Traffic/Men Arguing

This one took place at 1333 Franklin and was the funniest one of all. Across the street, on the other side of Odgen, there were these two men arguing and yelling. They seemed to be fighting over money. One guy apparently was harassing the other because he was begging for money. The yelling happened at least for the five minutes or so that I was recording. Then, when I was nearly finished, the two men parted, but not without shaking hands first. Did they know each other? Were they friends? I had no clue, but was very confused. First they seemed to be fighting, and then they seemed to be saying good-bye, in a way that said "nice seeing you again". As I was packing up, the guy that was doing the harassing (or not) walked past me, said hi, and then went into 1333 Franklin. Listen to the beginning of their banter.

My microphones were attached to a for rent sign.

String Music/Birds

One stop I made was on Knapp (I had always overlooked these addresses before, not realizing that they were all-odd-numbered). 1119 Knapp captured the best sounds of the St. Patrick's Day party going on down the street. My mics were hooked up to a rain gutter and a stick that was leaning against a rock wall. Listen to the party here.

Double Gulls

My next stop was right next door at 915 Lyon, where I again heard an assortment of birds, including seagulls this time. At one point, there were a couple of gulls flying overhead and they seemed to be calling back and forth to one another. I looked up as they flew overhead. There were plenty of seagulls flying around, but I thought the two talking to each other was more interesting than the others. Have a listen of their conversation.

Cars/Birds/Car Locks/Dogs Barking

Lyon
All of the recordings that I took on East Lyon had the same microphone set-up: one microphone was pointing up, the other was pointing down, and they are connected to the railing that let up to the stairs to the front doors of the residences that I stood in front of (all of the residences were very similar from the outside). Here is my drawing of it:















I had never been on this part of Lyon, and even though, just a few blocks away, was the intersections of Odgen, Farwell, and Franklin (which is very noisy), this little area was quite residensial. It felt like a nice little neighborhood tucked away behind the city. There was a park not too far away (hence the barking dogs). The birds were quite nice and gave it that feel of my old neighborhood where I grew up. Unfortunately, even though there was less traffic, there was always a car coming by.

At 911 E. Lyon, I got to listen to some STRONG BIRD sounds. The birds were just quite animated.

Ambulance

After I recorded my first sound, I didn't realize the next address wasn't all odd numbers. The address was 1321 Franklin, and I had missed that the two is even. But I recorded the sounds anyway, and this was one that I particularly liked. By this point I was across the street from the addresses, as there were no buildings on this side of the street I was on, so I just relied on the addresses across the street. This is the only time I did this on my walks, as with the next walk I ditched the idea and just dealt with the buildings on the same side of the street I was walking on.

So across the street, where I took this sound recording, there is a park, which I had never actually been in before. I sat at the edge and attached one microphone to the notebook I had with me, and just laid the other one on the dead (looking) grass of the park.












This was the very last recording I did for the day, which ended at 6:14 p.m. The recordings (for all of the days) lasted approximately five minutes. Here is a listen of the ambulance I caught, and near the end, there was a dog walking by, and you can hear the click of its toenails against the sidewalk...

Drift One Ideas

My start point for this soundwalk will be at 1032 E. Knapp St. (in front of my apartment building). I plan on using a quarter and, holding it vertically, drop it in front of me (either at arm's length or just where my arms drop at my sides naturally). Because Washington is looking left, if it lands heads up, I will go left; if it lands tails up, I will go right. This will happen at every street corner. I will stop and record sounds everytime I am in front of a building that has all odd numbers in it's address. My walk will last when I hit a dead end, or when an hour is up, which ever comes first. If I do not have enough sound recording, I will do the walk again later.

Here are the sides of the quarter I used. I held it from about the height of my chest/shoulders to drop it. You can see the scratch marks, especially on the edges.

Milwaukee's Lower Lower East Side

I went on four walks in three days. Walk One. Nothing happened, as I hit a dead end.

So I decided to go back to my starting point and start again, as I only began about 20 minutes before.

Walk two.

The next day I went out was March 16th.

The next day it was supposed to be warmer out (and I think it was), so I decided to continue my journey for about another hour again to get some more sounds. Below is the way I traveled (at the end, I had circled Franklin-Ogden-Prospect-Knapp a couple of times so it was good I quit there).