Follower or Leader?

[debra1rlo]

isn't discussing if your music is original not that original?

It's ok, we're discussing if everyone else's music is original, not yours or mine.

gee Deb, that's original for you to refrain from a discussion about your music.

I saw all the other kids were doing it and well... monkey see, monkey do.

[Locus M]

Now, let's say if there was a competition for soundscape/noise/ambient. If everything is music and everything is art, then how would you even establish some kind of parameter for judging excellence?

How would you judge excellence in any style of music? By the charts? If so, just remember the 1000-flies-can-not-be-wrong-about-shit fallacy. Though there are other criteria as well, I know. I especially remember the complexity arguments by the jazz fusion fans: The more complex and "hard" to learn and perform (eg endless masturbative solos in various advanced scales)the more superior the music was supposed to be. BS IMO! At that time I found it just as hard to keep a "simple" electronic sequense going for minutes without getting bored. Once again we are in subject-land, not object-land, so I'll bet you can not mention a criterion for excellence that can not be challenged.

[Chuck E. Jesus]

i don't think Lunatique posted a long enough insight into his mind.

if you missed any of it i'm sure he'll be happy to re-post...

[whyterabbyt]

I don't think you're being fair.

gee, when did you start caring about 'fair'?

You picked one point out of multiple points I made. Why did you ignore these other points I made?

because you barely touched on them, so it was pretty clear they weren't of real significance within your post, which was primarily focussed on dragging out the same tired old bugbear as usual.

I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I

How interesting. No, honestly.

Now, let's say if there was a straw man about individual preferences. how would you even establish some kind of parameter for judging excellence? you can't, you see. if you think one thing is better, then... the imaginary trains wont work.
Now doesnt this just kinda prove to you once and for all that people just make experimental music because they're nowhere near as talented as me? i mean, if you preferred one thing to another, then it would be madness! chaos! your whole utopiac house of experimental card would falls apart. so im right, just not close-minded. muahahahahaha.

or whatever it was. it really was compelling though....

I'm not a close-minded person.

Right. Now that you've said it, Im thoroughly convinced.

"Unfortunately, the soundscape/noise/ambient arena is full of people who would be considered bad in any established conventions of music, and the only time they don't suck is when they work in a style where quality is difficult to assess."

Am I still a fascist?

yup.

[dirty oscillators]

i don't think Lunatique posted a long enough insight into his mind.

if you missed any of it i'm sure he'll be happy to re-post...

maybe he should start blogging?

[dirty oscillators]

Now, let's say if there was a competition for soundscape/noise/ambient.

Between music is a marketplace and music is a competition, some folk here sure have some puzzling ideas about music.

+1

[herodotus]

Now, let's say if there was a competition for soundscape/noise/ambient.

Between music is a marketplace and music is a competition, some folk here sure have some puzzling ideas about music.

It all makes perfect sense if you just reduce the huge chaotic complexity of the worlds music to a series of American Idol-style talent shows. You show how open minded you are by listening to the Pop, Country, Rap, Adult Album Alternative and Heavy Metal versions of this talent show.

And people who don't show up to one of these talent shows? Well they are simply not good enough to fit into one of the categories on this clearly exhaustive list of musical categories.

Now, suggesting that another talent show be added to this list isn't 'puzzling' at all. It is, in fact, the supreme act of open mindedness.

[debra1rlo]

[robogone]

I don't think you're being fair.

gee, when did you start caring about 'fair'?

I don't think you're qualified to be fair to him anyway, as you've had no formal training in fairness.

So carry on.

[projectdan]

I dont understand how indie and most guitar music gets away without getting criticized for the exact same reasons people criticize ambient, trance and hiphop here. I mean the level of playing skill required to play most popular guitar based stuff is rock bottom, add to that the fact that most indie/guitar music has to be, in general even less imaginative and more constrained than even hiphop and trance. How does it always seem to get away with it?

If you lot want to look down on certain types of music and musicians please dont leave out the guitar based ones, they are getting away with murder, feel free to hate them too, please!

[whyterabbyt]

needs more pitchfork?

[Locus M]

Well Lunie. Since you are honered to be the horse to beat to death now, I just couldn't help notice this tiny-whiny-little contradictory statement to all you have written within this thread:

Electronic - I love sounds. I love the variety of sounds we can fabricate out of thin air with electronic means, or audio you can mangle into something completely different. I love the fact that there are very few limits in what you can do in this genre. I love the electronic groove--particularly progressive house and breakbeat.

HA HA! So..did I get you or what? YOU SAID IT YOURSELF: VERY FEW LIMITS! So is it art or not given this fact?

Man...do I feel good now

[Chuck E. Jesus]

All I was saying is that some people just don't seem to want going through the efforts it takes to create some music. As an example, there's another thread I'm just participating in, someone asked for a list of chords for all scales in all keys, because he/she apparently wants to compose tunes in some sort of jazzy house genre. This, to me, is just plain wrong (ok, let's better say the "wrong approach"). The folks producing such music have never ever resorted to a chord spread sheet or anything like that. Even if their jazz theory knowledge might be limited, they either played their chords themselves or hired someone to do the job for them.
Asking for a tool to accomplish the task for you is pretty much like asking for a virtual Charlie Parker or so.

interesting you bring up Charlie Parker...i know a guy that spent the last five or so years learning the sax...he already knew how to play bass, some guitar and flute, but he focused on learning to sight read and jazz..it took a lot of effort on his part, and now he is a virtual Charlie Parker (as long as he has the sheet music in front of him)...fine if that's his goals and whatnot, but now he has some sort of attitude that he knows "real music"..and i've never heard anything particularly interesting or dare i say "original" come out of it, and now he is impossible to even jam with for fun...i'm not trying to contradict you or anything, just pointing out two sides to the same coin...

Personally, I'd never do so (had to learn this for myself, I've been a lot more rude some years ago). In case it's about music, the first thing I do is to listen to it. The second thing is listening as well. Same with the 3rd, 4th or whatever thing. In the end, I might ask or suggest something, but that might even be irrelevant already.

- Sascha

i'm not lumping you in with anyone else, i know where you are coming from...you've always been helpful and friendly to me, and you seem to actually know what you are talking about...and i hear you about being rude: i'm trying to be nicer, but i seemed to have failed miserably in the last few days i guess some people just bring out the worst in me...

[Hink]

I have a hard time grasping music as a competition, I think some might remember my signature of yore...something similar to the measure of one's talents is not a measure against the talents of others but a measure of one's own growth as an artist

I haven't taken this thread too seriously (obviously) because I'm neither nor a follower. I'm on my own path in life and though paths may cross with the paths of others it doesn't mean I'm following or leading. One thing that I find amazing about this thread is the clash of egos, the attempts of interjecting critical thinking in an extremely creative environment.

On top of that having been around a while I see complete hypocrisy based solely on egotistical elitism from some that I have "known" for years. Some that I have always admired and/or respected as well as some I expect it from. Then there are a few I would expect to come in here loaded for bear and ready to rumble only to see their claws are retracted and they are making sense.

I guess this is what happens when art collides with technology, but without mentioning names I will say that some people in this thread are just completely full of shit and a few of them are completely full of themselves...coincidence?

I say to those few, get over yourselves already [/i]

[Chuck E. Jesus]

If you lot want to look down on certain types of music and musicians please dont leave out the guitar based ones, they are getting away with murder...

i thought it was the rappers getting away with murder?