a radio show at WRVU; that's where Theatre Intangible started. People would call in and we’d put them live on the air mixed in with improvised music. Now I do it as a podcast out of my basement. VK: You have a venue out of your house too?
TY: Yeah, Noa Noa. My roommate plays drums in five bands so we take turns booking stuff. He does more rock shows, and I do more experimental shows. VK: How about Circuit Benders' Ball? How did you start that?
TY: I got into circuit bending in college through my friend Dave Armstrong in 1999. He showed me how you can just grab keyboards, lick your fingers, and touch random parts and make all these weird sounds. When I moved here there wasn’t much of a scene for it. I did my first Circuit Benders' Ball at Open Lot when it was still around.
PHOTOGRAPH BY ANGELINA M CASTILLO
VK: Where’s the next location for the Ball?
VK: How do you respond to the classic complaint that certain things aren’t music? I find that to be pretty prevalent in Nashville where such a large number of the population believe they know exactly what music is . . .
TY: I think it is because it’s an industry town. With the number of studio musicians, there is a set idea of what counts as music based on a business model. Music is music when it can be marketed.
PHOTOGRAPH BY TYLER BLANKENSHIP
2012 Circuit Benders' Ball
TY: Fort Houston on April 12. There will be all-day workshops like Intro to Circuit Bending, which basically consists of going to Goodwill, finding some toy, and learning how to bend it. There’s really no way to do it wrong. It is about experimenting and failing. It is aleatoric.
BYOB installation at Track One 86 | March 2014 NashvilleArts.com