Its like aural printmaking. Temporal multitracking. LIFO monophonic overdub. Tape-to-tape. Inverse chemistry set solution Hi-Fi mix down. 2-Maxwells-and-a wire jury-rigged sound system. Used to do a lot of multi-track recording back in the days before I was comfortable handling paper money.
Took 2 dinged up yard sale twin tape decks salvaged with rubbing alcohol and wired them together with Radio Shack. Found a good sized prehistoric stereo amplifier in my folks attic. Bought expensive cassettes with the last of my financial aid check. Got me a cheap ass mike from god-knows-where. Raggedy speakers from the swap shack at the town dump back home. Thought about it. Went stark raving mad. Sold my Apple II and bought a brand new Quadraverb, a mid range 10 band EQ, tin drum machine, and a gigantic but scratchy bass amp and speaker cabinet. My friends and neighbors and family donated banged up old instruments. I pretended I could play them. Sticks. Bells. Cello. Guitar. Electric. Mouth harp. Bass. Piano. Turntables. Pipa. Trumpet. Organ. Piccolo. And the beat box. Sat back crosslegged on the floor and had Corn Flakes for dinner just staring at all the little red lights...
Many years later I found myself in possession of in excess of 200 60 minute mix down tapes of junky flea-bitten pop music recorded in the most haphazard style yet seen. Tape to tape, up to 5 and more tracks deep. Instrument, machine and sometimes voice per track. Filtered through EQ and signal processor several times. Static. In fact, Static, Jin Zhi Static, Johannes Kepler Band, In Sol Visa, Alien Love Beings, Penang Tan, Cosmodemonic Telegraph Co., etc., etc. None of these names should be familiar. If they are, you're thinking of someone else's band.
In 1993, along with another 21.3% of the North American post starving artist population, I started a music-on-demand Internet service. Somehow I haven't touched an instrument since...