(2018) High Quality Final Days is 125 cassette tapes with 9 tracks of text-based compositions, 125 risographs with hand-lettered download codes, 125 VHS cassettes hand-harvested from my friend’s parents’ VHS collection, guts removed, filled with hydrocal (2.5 parts gypsum, 1 part water) turned into a cassette mold, and 125 silkscreened cardboard boxes derived from a woodcut of an illegible reproduction of a Blockbuster Video box by artist Oli Watt. They were released by Parlour Tapes+ on January 29, 2018.
You can purchase it here.
“A warm blanket made from highest-quality lambswool for eternal warmth and comfort. A real desert island gem.”
- Ken Murphy, President and CEO, Mattress Firm
“Truly, a tape for the ages.”
- David Cook, former CEO, Founder, Blockbuster Video
Some people grow to be very old and very dead. But somehow, some of these people are still very famous today. That is because of high-quality. Let’s say you’re the best at something. You can pour your accomplishments into a cast-iron mold, wait for the mold to heat up (it might take a couple of minutes), and soon the scent of warm acrylic and eternity will begin to waft from the mold. This smell will beget a real thrill, but then you’ll realize you have to wait some more, which will be equal parts boring and exhilarating. However, your patience will pay off; within moments you will have an object, fashioned of yourself, ready for you to drop into the confusion, to make an offering of it, so to speak, to the life-force.
High Quality Final Days is a motivational offering that can help you to understand the eternal consequences of discovering “what you love”, which is something that really can be discovered. “What you love” could be something like making a painting, making motivational tapes, being a business person. If you discover what you love, the universe can love you too, from the densest neutrino star to the fluffiest hydrogen clouds, from the event horizon of a black hole to a single Planck unit. Maybe your neighbors will love you too.
High Quality Final Days is a journey and you will meet a lot of characters along the way (!!!), including: humans; overtone singing robot synths; the re-synthesized voice of my daughter, my partner, myself; Vicki, Samantha, Fred, Alex, and the whole Apple stock-synth-voice gang; and more. These characters will emerge from a blanket of sounds generated from their own essence translated into Sibelius playback, midi sounds, and software synths. The sounds will uplift, nourish, and set a real mood. Some of the sounds might heal; with Pythagorean moments, ancient solfeggio frequencies, and other inspirational modes mixed in for good measure, you could be operating entirely on another plane. Maybe at the end of this tape you will want to exclaim something like: “wow, what a difference this tape has made in my life.”
- Samuel Robert Scranton, Founder, Department of Ceremonial Atmospheres
released January 29, 2018
All tracks written, recorded, and mixed in an apartment living room by Sam Scranton
Mastering and general mix beautification by Grayson Elliott Taylor
Art and Design by Oli Watt
Molly Roth Scranton appears on Tracks 3,7,9
Edith Emily Scranton appears on Track 2,9
Sugar Scranton appears on Track 6
Track 7 uses the following sounds from freesound:
272169__dethrok__cicadas.wav
319360__rohanpp786__1-mumbai-traffic.wav
383725__deleted-user-7146007__hand-saw-sawing-wood.wav
265627__director89__rain-atmo
170584__klankbeeld__terrace-ambience-01
256317__kodack__opening-soda-can.wav
Jeez, I couldn’t have made this thing without Molly.
