Words/music/videos by Adam Zucker

Heptagon is an audio project exploring social, cultural, and artistic avenues within the limitless genre of electronic music. I’m mostly inspired by dystopian themes, as well as electronic music’s campy and occult connection. I combine a lot of found footage and sounds with traditional instruments and synths to create music that (hopefully) evokes a range of emotions. 

As a musician, my intention is to evoke something that sounds dark and a little bit shocking, but hopefully not too abject. I want to communicate just enough shock and awe to capture one’s attention and elicit a guttural response. As an artist, I’m spurred on by art history, and how its cyclical discourse has influenced enduring understandings of cultural diversity. For my Heptagon project, I often consider how concepts from the past have informed present-day aesthetics. One of the main impetuses behind the current body of work is composing what I’d imagine industrial, EDM and electroacoustic music to sound like if it were made in the 16th century.

“Garden of Earthly Delights” is an example of my fusion of past and present aesthetic influences. I was listening to a lot of composers from the Middle Ages and Renaissance while writing this song, and the refrain, which is made from chopped-up horn-like synths, is my interpretation of common tropes in historical music. For the video, I remixed Animated Putty (1911), which is a 4-minute silent short film directed by Walter R. Booth. It’s considered Britain’s first stop-motion clay animation film, and portrays a lump of clay being transformed into organic shapes and forms, including a group of demons. It’s a mythical tale of creation and perhaps, destruction; but it always comes back to imagery of renewal. I felt like it was the perfect compliment to the musical composition, which is a tale of how earthly pleasures and the horrors of humanity are intertwined. 

The composition is partially inspired by the theme song for the 1990s TV show, ‘Goosebumps’, which had a groovy beat and melody that expressed spookiness in a fun and somewhat campy manner. I often think of my work as soundtracks for certain experiences and themes within the human condition. ‘Goosebumps’ is a meditation on environmental issues and the ominous relationship we have with it.

Visit Heptagon’s Band Camp Page, YouTube Page, and Instagram Page.

Adam Zucker is New York-based artist, art historian, curator and educator. See more of his work at Artfully Learning, where this article first appeared. And at Rhino Horn Group.