Vibrating Wires
We Will Watch It Go Up In Flames
Mark Rushton’s Abundant Spare Time is a weekly email on Substack where I talk about my ongoing work as a recording artist and visual artist. This is my 159th weekly email/post.
This week’s topics:
With Color In Your Life
Vibrations by Vibrating Wires
John Maus - “Because We Built It”
With Color In Your Life
Got lucky with this photo, especially with the processing. I was trying to capture the pull-up bar above my head, but the sun caused some pretty glares. I try to do around 30 pull-ups/chin-ups a day (spread out over 10 or 15 minutes) when I’m in the company gym. That’s my workout.
Did a bunch of audio editing. And deleting. I also assembled the “Vibrations” album by Vibrating Wires.
Jon Harnish signed up for BMI in 2011 but didn’t do anything with it. Recently, he tried to sign up for ASCAP but was told he’d have to leave BMI. So that’s in the works. We have some fun collaborations in the pipeline.
A musician in his mid 50s on TikTok found Jon’s bass playing and they’ve been talking. The guy is on another continent. I guess the guy isn’t signed and has never distributed or licensed music. To my ears, it’s very high quality. I’m asking around on this one, so we’ll see what happens. Always be willing to help others climb.
Last weekend, I discovered from one of my royalty statements that a track pushed to radio stations in Q1 2025 actually got some airplay in the Philadelphia area. Airplay is always great, but royalties are the cherry on top.
Vibrations by Vibrating Wires
Here’s a little “self-interview” on the Vibrations album by Vibrating Wires, which is out now on Bandcamp and should be on the streamers by October 15, 2025.
Tell everybody about your new album, “Vibrations”, as Vibrating Wires.
I started Vibrating Wires around 2020 after I bought a lap steel guitar. I never wanted to “play” it in a traditional way. I just wanted to get sounds out of it.
Because it only has a single pickup, there’s often a lot of hum and ambient noise. I purposefully left that in. I didn’t want “pristine” recordings. I wanted “raw” and “desolate” sounds - often run through my effects boxes.
Since 2020, I’ve released 84 tracks under that “band” name, including last year’s 20-track “Ghosts Forever”. I’ve licensed at least one of the songs to an exclusive library. So far, I’ve had more than 150,000 streams on Pandora. Lesser numbers on other services. It’s rather “difficult” music.
It often sounds like “mutant country”.
Yes. On purpose. It’s a very stark sound. Minimal. Dark. Kind of a “David Lynch-inspired” thing. Or maybe a “Scott Walker background” inspired bit of noise. Like being in the middle of the desert at night. With UFOs flying by.
Uneasy listening.
That’s right. But some people like that sort of thing.
What inspired “Vibrations”
It’s just an ongoing progress of this creative thread. I wanted to keep the album down to 10 tracks. Some of this music is a bit longer than normal: 3, 4, and even a 5 minute track, but most are under 2 minutes. Little sketches.
There’s variety. A couple of the tracks are mostly processed “hum” of the lap steel guitar run through my effects boxes.
Everything is a first take. No overdubbing. I didn’t use a DAW (Digital Audio Workstation) here, just audio editing software to trim the ends. I rarely use a DAW. I only use a DAW for basic multi-tracking on beat-driven projects.
Who inspires this music?
Daniel Lanois, for sure. He can actually play a pedal steel. I saw him live around 2016 and that concert was magic. I am just messing around with sounds. The more avant-garde parts of David Sylvian’s catalog. Derek Bailey, possibly.
It’s a creative release. I don’t care about numbers and sales. I’m not making pop music here. I like to call this music “desolate”. Or “mutant country”. “Desolate” is probably the best one-word descriptor.
John Maus - “Because We Built It”
I’m glad John Maus hasn’t changed his style, which is kind of a “gothic keyboard pop” + “minimal/emotional Scott Walker-baritone” vocals + “early John Foxx” rhythmic elements.
He’s really built his own recognizable sound. This new song is a good introduction for those who haven’t heard him before.
There’s also a recent article about him in Musicology Magazine, a publication I haven’t previously been aware of. Read it on your desktop computer and turn the pages. I do miss print magazines.