Acknowledging a lack of process in producing something is still kind of a process,
just one that eschews technical knowledge in favor of going directly for the feeling, the flow, and personal expression, hence your favorite catchphrase, the

gopher it!

An advantage of this is that you just immerse yourself directly into the practice, without wasting time.
Practical truths are revealed to you, that stick more easily than stuff you have glossed over in a book.
However you might be more vulnerable to floundering and be more limited in the results you obtain.

The other extreme is hoarding technical knowledge without actually using it, because well, you don’t actually need it for the moment.
Pursuit of technique is something I am personally engrossed with, and to the detriment of my own creative output:
for the sake of higher quality, better articulation of one’s message,
that can devolve into perfectionism if one’s actually productive, or just analysis paralysis with less experienced artists.

Words can help as much as the can get in your way, both written and orally, even in your internal monologue. I think a big part
of doing art is translating whatever abstract concept you have in mind into a finished product using a specific language or notation: of shapes, sounds, textures, etc…
Fluency in that language is reached through output and feedback on that output, just as with foreign language.

Imitating the styles you like is just as valid as starting from scratch, as long as you are aware of the risks that lies in blindly persisting in a single direction
without considering the actual fit of your method to what you want to create.

The argument between theory and practice, and the actual ratio to be allotted in any kind of craft, usually goes as follows:
Grinding is obviously required, but not questioning the efficiency of your process with regard to reaching one’s goals might be detrimental,
whereas some basic understanding of the things you struggle with, combined with proper exercising of those concepts in context, is (in theory of course)
more likely to reach breakthroughs.

Your post struck a few chords on me (excuse the pun): on philosophy of art, on the process of producing and interpreting/consuming music.

the reason I listen to any music is to satisfy and reinforce base animalistic instinct as much as possible

Reminded me of how music appeals to emotions, which are different facets of the same thing, which is the ego which wants something or not.
Thus, I would expect thoughtlessness to be found in ambient textures, noise and drone, to bring a sense of atmosphere and space, without strong emotions.
Experiencing music, either by producing or listening, relates to describing and sharing more or less crudely states of mind, like say,
mental illnesses or a conversation with someone.
But since instrumentality or two-way telepathy isn’t happening anytime soon, we use art instead to do so.
It probably can help cope with the condition of human life through self-expression, but may also be considered a luxury, or even pretentious.

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• This reply was modified 6 years ago by Jambato.

That’s right. (Un)fortunately I don’t have either FB or Instagram, so those means of contact are out for me. I am on Discord and Mastodon though.

According to the event page, at least 200 people are going. That’s no CODEX 5 level crowd, and with all the potential dancing across two stages, it might be messy.
Meeting before the event for dinner or something is an option as well.

I wonder if it is possible to DM/PM someone over the forum

Some info about the comic you mentioned:

The MAL page, according to which:

The fifth and sixth chapters of Gedatsu Man were published in English by VIZ Media in their underground manga anthology Secret Comics Japan on July 6, 2000.

A note from the comic: Gedatsu is a Buddhist term for “salvation of enlightenment”.

And to get an idea from the content, from bakaupdates’ mangaka page:

Hironori Kikuchi made his debut with the comic story ‘Fruits’ in the magazine Garo in 1995. Although the editorial staff was confused by the lack of story line the comic presented, it was intrigued by its scenery and the expressions of the characters. The crazy, dangerous atmosphere of Kikuchi’s work was in sharp contrast to his skillfully drawn backgrounds and characters, which at cursory glance seem cute. This hallucinatory quality of the strip made one of the editors call it “a drug you read”. In 1998, Garo published the series ‘Gedatsu Man’ – an absolutely nonsensical comic that makes you fear for its creator’s sanity. Kikuchi, however, is a very normal, proper and sincere person, and a great fan of ’70s and ’80s hard rock. ‘Gedatsu Man’ has been translated in English and published in the underground collection ‘Secret Comics Japan’.

When reading this, I couldn’t help wonder: did BTW make musical drugs? If so, I believe he succeeded.