Some may argue that I spend far too much time worrying about logos and text, but I really believe that it is vital to building a strong brand and identity. My problem, however, is my inability to make up my damn mind. I’m constantly thinking, tinkering, thinking and tinkering some more, often forgetting that the constant changes are a detriment to the very brand and identity I feel so strongly about. My solution to this annoying habit of mine is to more or less get the logo and text design out of the way early on.

While thinking about how to represent Phonemic, I went back to the meaning of the word itself to get some ideas flowing. First thing I decided on what the use of forward slashes before and after the P and H in the word. These slashes¹ are used to indicate phonetic sounds, such as /f/ and /r/. Instead of changing the PH to F to properly represent the phoneme, though, I elected to keep it spelt as /ph/onemic as opposed to /f/onemic simply because it looks less ridiculous.

I did feel that the initial text looked rather plain, so I tried distorting the letters P and H to add a little extra emphasis and make it more interesting. I also decided to try out a different colour scheme.

As I often do, I quickly grew tired of that font and those colours. I wanted to create something more compelling, so I tried out some more modern text in contrast to a somewhat aged look, colour-wise. I also felt the need to switch the forward slashes in favour of vertical bars² simply because the slashes felt very awkward with the new font.

I wanted to expand more on the colour palette and also explore some actual logo possibilities. I ended up just isolating the |PH| because, really, how the heck does one illustrate a phoneme or something phonemic?

I like the sort of “cut out” look of the last image, but I thought I’d try to go for something that would work better at different sizes and I figured I may as well try expanding that colour palette even more. I really like this style as it creates some interesting depth and gives it more power. This is important as the lack of an actual logo/shape with the text kind of empties it of the stock it needs to stand out.

The text design is sure to change as time goes on, but I’m actually quite satisfied with what I have at this point in time. I’ve still got to get some kind of symbol or logo of some kind together as well, so expect follow-up on that in the near future.

I’m still very much a novice in the way of design, so I’m always learning new techniques and methods to recreate the images in my head. If you have any suggestions or ideas, please feel free to let me know!

1. virgules [↩]
2. pipes [↩]

My each day seems set on making me see and understand this. I lament the time when I could get up at noon and plan for nothing but riding my bicycle or building a fort all day; doing the things that made me happy, not working for some faceless corporation carrying out its every bidding for 9 to 11 hours of my day.

It seems I’ve something left to learn from this torture as I can never seem to pull out of it… Though I’m sure it’s for lack of trying. As I’ve said and demonstrated many times before, I am a lazy person. I have no problem calling it an affliction; I am a slave to its temperament. I have my days when I can manage to break free from its grasp and pour myself into the things I love rather than mindlessly sucking comfort and fulfilment from the things around me. But those feel few and far between.

Most days, I elect to sit dispassionately in front of my television, clumsily including myself in the business of false familiars; laughing when they laugh, crying when they cry, hurting when they hurt. It’s autopilot for the terminally distracted and indifferent. This is just one of many ways I keep myself trudging through the days, blindly hoping for better things.

However, to be fair — not only to myself, but to those around me — this isn’t a permanent state of mind. I experience joy and silliness on a day to day basis. There are simply those times when gloominess is the most comfortable blanket in the house. We get bored. We get dreary. We are an ocean, slave to the ebb and flow of flimsy sentiment.

But it seems there’s always a balance of sorts, existing outside our perception, that we need to remind ourselves of in order to keep our sanity in check; this balance of human emotion that allows us to actually leave the house and participate in the world.

I am fond of this balance.

I’ve been considering and reconsidering the artist name “Digital Enigma” for a long, long time now and it wasn’t but 2 months ago I decided to just drop it. I mean, I came up with the name around the time I started “making music” on my good ol’ PlayStation back in 1999. I was 15 years old then and I honestly thought it was a cool name.

Digital Enigma perfectly described me as a musician; I created music in a digital realm and I couldn’t decide what the heck kind of music I wanted to create. I thought it was clever. But, at this juncture in my life, just saying that name aloud makes me cringe. It’s childish and simplistic and I don’t think it fairly represents me or my music.

This is where the challenge lies: How do I come up with a name that fits with the style of music I create and the type of image I wish to convey?

Tough stuff it is.

So, over the past couple months, I’ve kept this on the back of my mind as I’ve gone about my daily business. As I’m sure you know or can imagine, trying to stand out and/or be unique in the musical world is a monumental task only few are truly capable of taking on, yet so many try to do it. This just further complicates the task that much more. I finally came to terms with that fact and decided to look at my music as a whole and try to describe it with as few words as possible. This lead me to the study of linguistics and terms associated with it. (It’s a logical conclusion, no?)

Research introduced me to the idea of phonemes and their function in language. What interested me most about the concept was the simple description of what a phoneme is: “the smallest segmental unit of sound employed to form meaningful contrasts between utterances”. Even reading it now, I’m fascinated with the musical implications. And what’s more, the idea itself is an oft-disputed one. To some, it’s a very language-specific notion: “any of the abstract units of the phonetic system of a language that correspond to a set of similar speech sounds (as the velar \k\ of cool and the palatal \k\ of keel) which are perceived to be a single distinctive sound in the language”. To others, not so much: “a phoneme is a difference in sound that makes a difference in meaning”. This gives me a delightful little grey area in which I can prance about.

I feel I can now accurately describe my music with one word: phonemic. However, here comes the big “BUT”… The damned domain name is taken!

This has me a little upset, only because URLs like phonemicmusic.com and thephonemic.com kinda piss me off.

So, with that, I’ll end this post with two things:

1. A short, unfinished song that may end up being the intro to the new album.
2. A question.

Phonemic - Different Machine (v0.1)

What would you recommend as a good URL for my website?