Q & A From Details Magazine
- Q - How much do you use technology in your work?
-
- PG- Pretty well everything I do involves technology,
equal parts
- high-tech and hand made, whether musical, visual or technical.
- An example would be on the new album where we are using hard
disk
- based digital recording with customised software, dynamically
- automated digital recording consoles alongside some cheap
old
- electronics equipment and many traditional instruments from
- different countries. My father was an inventor/electrical
- engineer and I grew up fascinated by all the futuristic projects
- he was working on. I definitely get a buzz out of doing things
- that haven't been done before.
- Q - What's your favourite piece of electronic equipment
and why?
-
- PG- My little portable transistor radio on which I
listen to BBC
- Radio 4. I usually buy the cheapest, then I don't worry about
- losing it. And my computer, because of access to the net
and the
- creative possibilities it provides, visually and musically.
- Q - What was the first electric gadget you owned?
-
- PG- A small '60s reel-to-reel tape recorder with a
built in
- speaker. The first song I recorded on it with great excitement
- was 'Red River Rock' by Johnny and the Hurricanes.
- Q - What's your favourite web site and why?
-
- PG- HotBot.com is the one I visit most often as it
seems to be
- much the most useful search engine I've come across and I
love to
- play detective. I also enjoy reading customer written book
- reviews at Amazon.com.
- Q - Do you use financial software? If so, what?
-
- PG- Extremely rarely. If someone would only write
some financial
- software that was fun to play with visually, I might be tempted.
- I find visually displayed material much more accessible than
text
- or numbers.
- Q - How would you describe your computer skills on
a scale of
- 1-10, with ten being the highest?
-
- PG- A friend suggested my score could be a two or
an eight
- depending on what I was up to.
- Q - Technologically speaking, are there any innovations
that you
- are excited about?
-
- PG- Many. I love reading about ingenious and inventive
- innovation and have been a regular reader of New Scientist
for
- many years. I have twice been in New York in major snow storms
- and loved how it affected the sound of the city and the behaviour
- of its people. I have also been fascinated by the skin of
- dolphins. Both of these things led me to dream of a soft
city
- with buildings, streets and cars with soft cladding, and
I was
- excited to discover some projects moving in this direction.
- Q - How loud do you turn up the stereo?
-
- PG- Medium, except on occasions in the car when I
crank it up
- (not the car, the volume...)
- Q - What's your favourite video game and why?
-
- PG- It has to be EVE. We spent along time working
with a lot of
- interesting contributors, fine artists especially, to design
a
- visual and musical game that we would enjoy playing ourselves.
- Q - Do you keep an electronic diary? What kind of
machine do you
- keep it on?
-
- PG- Yes I keep an electronic diary with my assistant
Annie, which
- is synchronised between work desk, Powerbook and Newton.
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