VonneumannJOHNNIAC
ABOUT THE RELEASE
JOHNNIAC was built in 1953. The acronym stands for JOHn von Neumann Numerical Integrator and Automatic Computer; as the name implies, it was a computer based on Von Neumann’s architecture and dedicated to him. JOHNNIAC weighed 5 thousand pounds, and arguably the longest operational early computer (i.e. working with punch cards), being used almost continuously from 1953 for over 13 years before finally being shut down on February 11, 1966, logging over 50,000 operating hours.
You can think of JOHNNIAC as a technological dinosaur: it represents a world that doesn’t exist anymore, blown away by the meteorite of digital acceleration.
On July 22, 2022 vonneumann enters the Sam studio in Lari (Pisa) to record a new LP. Their record marks a sharp change in the band’s approach: no overdubs – no editing. Everything is played live – electronic sounds included – straight to tape (aehm, to hard disk). No external collaborations, except Ivan Antonio Rossi recording, mixing, and lending his voice on a track.
Reinforcing the departure from past releases, JOHNNIAC bears no underlying concept, except maybe the idea of representing a world that doesn’t exist anymore. In times of boomer, millennial and gen-z talks, vonneumann places itself way behind those arguments and crafts its most direct, no-frills record ever. A 5 thousand pounds record.
In JOHNNIAC you will find: 70s distorted guitars, deconstructed rap lines, 90s Chicago noise, HD electronica, semi-stoner bridges, modular synths, funk&glitch, and the usual load of irony and errors.
Enjoy your listening, friends.
A note on the cover graphics
The underlining idea of the cover design was inspired by the works Zhenya Machneva, an artist who creates loom-made tapestries depicting industrial mechanical objects from past eras. We transposed that idea with the intention to create knitted vintage computer circuits (i.e. a JOHNNIAC). As much as the idea seemed convincing, the technical difficulties in realizing such artifacts seemed insurmountable.
The stall was resolved in a few months, by using generative AI. We put DALL•E at work, generating images from prompts such as “A knitted picture of a vintage johnniac computer control board” and “A knitted picture of a vintage wall computer control panel“.
The final artwork was created through a long process of selection and assembly of the single images generated by DALL•E, which was used as a non-sentient collaborator, whose ideas, interpretation mistakes and erratic behavior were exploited at our will.
Credits
Filippo Mazzei – guitars & Digitakt
Fabio Ricci – drums & iPad
Toni Virgillito – guitars, Ableton Live, modular synths & programming
Ivan A. Rossi – recording, mixing, mastering & dissing on el Carinebo
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