Welcome to April of 2020 and episode 256 of the show, with the guest duo of Daniel James Smith and Krystall Schott, who make up the band “Untitled Social Experiment”, also known as “USE”. With songs like “Sugar Rush” and “Psycho“, this pairing has brought solid production quality into the content they put out, with … Continue reading "256: Daniel James Smith & Krystall Schott | Music And Creativity With The Band “Untitled Social Experiment”, Known As “USE”"
Welcome to April of 2020 and episode 256 of the show, with the guest duo of Daniel James Smith and Krystall Schott, who make up the band “Untitled Social Experiment”, also known as “USE”. With songs like “Sugar Rush” and “Psycho“, this pairing has brought solid production quality into the content they put out, with messages to understand underneath.
Daniel has been making music for some years under the moniker of T.O.L.D, and brings his experience and skills to Untitled Social Experiment. Krystall has done painting, sang in choir early on, and after modeling in recent years, she made her return to music when teaming up with Daniel to form creative art. Synths and melodies and singing tones abound in the music made by USE.
Show notes:
how the group and duo originated, and who they are inspired by
the production of art in a light nature, but keeping a focus on content creation
how introductions and key moments in life can seem blurry
what it takes to get along with someone, based on similarities
some bands the group would work with or like to emulate in some form
the pandemic and quarantine, and where it leaves each person to self-process, and looking toward how it leaves society
what age the members started doing music at, and what types of instruments or singing they have done
how support at the right time in life can lead to quicker results
switching from one goal to another once it seems too readily available, versus sticking to one thing at a time
the way that the members complement one another for production
a book called “The Dao of Capital” being read at the current time, and what it represents for temporal understanding
the qualities that each band members looks for in others
the song Adam & Eve Meet Snake, Say No to apple, Stay in Paradise Forever mentioned in the episode
other types of content being put out, whether on Tik Tok or elsewhere
periods of flow and lack of flow, and how to think about them
a couple of questions back to me about me and my show
messages from each member about life
Glad to have Daniel and Krystall on the show~. You can check out their content on Spotify and other audio platforms online, along with some of their content featured on T.O.L.D. You can also check them out on Instagram at @untitledsocialexperiment.
Untitled Social Experiment (aka USE) uses an apt metaphor in its single “Sugar Rush” for the questionable appeal of party culture. The references are the world of after hours or not so after hours …
Untitled Social Experiment (aka USE) uses an apt metaphor in its single “Sugar Rush” for the questionable appeal of party culture. The references are the world of after hours or not so after hours parties in Los Angeles in mansions rented in the name of hedonistic fun but often ended up being the kind of dystopian social milieu straight out of an early Bret Easton Ellis novel. That world seems especially surreal to anyone not indulging in the plethora of substances to be had that make such odd situations seem enjoyable to many people. The song, a downtempo, brooding pop song captures that sense of not knowing why anyone would spend their lives in such empty pleasures endlessly seeking them out for a cheap thrill, a fake rush that isn’t cathartic but purely sensorial. The song questions these experiences and situations that are supposed to be sweet but like pure sugar has empty calories and provides minimal actual nourishment for the body much less any other aspect of one’s humanity. The performative aspect of that ersatz fun that is insisted upon gets dished on with style on the song and its lushly dark melody and spaciousness are an analog of the poisonously dreamlike quality of being in that moment of disaffected wonderment. Listen to “Sugar Rush” on Soundcloud and follow USE there as well.
Duo U.S.E (United Social Experiment), made up of Dan and Krystall, has released an alternative pop/rock single entitled ‘Sugar Rush. The dark but elegant track comes from Krystall’s memories about the LA party life, ” It made me think of all of the LA afterparties and all of the times I was the only sober person wandering around endless hallways in these large mansions that were rented for the sole sake of partying. More like soul sucking. I was always following my foreign roommates to these parties pretty much for the sake of keeping them alive, but I was also curious. I’m not going to lie. Due to my disinterested in alcohol, drugs or human ladder climbing I was an outsider and observer every single time. It’s weird to be in an environment driven by vices that you have no interest in. Thinking “Am I missing something? Or am I better as an outsider – in the dark?” It’s probably the closest thing I could think of to watching a scary movie.- You know, the kind that takes place in a weird haunted house. You know you’d never be dumb enough to buy it but still you find yourself on the edge of your seat screaming for the characters in the film.”Dan and Krystall came together to create USE after being exhausted from time in different industries with similar politics. The goal of the project is to play with the noticeably strange standards and politics of the culture and turn them in on themselves. “The idea that everything is so perfect that we must be dreaming came about. And the idea that in meeting each other we had found a way out of ‘the Matrix’.” Their project is really about stream of conscious and doing what comes organically so is doesn’t fall into any one genre, although they have coined the term Grungewave. “There are definite electronic elements but we keep evolving. It is important for us to not force ourselves into any one idea and just let things happen naturally.” As well as the music the project is about videos, art and collaboration. “We like the idea of playing with perception, the media, human psychology and the current social climate which is one of mass consumption. Is there anything particular you’d like to know?”Listen to the track here: https://open.spotify.com/track/4KOe7WsNHtCeXIWjOQO27eFollow them here: https://www.instagram.com/untitledsocialexperiment/ , https://twitter.com/usebot001
Week 67 | Tobi’s New Independent Music Picks. A totally random, whatever came to mind first, selection of the latest additions to our New Independent Music Friday playlist Music reviews written by …
Artist: USE ft. T.O.L.D
Track: “Something in the Way” (Grungewave)
Self-described ‘Grungewave’ Artists USE featuring T.OL.D. deconstruct Nirvana’s 1991 release, ‘Something in the Way’ and cast it a staggering stripped-down reimagining of vast, unforgiving sonic landscape, haunted by electro-vocal, phantom and elemental.
‘Underneath the bridge, the tarp has sprung a leak,’ phonetics devolved utter constant and guttered vowel; rung flat and electro-atonal, vocoder ghosts; a phantom zone modulates distant, low bass drone and ambient; rising darkness, dank and unforgivable. Whispers shimmer in drift and delay; slivers of reverb, ethereal and unearthly.
“Something in the Way”; kick impacts deep and sunken, low frequency stained dirty; gated snare smacks tourniquet tight, accompanying its funeral drum. Ambiance rises, gaseous and fused with electric charge; static movement, unnatural. Odd synth-sonics pulse and modulate in great mortal breathes of fizzing saturation. Piano keys brighten in brittle desperation and lamentation, only to die back into the nothing.
Both faithful rendition and inspired reworking; “Something in the Way” delivers a singular listening experience unlike any other; though evocative of seminal works, such as Pink Floyd’s ‘The Wall’, The Smith’s ‘Last Night I Dreamt that Somebody Loved Me’, and Nine Inch Nail’s ‘Something I Can Never Have’, USE have crafted a production of standout originality; a staggering statement of artistic intent, uninhibited and uncompromising; raw, difficult and quite simply beautiful.
“Remember the days when the only way we discovered new music through magazines and newspapers? Times have changed and although we do love a bit of nostalgia here at Talk About Pop Music we mo…
What kind of madness is this? Silent Sunday on a Monday? Well, yeah. I’m lagging behind. Not that it matters – here’s three nice tracks to space out to. Safe travels.
USE – Holy Shit Planet Earth
Here’s USE again. We’ve covered them twice before, and their ability to facinate me has not died out just yet. There’s just something about Krystall Scott’s voice that is so pleasing. Seductive, intelligent, curious.
It’s not exactly ambient, this. Or is it? “Vocal based ambient”? I don’t know. Not easy to tag. But why should we. It’s a piece worth hearing, pondering about, and appreciate.
A nice opportunity to give you a little bonus when rounding off this rather delayed “Silent Sunday”.
Would you like to hear a very nice song?
Then listen carefully to the next song from USE with Face Matter. Dan and Krystall have managed to create a beautiful and sensitive song that personally appealed to me when I first heard it.
Not only the music but the production is well put together and sounds very pure.
Strange
It’s not many days since I last did an “double oddball feature”, but I just have to do another; this time a sci-fi special! Here’s one rather odd instrumental consisting of…
USE, “Test”
Here’s a track with a female voice testing something for some unknown purpose. That’s it. Only processed with a kind of a shimmer reverb or something of that effect.
Confused? Listen:
Fascinating, isn’t it? I’ll admit right away that got totally lost in that voice.
The duo USE (untitled social experiment) explains the track like this;
– Everything makes too much sense. we don’t think it’s real so we’ve begun testing it to make sure we aren’t just in the middle of a coma.
I mean, what’s not to like here?
And yes, I need to state the obvious: The female individual on this recording? Omg, dat voice. With that perfect sterile sci-fi tone and diction. I have listened to this thing on repeat now for a while and I have concluded that I could have received instructions from this voice indefinitely.
I want her embedded in all my current and future digital equipment.
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