William Basinski - The Disintegrating Loops - Calmness

Basinski is known for using tape music as loops of repetition. Loops represent the neverending cycle of music. Music that was once produced can be reused once their tapes are rediscovered. However, music on tapes, although they can be preserved for quiet some time, will not last forever as nothing lasts forever. Neither does the song that served for the basis of his song "dlp 3" which is actually not even ten seconds long but because the tape is replaying again and again, Basinski's song is over 40 minutes long. In these 41.50 minutes one gets to experience that not even a loop remains the same. As the tape is played in an "endless" loop the tape is actually starting to decay during its play. This means that with with the ongoing of the tape, the song is starting to sound weird, some tones are beginning to break or sound crispy/static and with further development this gets even worse.
At the beginning of the tape the listener experiences a very calming piece, the song has a slow tempo, the duration of the occuring sounds is rather long and the rhythm of the song is very clear and soothing. Overall, the piece is actually nice to listen to. That is until the process of the decaying tape starts to become recognizable. 

The process of the decay may not be recognizable at first but it is an ongoing process and by the end of the tape, the listener will not be able to trace the rest of the occuring sounds back to its origin. The reason is that with the decaying tape the sounds of the instruments become more alien to the listener, they appear very static and broken, some sounds die earlier than the others and there are broken breaks within the loops as well as between them, caused by the decay. 

When having my eyes closed, I picture a very calm scenario which is slowly but inevitably dying and thus vanishing until there is nothing left. That is also the idea Basinski had in mind when creating his piece "The Disintegrating Loops - DLP 3". Basinski also chose the bombed World Trade Center Towers from 2001 as the cover for this piece because that was the time when he stopped his project on trying to safe the original tapes. Before then, he had tried to safe the tapes but as the World Trade Center was bombed in 2001 he stopped this project and watched the towers burn while listening to the first song from the album "The Disintegrating Loops". Although the Background therefore is rather obscure, the story behind the recording of  his album is in that sense very epic. No matter how hard you try, you cannot always save the thing you want to safe when the process of its decay has already started (and is inevitable). 

At the same time, since the tapes were digitalized and audience can now listen to them over and over again, listen to the decaying tapes while their source of music is in fact not decaying, it is ironic since it contrast that very idea of disintegrating loops. Whatever conclusion listeners come to, the tape music is still a very melancholic one which I still find very calming in a sense that my mind started to accept the song and play it as background music. The recordig had my mind drift away since the decaying process does not create any sudden and abrupt changes which would have me "wake up" and become focused again. The process of the decay takes time, the tape does not suddenly die with a loud screeching sound, but the changes are very small. Yet, they proceed on happening so they can be unnoticed at first.