by Donte Kirby
Data Garden is, “much bigger than just a record label. It’s an art’s organization looking to make advances in how music is distributed,” says co-founder Joe Patitucci, a Philly native who has lived all around the greater Philadelphia area and now resides in South Philly.
So, what is Data Garden’s advance in musical distribution? Digital distribution on a square paper cut with album artwork on the front and download instructions on the back. Cool, but the added bonus- you can plant that paper under a quarter inch of soil and grow into blue lobelias.
“Back in the day, people would come to your house and check out your vinyls or CD collection. Now someone will come to your house and say ‘hey that’s a nice plant’ and you’ll be like ‘yea, check out this music that it came from,’” imagines Patitucci.
Ray & the Prisms – Timelapse in Colour
The idea behind Data Garden originated from the release of Patitucci’s album under the alias Tadoma by Secret Station Records. Patitucci was at a table selling his album when someone bought it and said “this is probably the last CD I’ll ever buy.” Those words rang true for him. When the album sold out and the label asked if he wanted to do another print he declined.
“What’s the point of creating CDs?” mused Patitucci, “thinking of ways that were physical but had value, something that had a life of its own.” Thus the idea of plantable album download cards were born.
Data Garden does more with plants then use them for album distribution, they make music with them. At the Philadelphia Museum of Art they have hooked tropical plants up to sensors that measure their metabolic changes and conductivity. Those sensors are hooked to synthesizers that create music.
(photo credit Constance Mensh, The Philadelphia Museum of Art)
“We’ve seen evidence of certain things creating changes in the plant,” says Patitucci. “People that identify with having a close relationship with plants or are good at channeling energy affect the plant. We had these plants set up in the Museum of Art and when a certain person walks into the room the music would completely change. I would ask them what they were doing and the answers would be matter a fact like ‘I’m a florist’.”
All that Data Garden’s been doing will be showcased within the new album by The Thangs, an instrumental hip-hop group. The album, Wedodo, is due to be released in October and Patitucci describes the sound as “free flow, really chopped up and constantly moving.”
Other projects set to be released by Data Garden are Telequanta’s Metalverse also in October and Data Garden co-founder Alex Tyson’s EP Aquaglass.
If Patitucci had to say what kind of music Data Garden releases his answer would be “our zone, there is kind of electronic music that’s in between genres.”
Datagarden.org is the record label’s website and it boasts a unique design by Tyson inspired by the look of a synthesizer, old computers and old electronics like the Atari. The hummingbird that follows your mouse was inspired by a crazy dream of Tyson’s where he was followed by a one.
The site also has a journal section that not only documents the growth of Data Garden but electronic music as a whole. “[The journal is] where you get to see where we are. A place people can make their own connections. People would come to the site and end up finding themselves there.”
