Privacy Glitch by iosmusicandyou

"Privacy Glitch" is a continuation of the musical study that I've been doing on the hot topic of online privacy in this increasingly free flowing age of social media; I started this idea in my last piece, "The Price Of Patriotism," which explored the trials of Edward Snowden, but that certainly wasn't the end of the story. This piece looks at the balance between the sometimes knowing and sometimes unwitting consent to a lack of privacy, as we share our lives with people around the world. Social media and online interactivity often seems like a fun and exciting way to connect with friends past and present, so we often leap right into the fray without a second thought. When we do, we pretty much give consent to a lack of privacy, something that's not always clearly apparent. This grey area where we let growing corporations use our data for their advantage is a bit scary, and the consequences can be larger than we initially imagine. I'm exploring this balance between consent and manipulation in "Privacy Glitch" through three distinct musical sections, which range in mood from enthusiastic to downright dissonant. There's an upbeat and overwhelmingly positive mood in the first section of the piece which reflects our initial excitement around the interconnected nature of the online world - let's face it, things like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter are pretty thrilling at times. It's easy to get caught up in the flow of information, participating actively by transparently putting ourselves into the public eye. Things start to get a bit muddy in the second section as a slower tempo, a slightly demented and dissonant arpeggiated pattern, and minor chords represent our growing unrest with the prying eyes of the world. While life casting might have been fun at first, grey boundaries and the liberal use of our information by major corporations just feels wrong. As the piece moves into a disjointed and edgy collection of glitched out electronic sounds, we realize that we've led ourselves too far, and at this point, there's simply no turning back - we're stuck in a web of need, want, and mistrust. We've come to rely upon the ease and accessibility of online sharing and at this point, we need the conveniences that it provides . . . but we don't like the fact that the world can see into our personal lives. It's an uneasy place to exist, a fact that's very apparent in the thick and dissonant soundscape that ends the piece. "Privacy Glitch" was composed completely on my third generation iPad, with the help of some outstanding apps. My main DAW was NanoStudio and my indispensable connection between all the apps was the amazing Audiobus. I used several synths to create the layers of sound, including Nave, Thor, Sunrizer Synth, Animoog, and iMini. There were also some great additional applications including ThumbJam, DrumJam, Stochastik Drum Machine, DM1, SoundPrism Pro, WerkBench and AudioShare. I used JamUp Pro XT to record my bass at a couple of points. I used a number of effects apps that included AD480 Pro, AUFX: Space, Turnado, Audio Mastering, and Master Record. This one combined the power of a lot of apps, and consequently took some time to assemble . . . but it was worth the effort.