Does production even matter?
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- KVRAF
- 2945 posts since 23 Dec, 2002
If the OPs point is that a he'd rather a good song with poor production versus a well produced piece of garbage I don't think I'd argue with him. I am not sure that this is the point he is making.
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- KVRAF
- 10588 posts since 13 Jun, 2004 from Alberto Balsam
Production is just as important as the music. Songwriting is the message, but production is how the message is conveyed, which is just as important as the message itself.
I disagree with the new definition of production, being the portion of the media achieved by nerds twisting dials. Surely, production pertains to the entire process. Back in the day when a bunch of musicians were placed different lengths from a giant cone that ended in the stylus cutting to a shellac master. The painstaking choice of instrumentation, the placement of musicians, and matching the right cone, room, and stylus for that particular recording was the production process, and the process was just as expertly nuanced as production today. As such, It doesn't make sense to me to separate the recording process (pertaining to mic placement and instrument choice and such) from production.
I'm a young man, but I'm old enough to remember days before MP3s when I had to download MIDI files of my favorite songs and play them through my Sound Blaster 32's built-in sounds. I'll take a lossy codec over that anytime.
There's also what we mean by good vs. bad production. I challenge the objective standards of "good" production. Many (most?) of my favorite productions deviate from objectified standards, such as academic ideas of balance and clarity. Grungy rock requires grungy production to get the grungy point across. Switching a gutter punk production with a crystal clear Fleetwood Mac production would be disastrous for both, and a lot of work goes into dialing in the correct filth for a production that isn't "good" by objective standards, but is absolutely artistically correct for matching the aesthetic of the music to portray.
I disagree with the new definition of production, being the portion of the media achieved by nerds twisting dials. Surely, production pertains to the entire process. Back in the day when a bunch of musicians were placed different lengths from a giant cone that ended in the stylus cutting to a shellac master. The painstaking choice of instrumentation, the placement of musicians, and matching the right cone, room, and stylus for that particular recording was the production process, and the process was just as expertly nuanced as production today. As such, It doesn't make sense to me to separate the recording process (pertaining to mic placement and instrument choice and such) from production.
I'm a young man, but I'm old enough to remember days before MP3s when I had to download MIDI files of my favorite songs and play them through my Sound Blaster 32's built-in sounds. I'll take a lossy codec over that anytime.
For me this is contextual. Am I having a sit-and-listen, I'll take the good song. At the club or accompanying an action scene in a movie, I'll opt for the production.Scotty wrote:If the OPs point is that a he'd rather a good song with poor production versus a well produced piece of garbage I don't think I'd argue with him. I am not sure that this is the point he is making.
There's also what we mean by good vs. bad production. I challenge the objective standards of "good" production. Many (most?) of my favorite productions deviate from objectified standards, such as academic ideas of balance and clarity. Grungy rock requires grungy production to get the grungy point across. Switching a gutter punk production with a crystal clear Fleetwood Mac production would be disastrous for both, and a lot of work goes into dialing in the correct filth for a production that isn't "good" by objective standards, but is absolutely artistically correct for matching the aesthetic of the music to portray.
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- KVRian
- 581 posts since 17 Feb, 2016 from west coast somewhere USA....
No and no. Just go for it people and let the sonic record sort it out for the history books. Rock on. 
