Cage was influenced by Zen teachings and other post-modern notions such as the obliteration of the dualist subject. Reading his famous debut book Silence, one gets the impression that his provocations were done almost in a state of exigency, as a means of speeding up a necessary progression. And, as the article makes a point of, music in his case is perhaps best seen as a metonym for the creative process, and perhaps life, at large.

I think it's interesting to engage in Cage's work with the view of Cage as a technologist. Today, our means of synthesizing sound, imagery and even intelligble content I think dwarf those to which Cage was ever exposed. Cage's urgency, however, is as relevant as ever.