Back in January when I was in Gainesville to perform at the wonderful Apartment Music 31 and 32 shows, I met the affable, accomplished fellow ECer and Apartment Music performer, Adam Naworal. He and his multi-talented wife, Aimee Grace Naworal perform as the duo, Tomokie’s Cup. Adam has initiated two way interviews with fellow ECer’s such as Lord Litter and Frank and kindly invited me to do one with him.
​You can read Adam's interview of me here.

LS:
What inspires you to pick up a certain instrument or piece of gear? For instance,
what attracted you to the electronic bagpipes?  
AN:
​I always wanted to do things that others aren't doing, without trying to sound too
full of myself. The electronic bagpipes were something we found after getting actual bagpipes and finding out they were defective and INSANELY expensive to repair. I tend to go for instruments that are easy for Aimee and I to both play and learn. I also don't want to limit myself to one particular type of instrument, which goes into our decisions as well. We have synthesizers and strings and a harmonium and various other things, all of which come in handy depending on our mood and what ideas we have at the time. I truly believe that being a multi-instrumentalist opens up a vast array of creative possibilities, and I highly encourage everyone to pursue that path.

LS:
Do we survive death in any sense, and if so, do we survive for a time or forever?
AN:
I believe as long as you leave memories, acts, and art behind, you never truly die. I’m not much of a believer in afterlives and such, but I do feel the quickest way to achieve immortality is to leave a tangible piece of your life for future generations to study.

LS:
What is the story behind Waste of Tape? 
AN:
Oh wow, there's a question I have genuinely never been asked! Waste Of Tape
started when I met Jim Greco. He was stunned that this nerdy little goth kid knew who Beherit was (he was wearing a Beherit shirt). We got to talking and realized we both had similar interests and thought processes, and we were both interested in doing noise as a therapeutic release. Jim was especially interested in experimenting since he's in a lot of death metal and black metal bands which require a lot of thought and practice. We recorded some really bad noisecore and then some better jokey tracks on the first day of our existence. We were throwing names back and forth and finally I said "Well, might as well call it Waste Of Tape because it's starting to look like one", upon which Jim said "STOP! THAT'S IT!" We've since evolved from mostly comedic who-gives-a-fuck-ism into
more restrained and atmospheric music, while still being jerks to each other in the best sense. Jim's a good dude and I've enjoyed creating nonsense with him for all these years.

LS:
Can mind dominate matter or does matter completely dominate mind, or has each, perhaps, a certain limited independence?
AN:
Mind CAN dominate matter, but be careful what you wish for; their limited
independence may be the best thing. When you put too much mental emphasis on physical pleasure, for example, it can be a toxic combination. I think it’s best to approach this subject on a by-case/by experience basis, since not every experience will warrant the same reaction or thought process.

LS:
What music do you listen to around the house when you are hanging out with the
Aimee and cats? Or when you are just hanging out by yourself with the cats? 
AN:
My main musical interests run from noise rock and no wave to free jazz and fusion to krautrock and weird prog to early electronic and musique concrète and everything in between! That being said, I can go from listening to Girls on Fire right into Xhol and then switch to "Easy Lover" or "Games Without Frontiers" without feeling like I'm being too eclectic. A good song (or piece of music or piece of audio art) is good, regardless of genre or popularity, and I will not deny that some of the poppier stuff I enjoy would probably surprise people. A good cross section of my musical (and film) tastes can be found at my Rate Your Music page, where I operate as dotadot.

LS:
Has the Universe a purpose?  Or it it driven by blind necessity? Or is it a mere
chaos and jumble in which the natural laws that we think we find are only a fantasy generated by our own love of order?
AN:
I'm not so certain the Universe has a purpose per se, but if it doesn't, that simply
makes the universe the greatest embodiment of Dada ever. Nothing wrong with that!

LS:
Legend has it that goats discovered what berry?
a.   blueberry
b.   coffee berry
c.   blackberry
d.   none of the above

​AN:
I wanna say B!
I recall reading somewhere that goats were observed being more active after eating coffee berries and their herders thought "Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm".

LS:
If there is a cosmic scheme, has life more importance in it than astronomy would
lead us to suppose or is our emphasis upon life mere parochialism and self-importance?
AN:
I'm going to quote the recently departed Mark Hollis of Talk Talk for the last part of the question: "Life's what you make of it". I really think including others in your life leads to a healthier overall experience than being self-important or –absorbed. The EC community is proof of that!

LS:
What is your favorite Pepperidge Farm cookie?
AN: Mannnnnnn, I haven't had any of those in forever! I remember the one I liked was shortbread with caramel and chocolate; I'm not sure if they even make that anymore.
(EDIT: After reading your interview with Lucy (Bonk), the cookie she named is the one I was thinking!)

LS:
If you had one message to give to your fans, what would it be?  
AN:
Never let anyone tell you that what you're doing is worthless. Always go with what your heart tells you. If you don't like something you've created (art, music, whatever), think about how to improve it and go from there. Just keep creating; your ideas should never stay in your head to the grave. In the words of Jónsi from Sigur Rós, GO DO.

(Questions 2, 4, 6, 8: Credit: Bertrand Russell and his "Philosophy of Laymen" Question 7 Credit: The "Screaming Goats- A Pocket Guide")
Photo credits: Aimee Grace Naworal

Lucy Bonk
​has been an integral part of the Florida noise scene since the start of the new millennium. In addition to her own amazing noise work, she also collaborated with other great noise musicians/groups such as Dan Reaves, Kris Gruda, Adam Naworal and Canned Ham. She has performed at a number of Hal McGee’s magnificent Apartment Music shows as well as other noise festivals, galleries and clubs. As a big Canned Ham fan, I was thrilled and overjoyed when Hal suggested that I check out Lucy’s work on-line and reach out to her for an interview for the EC site. I was thrilled and overjoyed again when she agreed.

Leslie Singer:
Where did you grow up?
Lucy Bonk:
​I grew up in Saint Augustine, Florida.

​LS:
When did you start making music?  Did you start with playing drums as a kid?
LB:
​I guess I technically started with failed piano lessons as a kid, and then progressed to the usual recorders-and-marimbas stuff in elementary school, and then was actually a low brass player (euphonium, tuba for a short spell) in middle and high school, marching band, the whole schmear. I never played drums as a kid, I was taught drumming basics by a crust punk who showed me how to play the beat to "Hey Ya!" on a crappy drum kit that was stored at the local lefty bookstore/show venue when I was about 18 and from there I just basically messed around with any kit someone would let me use.

LS:
Who or what do you consider your biggest influences?
LB:
​Who- Negativland, Reed Ghazala, Forrest Mims III, Nicolas Collins, Simone Giertz, Sun Ra, various comedians.
What- Garbage, doing things because you think it’s funny and pretending it’s art.

LS:
How did you get interested in noise and the noise scene?
LB:
Circa 2004 or so my best friend and I were very into absurdist and dada stuff, even though we wouldn’t have called it that at the time. We used to do "noise busking" before I was even really properly familiar with what noise was, bringing ridiculous stuff into the streets of a tourist town to see if people would give us money for making sounds with it. They did. Mostly really drunk people. Musically it was probably realizing that the most important thing about punk rock to me was the DIY part more than the sound. And we just liked to do things that made us laugh, like "covers" done with instruments that made no sense and forcing our friends to listen to Amway tapes, etc.

Lucy Bonk/Adam Naworal at +SoLo, August 24, 2012

LS:
Bulky Acronym is a great moniker. What are all your other monikers and how did you come up with them?
LB:
​Bulky Acronym is just an anagram of my full name, Lucy Mary Bonk. I mostly used it for screen names and internet stuff, but have performed under that name a few times. I actually stopped using it a while ago and will probably never revive it. ALL the monikers I’ve ever used, oh my god. I have been doing noise and stuff off and on since I was about 17 and have literally never settled on something I wanted to use forever, and I probably never will. Let’s see if I can make a list. These are mixed solo names and "band"/project names.

- Reality Executives 
- Reptile Theater
- Terror Probe
- Guilt Trip (what I’m using the most currently)
- Big Church
- My real name, which people don’t believe is real half the time anyway
- SHOUEZ (a recent one off for a showcase of bad bands created on the fly)
- ECM3 (not my name idea)
- HOW RUDE
- Phantom Prank Device
- I’m Pregnant (another one-off)
- Hissyfit

That’s all I can think of for now but I know there are more.

LS:
You’ve got a wonderful critical and absurdist sense of humor with the way that you use sampled audio material from TV and radio. One of my most favorite performances of yours that I’ve seen is the one you did under the moniker of Aggressive Investment at Apartment Music 19. What do you like about using found material?
LB:
Aggressive Investments happened because I had just gotten a job doing transcription for mostly financial industry clients, and was suddenly dumped into all this bizarre jargon I had never heard before. I usually think of something first and then go and find the audio later, thank you sketchy YouTube-to-mp3 websites that have probably given all my computers viruses over the years. But of course, like most people who are into this stuff, I’ve come across a lot of strange cassette tapes over the years. I enjoy improvising along with the cadence of speech and emotional state/volume of a person talking. I regret some of the things I’ve sampled in the past, because I feel like it was insensitive or exploitative ("gangstalking" channels on YouTube, etc.) and my running joke obsession with Alex Jones because, well...we all know what’s happened with Alex Jones.

Aggressive Investment at Apartment Music #19, September 14, 2013

LS:
You get some really cool, heavy sounds from your gear.  What kind of equipment and software have you been using to create your music and artwork? Can you share some background about your circuit and data bending/modifications?  
LB:
I learned how to circuit bend when I was about 23 and was immediately in love.  I saw it as a way to get sounds I thought only synthesizers I would never be able to afford in my life could make, and also to demystify my own gear so that I could fix things when they went wrong, or make them functionally wrong if they were boring. Toys, of course, are full of mysteries.  

I don’t do much out-and-out circuit bending these days. My last hardware project was adding a bunch of arcade buttons to glitch points on a Casio PT-100.
​I modify toy arcades, and have been unsuccessfully trying to build my own cabinet that will only play the worst bootleg games I can find.

​Lucy Bonk at Apartment Music #10, May 28, 2011

​Lucy Bonk at AR179, February 6, 2018

Databending/datamoshing/controlled data corruption has been an interest for a while. I started out just using Notepad and Audacity and importing image or music or program files incorrectly to see what they puked out. Basically a computer doing the best it can when being asked to do something it isn’t supposed to, i.e "open this text file as a .wav". Datamoshing is, in short, just removing certain types of frames from video, creating the effect you’d get from a bad digital antenna connection.

I know it’s uncool but currently I am very into video games on several levels. I can’t play with anything without wanting to get inside the guts, so when I discovered rom corruption, which is basically taking the data of a video game and mashing it all up via rearranging bytes, abusing cheat codes, replacing values with a hex editor to get amazing visual AND audio artifact, it became what I do the most and is pretty much an obsession. I use a program called Vinesauce and another one called Real Time Corruptor, a hex editor called Cygnus, and a pixel editor called YY-CHR. It doesn’t sound exciting but I recommend it to literally everyone.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCFtt57uphZHEqoLiz0unw8w
(A link to a YouTube channel with three great pieces of rom corruption)

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpv8AVOfpvNlb3UYkXqU93Q
(A link to the YouTube channel with some music and video along with a weird fake anti-reading PSA that Lucy made in collaboration with a bunch of her internet pals and coworkers.)

​A link to some of Lucy’s songs/pieces on Soundcloud

LS:
I really like how your work moves around from the circuit bending to all out percussion with pots and pans—the electric to the acoustic of sorts. What is/was your inspiration for in both of those areas?
LB:
Ah, I almost NEVER use acoustic instruments any more, but someone gave me a giant mixing bowl that sounded like a gong, and from there I hunted down a bunch of other bowls for different sounds. I then started building stuff like a xylophone made of water-filled contact mic’d mason jars and various glass bottles, etc.

Lucy Bonk at There Must Be Something in the Water, July 23, 2011

LS:
Do you have any pets?
LB:
I have four cats (two indoor, two outdoor) and an Eastern Gray Squirrel.
 
LS:
And now for the question that a colleague of mine used to wrap up every interview with:
What is your favorite Pepperidge Farm cookie?
LB:
Uh, all of them? I haven’t ever really met a cookie I didn’t like. If I gotta pick, it’s these toffee and chocolate chip ones I am about to smash. They don’t have a goofy name like most PF cookies. Did they stop doing that or did they just shaft this cookie for no reason? Excuse me, I need to go write a letter to the company.