It is fun to revisit memories this way, a digital stamp in my weather passport, where everything can be contained in a forecast and Stockholm sits between Vilnius and London by sheer chance. It has also been a way to feel close to people I love while traveling, to know whether it is raining where they are.
As with most technology, this is artistry by committee. There is no Thomas Cole waiting in the wings. But someone has to animate the stars, to decide when to streak one across the screen–to play god in our pockets.
Brian Eno is well-represented in iOS. His other apps like Bloom, Trope and Air invite listeners to touch the screen to make their own composition. Reflection ($30.99) is different, there is no interaction for the listener. The interface has three buttons: a pause button, a sleep timer, and AirPlay. Reflection produces endless permutations of Eno’s 2017 album, an hour and five minute long title track.
“Just calling it an app is akin to saying Falling Water is just a building,” writes one app store reviewer. “I would not call this an app,” agrees another, “Between the music and visuals it’s more like sonic architecture.” The visuals consist of slowly morphing rectangles that only seem to change in the split second you look away from the screen.
Though you might not think it from the comic, I’m actually sympathetic to questions about tools and process, as I myself am a kind of process junky. I love hearing about how other writers work.
I’m also not someone who dismisses questions about tools with the line “the tools don’t matter.” In fact, I think tools matter so much that if you don’t talk about them correctly you can do some damage.
...What I love about John Gardner and Lynda Barry is that they believe that the tools you use do matter, but the point, for them, is finding the proper tools that get you to a certain way of working in which you can get your conscious, mechanical mind out of the way so that your dreaming can go on, undeterred.
You have to find the right tools to help your voice sing.