The Evolution Control Committee (The ECC) is an

experimental music Experimental music is a general label for any music or music genre that pushes existing boundaries and genre definitions. Experimental compositional practice is defined broadly by exploratory sensibilities radically opposed to, and questioning of, ...

band based in

Columbus, Ohio Columbus (, ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of cities in Ohio, most populous city of the U.S. state of Ohio. With a 2020 United States census, 2020 census population of 905,748, it is the List of United States ...

. The ECC was founded by Mark Gunderson (a.k.a. TradeMark G.) in Columbus in 1986. They create music that falls within the borders of the

sound collage In music, montage (literally "putting together") or sound collage ("gluing together") is a technique where newly branded sound objects or Musical composition, compositions, including songs, are created from collage, also known as musique concrè ...

genre, typically using uncleared and illegal samples from various sources as a form of protest against

copyright A copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive legal right to copy, distribute, adapt, display, and perform a creative work, usually for a limited time. The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, ...

law. The ECC also produces numerous audio

experiment An experiment is a procedure carried out to support or refute a hypothesis, or determine the efficacy or likelihood of something previously untried. Experiments provide insight into cause-and-effect by demonstrating what outcome occurs whe ...

s that goes outside regular composition methods, including the disfiguring of

compact discs The compact disc (CD) is a digital optical disc data storage format co-developed by Philips and Sony to store and play digital audio recordings. It employs the Compact Disc Digital Audio (CD-DA) standard and was capable of holding of uncompr ...

in a live performance known as "CDestruction". They have produced a few

video Video is an Electronics, electronic medium for the recording, copying, playback, broadcasting, and display of moving picture, moving image, visual Media (communication), media. Video was first developed for mechanical television systems, whi ...

works as well, ranging from re-edited 50's

corporate A corporation or body corporate is an individual or a group of people, such as an association or company, that has been authorized by the state to act as a single entity (a legal entity recognized by private and public law as "born out of s ...

shorts to

Teddy Ruxpin Teddy Ruxpin is an electronic children's toy in the form of a talking bear-like creature known as an 'Illiop'. The toy's mouth and eyes move while he tells stories about his adventures played on an audio tape cassette deck built into his back. ...

reciting the works of

William S. Burroughs William Seward Burroughs II (; February 5, 1914 – August 2, 1997) was an American writer and visual artist. He is widely considered a primary figure of the Beat Generation and a major Postmodern literature, postmodern author who influen ...

. Other activities include

culture jamming Culture jamming (sometimes also guerrilla communication) is a form of protest used by many anti-consumerist social movements to disrupt or subvert media culture and its mainstream cultural institutions, including corporate advertising. It at ...

. They are one of the pioneers of the mash-up or bootleg, where two or more songs are mixed together into a new track. According to

Neil Strauss Neil Darrow Strauss (born March 9, 1969), also known by the pen names Style and Chris Powles, is an American author and journalist. His book ''The Game: Penetrating the Secret Society of Pickup Artists'', describes his experiences in the seducti ...

in ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

'', "...many musical observers trace the official beginnings of the British bootleg scene to The Evolution Control Committee, which in 1993 mixed a Public Enemy a cappella with music by Herb Alpert." These are the now-classic "Public Enemy/Whipped Cream Mixes" containing

Public Enemy Public Enemy is an American Hip-hop, hip hop group formed in Roosevelt, New York, in 1985 by Chuck D and Flavor Flav. The group rose to prominence for their political messages including subjects such as Racism in the United States, American r ...

's inflammatory raps titled "By the Time I Get To Arizona" and "Rebel Without a Pause" overdubbed onto instrumentals by

Herb Alpert Herb Alpert (born March 31, 1935) is an American trumpeter, pianist, singer, songwriter, record producer, arranger, conductor, painter, sculptor and theatre producer, who led the band Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass (sometimes called "Herb Alpe ...

and the

Tijuana Brass Tijuana is the most populous city of the Mexican state of Baja California, located on the northwestern Pacific Coast of Mexico. Tijuana is the municipal seat of the Tijuana Municipality, the hub of the Tijuana metropolitan area and the most popu ...

. The ECC wrote "Rocked by Rape," consisting of samples of

Dan Rather Daniel Irvin Rather Jr. (; born October 31, 1931) is an American journalist, commentator, and former national evening news anchor. He began his career in Texas, becoming a national name after his reporting saved thousands of lives during Hurrica ...

deadpan Deadpan, dry humour, or dry-wit humour is the deliberate display of emotional neutrality or no emotion, commonly as a form of Comedy, comedic delivery to contrast with the ridiculousness or absurdity of the subject matter. The delivery is meant t ...

delivery describing various atrocities over looped

riffs A riff is a short, repeated motif or figure in the melody or accompaniment of a musical composition. Riffs are most often found in rock music, punk, heavy metal music, Latin, funk, and jazz, although classical music is also sometimes based on ...

from

AC/DC AC/DC are an Australian rock band formed in Sydney in 1973. Their music has been variously described as hard rock, blues rock and Heavy metal music, heavy metal, although the band calls it simply "rock and roll". They are cited as a formativ ...

's "

Back in Black ''Back in Black'' is the seventh studio album by Australian rock band AC/DC, released on 25 July 1980, by Albert Productions and Atlantic Records. It was the band's first album to feature Brian Johnson as lead singer, following the death of the ...

." This work brought legal threats against The ECC by

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS (an abbreviation of its original name, Columbia Broadcasting System), is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainme ...

, but by 2003, CBS appeared to have dropped the issue. "Rocked by Rape" was nationally broadcast on NPR's ''

All Things Considered ''All Things Considered'' (''ATC'') is the flagship news program on the American network National Public Radio (NPR). It was the first news program on NPR, premiering on May 3, 1971. It is broadcast live on NPR affiliated stations in the United ...

'' in 2000. It was even played at a

roast Roasting is a cooking method that uses dry heat where hot air covers the food, cooking it evenly on all sides with temperatures of at least from an open flame, oven, or other heat source. Roasting can enhance the flavor through caramelizatio ...

for Rather, later broadcast on

C-SPAN Cable-Satellite Public Affairs Network (C-SPAN ) is an American Cable television in the United States, cable and Satellite television in the United States, satellite television network, created in 1979 by the cable television industry as a Non ...

. Since 2000, Gunderson has performed his works on stage through an electronic instrument of his own invention: "The Thimbletron." It is made of a pair of gloves with ten thimbles attached at the ends of the fingers that are then wired to a laptop computer. As the thimbles are touched together, the laptop in turn plays a different sound sample. Gunderson claims that the device uses "thimbletronium energy" and warns that "thimbletronic radiation can leak unexpectedly due to a mishap during a live performance. The audience is advised to attend Thimbletron performances at their own risk." Gunderson has also modified a bread toaster in a similar fashion, with each depression of a lever playing a sample. The Thimbletron has been largely retired in public performances in favor of the Wheel of Mashup in which audience members come up on stage and spin a wheel to randomly select the music and vocals to be combined. These are then mashed together in real time using the VidiMasher 3000, a large rear-projected touch screen used to control

Ableton Live Ableton Live is a digital audio workstation for macOS and Windows developed by the German company Ableton. In contrast to many other software sequencers, Live is designed to be an instrument for live performances as well as a tool for compos ...

VidiMasher 3000 (Video Mashup Screen) Demo

Discography

*''Jesu Boy of Man's Desiring'' (Self Release) *:Audio cassette featuring early cut-ups. *''Buddha Bleach'' (Self Release on Def Clam Tapes, Dec. 1990) *:Audio cassette featuring early cut-ups. *''The Last Mall'' (Self Release) *:Audio cassette featuring loops and crank phone calls. Packaged in a "Lazarusears" shopping bag. *''Big Wyoming'' (Self Release) *:Audio cassette featuring travelogue of a Gunderson family ski vacation accompanied by

Casio is a Japanese multinational electronics manufacturing corporation headquartered in Shibuya, Tokyo, Japan. Its products include calculators, mobile phones, digital cameras, electronic musical instruments, and analogue and digital watches. It ...

. Packaged in postcards. *''Gunderphonic'' (Self Release, 199
ECC -=- The Virtual Gunderphone
*:Audio cassette inspired by John Oswald's

Plunderphonics Plunderphonics is a music genre in which tracks are constructed by sampling (music), sampling recognizable musical works. The term was Neologism, coined by composer John Oswald (composer), John Oswald in 1985 in his essay "Plunderphonics, or Aud ...

. Features cut-ups, including the well known Whipped Cream mixes and two "corrected" Gulf War speeches by George H. W. Bush. The audio cassette is packaged inside of an old 8-track cassette. *''Double the Phat and Still Tasteless'' (Released on Eerie Materials) *:CD featuring cut-ups and

electronica Electronica is both a broad group of electronic-based music styles intended for listening rather than strictly for dancing and a music scene that came to prominence in the early 1990s in the United Kingdom. In the United States, the term is mos ...

, as well as absurdist humor skits and guest performances. A 5.25 inch floppy disc is slit along one side and the CD is slipped inside. *'' Plagiarhythm Nation'' (Released on Seeland Records) *:CD featuring cut-ups and electronica. *''The Whipped Cream Mixes'' (Released on Eerie Materials/ Pickled Egg) *:

Vinyl Vinyl may refer to: Chemistry * Polyvinyl chloride (PVC), a particular vinyl polymer * Vinyl cation, a type of carbocation * Vinyl group, a broad class of organic molecules in chemistry * Vinyl polymer, a group of polymers derived from vinyl ...

45. Side A - Rebel Without A Pause. Side B - By The Time I Get to Arizona. *''Unreleased Ambient Works'' (Self Released) *:CD featuring dark atmospheric/ illbient works. *''Rocked by Rape'' (Released on Eerie Materials) *:Vinyl 45. *''The Television Will Not Be Revolutionized'' (Self Released) *:

VHS VHS (Video Home System) is a discontinued standard for consumer-level analog video recording on tape cassettes, introduced in 1976 by JVC. It was the dominant home video format throughout the tape media period of the 1980s and 1990s. Ma ...

video cassette. *''Compact Discstructions'' (Self Released) *:A manual packaged with a random CD. The manual describes various ways to make a CD play incorrectly, and is intended ultimately to destroy the CD. *''Subliminal'' (self-released) *:Cassette featuring many layered subliminal

self-help Self-help or self-improvement is "a focus on self-guided, in contrast to professionally guided, efforts to cope with life problems" —economically, physically, intellectually, or emotionally—often with a substantial psychological basis. When ...

recordings. The website claims that side one "will increase your creativity, improve your employment, develop your ESP, help you stop smoking, and so on." While side two, being a reverse recording of the same, "will help you gain weight, get demoted, become stupid, etc.
link
*''Weapons of Ass Destruction'' (self-released) *:Full length album released online, available for download from th

*''All Rights Reserved'' (self-released) *:Full-length album released onlin
Discography: ECC Media of the Past, Present, and Future
also available in LP and CD format.

Related artists

Mark Gunderson also records as DJ Pantshead and performs with Cheese & Pants Theater, a comedy/performance art duo consisting of a giant pair of pants and a giant Parmesan cheese shaker who pantomime to bizarrely edited vintage audio and as DJ John Philip Suicide with Dub Assault. Past projects have included the experimental performance troupe Gaga, several ECC performances at the Columbus Avant Garage film festival, and a release with the Weird Love Makers. A present project is his webcast 'The Sound of Plaid' as Trademark G. at the Amsterdam-based international radio-art webstation DFM RTV INT, which airs two times each week. Other related artists include The Bran Flakes,

Emergency Broadcast Network Emergency Broadcast Network is a multimedia performance group formed in 1991 that took its name from the Emergency Broadcast System. The founders were Rhode Island School of Design graduates Joshua Pearson, Gardner Post, and Brian Kane (autho ...

, Escape Mechanism,

Negativland Negativland is an American experimental music band that originated in the San Francisco Bay Area in the late 1970s. The core of the band consists of Mark Hosler, David Wills (aka "The Weatherman"), Peter Conheim and Jon Leidecker (aka "Wobbly" ...

, John Oswald, People Like Us and The Tape-beatles, Messer Für Frau Müller. Greg Gillis, in interview outtakes for the movie ''RIP: A Remix Manifesto'', admits that Evolution Control Committee was a major influence and inspiration to create the mashups for his artistic persona Girl Talk. Gillis even explains that the best description of Girl Talk's music is "

References

External links

Evolution Controlled Creations website
* *
La licence artistique

The Some Assembly Required Interview with The Evolution Control Committee. {{DEFAULTSORT:Evolution Control Committee American experimental musical groups Culture jamming Musical groups from Columbus, Ohio American mashup groups Sound collage artists