RE: [microsound] The 'quest for newness'...

[Gunnar Garness <ggarness@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I agree completely.  It is every artists (not just musician's)
responsibility to approach what they do with cautious consideration.  One of
my favorite new releases was originally CDr (Zammuto's "Willscher" on
Apartment B Records).  There are some many levels to this release and's it's
obvious a LOT of thought went into it's making.  it definitely has a
personality if that's what you're looking for.

Gunnar

-----Original Message-----
From: Joshua Maremont [mailto:thermal@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]
Sent: Thursday, August 17, 2000 11:50 AM
To: microsound
Subject: RE: [microsound] The 'quest for newness'...


What is a blessing is also a curse.  When I made my first album 12 years
ago it was, for me at least, an activity to be undertaken with great
seriousness:  there were expensive studio time not to be wasted, costly
tape to be conserved, the need to keep timings within the advisable
limitations of a single LP (although we went a bit past these), and the
knowledge that another such release would not be possible for at least
another year.  We took the best material from our past years, perfected it
in rehearsal, and released a small slice of ourselves which would do for
the next three years, as it was only after this time that our second issue
found its way out into the world.  Now the digital home studio is almost a
necessity - especially for electronic musicians - and the expansive time
allowances and cheapness of the media make it possible for people to
release an album each week, eliminating any necessity of pruning, editing,
or gestating, all of which to me made the wait between albums in the past a
more deliriously satisfying experience than one has in the age of, shall I
say, the digital laxative.  To me the issue does not relate to the tools of
composition:  I recall that many "serious" musicians complained at the
advent of the sampler and the MIDI sequencer that now Any hack would be
able to make music, and the complaints about the hackery software music
seem to worry about the same ease and democratization in music
production.  Certainly I have heard plenty of music in the last year which
seems hamfisted tweaking of software presents - "Powerbook diddling"
happens - but then I have heard equivalent dysinspiration (should I say,
expiration?) in just about every other region of music I have explored; I
also expect that regardless of the amount of music flooding or trickling
into the "market" the proportion of the interesting to the uninteresting
remains about the same.  The idea of newness meanwhile is a bugbear - just
about anything appearing to be shockingly new can be found to have strong
influences and unmistakable antecedents, however many years it takes the
novelly shocked listener to find them - and mere newness does not make
something particularly good.  Returning to Oval, where I recall this thread
began to fray, what has made Oval enduring for me is not its newness -
skipping CDs alone would seem emptily gimmicky after a few initial listens
- but its musicality, its melody, its richness, its personality, and I
expect if the next Oval record were an acoustically recorded country album
it would retain these characteristics.  And here is for me the dividing
line:  does a record, whether the first this month or the first this
decade, whether "bleeding-edge" or safely genre-stamped, whether made in a
highend studio or at home, whether produced with medieval instruments or
freeware, have emotion, have personality, have a desperate passionate
reason to Be?  Has it been extruded or born?  Have care and time been taken
with it or has it been recorded while its creator was on the potty?  The
clock cannot be turned backward, and as a musician I am quite happy that I
can now make records on the G4 in bedroom rather than in the uncomfortable
tick-tock of the hired studio and that I can release them more often that
once every two or three years, but the dangers of the situation must be
acknowledged if our music is to be worthy of listening five or ten years
from now.  Then again, the occasional brilliance found on a handwrapped CDR
or an obscurely posted MP3 file makes the proliferating dross ever worth
the wading.

PS - For sheer personality, the Tomlab compilation "For Friends" has quite
won my affections this week, and at its low price I recommend it to all.

Playing now:  Tram "Heavy Black Frame"

joshua maremont / thermal - mailto:thermal@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
boxman studies label - http://www.boxmanstudies.com/


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