Re: [microsound] technological mediation

[Joshua Maremont <thermal@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

At 01:11 PM 11/20/00 -0800, Sean Cooper wrote:
> or, perhaps more honestly, as an artist you prefer to substitute your own
> set of stereotypes and expectations for those assumed to be held by your
> listeners -- a process of mystification that you actively enjoy when you
> are in the listener's position (cf. your zoviet-france
> experience). nothing wrong with that, of course, but the situation is no
> less "mediated."

Well, I prefer a complete absence of stereotypes.  In my own case, I had a 
two-person band with guitars and drum machines and sequencers in a time and 
place whose music scene was dominated by poodle-metallists and 
thrash-funkers and whose audience immediately asked "where is the 
drummer?"  The choice was simple:  list our members and gear on our 
records, consigning ourselves immediately to ghettoization as despised 
synthpop wankateers (our live shows did that already), or leave some 
ambiguity for those not yet forced to pose the dreaded drummer 
question.  Not saying, certainly, but not hiding.  But mystification is a 
different matter.  Zoviet-France released vinyls and cassettes and later 
CDs full of strange and unidentified noises, yet in performance there was 
no attempt to hide the quite homemade and simple methods by which the sound 
was generated.  On the other hand a certain electronic music star was seen 
at a concert several years ago hiding his Mysterious Equipment under a tarp 
and blocking attempts by the other musicians to see it; my source for the 
tale was managed to lift the veil and found a quite common synthesizer 
beneath it.  The first example, to me, is not mystification, but the second 
is.  Meanwhile in electronic music we see ghettoization at increasingly 
microscopic increments of stylistic difference:  on the Hyperreal ambient 
list, for example, there is not only new digital electro but also the 
subdivision between early and late Autechrean styles.  Within such a 
context, I fear that, for example, were Vladislav Delay's beautiful "Ele" 
to be branded with a credit to the effect of "all done with Reaktor," those 
interested in dub or ambience would dismiss it as dance music or computer 
music before bathing in its intoxicating rhythms.  For the CD instead to 
give no clue as to its origins (beyond simply Finland) seems to make its 
appeal perhaps more universal.  Another example of not-saying but 
not-mystifying might be Monolake:  the CDs offer little in the way of 
technical details, yet "The Monolake Collection" is available for anyone 
who buys Reaktor.  I offer such examples to offset the dyad of Deliberate 
Hiding and Scrupulous Documentation seemingly sustained across this 
thread.  I hope no dead horses have been flogged herein...

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