Sacred Geometry Variations (Sum II.5)

One set of old 90s lyrics and a re-imagining of them by 8 imaginary artists, next in the series of In Sum albums. The Sum II series is music based on specific days--in this case May 1, 1997, the date I finished the lyric.

• Loud Shirts (Brain Terrain) (Power Pop) Cover art is AI-generated based on an idea I once had for a staged photograph. The lighting is wrong but fairly close to how I would have done it. The animation is trigonometry, not geometry. The distorted bass sound is interesting. All these songs also have a "producer".
• Haley (Bossa Nova) A "Girl From Ipanema" vibe. I love the naive irony of the vocal, as if the vocalist really didn't understand its sarcasm. I included a clip of Astrud Gilberto and Stan Getz done for Ipanema. I've always loved this footage because she looks almost catatonic, but bossa nova tunes are typically like this--so smooth you're trapped by its stylistic constraints. (My bugaboo about AI vocals is they they "pack" lyrics into one bar, singing them fast so they can get to the next bar and put emphasis on the wrong syllables). The art is a collage of work by Brazilian artist Helio Oiticica.
•  Llewelyn Ross (Alt-Country)--as a play on Llewelyn Moss, a character in No Country For Old Men. The vocal sounds like Wilco in spots, especially in the chorus. Photos are AI-generated.
•  Cadillac Tank (Blues). Famous painting by Picasso which I've inverted. The actual painting is a lot more blue. An amazing painting to see in the flesh. 
• Red Hex (Alt-Cajun) The still from Jarmusch's Mystery Train fits perfectly. Nice Grappelli violin solo.
•  The Vagueries (Bluegrass). Image is an Australian group mug shot from the 1920s. This is the music they play in the prison band.The background singers sound drunk. (The word "isosceles" was a particularly difficult word for AI, and had to be algospoken ("Eye sossa leez")
•  Slaaken (New Tango) The first lines sound German, which is why the El Lissitzky self-portrait seemed to work (He's actually a Russian Jew). The process of associating visuals with music involves lots of experimenting, not unlike experimenting with spicing in a new recipe: there's one combination that seems to work.
•  Richard Prince (Country). Background image is by Richard Prince, whose appropriations of Marlboro cowboy ads remains controversial, and this is kind of a commentary on that. The chicken-pickin' guitar is interesting. Very often you'll hear things in the generations that are very clever. The one I particularly like is how it picked up on the word "stop" in People Get On. 

Shorts:

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Arrangement for string quartet: