broken flow – (a transitional release born during volume three, caught in the crossfire)

Before I even knew error balm vol.3 would close the series, I had already started working on another project—something looser, more playful, and originally meant to be collaborative. That project was called broken flow, and it was always meant to be the next evolution of enabl.ed after the trilogy.

Not a sequel. Not a reboot. More like the transitional glitch – a moment of stylistic drift recorded in real time, during the production of vol.3. Some of the melodic ideas and rhythmic sketches for broken flow were literally written on the same days as vol.3 sessions. You can hear their shared blood—similar drums, overlapping textures—but where vol.3 was tightly focused, broken flow was designed to breathe. To wander. To get lost on purpose.

The original concept for broken flow was to do something more spontaneous and collaborative. A collection intentionally designed to unravel and re-thread rhythm. Each track explores off-kilter timing, where fractured melodies and glitch-warped sequences seem to drift—but never collapse. The foundation lies in a contrast between distorted and clean pinched drums, creating a tension between looseness and control. The “broken” rhythms aren’t broken by mistake; they’re broken on purpose, with glitches acting as the glue that keeps the entire flow from falling apart. It’s IDM that breathes unevenly, but still holds a pulse.

I’d been talking with another record label I respected about doing this release, and the energy was promising.

But that never happened.

Instead, the entire thing quietly fell apart over something I didn’t fully see coming: concerns about artistic integrity—centered, in part, around vague assumptions tied to the use of AI, and broader existential questions about “trust” and “authenticity” within the Clean Error ethos. You know—real philosophical stuff. The kind of discourse normally reserved for forums that still argue over whether vinyl “feels warmer.”

One of the actual sticking points?
Apparently, the presence of AI-generated artwork on Clean Error releases was enough to convince some folks that the entire label—music, intent, process, everything—must be fake. Synthetic. Deceptively automated. Which is not only a reach, it’s a textbook logical fallacy.

Let’s break it down:
Just because an album cover is clearly made using AI-assisted visual tools, that doesn’t mean the music—or the artist behind it—is artificial:

That’s like saying an Autechre track doesn’t count because they used generative patching in Max. The method is the music. That’s like assuming every piece of art made with generative prompts is soulless—when half of traditional digital art relies on brushes someone else coded. That’s like saying a digital painter isn’t a real artist because they used Photoshop layers instead of oil on canvas. Welcome to 2025. See the problem?

This is guilt by association—a sort of aesthetic panic response that goes:

“If the cover looks like AI, the content must be AI, the artist must be AI, and now my entire sense of musical purity is spiraling.”

Look… the artwork on Clean Error releases is often created with generative tools. That’s not a secret. It’s part of the label’s visual language. But that doesn’t mean it’s done lazily. It’s curated. It’s styled. It’s directed. It’s not just clicking “make image” and uploading it to Bandcamp—it’s another layer of texture. Another collaboration with controlled chaos. Just like the music.

And let’s be real: Clean Error has never been about traditional purity. It’s been about intentional instability—both visually and sonically. The idea that one aesthetic choice (AI-generated visuals) invalidates the whole project is a bad faith argument. And unfortunately, it was enough to make “some people” back away without a single conversation.

Honestly?
If the artwork was hand-drawn in charcoal and the music was still glitched, resampled, and full of unstable rhythms, they probably would’ve called it “authentic.” But because a tool was used that made them uncomfortable, it became easier to dismiss the whole thing as fake.

That’s the danger of aesthetic gatekeeping disguised as moral critique.

Clean Error has always been open about process. If anything, it might be too open. So when people make up a narrative about deception based purely on visuals and music… it says more about their insecurities than it does about the label.

To be clear, the departure wasn’t mutual. It came swiftly, without a real conversation, and without space for clarification. What hurt most wasn’t the disagreement itself—it was the dismissal. A full severing of ties based on speculation, without ever sitting down to ask why things sound the way they do, or how the process actually works behind the scenes.

I’ve always been open about how I work. My methods are unorthodox, sure—nonlinear session building, heavy resampling of my own material, rendering ideas in fragments and stitching them together like collages. But that is the core of what enabl.ed and Clean Error are about. It’s not about imitation. It’s about iteration. Chaos not as a bug, but as a compositional choice.

The fact that this entire collaboration dissolved over assumptions—without any actual conversation—was disappointing. Especially in a scene like this, where connection and trust between artists and labels should mean something more. I understand we all have our boundaries and values, but if there’s no room to even talk before judgment, what are we building?

For anyone curious, I’ve already addressed Clean Error’s relationship with AI, its tools, and how I feel about their ethical use in music in this blog post here:
https://www.cleanmyerror.com/error-node-blog/cleanerror-a-story-driven-label-and-ai/

…which I encourage anyone to read if they’re trying to understand where I stand on that.

The fallout with the label won’t stop broken flow. It just changed its shape—and maybe made it more necessary than ever. I do plan on releasing it on Clean Error this year so everyone will get to hear it.

…and look—if the ultimate accusation here is that I’ve been dishonest with people, or that Clean Error is some kind of secret AI-run ghost machine, then you really have to wonder: why on earth would I be writing this entire blog post? Why would I attach it directly to the release? Why would I publicly archive all of this—my working process, my intentions, my errors, and my own disappointment—on a platform that’s literally connected to the music?

Because if my grand deception plan was to mislead the public and operate in total secrecy, then I’m really doing a terrible job. Maybe I should’ve just quietly dropped a few Bandcamp links and disappeared into the fog like a proper scammer. Instead, here I am explaining the very accusations I was supposedly trying to hide, in full, on the official release page. Seems like an odd strategy for someone allegedly trying to pull one over on everyone—including those who made the accusation in the first place.

So yeah—if this is deceit, it’s got a weirdly transparent, footnoted, emotionally vulnerable approach. Almost like I’m just… telling the truth. What a concept!!!

I use digital tools. I use modern plugins. Yes, I experiment with generative systems and modulation randomness. But I am not outsourcing expression to algorithms. The glitches are mine. The fractures are built by hand. The errors were earned. And yet, this ‘label’ I was collaborating with suddenly pulled out. No conversation, no resolution—just a snap judgment and severed ties. My whole sound identity—was being reduced to a false narrative. It was one of the most disheartening moments I’ve had in music.

And to any new musicians reading this, or anyone else navigating similar spaces: be careful who you open up to. It’s easy to believe that this scene is full of like-minded people who understand your process, your heart, your weird little obsessive production quirks—but some will turn their backs on you in a second. No conversation. No questions asked. One day you’re talking about collaboration and pushing the sound forward, and the next you’re getting ghosted over rumors.

It’s sad, and it’s happened to a lot more artists than just me. This industry, even in its tiniest underground forms, can be harsh—especially in scenes like ours. The experimental, post-IDM niche already has a small audience, and most of us are operating out of love and obsession, not profit. So it makes it even harder when the very people who claim to be about “community” are quick to distrust or dismiss without a single honest conversation.

It shouldn’t be like that. We’re not the mainstream. We’re not some over-saturated techno market or pop machine. We’re in the margins on purpose. We’re building from dust and noise and emotion. If anything, we should be more collaborative and more supportive than ever. But the truth is, even this scene—this strange, beautiful glitch world—feels diluted sometimes. Not in the creative sense, but in the trust. In the way people treat each other.

So just… be mindful. Protect your energy. Share your art, but keep your boundaries.

The idea that using tools like Max for Live tools or modular MIDI effects somehow invalidates the authenticity of my work? That’s not a critique—it’s a fundamental misunderstanding of what experimental electronic music even is.

We’ve always embraced broken machines. Circuit-bent gear. Tape warble. DSP freakouts. From the earliest Rephlex days to modern-day glitch artists pushing generative systems to beautiful extremes—this is part of the language. We don’t fear new tools. We corrupt them. That’s the lineage Clean Error belongs to.