UR

2013
Edition of 13
850 mm X 850 mm
.

Underground Resistance is a seminal Detroit techno collective that has been producing music since the early 1990s. “A label for a movement”, at it’s core the outfit is run by Mike Banks with former members including internationally renowned producers Rob Hood and Jeff Mills. Sonically and politically militant in its direction, the collective has focused on themes of race relations and black power – while at the same time having an expansive outlook in celestial dreams of a universal infinite. The cosmos plays an important role in music produced by UR – with record titles such as “Galaxy 2 Galaxy”, “Interstellar Fugitives” and “DayStar Rising”.

UR maps the entire Underground Resistance catalog using images of coronal mass ejections that occurred in the year each record was released. The solar ejections are scaled by the cultural influence and cultural penetrance for each record. The quantitative measure is a weighted average that uses results from Google and Youtube searches to derive an overall influence value. The visualisation is a composite of 123 images of solar flares from our sun that have occurred over a 23 year period : 1990 to 2012.

The concept is a recognition of the reciprocal nature of universal influence : electromagnetic radio waves from earth travel at the speed of light through interstellar space, while electromagnetic pulses bombard the earth from solar flares. It is entirely conceivable that sonic waves emanating from our planet reach the deepest edges of the cosmos and are potentially heard by the inhabitants of other worlds. Conversely, geomagnetic pulses exploding from coronal mass ejections reach the earth on a regular basis and are known to affect biological processes. Even deep space events such as stars going supernova 100s of light years away are believed to have had profound affects on the planet – one of which resulted in a mass extinction event 65 million years ago.