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-- music is obsolete (as we know it)
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quote:

Originally posted by nefardec However, I know if I play drum and bass for my little sicilian grandmother i think she might have the same reaction you described regading Ligeti's piece, which makes me think it is a condition of culture.

Of course, this could very well just be her conscious reaction. Subconsciously, she would probably be able to recognize the melodic elements, the rhythmic pulse, the timbrel noodling. It would register in her as music. She'd probably think of it as angry music, even bad music, but consciously, it's possible for her to reject it outright.

otherwise I agree with you.

quote:

This movement argues that 'modernism' in the classical sense

Firstly, the idea of modernism being referred to in a 'classical sense' doesn't make any sense as Modernism was a reaction to Classicism. It would often turn classical art against itself.

For example, the era of modernist novel writers at the turn of the 20th century would often write in a way which was 'against the grain' compared to the classical form of the novel before it. Whereas before we would have omniscient narration, with the narrative in chronological order, Modernist writers would often deliberatly write with scattershot chronology. They would write from the perspective of individuals, so you never got an overall sense of what was happening. Think Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness and his fictional narrator - Marlow, or William Faulkner in The Sound and the Fury and his narrators, Quentin Compson and Benjamin Compson.

As you may well know, Modernism began as a reaction against an established 'form' of the art. It questioned why these were starting points of novel writing or painting or whatever. At some point however, this 'writing against the grain' became in and of itself a kind of rule, a kind of structure for Modernism and it had to die.

And so we arrive at Post Modernism. Which is the rejection of everything Modern and a continuation of it. Post Modernism is a really tricky area to describe because it cannot really be described without contradicting itself. Its a curious paradox that is worth reading about in Peter Barry's Beginning Theory.

In musical terms this has already happened - you just missed it. Around the late 70s you may have heard of a label called Industrial Records. The manifesto of this label was to create music which did not rely on musical structure - which anyone, regardless of their race, class or knowledge could make and enjoy. It was essentially music for 'the working class' - hence the name. You can see this in visual terms with the Video Art movement. See 'Vito Acconci' or some other proponant of this genre.

Industrial music is very abstract, largely based on incidental noise. It doesn't have any sort of musical structure and in terms of its arrangement is quite random. In that sense you could think of it as closer to the incidental sounds you hear all around you.

However, Industrial Records died in 1983 and the big reason it did is because it became something of a cliche. It became the kind of form and rule that it was trying to get away from in its strict avoidance of form and rule in music.

Now everything in that vein or taking ideas and inspiration from it, in part or in whole could be regarded as Post Industrial. That is, music that came about in the aftermath of Industrial Records.

In the same way that Post Modernism just refers to art that came about in the aftermath of Modernism, what you are left with is a mish mash and a hybridisation of many of the ideas that came before it. But now theres no stated aim. No point of reference. No reaction to anything.

But in musical terms that event has already happened. About 30 years ago. Alot of people didn't know or cared that it happened though. You might be interested however.

quote:

Originally posted by Derivative Firstly, the idea of modernism being referred to in a 'classical sense' doesn't make any sense as Modernism was a reaction to Classicism. It would often turn classical art against itself. For example, the era of modernist novel writers at the turn of the 20th century would often write in a way which was 'against the grain' compared to the classical form of the novel before it. Whereas before we would have omniscient narration, with the narrative in chronological order, Modernist writers would often deliberatly write with scattershot chronology. They would write from the perspective of individuals, so you never got an overall sense of what was happening. Think Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness and his fictional narrator - Marlow, or William Faulkner in The Sound and the Fury and his narrators, Quentin Compson and Benjamin Compson.

Modernism was a reaction against the Victorian arrogance that had preceded it, motivated by social concerns. After a century or more of colonial European hubris, the changing political climate and the onset of the World Wars reflected on society. It was termed something to the effect of "the ache of the century". I don't think you can define modernism or post-modernism (especially the latter, which is so varied and ambiguous it is only really connected by the social conditions that induced it, "post-modernity") without noting the social stimuli that brought them about.

This reaction against the Victorian mindset did reflect in modernist literature. The modernists were greatly interested in advances in psychology that suggested mankind was not as high, mighty or self-controlled as they liked to admit (something that obviously reflects in novels like Heart of Darkness) and especially in human perception. Stream-of-consciousness was the most obvious example of this, as it was a rejection of the omnisicent narrative realist style favoured by the Victorians in favour of a highly subjective form of narration that mimicked how people's minds really worked.

..All of which is irrelevant really. I'm not sure modernism was a reaction to classicism as a whole (at least not in literature, which is the only area I have any claim to expertise in), but when he said "classical sense" I think he meant the commonly agreed definition of modernism (basically that it was a movement determined to be different to what came before), as opposed to referring to classicism.

Thank you i found this very interesting, both parts sinse i seriously think of becoming an architec when i grow up if music doesn't work out for me. ok so..

yes this my be true,idk if i am old school in that....topic lets say, but if this, one day, really becomes true, to me at least, it would be a sad truth. I view art as something creative, soulful and human, music and architecture, to me, are art fields, especially modern architecture which i am most interested in. The ideas of having machines creating our music, which is very intimate to me, and our homes just simply scares me, do you know how many people would lose their jobs and how it would affect the world? Idk if i could ever accept such things, even though music created by machines may sound awesome, but the soul, the hard work , the effort you think someone went through to create that song for you and thousands of other people, it simpley isn't there. That just saddens and worries me.

music is absolute?













i agree.

quote:

..All of which is irrelevant really. I'm not sure modernism was a reaction to classicism as a whole (at least not in literature, which is the only area I have any claim to expertise in), but when he said "classical sense" I think he meant the commonly agreed definition of modernism (basically that it was a movement determined to be different to what came before), as opposed to referring to classicism

Thanks, yeah I meant like "textbook modernism". Also my specialization is architecture, so when I say modernism it mgith be a little different. Actually I sort of was being cynical about it because although modernists at least in architecture had these idealistic thoughts which drove their designs a lot of people ended up merely copying them stylistically and relying on archaic structural systems and programmatic organizations, etc

Derivative - thanks for that. I am aware that as an idea this has been done before. I wasn't aware of industrial records particularly. Like I posted earlier - the Muzak corporation essentially has done things like this since the 30s, and SMC pointed out some works from Reich.

What I am interested in though is a more statistics-based algorithmic method using today's technology and computer methods.
It wouldn't be exactly revolutionary as you have pointed out, but it might be revolutionary in the sense that it is generated much more quickly, possibly real-time, could be mass produced much much more easily, and I envision some sort of way too connect this to environmental controls/automation as I said in an earlier post. Maybe it's an experimental membership-only lounge which gathers data like occupant #, volume of alcohol sold, temperature, weather, day of the week, age of inhabitants, sex of inhabitants, relationship status, crowd noise, movement patterns on the floor, and all associated rates of change, means, minumums, and maximums etc etc and then using a variety of complex parametric algorithms generates some sort of music out of this. Possibly different algorithms would correspond to different categories of musical outcomes. So maybe artists are mathematicians: what if James Zabiela has an a set of his own algorithms and Tiesto has Waakop Reijers or Benno De Goeij make his own algorithms, and what if a group of internet users collaborate on a wiki and generate their own algorithms. Maybe some nameless disgruntled muzak employee makes a ton and then licenses them. then different nights at this lounge, different algorithms would interpret the same data set in either different ways or generating different sounds or both... maybe this method would be used by companies to sonically brand their business, stores, offices, etc. maybe cities use it to deter crime, brothels use it to enhance sex

quote:

Originally posted by nefardec and SMC pointed out some works from Reich.

Roach, Steve Roach.

I will add this, these days the songwriter is mostly obsolete.

The edm scene needs more original productions than remixers and djs. The tracks largely sound the same, with only a handlful of producers putting out musically interesting tracks.

quote:

Roach, Steve Roach.

Oops, thanks for the correction!




Re: clothes
yeah seriously when are we going to have abstract clothing like THIS again?

clothing like that is a direct result of not having to dress yourself nor feed yourself! it is truly the result of enormous wealth. nowadays i guess it's the image/name that matters

on a side note of a side note - i have a friend who wears every pair of jeans inside out

time,deep space,ever changing shapes of mechnical evergrowing shapes of Gray matter that will rule our Mindblowing experiences based on String theories that are synth sampeled by a machine that GOogLe will build in the dark future on 2076.
I think of zombies controlled by Acid funk that will walk on the moon created by somekind of evil software which uses the brain of president nickson....***********yawwwwwwwwwwn***********









Or in other words: THIS THREAD IS TOO LONG AND WITH TOO MUCH USELESS BIG WORDS

yeah i think we all got that already

but thanks

quote:

Originally posted by nefardec yeah i think we all got that already but thanks

Just kiddin man
keep being who you are

quote:

Originally posted by skip even if you're "a bit imaginative", it still doesn't make any of this music to have any relation to bioinformatics. you got the stupid ideas thing wrong here. i don't mean it as a negative thing. IMO it's perfectly fine to have stupid ideas, it's how you act on them what makes you stupid or not. so because i don't think your ideas belong to "the stupid ideas category". well that doesn't make my ideas any more or less anything. you've clearly misunderstood me here. sure nanotech could be used to music production in the future, it could be used for almost anything. that's not the point though. the point is that what does it have to do with the kind of music you're talking about here. would nanotech be used exclusively to make such music only? if not, what point does mentioning nanotech here serve?

no reply? no explanation for using the big words. the longer this goes on the more convinced i am that you nefardec are just what my first impression about you was. and i'm glad if you're able to prove me wrong.

ok, i'm going to go cry in a corner now, skip doesn't like me, and i've failed to prove myself as a worthy person in his eyes!



did you ever think maybe people have better things to do? i don't even know you

Life is obsolete!


anyway, reading this thread, this book came to my mind.



its hard to read, but its worth it...

nice thread btw!

Re: Re: Is Music Obsolete?

quote:

Originally posted by nefardec This movement argues that 'modernism' in the classical sense (mies van der rohe, walter gropius, etc) was a half-baked movement that merely swapped aesthetic representation and 'style' from the decadent and decorative to the minimal and industrial without actually overturning society and thought.

i most often view art as entertainment, i believe most people do the same; under that pretext (the one i contend to be the most prelevant) overturning society and/or thought is not a requirement for art.
The changes i (we?) wish to see various forms of art go through are 'merely' the swapping of aesthetic representation, style, and content.

quote:

Originally posted by nefardec These emergent architectures are called many times "parametric" architectures, because they are basically complex computer-generated systems with human-specified variables/parameters that control the specifics of the design. It revolutionary in the sense that these methods change the way one creates, the entire design process, and the discussion is in the process and not necessarily the outcome, because everything is essentially laid out beforehand as an intelligent system (as opposed to a society needing to figure out how to inhabit some arbitrary creation from man with a large ego)

...which is all fine and dandy seeing as architecture (of homes and workplaces mainly) serves more purpose than to entertain; unlike music.

quote:

Originally posted by nefardec I think in the near future there will be emergent musical technology that subverts the age-old definition of music as a discrete and representative form and structure.

in the near future?

• the discrete boundary has been breached by medium of the dj (among others)
  
• the representative form was breached with sound being synthesized to create something new rather than to emulate the old, or even more clearly, with the addition of a randomize button on a synth
  
• the structure has been breached thoroughly by so-called classical musicians, as already discussed in this thread

1. cutting edge music does change "music", it's just the your likelyness of being aware of it is infinitely small
   
2. please show me how the structure is the same between two arbitrary songs: the one i happen to be listening to at the moment (Abercombie, Laverne, Mraz & Nussbaum - Monk Like) and Filo & Peri - The Anthem
   
3. A. nice touch comparing 2 subsubsubgenres that are all but entirely indistinguishable to the great public
   B. however, seeing as i'm not part of that great public, i can answer that making minimal techno is worlds apart from making filo & peri - the anthem, regardless of whether you're actually talking about minimal techno, or about that trendy new tech house (though with the former the distance is greater), if you'd like me to elaborate, i will
   
4. by the way you worded that paragraph it seems as though you posited minimal techno as "cutting edge", it is anything but.
   
5. "The sounds are simply an aesthetic"... "simply"? as if to say "insignificantly"? .....you're speaking about art... and you're reducing its aesthetic content to insignificance? are you an idiot?

quote:

Originally posted by nefardec ok, i'm going to go cry in a corner now, skip doesn't like me, and i've failed to prove myself as a worthy person in his eyes! did you ever think maybe people have better things to do? i don't even know you

i just think that you use bullshit arguments that don't have anything to do with the subject at hand. and yes, people have better things to do. i did for example when i didn't reply here for 4 or so days. anyway i just think it's weird that one doesn't back his arguments up in any way. and pretty much the only reason for such behavior that i can come up with, is that there aren't any explanations for using the big words and scientific terms that have nothing to do with the subject.
anyway i'm gonna give this up now unless you post something with even half sense in it.

@'psy-t' - do you feel better about yourself now?



it's kinda hard to open up a discussion with hostility like that. i mean, literally everything you posted was pretty much just posted in order to refute what weren't even arguments in the first place... does it make you feel important? and you even managed to throw in a few insults and condescending remarks too. good job.


honestly, where are you taking this and for what reason?

skip

please pm me if you honestly care that much

i don't think anyone else wants to read it

look, in hindsight, i probably should used different words to address this audience. i suppose i am rather flowery and imprecise when i write and i should have expected the topic to be hijacked on this account.


in hindsight i probably should not have even posted this here, given the types of people that tend to troll around here

this is something however i am interested in and delving into. if you think my ideas/statements have been crude - well, they are. i'm just making conjectures at this point. i'll make sure to keep them well away from TA in the future. when I have something interesting I'll post it and see if i can get 40 posts decrying my very existence again.

quote:

Originally posted by nefardec what i mean is such a revolution would mean that one produces music that is a direct result of the technology used to create it, and NOT to achieve some kind of 'effect' or 'atmosphere' or 'style. of course it would have to be a human initiative.

who would want to make music in that fashion other than the "dreaded capitalists"?

quote:

Originally posted by nefardec more or less what techno began as. techno however quickly became seen as a "fashion" or "style" when it was imported to europe, and people were more excited about things it evoked than how it was made.

techno was made by people who loved music using whatever gear they could find/afford, since most of that gear was crappy to begin with (at least in context to the sounds the musicians wanted to produce), they had to 'abuse' it and produce such things as the tb303 squelch. more likely than not, for the musicians, it was about what they made, not how they made it. hence not 'more or less what techno began as', and not at all similiar to the concept you suggested above.

for artists a method is just that, a method; not an aim. (generalization)

quote:

Originally posted by nefardec see what i mean is, you can take any sequencer and replace samples with a different set of samples or patches, and maybe change the tempo, and you can instantly transform it from an epic trance track to an electrohouse track. so what i am suggesting is maybe a return to a time where the process of making music is more closely related to its sound.

samples/patches = sounds

"see what i mean is, you can take any sequencer and replace sounds with a different set of sounds, and maybe change the tempo, and you can instantly transform it from an epic trance track to an electrohouse track. so what i am suggesting is maybe a return to a time where the process of making music is more closely related to its sound."

you are an idiot.

quote:

Originally posted by nefardec @'psy-t' - do you feel better about yourself now? it's kinda hard to open up a discussion with hostility like that. i mean, literally everything you posted was pretty much just posted in order to refute what weren't even arguments in the first place... does it make you feel important? and you even managed to throw in a few insults and condescending remarks too. good job. honestly, where are you taking this and for what reason?

first off, my reply is an interaction, something you should be happy to receive, as it helps you improve your theory, or discard it if you find the refutations convincing.
secondly, just because you say a statement isn't an argument doesn't make it so.
e.g. i say 1+1=3 and give it a disclaimer saying it is not an argument. you tell me that 1+1=3 is wrong. i reply "you're refuting something that isn't an argument". obviously, i would be right, yes?
and lastly, the hostility is there because you're devaluing the art of discourse, philosophy, and generally, art.


post scriptum (should have been pre scriptum, oh well): do you feel better about yourself now?

quote:

Originally posted by thoughtlessjex That kind of technology is actually supposed to be coming in the new Spore game. Brian Eno is supposed to be helping to design a process-based music generation program for the game that uses a few prerecorded segments to create music that evolves from the simple beginnings to the more complex ending. There are no songs in that soundtrack, there is just the soundtrack. I think it's pretty neat stuff, and has interesting repercussions for the EDM scene, I think.

http://www.mobygames.com/game/rez/

ok i'm out. have fun

thanks for the links

and i enjoyed your acid mix btw

quote:

Originally posted by tryan77 This is hilarious. You downgrades watch too many movies. Music is a God given gift for enjoyment. It will never and i repeat never move someone (when it is created by a robot) the same way it moves someone when it is created by a human. Why are you wasting your time? Common sense goes a long way. You all have it, use it

if that's the case i'm sure you could tell me which of these was made by a human and which by a machine, aswell as how you determined that.

http://psy-t.cyberia-archives.com/2.mp3
http://psy-t.cyberia-archives.com/3.mp3

quote:

Originally posted by skip seriously wtf are you on about? machines making music according to some parameters made by some human? what's the point in that? would anyone be willing to listen to the crap the machines would spew out? i seriously doubt it.

lol, the larger most of the music you probably listen to is made exactly like that. but go on doubting

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