This week in class, we explored queer music though an experimental composition task inspired by Throbbing Gristle.
In the queer music exercise, where we were asked to create a track inspired in “Throbbing Gristle”, I paired up with Esther.
Rapidly we found a common direction. Inspired by the track “Hamburguer Lady , we found that the one of the most striking features was its complete rejection of conventional music structure. It didn’t have a typical ABAB or ABABCB form, in fact they deliberately sought to challenge musical traditions.
As the vocalist Genesis P-Orridge said in an interview: “In order to do something that seems new you have to strip away everything that’s traditional…You have to get everything that’s normal and break it”.
Following that idea we decided to not include verses and choruses and we avoid using quantisation, just fluid tempo. This matched the unsettling tone of the song.
Another thing we borrowed from our reference track was the use of heavily distorted pads. We chose a pad, then add the guitar amp effect to give it a more crunchy sound and to emphasise the crunchiness we used Logic’s Candy Fuzz plug in. Adding distortion created a sense of confusion, tension and discomfort.
This experience made me realise how sound design can help communicate some abstract concepts rather than just relying in melody and harmony.
Overall, this exercise expanded my creative mindset and tight me that breaking the rules is not always a mistake.
BIBLIOGRAPHY:
LEE, GAVIN. “Queer Music Theory.” Music Theory Spectrum, vol. 42, no. 1, 2020, pp. 143–53. JSTOR, https://www.jstor.org/stable/27141588. Accessed 7 Nov. 2025.
Thecreativeindependent.com. (2017). Genesis P-Orridge on destroying preconceptions – The Creative Independent. [online] Available at: https://thecreativeindependent.com/people/genesis-p-orridge-on-destroying-preconceptions/ [Accessed 10 Nov. 2025].
Smith, E. (2016). Lucid Definitions for 10 Hazy Musical Terms. [online] Houston Press. Available at: https://www.houstonpress.com/music/lucid-definitions-for-10-hazy-musical-terms-8531645/ [Accessed 10 Nov. 2025].
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