Experimental Electronica Music Videos are a Next-Generation Variety Show

As an international distributor of electronic musical instruments during the 1990s, Geoff Farr frequently spent long nights in European hotel rooms watching the only
television programs that required no translation: short experimental videos backed with electronic music scores. Farr says German television was an especially rich medium for an American insomniac interested in creative new videos.

"I watched endless hours of shows like 'Flomotion' and 'Man vs Machine,' Farr says. "There was another program called 'Space Night' that ran photos from NASA archives, accompanied by some really interesting electronic music artists. The shows were really compelling ... I couldn't rip my eyes away from the screen."

Farr surmised that others would find the offerings equally entertaining, and attempted to secure United States licensing rights for the programming. After it became apparent that such rights would be prohibitively expensive, he decided to create his own compilations of original experimental videos, and called the shows i Promise 2 Be You.

Farr enlisted the aid of musician and film editor Bill Black, with whom he had collaborated on an earlier video production that had been selected as a finalist in the 2002 Sundance Online Film Festival. Farr began to envision and assemble what would eventually become 10 half-hour programs on the i Promise 2 Be You Web site (http://www.ipromise2beyou.com).