them and the shores, the ears of listeners. These initial sounds registered in the file Asteroid 2012 DA 14, however, went to sleep or kept dormant, in some yogic cryo-suspend, for almost 6 years. This post is about those sounds, their origin, and how they woke up, fell asleep, woke again.

 On Friday, Feb. 15, 2013, the asteroid named 2012 DA14 passed by the Earth within satellite orbiting range.  BBC report  While NASA scientists concurred a year earlier that it posed no risk of impacting our planet, it's nearness caused an emotional and imaginary impact, especially on deep space enthusiasts and star-gazers. It was said this asteroid might even be visible in backyard telescopes if one knew precisely when and where to look. When... was not the problem... if the published time frame was accurate. Where? "Here" was the simple reply. But I wanted to "hear" it more than see some light bounced back from a distant rock through a telescope (which I didn't have anyway).

  Having been a follower of Thomas Ashcraft's (www.heliotown.com) radio-telescopic tracking of space dust and forward meteor scatter using radio noise as a medium in which to observe atmospheric disturbances. I began to learn how to detect in common radios various kinds of ionic and electro-magnetic impulses, such and his forward scatter antennae array in New Mexico might catch. I learned what solar flares and lightening disturbances should sound like in the radio spectrum. With respect to then on-coming Asteroid 2012 DA14, I went in for an amateur experiment tuning 3 radios (short, mid and long wave) to position between stations. My not-so-very-vast array was composed of 10 meters of copper wires in a spidery web attached to the iron balcony and whatever looked like it would capture radio signals including the old piano's sound-board.

   I recorded live for 4 hours applying an Audiomulch down-pitch filter at 7 octaves, 4 octaves & 2 octaves (respective to each radio), hoping to capture some traces of the passage of the asteroid as radio interference. I used smaller cuts of this panorama in various projects over the next years while never seeing any convenient way to share the whole opus. Finally I tried an upload for the whole to soundcloud but after several close but no cigar attempts, I resigned myself to splitting the files into several more digestible ones for streaming and perhaps later re-production. The reason for all this work will become apparent when one listens, perhaps. To my ears it is a rather unusual kind of drone which is neither dark nor light but some mixture of both. A phrase from Thomas Ligeti comes to mind: "a brainless burning beacon". Is it only my imagination that is sounds like the void of space itself? I can't be certain what it is but that the mood induced is both fascinating, frightening, or in any case spooky.

Jeff Gburek
Poznan, October 2019

 P.S. After contacting Thomas Ashcraft about the upcoming publication of these recordings, he had this to say and granted me clearance to share his words with my readers and listeners.

"Very strong work for sure! I kept hearing an underlying chorus which I liked a lot. Not sure if the chorus was there or it came from my own resonances. I respect the intensity and long form. It is testing to the listener which is a quality in itself. I am thinking now that I could have listened at lower volume? I just assumed it should be loud. But maybe it is subliminal as well? Seems like big screen possibilities? Passage through the membrane? Rather unnerving I must say. Sort of has a "heroic" feel?  Like a "heroic" dosage of medicine. Also approaching terrifying maybe? Glad you are exploring these realms. Most artists suppress it. Too much force."