Timbre and the "Zone of Entanglement" in Electronic Dance Music: Re-Thinking Musico-Social Ontologies with the Mycelial Turn

Perevedentseva, Maria

Abstract

This article weaves together relational tendencies in recent scholarship spanning philosophy, mycology, psychopharmacology and timbre studies in order to argue that timbre's unbounded ontology and cyclical re-use across electronic dance music (EDM) history affords listeners experiential access into radically distributed modes of being. Taking its cue from the biological structure of the fungal mycelium, from whose flowers the psychoactive compounds of many psychedelic drugs are derived, this study builds on established models of EDM's affectivity to propose that timbre in EDM manifests a psychedelic and specifically social form of consciousness. Highlighting the potential for entrainment that EDM's synthesised timbres make possible, a conception of timbre as a mycelial "zone of entanglement" is put forward, in which the material and cultural, individual and social, and spiritual and fleshly dimensions of the listening experience are folded into a reverberant unity, in turn encouraging a negotiation of the ethics that this entanglement entails.

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Mar 28, 2023
• Online Publication Date: Nov 23, 2023
• Publication Date: Nov 23, 2023
• Deposit Date: Jun 16, 2023
• Publicly Available Date: Feb 24, 2857
• Journal: Dancecult: Journal of Electronic Dance Music Culture
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 15
• Issue: 1
• Pages: 13
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.12801/1947-5403.2023.15.01.03
• Keywords: Timbre; mycelium; ontology; psychedelics; electronic dance music
• Additional Information: Part of special issue titled 'Psychedelica and Electronica' edited by Trace Reddell and Graham St John