After ruminating on the initial idea of Ballard’s desert, I began to try and find sonic inspiration in music and games. Thinking about this place immediately reminded me of William Basinski’s ‘Disintegration Loops’, Gavin Bryars, ‘Jesus’ Blood Never Failed Me Yet’ and Oneohtrix Point Never’s ‘Garden Of Delete’ album. To me, all these records build vast, modern cityscapes – highlighting the weariful, sardonic, wryness of life in an overpopulated city. I think the values and aesthetics of these records perfectly align with what I want to convey within the game and its respective landscape.
For visuals, I was heavily inspired by the work of PWR Studio. A lot of their work involves creating landscapes, people and objects through stitching, deep frying and restitching memes, images and advertising. I feel their visual aesthetic and ideas perfectly aligned with how I imagined the graphics for this soundscape.
During the following meetings, I used this research along with my collaborators ideas to create sounds that fit into the world of the parallel cage.