TECH TIME

The end of projects always brings a sense of relief, but it's also a time to look back and judge what I've accomplished. The release of CREAM OF CONNER, after a four-year gestation, gives me a chance to look back over the course of my "career" in music, and I can't help but think about the technology that I had available in the early Eighties. The technological advances since my first musical release in 1984, on audio-cassette because CD's weren't a thing yet, is startling when you consider it in historical terms.

Where it's most evident is in the ways that we use current tech products to expand the reach of our voices, ideas and ideologies, and it's important to respect our place within that system. I think that learning to respect the power of technology has become an imperative if we're going to continue to advance as a society.

Things started to speed up around the turn of the Twentieth Century, but it was the 1960's when rapid cultural change really blasted off. The difference between 1964 and 1969, culturally, intellectually, socially, politically, would have taken decades or perhaps centuries to form in earlier times. Technologies like color television, hi-fi systems and top forty radio created platforms for social innovation and change like never before.

The Beatles 1964 and 1969. Only five years apart.

Thirty-two years of rapid technological advancement is an unbelievably short span of time for any social or cultural system to absorb without consequence. In 1984, my ability to reach an audience with music or comics was impeded by the lack of many things we take for granted today. That was the year Mac was released, but most people still didn't have a personal computer, and at work I was still using a photo-typesetting machine that used only codes. I couldn't see what the type I was setting looked like until it was photographically processed. To print a four-color document, like say cover art, required expensive photographic plates, an actual printing press, from originals that had been pasted in with wax and adhesives. And THAT was still an advancement from the decades when they used hot type.

As an artist, creating a portfolio in those days was incredibly expensive. It required sending out slides to prospective employers, plus having the physical documents in a folio case for direct interviews. I was in my forties before I actually had an online portfolio. I actually lost a whole portfolio of original work once to an inept studio, which was devastating. That would never happen now.

Especially for younger people, I think it's important to stress just how rapidly things change in our lives, when there's such a rush to always be adapting to the now. It starts to leave older people behind, no matter how plugged in you were to the culture when you were younger. As things continue to accelerate, the culture becomes only about fashion and not substance. There's always something new birthing at the moment, so what was raved about yesterday becomes passe. That's been said for many generations, but the difference is that now, it literally is yesterday.

One thing I tried to impress on students in my design classes was how quickly culture changes, and with it our sense of who we are. A few decades of history will teach you that trends and fads come and go, and mostly we just look back on the past with embarrassment. So it's important to not be stuck too much in what's trending and see ourselves as part of the long arc. 

When I look at how quickly the analog world passed over into the digital world, I feel really lucky to have been one of relatively few people historically who experienced this revolution. Because of that, I think I appreciate the options we have now even more (though technology is hardly cooperative and is often exceptionally frustrating). But our tech options give us, through YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and other social media, much more information than any culture ever in history. Information that must be absorbed, processed, worked with. It's an unending barrage of stuff.

There's just too much for us to absorb, to accept all the different voices, opinions and craziness of human nature, to take in in such a brief historical moment. We weren't prepared for this. The DNA of our cultural and social bonds never created the foundation for what technology has delivered.

The ability to express ourselves through digital technology, not just social media, but digital production processes like video, effects editing and musical sampling, creates an entirely different platform in which young people can participate. Jobs become even more competitive for artists when so many people have access to the means of production. And at the same time, people on the outside of hiring can also see the work of others and be inspired and challenged by it. I'm constantly amazed at the quality of work I see on Tumblr and YouTube videos, that was never available when I had a soundless 8mm film camera and separate cassette player for sound in high school film class. 

Technology is our Pandora's Box, and with every advancement comes some danger as well. Our social media presence is like Mr. Walker, when we get behind that wheel of anonymity, we become changed. Aggressive, angry, petulant, our anger inflamed by the people behind the other wheels who've become anonymous idiots, all challenging out ability to be Empress of The Road. Being a good citizen behind the facade means learning to accept that we're not the only people out there. We stop seeing humanity and only see competition. What good is gaining all these great inventions if it means we can't keep up, if we just devolve into aggression and hostility?

I think it's important to stress that as divisions drive our society further apart, it's in the day-to-day, one-on-one physical opportunities we encounter that contribute most to making peace in our world. Be kind to the people you deal with. It's not always easy, especially if you're trapped with hostile, obnoxious people in the workplace or relatives you can't stand. But try not to feed the division, and don't let our technological awakening be a source for self-serving and arrogance. We have to respect that we're in a time of enormous change and upheaval, and find common ground to get to the next stage, whatever that might be.