I find it mysterious and intriguing how a clip of video drastically changes in significance and meaning when the right music is played to it. Consider how hypnotizing your favorite music videos are—there's just something incredibly magical and mystical that happens in our minds when the right music meets the right video. Have you been there, as I love to be? So indescribable—when a certain pattern of music plays on parts of you so deep it's impossible to describe in words. If you know all too well what it's like to drop everything because the right rhythm hits your soul, to have your insanity pawed at and played with, then you already know me. Music is my life in that it's air that I need to breathe. Every major genre of music—from trance/"dream"/electronica, to folk, to rock—operates switches, knobs, and levers deep inside me that I'll never understand. The right music turns the ocean of consciousness into great swells my being rides upon. Why is music is mysterious? Why do we become so captivated and emotional when patterns of pitch and rhythm play to our ordinary senses and memories? Pure exhilaration.

     I'm 28, was born and raised in Syracuse NY, attended Liverpool High School, and graduated from Cornell University in 1999 in computing science and theory. My Cornell experience was incredible, and I had deep respect for my classmates, the faculty, and the curricula. I spent most of time entrenched in coursework, but I've never lived a day in regret, especially now that I know how much it's served me and how its allowed me do to what I do today. I was part of the Navy ROTC program: the Navy pays tuition, and you commit 5 years as a naval officer--weighty decisions to make at 19, hm? I was commissioned as a naval officer upon Cornell graduation, completed the navy's 16 month nuclear power and submarine training pipeline, served three years of sea duty aboard the submarine USS Jefferson City (SSN-759) out of San Diego CA, and served a year of shore duty as a submarine tactics instructor at the Bangor subbase in Bangor WA. USS Jefferson City is a "fast attack" (ie, Los Angeles class) submarine and has a crew size of about 120, about 4-8 junior officers, and 5 senior officers, and it does a lot of the things seen in the film Hunt for Red October. The process of qualifying submarines takes 1-2 years and is most comparable to medical residency in that there's so much to learn that you have to live, breathe, and sleep it in order to absorb it all. I resigned my commission and left the navy in 2004, with confidence that my future would be best spent developing artistic music visualization software, leaving the navy in September 2004 as a fully qualified submarine lieutenant. I have lived in Boston MA since but who knows for how long as SoundSpectrum continues to grow.

     There's been many positive things come from being in the Navy, but there's been negative things as well. The positive things have been working with the submarine enlisted, interacting with a variety of personalities, the Navy core values, and being part of a branch of the military that proportionally plays one of the larger roles in national defense. One of the negative parts, for me, was not having enough free time to maintain a personal life outside the Navy. When you're a part of a small crew that needs the expertise of each body, your personal life falls second. The nature of leadership is fascinating to me, but it's a collection and many double-edged swords. Woe to "leaders" who have forgotten the needs and desires of those required to serve them. Retired admiral Stockdale is impressive man with some impressive credentials. Someone who spent 7 years in a not-so-humane Hanoi war prison may have something to say about leadership under fire. He holds that a good leader is 5 things: a moralist, a teacher, a writer of law, a steward, and a philosopher, and I always push to measure myself against these ideals.

     Becoming a submarine officer hasn't been easy for me. As if the Navy wasn't already conservative in its ways, the nuclear power part of being a submariner requires even more strictness and formality. Of course it's completely warranted, but it's not always compatible with a person who's a free spirit at heart. So as I tip my hat to the dedicated men and women of the military, I'm more motivated to move in artistic directions, especially as G-Force has done well. On one hand, I had to eat, drink, and sleep Navy stuff, leaving me with little free time for my projects. On the other hand, exciting artistic opportunities presented themselves, and I have all kinds of new and exciting ideas with music visualization I'd like to try. Many of these new ideas surpass what G-Force has done and are things that could really move music visualization into the mainstream. WhiteCap and G-Force each have been downloaded more than a few million times and have appeared in many magazines, forums, DJ events, and video productions.

     During my submarine shore duty in the Seattle/Bremerton I lived two lives. By day, I tried my best to be the submarine officer that I was trained to be. By night, I developed music visualization software that is enjoyed by many many users. The joke was that if I've managed to design and create G-Force in the wee hours of the night, imagine what I could do if I had a full night's sleep and worked full work days on it, week after week. Music combined with mathematics, analysis, and abstract visual art has an enormous future... and I want to continue to be on the tip of that wave.

     I prefer to be around people who know what they want and have exciting goals beyond the mainstream's standards. It's not always easy, but choose solitude and industriousness over idling hours away on a barstool, watching TV, or playing video games. If you find yourself struggling with these things, then ask yourself some things... How many of your favorite musicians watch the amount of TV that an average American watches? How many of your favorite writers would rather bar-hop than stay home in order to complete their work? How many accomplished researchers play video games regularly? I appreciate and respect people who use their free time to be industrious, in whatever from it happens to take, and I'm well aware that this often comes at the cost of loneliness.

      I believe the best way to convey who I am is to list works, artists, and characters that I identify with and enjoy most. My favorite directors are Michael Mann, Luc Besson, Oliver Stone, Stanley Kubrick, and Ridley Scott (most of all). In no particular order, some of my favorite films are Cool Hand Luke (1967), White Oleander (2002), Thelma and Louise (1991), Blade Runner (1982), Hamlet (1990), Heat (1995), Casino (1995), Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969), Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004), Deer Hunter (1978), Starman (1984), Eyes Wide Shut (1999), Born on the Fourth of July (1989), Suicide Kings (1997), Shawshank Redemption (1994), Pulp Fiction (1994), True Romance (1993), Changing Lanes (2002), American Beauty (1999), Platoon (1986), Pi: Faith in Chaos (1998), Prince of Egypt (1998), Wall Street (1987), Schindler's List (1993), The Messenger (1999), Any Given Sunday (1999), Leaving Las Vegas (1995), Gladiator (2000), Kingdom of Heaven (2005), The Matrix (1999), Three O'Clock High (1987), Jerry McGuire (1996), Raiders of the Lost Arc (1981), 12 Monkeys (1996), Face/Off (1997), Dune (1984), Shakespeare in Love (1998), Reservoir Dogs (1992), Waking Life (2001), Finding Neverland (2004), 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), Black Hawk Down (2001), Touching the Void (2003), Dust to Glory (2005), Million Dollar Baby (2004), and Fight Club (1999). I most often identify with characters and artists that are forced to endure difficult struggles in their life, most of which are internal—struggles and problems that follow them as closely as their own shadow. If you also identify with these characters and works, through the lens of your own life, then you already know me.

     Enough of my babbling... Go listen to some music.

 
© 2006 Andrew O'Meara