Follower or Leader?

[Hink]

all that work and I get one laugh, now I know how Howie Mandel feels

[herodotus]

Nah, I'm going to bed.

I'm on dial-up at present anyway.

@%#*ing Comcast.

[dirty oscillators]

all that work and I get one laugh, now I know how Howie Mandel feel

no, deb was laughing... it's just that eating popcorn is her own way of laughing.

[debra1rlo]

all that work and I get one laugh, now I know how Howie Mandel feels

I was trying to think of a good enough comeback, but I was clearly outmatched.

[Lunatique]

3)People who wanted to excel in the established musical conventions but failed, then looked to unconventional genres that seems to be a lot less demanding in terms of necessary knowledge of music theory, instrument performance, compositional skills...etc. When there are no established rules, you can't really fail/suck at it, right? Anyone can proclaim genius and originality, and there's no yardstick to assess whether anything they do is any good. 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.

Really excellent post. Very good insights, and a lot of truth that doesn't get discussed largely because it's not exactly politically correct.

I've listened to the "music" of some who are so disdainful of pop, commercial success and the music business, and my curiosity was rewarded with a variety of noise that is rigorously defended as being music. It was original, but not very interesting or even pleasant. The genre of ambient has been trashed by this stuff. It didn't occur to me that this was their escape from the constraints of music convention, which requires skill and talent, but that does make sense.

So in the end, to me, whether someone is highly original or not is not the main issue; I only care if they are any good according to my personal standard for excellence.

In other words, being a follower and/or leader isn't really an issue in terms of perceived music quality and enjoyment. I do think those who are bored with much of what they hear would be more likely to be constantly seeking music that is outside not only the mainstream but even the more recent genres, which themselves are only a decade or so old. For them, true originality is all that sparks their interest, for whatever reason. Maybe it's about not being part of the crowd, sheep, lemmings or...

Damn, so much hot air bullshit based on personal tastes and opinions.

I guess those of us that can fluently play several instruments and write songs yet still also make some 'experimental ambient' as well don't quite fit into this shit theory.

You may want to read more than just one paragraph of my entire post that was quoted. This is the rest of the post about that particular point:

I think there are generally three types of people trying to do something totally off the wall and different:

1)People who are already knowledgeable and skilled in established musical conventions, and looking to try something new and exciting.

2)People who never bothered learning the musical conventions and right off the bat gravitated towards the unconventional because it's simply their personality and taste.

3)People who wanted to excel in the established musical conventions but failed, then looked to unconventional genres that seems to be a lot less demanding in terms of necessary knowledge of music theory, instrument performance, compositional skills...etc. When there are no established rules, you can't really fail/suck at it, right? Anyone can proclaim genius and originality, and there's no yardstick to assess whether anything they do is any good. 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. There are certainly people who are really good working in that arena too, and for me personally, I can tell the good ones from the bad ones. The good ones actually compose soundscapes that have interesting progression and layered complexity that's actually musical and expressive and takes you on a journey of high's and low's and sparse and dense "movements," while the bad ones just drone on and on without any thought or purpose--just a blanket of random noise. (Yet even here subjective taste is still prevalent. My preference for expressiveness and a sense of musical progression may be something an experimental person completely hates and wants to get away from altogether, so random noise is just what he wanted. )

So, as I stated, I DO listen to soundscape/noise/ambient stuff, and I DO think there are good ones and bad ones in that genre. So NO, I'm NOT belittling an entire genre of music--I'm merely saying that particular genre is a great hiding place for people who do not possess the knowledge/ability that is commonly associated with established musical conventions (and whether that's a good or bad thing is subjective to the goals of each musician). Whether my idea of really good soundscape/noise/ambient stuff is the same as other people's is a whole different matter.

An interesting point--I'm a huge fan of Sakamoto Ryuichi because he's a genius and a musical chameleon. He's one of those very rare people who possess the knowledge and skill to compose a very wide range of styles with a sense of authority and authenticity--from classical, electronic, jazz, ethnic, operas, avant-garde, to rock/pop, and so on. He's respected by musical artists from various genres--be it cutting edge DJ's and electronic musicians, or classical and jazz and pop musicians, and that is a hard feat to pull off. But here's the interesting point I wanted to make--he does experimental ambient stuff too, and I really don't care much for his ambient stuff--I think it's the weakest among all the styles he works in. There are other ambient artists out there who probably can't hold a candle to his knowledge/skill in general as composers, but they make far more interesting ambient stuff than Sakamoto does. You see the point I'm making here? An extremely talented and authoritative figure like Sakamoto should be able to impress me with his ambient works, since I'm such an elitist bastard, right? But it doesn't work that way. Having achieved excellence in the established conventions or even other experimentations in avant-garde like Sakamoto has is no guarantee that he'll be able to pull off really compelling ambient works--at least not to me.

[koolkeys]

the whole point of all this is because you stated "originality is over rated". personally i would have been fine if you said "originality is difficult to obtain but is something an artist should strive for." but what you said implies that we should throw away our integrity and settle for less, which is BULLSHIT. all my life i've wanted to be different or unique or even someone who strives to be original, and when i hear someone that says something like you did, i take a personal offense to it.

I think you may be being a little unfair there. I don't get anywhere that the statement he made means you should throw away your integrity. You can have integrity but not total originality. And to be honest, there is very little "original" in music these days, both mainstream and otherwise. Most everything has been done before. Originality isn't the only thing that makes art to be "art". And I think that's what he probably meant by "overrated". As in, it's not the big deal people make it out to be.

No offense, but I just think you are reading into those three words way too much. THAT is twisting words, is it not? I mean, you're obviously entitled to think what you want, but I don't see the big deal.

You can still create art without completely original thinking. Anyone who says different is just wrong. It isn't about settling for less either. Everyone has their own reasons for writing, their own goals, their own methods. For one person to say that if somebody works a certain way is throwing away integrity and settling for "less", is just unfair, IMO.

I hope you don't take this personally. It's just my opinion. I don't want to get into any mudslinging matches of my own here. I've had enough of those lately.

Brent

[Lunatique]

You can still create art without completely original thinking. Anyone who says different is just wrong. It isn't about settling for less either. Everyone has their own reasons for writing, their own goals, their own methods. For one person to say that if somebody works a certain way is throwing away integrity and settling for "less", is just unfair, IMO.

I agree. Originality without quality means nothing, as novelty can only take something so far, and cannot carry it the rest of the way. There are an overwhelming number of really bad poetry, novels, films, paintings, music...etc that are highly original and experimental, but the only thing people will comment on is their novelty and not their quality.

Personal creative vision doesn't have to be totally innovative to be worthy of an audience or respect of one's peers. For example, someone might experience what he considers a very profound and life-changing event--maybe it's caring for his father in his final days fighting cancer, or maybe it's raising a daughter on his own after his wife passed away, or maybe it's getting captured by enemy soldiers and spending 10 years in a POW camp--whatever it is, he decides to write a novel about it. Now, none of the situations I mentioned are very original--many people have gone through the same experiences, but does that negate the worth of his experience? Does his novel not convey his feelings and insights and the profound effect the event has had on his life? If his novel is really well-written and moves a lot of people, is it not worthy of a Pulitzer prize?

So if we look at the same idea in music--it's really not that much different. The established conventions of harmony, melody, rhythm, sounds...etc are like grammar and plot devices used by writers. It's how you use them and what you say with them that really matters. A poet can write random nonsense and it'll be highly original, but what else does have going for it aside from its novelty?

[Cordelia]

A poet can write random nonsense and it'll be highly original, but what else does have going for it aside from its novelty?

He took his vorpal sword in hand:
Long time the manxome foe he sought—
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood awhile in thought.

Hmmmm...just novelty, I guess...won't last, won't have an impact...

[Sascha Franck]

3)People who wanted to excel in the established musical conventions but failed, then looked to unconventional genres that seems to be a lot less demanding in terms of necessary knowledge of music theory, instrument performance, compositional skills...etc. When there are no established rules, you can't really fail/suck at it, right? Anyone can proclaim genius and originality, and there's no yardstick to assess whether anything they do is any good. 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.

Really excellent post. Very good insights, and a lot of truth that doesn't get discussed largely because it's not exactly politically correct.

I've listened to the "music" of some who are so disdainful of pop, commercial success and the music business, and my curiosity was rewarded with a variety of noise that is rigorously defended as being music. It was original, but not very interesting or even pleasant. The genre of ambient has been trashed by this stuff. It didn't occur to me that this was their escape from the constraints of music convention, which requires skill and talent, but that does make sense.

Excellent points. Absolutely what I'm thinking, too.
One could probably compare it to the event of punk music back then, too. Blame everything as being over-established, blame good players as "musician's musicians", music whores or whatever. Then start your "revolution" with "I'm not suiting any genre", "I want to be original" and what not. Don't forget to add some "music theory is for re-producers" and "I don't need an input device for my sequencer, MIDI keyboards are too limited anyway" flavour to it and you're all set.

Sounding harsh? Yes, it is. But I think it's absolutely true, though, there's just quite some people being like that.
It's becoming especially noticeable when you watch some of the "what's the best..." threads. Very often these threads are started by folks without any clue (ok, that's fine, when you start out you don't have a clue), but with plenty of tools at their disposal already (I'm trying to not suspect where they got their tools from), just with a lack of whatever to tell whether their tools are actually suitable.
Then there's also those "I want a plugin to create all chords in a given key" threads.
Quite some of these folks don't seem to have the guts (and patience) it takes to actually learn some traditional music skills, let alone develop their hearing skills (so they could actually make their own decision on "what's the best", separate major from minor, etc.). In the next sentence they would blame those very traditional skills as being reactionary, old-fashioned, "I don't want to sound like the establishment..." and what not.

Might be that I'm too hard here, but you may get my point, though.
I've been teaching guitar for almost 20 years (I'm not anymore, fortunately), and I've seen quite some people with a mindset pretty much like this as well. "No, I don't need alternate picking, I want to become the next sweep picking guitar super hero". These folks completely miss the point that a solid foundation of certain musical skills is a proper thing to start with and then probably move away from there.

Now, I'm not saying that you can't do without formal education. In fact, especially regarding music, I know quite some people with a complete lack of any formal knowledge doing great stuff. Even highly impressive stuff.
I guess it's more about the efforts going into it. Quite some folks seem to want to be the next big music act without willing to put any efforts into it. Hence their questions for chord-generating plugins, more drumloops and what not. There's quite some of those folks on KVR. "I have Cubase SX 2, Komplete 5 and <insert any famous synths, plugins and sample libraries>, using the onboard soundcard of my Walmart PC". Sounds familiar? I don't want to start a warez discussion by any means, but these very people often are the same defending their "ambient" and "anti-establishment" music. Just because it's all so highly original.

A disclaimer, just that nobody's getting me wrong: I do like quite some ambient music, some punk as well. And I'm also not referring to any specific persons involved in this thread to be sure. It's just general observations I made over the last years.

- Sascha

[whyterabbyt]

Of course, this is a generalization and there are exceptions, but it's something I've noticed in many cases. The problem with a symptom like that is if one does not have the knowledge/skill to even make something worthwhile in established conventions, that means he's lacking all the necessary skills to make "music" in the way that human beings have come to know music--lacking the ability to play an instrument decently, compose a decent melody or harmonic progression or rhythm...etc. People like that will often gravitate towards the really obscure genres that does away with as many musical conventions as possible.

I had a bet on with myself, that you'd turn up in this thread with the same old musical fascisms as ever. I win. "You're not worthy unless you can operate a mechanical device fluently. You're not worthy unless you can comprehend an obscure symbol-pitch encoding system. You're not worthy unless you embrace an arbitrary set of pitch/time patterns." blah blah blah.
What utter bollocks. Its always been that most of the people who gravitate towards playing musicAL instruments are born with an ability in the first place, same as those who are naturally better at the hand-eye translation/coordination of drawing, or the better sense of balance of a gymnast. That doesnt make them artists, though, any more than being a fast runner does. It just means they were born with something they could leverage, and, as is typically the way of things, the prevailing attitude is to define those skills as being mandatory to the art form that utilises them.
Its the classic method by which priveleged insiders protect their territory; cultural fascism at its finest. A self-serving set of definitions designed to exclude people who dont play and instrument, dont read notation, cant memorise arbitrary patterns, from music. They can't do it 'decently' so they better not do it at all, until they're prepared to learn. And if they still want to do it, and go their own way, but stay out of your hallowed territory, then people like you ensure that what they do is denigrated for everything they do that is their own. Its not valid because its not what you do. If they dont do what you do, it cant be valid. If its 'experimental', its because they cant do anything else, whether they want to or not.

Here's the thing, though; music is still an art form, a means of artistic and creative communication. And its not the ability to play an instrument, or read notation, or remember rules of harmony, or any of those lucky mechanical or mental abilities that allow one to create art. Its the ability to formulate and express an idea, the concretisation of something innate to being a human, in order to provoke a response, a reaction in an observer. That might be facilitated by dexterity with some clumsy arrangement of wood and wires, or it might not, but it certainly doesnt require it. It requires something else. And if you dont get that, you probably dont have it.

Its just like painting. The ability to paint a seashore, or someone's kitten, isn't the thing that differentiates the artist from the amateur, and you'll often find the dabbling amateur whose kittens are masterful. Painting kittens well isnt art, though. The ability to paint photorealistic pictures of cute girls isnt art. Knowing which lens to use for a closeup of pollen on an orchid isnt art. Being able to keep time isnt art. These are all just relatively uninteresting manifestations of fairly intrinsic abilities, some of which can be improved by learning.

Art is expression. Its a self-serving lie to claim that the success of expression lies in the mastery of some arbitrary physical or mental skill. Its a self-serving lie to imply that the creativity of an individual is impaired if they don't first negotiate their place amongst the self-declared elite who have engaged in mastering those arbitrary physical or mental skills. Its a self-serving lie that following the dogma of those who mandate arbitrary physical or mental skills places one in a position of authority of what is 'valid' or 'successful' or 'worthy' across the entirety of the related artistic endeavour.

The 20th century gave musicians, and other artists, freedom to escape the confinements of the same tired ideas you are clinging to. You might want to consider joining us in the 21st, instead of desparately trying to reinforce your investment in the narrowminded cliches of the 17th.

[Locus M]

Man ...overall Eduardo is beaten to death here. Why? For a standard out-of-the-butt remark, that is no worse nor better than most "KVRian slips" that all of us are guilty of from time to time. Has KVR history something to do with this? I have heard lot worse in many other threads, so I simply do not get the heat around here. Besides, it does make sense from some angles. I mean: who's in authority to determine what kind of music people should enjoy listening to and produce and what features should characterise that music? In this respect "originality" could indeed be overrated to many people if it is supposed to mean that we should not strive for repetitions or genres or copying each other. Who the f*ck have decided that this is "bad" from the outset? Whoever that may be: Go dig a hole and jump in it! I enjoy what I like. If you have a problem with that, put a contract on me!

Now can we be a little rational around here or is that simply too boring?

So, some of you obviously define originality as "something that stands out from mainstream music and is better"

Others (well not many)have a more open definition like "something that stands out from mainstream music" in which we do not know whether it is supposed to be good or bad

And yet others:

"Something that stands out from mainstream, when they can not succeed within normal music conventions (which is something bad, when stated that way I guess).

So what is the problem? Same as always, namely that the objective aspects of such issues continually are confused with the entirely subjective. In this case the objective part is the claim that it is something that stand out from mainstream music. This could be easily determined with means of music theory and I guess we could all agree on most of such works. And now the subjective part, namely whether this is good or bad.... guess what?...you can scream, cry, play the bongos all night while you chant your personal preferences all over KVR in the most repetitive way. In the morning the world will still be full of people who have other preferences than you....and…...SO F*CKING WHAT? If this fact takes the pleasure out of your own joy of music, I can tell you with 99% certainty that your problem is something completely else and that the musical issue only one of many potential symptoms.

Ahh...what a relief. Now I am cool again. I promise not to bite if some of you disagree with me. After all that is the curse of statements like that: They backfire!

[whyterabbyt]

I would hardly call the cacophony of much experimental music ambient in any sense of what the original meaning of it was.

that's primarily down to your own ignorance though.

[captain caveman]

Art is expression. Its a self-serving lie to claim that the success of expression lies in the mastery of some arbitrary physical or mental skill. Its a self-serving lie to imply that the creativity of an individual is impaired if they don't first negotiate their place amongst the self-declared elite who have engaged in mastering those arbitrary physical or mental skills. Its a self-serving lie that following the dogma of those who mandate arbitrary physical or mental skills places one in a position of authority of what is 'valid' or 'successful' or 'worthy' across the entirety of the related artistic endeavour.

Although it has to be said in the case of modern art, that unless the artist in question has been trained/schooled as an artist then throwing a pot of paint at a canvas can't be construed as more than that just an act. If they know how to paint and choose other forms of expression using paint then it is no longer a random act and may well be deserved of some chin-stroking, discussion and general flute-chinking.

In the case of music, to understand the rules of music before breaking them is the only thing that makes for me the more avant-garde vaguely digestable in the same way as modern art. I could go and put four soundscapish Reaktor ensembles and a long Absynth patch on right now and while it may sound okay, it would mean absolutely nothing to me (and, I would hope, anyone else), I could take a picture of my unmade bed or throw some ink on my neighbours cat too but in the same way that wouldn't make me an visual artist.

I would also have to add that IMO no-one can be as musically creative as they could be unless they "master those arbitary physical and mental skills".

[whyterabbyt]

Although it has to be said in the case of modern art, that unless the artist in question has been trained/schooled as an artist then throwing a pot of paint at a canvas can't be construed as more than that just an act.

of course it can.

unless, of course, you buy into the notion that only those who have 'authorisation' as artists should ever be accepted as such.

If they know how to paint and choose other forms of expression using paint then it is no longer a random act and may well be deserved of some chin-stroking, discussion and general flute-chinking.

the fallacious assumption you have made is that assuming the act is random solely on the grounds that it has been done by someone who is not 'trained/schooled as an artist'. the legitimacy of the act is not determined by the training of the person who undertakes it, though.

In the case of music, to understand the rules of music before breaking them is the only thing that makes for me the more avant-garde vaguely digestable in the same way as modern art.

Again, there is the assumption that it is a single set of rules which prevail. I dont happen to subscribe to the priveleged, 19th century, european notion of which rules those are.

I could go and put four soundscapish Reaktor ensembles and a long Absynth patch on right now and while it may sound okay, it would mean absolutely nothing to me (and, I would hope, anyone else), I could take a picture of my unmade bed or throw some ink on my neighbours cat too but in the same way that wouldn't make me an visual artist.

No, it wouldnt. You described a sequence of actions without motivation; artistic intent was clearly missing, and its pretty much a prerequisite. IMO.

I would also have to add that IMO no-one can be as musically creative as they could be unless they "master those arbitary physical and mental skills".

Which is a bit like saying 'noone can be as happy as they could be with a lot more money'. Its an assumption that the result is totally interdependent on fulfilling the condition...

[Emerald Tablet]

Narcissistic Messiah?

Narcissus became entranced by his own reflection in a pool.
It was all about "them". Than "they" died.

Could it mean. If you look at your ego long enough
your ego will die?

And Messiah .... isn't any human Messiah including Jesus an error in itself saying flesh can be saved through the flesh .... Vanity .....

We are all beasts and doomed and we can only safe ourselves untill we die.

Isn't Narcissistic Messiah a tautology anyway?
So ....who gave Emerald Tablet that name?

Why the sock puppet? You don't need to talk to yourself. Post under "Emerald Tablet" please.

thats a lie