KVR Audio

dburgan · Post by **dburgan** » Mon Dec 27, 2004 10:48 pm

Hmmmm ....

I reject the assertion that there is a disproportionately large number of crummy ambient artists out there. By my reckoning, ambient has a very SMALL number of artists, and the average quality level is far higher than most other forms of electronic music. Someone tell me how many shit dance music or trance artists there are out there in comparison to ambient.

I also reject the assertion that making ambient music is easy. To me, good ambient is, in fact, the HARDEST genre to compose in because it is very difficult to avoid the trap of getting stuck in a drone. It takes supreme patience and a very intense focus to really express one's self on such a broad palette. I will admit that making bad ambient CAN be easy, but is anyone going to seriously tell me that making bad garage rock or bad trance is hard?? Please. The bar is no lower in ambient than in other genres, IMHO. And the upside potential is far higher.

Anyway, I personally don't care if someone doesn't like ambient for whatever reasons they like, but dissing the genre just because there is some amount of bad ambient music is silly. It's like saying that techno sucks because of all the eJay producers out there. Separate the wheat from the chaff, please.

Anyway, all my $0.000000000000001 worth ...

Markleford · Post by **Markleford** » Mon Dec 27, 2004 10:57 pm

whyterabbyt wrote:Just out of interest, apart from ahja, who involved in this thread is actually doing stuff they consider 'ambient'.

I've done only one track ("Hurry Up And Die": check link below) as of late that might be considered as "ambient", mainly in that it used a time-stretched heavily effected sample as the primary texture (but had an intrusive, if slightly arhythmic, beat), and one ("Burnt Credit Remix") that used a feedback/tape-delay bed mixed in with a solo piano theme over a dnb-ish beat.

More importantly, though, I'm super-heavily invested in generative, gestural, algorithmic, and aleatoric processes. Fact of the matter is, I probably write as much custom code to do music as I write music by hand. In this regard, I feel a strong kinship to the more "hardcore" end of the ambient spectrum, where the point is as much about process, approach, and theory as it is about end-result.

However, if I may quote some of my own blahblahblah posturing from a site dedicated to you-just-don't-understand-me music:

To paraphrase a favorite aphorism about "discipline", I believe that algorithmic composition shouldn't be an end in itself, only a means to an end. While I can appreciate some "chin stroking" audio experiments (and sport an appropriate goatee for the task), I think that the best results come from gestural systems that include some amount of application (and moderation) of human aesthetic.

Similarly, ambience will always have a place in my toolbox, but it will hardly ever take centre stage.

- m

ahja · Post by **ahja** » Mon Dec 27, 2004 10:58 pm

I can't recall anyone 'dissing' ambient in this thread?

Heh, but to stir up some more angry people. I, personally think, some of the best ambient tracks are made by trance and techno producers. Here are a few examples... Hallucinogen/Shpongle, Etnica, Pleiadians, Infected Mushroom, Future Sound Of London, Orbital, 12 Moons, Galaxy/Electric Universe, Juno Reactor, Jaia, X-Dream, etc...

androidlove · Post by **androidlove** » Mon Dec 27, 2004 11:14 pm

page 12!

kaden · Post by **kaden** » Mon Dec 27, 2004 11:34 pm

I, personally think, some of the best ambient tracks are made by trance and techno producers. Here are a few examples... Hallucinogen/Shpongle, Etnica, Pleiadians, Infected Mushroom, Future Sound Of London, Orbital, 12 Moons

Do you actually know what ambient music is? I mean, charmingly naive trolling aside, do you have *any* knowledge of the vast body of works that constitute what's known today as 'ambience', or are you using the term to generically describe 'hmmm...can't really dance to it' stuff you stumble across on Soulseek?

I was more or less ambivalent about this thread, but still interested, until I read that quote...

harumph...kids...

K

ahja · Post by **ahja** » Tue Dec 28, 2004 12:21 am

kaden wrote:
I, personally think, some of the best ambient tracks are made by trance and techno producers. Here are a few examples... Hallucinogen/Shpongle, Etnica, Pleiadians, Infected Mushroom, Future Sound Of London, Orbital, 12 Moons
Do you actually know what ambient music is? I mean, charmingly naive trolling aside, do you have *any* knowledge of the vast body of works that constitute what's known today as 'ambience', or are you using the term to generically describe 'hmmm...can't really dance to it' stuff you stumble across on Soulseek?

I was more or less ambivalent about this thread, but still interested, until I read that quote...

harumph...kids...

K

What? This makes no sense. You obviously don't know what your talking about here, man.

vurt · Post by **vurt** » Tue Dec 28, 2004 12:24 am

ooh ah!

mayan · Post by **mayan** » Tue Dec 28, 2004 12:51 am

I have no idea what "ambient" is other than a catch-phrase for something that doesn't fit the dominant paradigm of the CD purveyors. If so, that's cool...I've just heard ALOT of stuff described as "ambient" and it seems to cover an awful large ground of territory.

I have no idea what to call my music - but I'm sure if I ever came out with an album it would be shoved in some "ambient" bin.

hao nao · Post by **hao nao** » Tue Dec 28, 2004 12:52 am

ahja wrote:Seems like everyone and there mother is producing ambient these days, especially around these parts.

Just curious... and I don't mean to offend anyone by saying this, but what makes everyone flock the ambient genre? Is it because you can just load up a reaktor ensemble, press random, crossfade a few samples and call a tune? Or you just sit there fiddling with a sound, drown it in FX and think you're the greatest? Instant gratification maybe? Again, I stress I'm not trying to offend anyone... But it's very strange that all of a sudden ambient is the new trance (you know what I mean). I hear some great ambient here and I hear a lot very poor ambient.

I do ambient stuff too, have for about 7 or 8 years now... but more soundtrack/eno/classic stuff. So please, don't think I'm against you. I realy am 'one of you'. Just getting a bit old lately... You know well-known saying, "Once everyone's doing it, it's not cool anymore."

ahja, if it helps, I also sometimes overly frame my questions

there are some good answers up there, e.g., that it is easier to put something together than in other forms [which helps me quite a bit, since I have more of a slavic-symphonic, folk-song, Cole-Porter, big-band-jazz imagination

],

but conversely, getting back to "ambient", it's then up to the artist to judge or intuit what stays, what goes and what the rules and the form or arrangement of the particular piece are, so that it doesn't just sound like so many minutes of random noodling

similar to the best free verse, e.g. "Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird" by W. Stevens

Steven West · Post by **Steven West** » Tue Dec 28, 2004 3:42 am

- I hear you Kaden!

I stick with 'lo-fi' for myself still. Not because of the sonic variety I can acheive and the vast ranges of tempos I can choose within that genre - which can brush up to electronica, ambient, techno, and experimental purveyors.....

I'm just damn cheap!

androidlove · Post by **androidlove** » Tue Dec 28, 2004 4:15 am

I dine here for the ambience.

k-bird · Post by **k-bird** » Tue Dec 28, 2004 5:06 am

ahja wrote:Just curious... and I don't mean to offend anyone by saying this, but what makes everyone flock the ambient genre? Is it because you can just load up a reaktor ensemble, press random, crossfade a few samples and call a tune? Or you just sit there fiddling with a sound, drown it in FX and think you're the greatest? Instant gratification maybe? Again, I stress I'm not trying to offend anyone... But it's very strange that all of a sudden ambient is the new trance (you know what I mean). I hear some great ambient here and I hear a lot very poor ambient.

I do ambient stuff too, have for about 7 or 8 years now... but more soundtrack/eno/classic stuff. So please, don't think I'm against you. I realy am 'one of you'. Just getting a bit old lately... You know well-known saying, "Once everyone's doing it, it's not cool anymore."

Good music is never about how much work you put into it, unless you're writing music for the arty liner notes crowd. It's about the sensibility you have for whatever you're working on, what sounds good and what sounds bad. If you can tell the difference then you're halfway there.

Look at Eno's ambient experiments: he himself said he was a lazy sod and just wanted to build a machine then let it rip to see what it comes up with. I believe the catchphrase is work smarter, not harder.

If you feel a need to piss and moan because other people have found a way into your special little clubhouse, i feel sorry for you.

ahja · Post by **ahja** » Tue Dec 28, 2004 5:12 am

Oh jeez.. I thought we went through this already!

intel · Post by **intel** » Tue Dec 28, 2004 7:50 am

yes. we're passed that. we need to concentrate more on this nonsense instead:

ahja wrote:I, personally think, some of the best ambient tracks are made by trance and techno producers. Here are a few examples... Hallucinogen/Shpongle, Etnica, Pleiadians, Infected Mushroom, Future Sound Of London, Orbital, 12 Moons, Galaxy/Electric Universe, Juno Reactor, Jaia, X-Dream, etc...

because I know I'm not the only one who laughed out loud, then walked away from the computer shaking my head when I read that heap of silliness.

intel · Post by **intel** » Tue Dec 28, 2004 7:51 am

Mighty_Hero wrote: Are we going to make this thread 12 pages?

So... Is ambient the new fashion or,,,