Multimedia Producer

Exquisite chill out iMix

info — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 07:48:54 +0000

Some super cool laid back chill with a watery feel - sit back relax and drift away . . .

Bondi Blue

info — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 06:13:40 +0000

John Simmons (ouch-media) is an award winning composer, musician and film-maker. He has just finished writing the score for the Underwater Bondi Experience - a tourist attraction at Bondi Pavilion Bondi Beach Australia. Beautiful chill out music - put on your snorkel and mask and venture under the blue waves of the Pacific Ocean at Bondi Beach, cool summer groovy beats and turquoise melodies transport you off to a better place.

How Philosophers Die

info — Thu, 10 May 2007 00:00:34 +0000

It is a piece of ancient wisdom that to philosophize is to learn how to die. From Socrates onwards, the philosopher is the person who has no fear of death, but accepts their fate with calm and contentment. Yet, how do philosophers themselves die? This song will explain and the answers are unexpectedly and darkly funny? As some of you might recognize, this song is also an indirect homage to Brian Eno.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZiiRiwgiksc

Post-Humanists see death as avoidable?

info — Wed, 04 Apr 2007 21:54:05 +0000

My enquiries into death have lead me to some strange and often fascinating places and ideas - none more so than the idea of the death of death. . . Post-Humanists see death as avoidable, a thing that may be kept at bay indefinitely, and perhaps they are right. It has been pointed out, quite rightly, that death is a terrible waste. According to one estimate approximately 55 million people die each year. Only 3 million of these are caused by human action, mostly wars and other violence, accidents and suicide. The remaining 52 million deaths are by ‘natural causes’, principally illness of one form or another. In the eyes of the posthumanists, this loss is an outrage. The great pain that death causes loved ones left behind is one thing, but death is also a waste of the years a person spends acquiring knowledge and experience. . IT has been estimated that each death represents the loss of information equivalent to a book. (Unless you are a complete fuckwit of course) This means that each year the information loss to mankind is comparable to that contained in the British library.

Let’s look at the dimensions of the human holocaust that we call “natural death.”
The death toll in the Year 2001 was worst in India. Almost 9 million casualties. The bodies were piled nearly as high in China. The United States fell in third, with 2.4 million fatalities. 21 nations lost over half a million lives, each. These 21 countries represented all cultures, races, creeds, and continents. The human death toll in the Year 2001 from all 227 nations on Earth was nearly 55 million people, of which about 52 million were not directly caused by human action, that is, not accidents, or suicides, or war. They were “natural” deaths.

Back to the day of the dead

info — Wed, 28 Feb 2007 22:45:39 +0000

Just watched a dvd on Oaxaca (southern Mexico) and the celebrations of Día de los Muertos - found a great section which had a band playing The peanut Vendor and lots of dancing with masks of the grim reaper, skeletons, ghouls etc.
I’ve read several versions of what it is all about and have come up with this, which I will use during the show . . .
A combination of pre-hispanic and Catholic traditions of the memory of deceased ancestors, relatives and friends.
The subject matter may be considered morbid from the Anglo Saxon perspective, In Mexico the Day of the Dead is a time of celebration and remembrance, and although it occurs at the same time as All Saints’ Day and All Souls Day, the Mexican expression is much more colourful and joyfull with emphasis on celebrating and honoring the lives of the deceased,
rather than fearing evil or malevolent spirits!

Sex Education

info — Wed, 28 Feb 2007 03:52:32 +0000

Such differences of experience on this one - seems there has been absolutely no consensus on sex education. I went to a Church of England school in North London - the boys were hearded off to the headmasters office, the girls to the headmistress, we were shown slides of mutilated genitalia - syphilis, gonorrhea, herpes, genital warts etc etc and then told this is what would ‘most probably’ happen to us if we fornicated with the girls outside of marriage - sex was for procreation!

Addiction to pornography - the brown paper bag syndrome!

info — Sat, 24 Feb 2007 01:53:36 +0000

I am wiriting a section of my new show (Sex, Death and Desire) on addiction to pornography - particlularly on the creation of the addiction. I have one fantastic interview with a porn addict describing the moment as an 11 (possibly as old as 13 but certainly no older) year old he was exposed to some hard core photos which he discovered in a brown paper bag left by his older brother - the shock of seeing such images was such that he believes he is trying to get back to that moment that rush when his world was turned inside out. This kind of impact can only happen in childhood.
. . . any other stories on the subject would be greatly appreciated.

Only one memory - A single syllable

info — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 23:03:51 +0000

I’ve been going through my Brian Eno collection - still brings me pleasure. Under-rated as a lyricist - even on tracks like “On some faraway beach” from “Here come the warm jets”
Cast up on a plateau
With only one memory
A single syllable
Oh lie low lie low.

Then there’s Apollo - even though Deep Blue Day has been in movies (Trainspotting) and get’s heard time and time again it is still sounding fresh - you couldn’t date that album.

Sex, Death and Desire

info — Sun, 19 Nov 2006 11:36:42 +0000

This is the title of my new show . . .

Sex, Death and Desire is a multi-media look into the connections between song, dance, religion and ecstasy and the relationship between sound and space, about the ways in which language creates but is also created (and disrupted) by a physical environment, the difficult interrelationships between the ‘natural’ and the ‘discursive’, the opposition between reality and illusion and the tandem subject of the theatre itself. The work has been booked for Friday, 20th April 2007, and Saturday, 21st April 2007, at the Opera House’s Studio.

Sex, Death and Desire

John Simmons, musician, multimedia producer, composer, designer and filmmaker

info — Thu, 14 Sep 2006 08:43:24 +0000

The following numerous accolades were received for his music and film work:

» 2002 Australian Guild of Screen Composers JD Music Award
» 2003 1st prize Canada’s Sea to Sky Short Film Festival
» 2004 Selected for the San Diego Film Festival. Performed at Sydney Opera House
» 2005 Book of Water in permanent collection of inVIdeo Milan
» 2006 US release of CD Flying

As the multi-media complement to the Critchley & Simmons duo, John Simmons has performed at the Sydney Opera House and the Palais de Tokyo in Paris. A new show is in progress for early 2007.

He is a decent man, more sinned against than sinning.