Months after I finished it, I was at the gym and it hit me:
“All the music on it is pirated. Full albums ripped from YouTube, artists unpaid.”
While I was building it, the only thing I worried about was whether the compressed files would sound bad. I never thought about whether it was right. I decided: "Fuck it. Pirated makes more sense."
Rams made an honest radio, the SK4. Since then everything's gone sealed and built to die. I built a tribute to him and then did the same thing to it: Temu knockoff tools, pirated MP3s. Now it plays dodgy sound and the mouse dances to it.
I built it, I filled it with stolen music, I am the mouse.
LOUDER, FASTER
It's a working modular sound system. On top there's a white lab mouse glued to a wheel it can't get off, chasing a red marble it'll never catch. A mic listens to the music and speeds up the motor, so the louder it plays, the faster the mouse runs. That's literally how it's wired.
The name is three things, and all three are me. Ghetto, Rams' clean design gone cheap. Blaster, as in Blas. Mouse, the lab animal running faster the more pressure you put on it.
It clicked while I was building. When my day job gets heavy I don't slow down, I do more of everything else: pilot school, sculpture, photos. Everything else looks smaller next to it that way. The job gets louder, so I run faster everywhere.
So the mouse is me. A full-time job, 8 to 10 builds a year, everything has to work properly, plus photography and pilot training. Each part of the system runs on its own for a reason: if one bit fails, the rest keeps going. Same with my life.
When the pressure goes up we just work harder to hold up whatever gets dumped on us. The mouse doesn't stop. It goes faster.
“I took the shortcuts. I built a tribute out of the same rubbish I complain about. I made the thing, I messed it up and I'm the one on the wheel.”
FULL CIRCLE
May 2025. I'd seen Rams' SK4 at a museum in Sydney, seven years after I first saw it in Berlin, and parts had been piling up in the workshop for months. The night before I started I did the Guaraní dream work I grew up with and woke up clear, but about a different project. Then the next morning, mopping the floor and burning palo santo, the mouse just showed up, the whole thing, and it wouldn't leave me alone.
Rams' design was honest. What came after him took the look and dropped the rest: cheaper, sealed, built to be thrown away, because it "makes more sense". Looks the part, nothing behind it.
The sound closes the circle. Cheap tools build a working machine that plays stolen music, the mouse runs to the volume, and we all dance along thinking we're still following the original idea.
This is just how I deal with it, not how everyone does. Some people crack under the pressure, some refuse to play, some step back. I do more of everything. I have to be honest about that, otherwise the whole thing is a lie.
Honest became dishonest, quality became cheap, repairable became sealed. I respect what Rams tried and I show what happened to it. I own up to my part and I still make things that work properly. Both are true.
I am the mouse. The mouse keeps running. I keep building. "Rams, I still believe."
White lab mouse glued to a wheel it can't get off, chasing a red marble it'll never catch. The louder the music, the faster it runs.
Modular, so you can fix each part on its own. Rams would approve of that bit, even if the music is stolen.
"RAMS, I STILL BELIEVE." Salvaged plywood, pirated music, Temu tools. A tribute to his principles, built the cheap way he'd hate.
An Arduino Mega with a shield runs the screen and the controls. Salvaged plywood, and you can see how it's put together. The pirated MP3s scroll across the screen for everyone to see.
Materials: Salvaged plywood, speakers painted white, Arduino Mega and Nano, Ryobi ONE+ 18V battery, DC motor, white toy mouse, red marble, pirated MP3s, Temu knockoff tools
Size: Modular, the parts sit side by side
Cost: About $213
Built: Four weeks, May 2025
The mouse: A mic reads how loud the music is and speeds up the DC motor to match. Louder music, faster mouse. The toy mouse is glued to the wheel for good, chasing a red marble on a stick it'll never reach.
Electronics: The Arduino Mega with a shield runs the screen and the controls. The Arduino Nano runs the mouse on its own.
Power: Ryobi ONE+ 18V battery, 4 to 6 hours, no wall plug needed
Modular: Each part can be fixed on its own, the way Rams would want. You can see how it's all put together.
The music: An SD card full of pirated music, ripped from YouTube, artists unpaid. Built with Temu knockoff tools even though I could afford good ones.
Status: Works. It plays stolen music and the mouse runs faster the louder it gets.
Context in Series
#4 of 12, the lowest point of the first part. The R9X was about the systems around me. This one is about me. I made it, I messed it up and I'm the mouse on the wheel.
The louder things get, the faster the mouse runs. That's how I deal with pressure: I don't do less, I do more of everything. I took the shortcuts and stole the music, and I still made sure it all works properly.
The telegraph was about the pieces of me. The R9X was about the systems. This one is about what I'm actively doing myself, while telling myself I'm still following the rules.
If I want to measure honestly, I have to be honest about my part. Next is Discourse Apparatus: why messages travel fastest when they're shaped like violence.