Music on sight
February 14, 2020

'Kate & Me' by French artist Pone - the first album to be produced with eyes

Pone was a beatmaker who helped shape the sound of French hip-hop in the 1990s, but when fell to the motor neurone disease (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis - (ALS), he wasn't able to produce music, at least not in the way he was used to. In 2019, with Ableton Live installed on his computer he started producing again - using his eyes to operate like a mouse. He could do everything he used to, just at a slower pace. This way he produced a fulm album, 'Kate & Me', an instrumental beat record created as an ode to Kate Bush, and the first album in history to be entirely produced through an eye-tracking device, "an emotional, spacious record with a sci-fi quality. With trademark optimism". Guardian went to southwest France to talk to the brave man.