- Oblique Strategies
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Oblique Strategies (subtitled over one hundred worthwhile dilemmas) is a set of published cards created by Brian Eno and Peter Schmidt first published in 1975, and is now in its fifth, open ended, edition. Prior to Oblique Strategies, Schmidt created "The Thoughts Behind the Thoughts" [1] in 1970, a similar collection of "55 sentences", in an edition of 100.
Contents
Design and use
Each card contains a phrase or cryptic remark which can be used to break a deadlock or dilemma situation. Some are specific to music composition; others are more general. Examples include:
- Use an old idea
- State the problem in words as clearly as possible.
- Only one element of each kind.
- What would your closest friend do?
- What to increase? What to reduce?
- Are there sections? Consider transitions.
- Try faking it!
- Honour thy error as a hidden intention.
- Ask your body
- Work at a different speed
From the introduction to the 2001 edition:
These cards evolved from separate observations of the principles underlying what we were doing. Sometimes they were recognised in retrospect (intellect catching up with intuition), sometimes they were identified as they were happening, sometimes they were formulated. They can be used as a pack, or by drawing a single card from the shuffled pack when a dilemma occurs in a working situation. In this case the card is trusted even if its appropriateness is quite unclear...
Cultural impact
References to Oblique Strategies exist in popular culture, most notably in the film Slacker, in which a character offers passers-by cards from a deck. Strategies mentioned include "Honor thy error as a hidden intention", "Look closely at the most embarrassing details and amplify", "Not building a wall; making a brick", "Repetition is a form of change", and one which came to be seen as a summary of the film's ethos (though it was not part of the official set of Oblique Strategies), "Withdrawing in disgust is not the same thing as apathy." This line was quoted in the 1994 song "What's the Frequency, Kenneth?" by R.E.M., who also mentioned Oblique Strategies in their 1998 song "Diminished" off the album Up. The Oblique Strategies are also referenced in comic 1018, "Oblique Angles", of popular web comic Questionable Content.
Other musicians reportedly inspired by Oblique Strategies include the British band Coldplay, said to have used the cards when recording their 2008 Brian Eno-produced album Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends, and French band Phoenix, who claimed to have used the cards when recording their 2009 album Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix.[1] German musician/composer Blixa Bargeld has a similar navigation system, called Dave. In response to their song "Brian Eno", off their album Congratulations, MGMT has said they had a deck of Oblique Strategies in the studio, but they "don't know if [they] used them correctly."
See also
- Lateral thinking
- I Ching - an ancient consultation book based on random draws
- Aleatoric music
- Water Yam (artist's book)
References
External links
- The Oblique Strategies
- PeterSchmidtWeb The Peter Schmidt web site.
- Random Oblique Strategies Gives you a random Oblique Strategy selected from editions 1–5.
- Random Strategies A script that displays a random phrase from an Oblique Strategies deck.
- Brian Eno with Jarvis Cocker - Eno explains Oblique Strategies on Jarvis Cocker's BBC6 Radio show, Nov. 08, 2010.
- Random Oblique Strategies site with modern design.
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