[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

Re: [microsound] projects



Trace,

What constitutes non-sampled content today?

Is such a thing basically a sinewave or synthesizer?
Is that what you mean?
(What about machine presets?)

Aren't field recordings as basic in content as a sinewave (or as
constructed)?


The form of your argument via "content" I am grappling with right now in
writing about Dj Spooky. What can be identified as content? What do we mean
by that? (A side related question: is it possible to speak of a conceptual
artist today without a concept, ie, without content?)

best,

    tobias

> All of this strikes me as less than inspiring. What's the point of working
> from stolen samples if you process them beyond recognition and any form of
> legal identification? Where's the risk in that? Where's the challenge or the
> protest or the resistance? And what's the point of such an aesthetic? Such an
> approach merely renders ALL sources equally meaningless because you process
> them the same way. In such a case, even if you write out your trail of samples
> and sources, you may as well be working from a copyrighted recording of the
> Beatles playing "Hey, Bulldog" as from your own field recording of dog farts.
> 
> Plunderphonics, mash-ups, and the new Negativland projects (check out "The
> Mashin' of the Christ" and "No Business" both at http://www.negativland.com)
> deal with the risk and pleasure of stealing and screwing up other people's
> stuff ... but the joke is that some of the pieces, and maybe all of them, are
> ultimately recognizable.  Otherwise, the irony is completely diffused, and the
> work is deprived of any cultural relevance.
> 
> You don't have to be very clever to find open source or "virtually public"
> samples. They're all over the place. I'm finding it depressing that so many
> can only conceive of microsound practice as a way to reprocess existing sound
> files. Yawn. Looking back over the history of microsound projects, most were
> created in just such a fashion: Parasites reworked Kim's files; McDonna
> reworked, illegally, Madonna/ACID Planet Loops; Bufferfuct reworked Kim's
> error files; City of the Future reworked a sample from Tarkovsky. Many of
> these projects -- and yeah, I've participated in them, too -- sound a lot of
> like. It seems clear to me that we've hit a creative dead-end -- and yeah, I
> mean myself, too.
> 
> I think it's a big mistake to think that the source is pointless and the
> process is everything. I'm so sick of max/msp patches and reaktor ensembles
> that can take anything from Bach to the Beastie Boys and make them sound like
> the same rumbling static and hi-freq screeches. What's the point? The point
> is, that microsound has mistakenly overvalued the language of the tool (that
> is, Kim's "the tool is the message") and process-based art. It has rendered
> content virtually pointless, and so has become just as bad as the hour-long
> group whack-offs favored by hippie jam bands.
> 
> But I'm really ranting specifically here about sample-based work, which I'm
> coming to despise in microsound. Is that all we can do? Can anyone on the list
> make a decent microsound track created from NO PRIOR RECORDED MATERIAL, their
> own or otherwise? I'm not talking about chopping up your field records and
> looping them through AudioMulch, or remixing your trash-folder of 2-sec
> recordings of your crashing hard-drive. Who's doing sample-less work? Or, on
> the other hand, who is doing risk-taking sample-based work that takes full
> advantage of the identity of its sources as a way to generate new meanings and
> recycle culture through the historical onflow of their manipulations?
> 
> -=the pHarmanaut
> 
> 
> ---- other's wrote ----
> 
> i'm all about it.  there are lots of open source or virtually public
> sound sources out there if you're clever.  also, i duly approve the use
> of small enough snippets or overly processed bits that could near
> impossibly be identified.
> -ryan dunn
> http://www.liscentric.com
> 
> On Sep 12, 2004, at 2:36 PM, visa wrote:
> 
>> Hi,
>> there hasn't been any microsound projects in a while, has there? I was
>> thinking that it might be fun to do something related to the recent
>> decision
>> by the us federal appeals court which ruled all uncleared sampling
>> illegal:
>> http://news.bostonherald.com/national/view.bg?articleid=43259
>> 
>> It would imo be interesting to do a project more or less subtly
>> opposing
>> this ruling. Like for instance, doing tracks entirely from uncleared
>> samples, but processed unrecognizable...
>> 
>> Is anyone interested in a project like this?
>> 
>> ~Visa
> 
> 
> 
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
> To unsubscribe, e-mail: microsound-unsubscribe@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> For additional commands, e-mail: microsound-help@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> website: http://www.microsound.org
> 



tobias c. van Veen -----------++++
http://www.quadrantcrossing.org --
http://www.thisistheonlyart.com --
McGill Communication + Philosophy
--- New School Philosophy --------
ICQ: 18766209 | AIM: thesaibot +++ 


---------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe, e-mail: microsound-unsubscribe@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
For additional commands, e-mail: microsound-help@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
website: http://www.microsound.org