oblique-stratagems/assets/oblique-edition5.txt

A collection of all of Brian Eno's oblique strategies, organized by edition

A line has two sides.
A very small object.  Its center.
Abandon normal instruments.
Accept advice.
Accretion.
Allow an easement (an easement is the abandonment of a stricture).
Always first steps.
Always give yourself credit for having more than personality.
Are there sections?  Consider transitions.
Ask people to work against their better judgment.
Ask your body.
Assemble some of the elements in a group and treat the group.
Balance the consistency principle with the inconsistency principle.
Be dirty.
Be extravagant.
Breathe more deeply.
Bridges   -build   -burn.
Cascades.
Change instrument roles.
Change nothing and continue with immaculate consistency.
Children   -speaking     -singing.
Cluster analysis.
Consider different fading systems.
Consult other sources   -promising   -unpromising.
Convert a melodic element into a rhythmic element.
Courage!
Cut a vital connection.
Decorate, decorate.
Define an area as 'safe' and use it as an anchor.
Destroy    -nothing   -the most important thing.
Discard an axiom.
Disciplined self-indulgence.
Disconnect from desire.
Discover the recipes you are using and abandon them.
Distorting time.
Do nothing for as long as possible.
Do something boring.
Do the washing up.
Do the words need changing?
Do we need holes?
Don't be afraid of things because they're easy to do.
Don't be frightened of cliches.
Don't be frightened to display your talents.
Don't break the silence.
Don't stress on thing more than another [sic].
Emphasize differences.
Emphasize repetitions.
Emphasize the flaws.
Faced with a choice, do both (given by Dieter Rot).
Feed the recording back out of the medium.
Fill every beat with something.
Get your neck massaged.
Ghost echoes.
Give the name away.
Give way to your worst impulse.
Go outside.  Shut the door.
Go slowly all the way round the outside.
Honor thy error as a hidden intention.
How would you have done it?
Humanize something free of error.
Idiot glee (?)
Imagine the piece as a set of disconnected events.
Infinitesimal gradations.
Intentions   -nobility of  -humility of   -credibility of.
Into the impossible.
Is it finished?
Is the information correct?
Is there something missing.
It is quite possible (after all).
Just carry on.
Left channel, right channel, center channel.
Listen to the quiet voice.
Look at the order in which you do things.
Look closely at the most embarrassing details & amplify them.
Lost in useless territory.
Lowest common denominator.
Make a blank valuable by putting it in an exquisite frame.
Make a sudden, destructive unpredictable action; incorporate.
Make an exhaustive list of everything you might do & do the last thing on the list.
Mechanicalize something idiosyncratic.
Mute and continue.
Not building a wall but making a brick.
Only one element of each kind.
(Organic) machinery.
Overtly resist change.
Put in earplugs.
Question the heroic approach.
Reevaluation (a warm feeling).
Remember those quiet evenings.
Remove ambiguities and convert to specifics.
Remove specifics and convert to ambiguities.
Repetition is a form of change.
Reverse.
Short circuit (example: a man eating peas with the idea that they will improve his virility shovels them straight into his lap).
Simple subtraction.
Simply a matter of work.
Spectrum analysis.
State the problem in words as clearly as possible.
Take a break.
Take away the elements in order of apparent non-importance.
Tape your mouth.
The inconsistency principle.
The most important thing is the thing most easily forgotten.
The tape is now the music.
Think of the radio.
Tidy up.
Towards the insignificant.
Trust in the you of now.
Turn it upside down.
Twist the spine.
Use an old idea.
Use an unacceptable color.
Use fewer notes.
Use filters.
Use 'unqualified' people.
Water.
What are the sections sections of?  Imagine a caterpillar moving.
What are you really thinking about just now?
What is the reality of the situation?
What mistakes did you make last time?
What would your closest friend do?
What wouldn't you do?
Work at a different speed.
You are an engineer.
You can only make one dot at a time.
You don't have to be ashamed of using your own ideas.
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