I created this audio piece based on a prompt from Disquiet Junto (https://disquiet.com/) "Turn old news into new music". I love reading very old news articles and noticing the ways life is still the same and the ways it’s very different. I wanted to find something from 100 years before I was born in The San Francisco Chronicle. My actual birthday (August 20th) was missing pages in the archive where I looked (newspapers.com) so I went with August 27th, 1884. The story I found is a ghostly echo of the present day anxiety about fentanyl but in other ways has no moral or backstory - it’s just a snapshot of life. I distorted the speakers voice about halfway through, using Holly Herndon's Holly+. And I used Victorian street sounds by Timbre from freesound.org.

fiend

San Francisco Chronicle. Wednesday, August 27, 1884. 

A canine, opium fiend.  How a dog relishes the fumes of the seductive drug. 

"Did you ever see a dog opium smoker?", was the question asked of a Chronicle reporter by a police officer a few days ago, while standing upon Market Street, near the Baldwin Hotel.  The reporter confessed that he never heard of such an animal and doubted its existence.  

"Well, come with me," said the officer, "and I will show you a canine victim of the terrible habit, although he does not heft the pipe, yet I call him a smoker, because he inhales the fumes of opium whenever he gets the chance and would sooner do so than eat."  

The officer then led the way to a saloon in the neighborhood of Eddy and Market Streets. There was found, lying under a table, a small dog that looked like a cross between a poodle and a black and tan.  When called from under the table, he opened big sunken and bloodshot eyes, but would not move. He was apparently in a drowsy condition, and reminded one of a person in the last stages of consumption.  

"That dog is surely a wonderful one," continued the officer, "and would be worth the attention of a scientist. I've known him ever since he was a pup. He then belonged to a notorious opium fiend, who made a practice of bringing him to whatever den he himself went to. The boys used to tease him by blowing opium fumes in his face, and he thus gradually began to relish the seductive drug.”

“Who owns him now?”

“I don't believe anyone claims him. But he is known to all the fiends in town. He always has a free pass to opium dens because he follows the smoker's in… 

[speech becomes gradually more in-audible]

Long Live the New Sound

fiend