Why does this always have to happen?
- Thread starter baboon2004
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baboon2004 said:Yeh, Appleblim, good point
Maybe it's just that I hear too many comments about wanting to learn real instruments, with not too many the other way ie not too many indie bands (any more at least) thinking about incorporating elements of grime/garage into their music (though I suppose the Junior Boys could be interpreted that way??).
but then he is talking about what's going on, a sprawling, symphony with full orchestra etc, not stiff little fingers.
thats a whole lot more interesting than some indie band. On the whole i'm shocked at the electric guitars' longevity, it's generally a pretty boring sounding instrument and the usual 4 man set up is really uninspiring , i can count on 2 hands the number of current bands i have any interest in or who are doing anything exciting with it.
hint
party record with a siren
mms said:
sure... but, be honest... how many grime producers would you say the same thing about? I mean people who regularly, currently, are doing something exciting with any kind of consistency? must be close to 2 hands' worth, right?
sure - there's a few strong moment-of-genius one-off grime 12"s out there... are you judging guitar bands by the same criteria - i.e. if they've done one single track you like, do you count them as an exciting band?
I'm inspired every day by music made with electric guitars.
but the grime producer to rock band ratio is about 1/100,000 so there should be some good stuff out there, i was being kind when i said 2 hands as well come to think of it.
Just a matter of opinion i guess, i got very bored of guitars a long time ago and it takes quite alot to make me excited about them
Just a matter of opinion i guess, i got very bored of guitars a long time ago and it takes quite alot to make me excited about them
redcrescent
Well-known member
A different take on how "conventional" music influences are already infiltrating grime...
Here's an excerpt from a 2003 Hyperdub interview with Wiley.
- Why do you use sounds that no one else would use?
Exactly, exactly: sounds people would think that're weak, or that's anything. But I just hear things. I play it and it just forms together innit. It's like a gift you know that? When I sit down I don't copy nothing, as such. I don't try and base my music around anything. Ideas just come in my head and I play them.
- There's a big Oriental feeling to them…
I used to watch a lot of Kung Fu films. I just like the idea of the Oriental thing. I started that idea, then I stopped it and then went back to it. It just something I like. I like Chinese music. I like Greek music. I've been buying loads of kinds of music: Greek, Chinese, African. I just went to some place called Sterns? It sells world music and I bought loads of stuff there. I'll take it back and sometimes I'll sample it, sometimes loop it, or take parts and put them in different places. I do all different bits to try and get the finished thing.
- That's strange to hear you're sampling because a lot of your tunes have sounded distinctive and related because the strings seem to come from a similar source or module…
I like orchestras innit. I listen to a lot of that. If I flick through a module and hear anything orchestral I might go in that direction. Though on another day I might go in another Oriental direction. I go in different directions every time I start.
Here's an excerpt from a 2003 Hyperdub interview with Wiley.
- Why do you use sounds that no one else would use?
Exactly, exactly: sounds people would think that're weak, or that's anything. But I just hear things. I play it and it just forms together innit. It's like a gift you know that? When I sit down I don't copy nothing, as such. I don't try and base my music around anything. Ideas just come in my head and I play them.
- There's a big Oriental feeling to them…
I used to watch a lot of Kung Fu films. I just like the idea of the Oriental thing. I started that idea, then I stopped it and then went back to it. It just something I like. I like Chinese music. I like Greek music. I've been buying loads of kinds of music: Greek, Chinese, African. I just went to some place called Sterns? It sells world music and I bought loads of stuff there. I'll take it back and sometimes I'll sample it, sometimes loop it, or take parts and put them in different places. I do all different bits to try and get the finished thing.
- That's strange to hear you're sampling because a lot of your tunes have sounded distinctive and related because the strings seem to come from a similar source or module…
I like orchestras innit. I listen to a lot of that. If I flick through a module and hear anything orchestral I might go in that direction. Though on another day I might go in another Oriental direction. I go in different directions every time I start.
redcrescent
Well-known member
...just hope that, whatever he does, Dizzee doesn't end up doing a N*E*R*D by putting out something as disgraceful as Fly or Die just to prove that he's not only a cutting edge producer, but that he can also sound like a three-month old indie band using (watch me!) real instruments...
I'm not worried.
I'm not worried.
B
be.jazz
Guest
And let's hope he doesn't learn how to sing! In-tuness would only have made "Dream" worse.
baboon2004
Darned cockwombles.
As long as Dizzee doesn't end up collaborating with Snow Patrol or Paul Weller, I think it's all going to be OK.
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New Roll Deep members for 2005?:
LRJP! said:
Unlikely, and that's the point, isn't it? No matter how tight a drummer you are, a programmed drum track just sounds different to a live one. Whether you like that sound or not often lies at the heart of debates like this (plus the challenges to personal philosophies and prejudices that programmed/live instruments represent). To take an example pertinent to the thread, my favourite bits by far of Reprazent's New Forms are when the progrmmed drums kick in, over the live stuff. Everything locks down, hard, and the sound has a particular feel that you simply cannot achieve with live instruments; it's not just a question of a production shortcut, but choosing the sound and feel that comes closest to what you want to hear. If Dizzee wants to bring in live instruments, that's fine by me (on his own he's a great live act), but his sound will inevitably change - radically. 'I Luv U' with a session band would be horrible, for example.
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be.jazz
Guest
I agree with you, Rambler, but alongside that there's an interesting dynamic developing, especially amongst drummers, where they are influenced by machines (along with actually using them themselves).
dubplatestyle
Well-known member
examples of artists who incorporated "real instruments" while keeping it street/hardcore/modernist/"for the floor": timbaland, the bomb squad, ced gee, marley marl, mannie fresh, the neptunes, swizz beatz, organized noize, dr. dre, red spyda, oh like every great rap producer ever (who isn't an essentialist premier-style sample chopper), any number of house producers, arguably roni size...*
it IS possible. it's just that most of these producers don't/didn't draw attention to it. or, even when they did ("i see myself working with a symphony orchestra one day", gawd just shut up already you meglomaniac), they never got around to it because they knew which side their bread was buttered on. (one of the benefits of rap's hyper-capitalist rate-of-turnover is that it doesn't allow trackmasters to indulge their [cough] "creative" side if they wanna stay paid. the fact that he purposefully turned his back on jungle's populist core at a key moment is what allowed goldie to make "mother". this is likely why, if it ever materializes at all, the new dr. dre album will be god-fucking-awful.)
can you imagine, for a less rock-centric analogy for a moment, having to listen to a solo timbaland go through a lovesexy-through-musicology style two decade slough?
(and, yeah, live drums do sound different than the programmed kind, but anyone who doubts you can do similar things with a live kit should listen to the otherwise pretty boring jay-z unplugged, where ?uestlove imitates timbaland drum patterns beat for beat. the problem is that live drummers rarely *think* like drum programmers when they sit down to play. [see also all rock band takes on the "drum & bass beat".) [would they have go through some sort of derek bailey-style unlearning process before they could sit down blind and bash out a "niogga what, nigga who"?])
* it should go without saying that all these producers are represented here at their respective peaks, ha ha.
it IS possible. it's just that most of these producers don't/didn't draw attention to it. or, even when they did ("i see myself working with a symphony orchestra one day", gawd just shut up already you meglomaniac), they never got around to it because they knew which side their bread was buttered on. (one of the benefits of rap's hyper-capitalist rate-of-turnover is that it doesn't allow trackmasters to indulge their [cough] "creative" side if they wanna stay paid. the fact that he purposefully turned his back on jungle's populist core at a key moment is what allowed goldie to make "mother". this is likely why, if it ever materializes at all, the new dr. dre album will be god-fucking-awful.)
can you imagine, for a less rock-centric analogy for a moment, having to listen to a solo timbaland go through a lovesexy-through-musicology style two decade slough?
(and, yeah, live drums do sound different than the programmed kind, but anyone who doubts you can do similar things with a live kit should listen to the otherwise pretty boring jay-z unplugged, where ?uestlove imitates timbaland drum patterns beat for beat. the problem is that live drummers rarely *think* like drum programmers when they sit down to play. [see also all rock band takes on the "drum & bass beat".) [would they have go through some sort of derek bailey-style unlearning process before they could sit down blind and bash out a "niogga what, nigga who"?])
* it should go without saying that all these producers are represented here at their respective peaks, ha ha.
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be.jazz
Guest
Yeah, ?uest is like the grandfather of the cybernetic drummer, no?dubplatestyle said:
echo-friendly
Banned
dubplatestyle said:
i thought roni size was jungle's sellout guy ... anyway, "street/hardcore/modernist/for the floor" cannot be defined by use of a certain kind of sound. it should be seen as reacting to other/previous music and it's (perceived) audience. it is the music that consciously tries to differenciate itself from music understood to be associated with undesirable social groups. at the same time it defines a social groups (of listeners).
of course such differentiation can and has often been done via sounds. but that is not the only way. in pop music, this differentiation process tend to be on three dimensions (1) rhythm (but always within the 4/4 grid) (2) sound (3) lyrics. other axes exist but are never touched in pop's orbit. The last couple of years have seen sophisticated music production technology being commoditiesed and one of the effects of that was to obsolete the distinction between "real" and "synthetic" sounds. timbaland for example has pushed various sound -- synthetic and real -- but they tend to have been novel, i.e. not coded up as belonging to social groups the hiphop and RnB scenes try to differentiate themselves from. this is one of the reasons for timba's continuing acceptance as as cutting edge producer.
hint
party record with a siren
I think you'll find there is far more manipulation / use of "machine" techniques going on in rock music than you might assume. I'm talking about quantisation of live recordings, replacing individual hits with samples... that kind of thing. It's widespread practice in "modern" rock production.
saying that you can't replicate programmed beats on a drum kit is missing the point. you can perhaps replicate the rhythm but not the sound, mainly because so many programmed beats are made up of sounds which cannot be made with a traditional drumkit. of course, if someone sat down at a kit and played the rhythm from "I luv U", it wouldn't sound the same, but that's got nothing to do with the fact that it's being played by a human being in real time. it's because the sound palette is so far removed from sticks, skins, air and drum shells. you could use the techniques I talk about above and replace each hit with the samples used by dizzee and you would then have the same beat. the lines are blurry.
you just have to listen to the original "amen brother" to hear that there's not so much difference between machine-made rhythms and live rhythms as far as physical boundaries go - i.e. placement of beats in a bar, syncopation, swing and dynamics. but saying that programmed drumming is better or worse than live drumming is like saying electric guitar is better or worse than acoustic guitar... the quality of the music and the nature of the final sound in the song is dependent on the musician and / or producer.
saying that you can't replicate programmed beats on a drum kit is missing the point. you can perhaps replicate the rhythm but not the sound, mainly because so many programmed beats are made up of sounds which cannot be made with a traditional drumkit. of course, if someone sat down at a kit and played the rhythm from "I luv U", it wouldn't sound the same, but that's got nothing to do with the fact that it's being played by a human being in real time. it's because the sound palette is so far removed from sticks, skins, air and drum shells. you could use the techniques I talk about above and replace each hit with the samples used by dizzee and you would then have the same beat. the lines are blurry.
you just have to listen to the original "amen brother" to hear that there's not so much difference between machine-made rhythms and live rhythms as far as physical boundaries go - i.e. placement of beats in a bar, syncopation, swing and dynamics. but saying that programmed drumming is better or worse than live drumming is like saying electric guitar is better or worse than acoustic guitar... the quality of the music and the nature of the final sound in the song is dependent on the musician and / or producer.
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real instruments in 'street' music - isn't it a reversal of the trend away from live instrumentation in disco productions in the late seventies? Once the major labels stopped paying for huge bands & recording studios. Producers grudgingly turned to electronic instruments for their sounds - these sounds arguably influenced electro & hip hop & then house & techno and therefore were in some way the source of today's electronic street beats. Once the artists get big enough to command record company cash they turn back to live instruments, cos they can
hint said:
Which begs the question of course - why would you? There's certainly something culturally different between having a live drummer or a programmed one, but if we're just talking about the quality of sound, why spend time and money getting a drummer to exactly replicate a beat you've already got on your sequencer?
That said, I take most of your points - and it's certainly true that we shouldn't ignore the amount of production work that goes on most 'live' drum tracks these days. I'm still not convinced though that live drums are the same as programmed - particularly genuinely live, on a stage. A human drummer is unavoidably going to nuance his/her playing to the music at each moment - a programmed drum sequence isn't, and that lies at the root of the different effects they have, even when, as you say, the looped break comes from a live source. Within 4 beats, 'Amen' is slightly loose against a strict beat, but when it's looped, every first beat locks down precisely - that tension between swing and metronomic precision is part of what makes breakbeat in general so effective. For the record, I love me programmed drums as well as live ones, but I just don't see that they are interchangeable - or even why you'd want to if you could.
hint
party record with a siren
Rambler said:
yeah - I agree rambler. I think perhaps this thread has meandered a bit!
I was talking about the writing process - i.e. the fact that dizzee rascal might take up drums won't mean his rhythms will be any less interesting. it's the sounds that will change, but that doesn't necessarily mean they will be inappropriate. writing with a drum kit and writing with a programmed beat aren't so far removed from each other really.
of course, when looping recorded breaks or chopping and re-arranging them you start getting results that are impossible to perform live. things like cymbal hits being chopped and shifted around so they cut in and out in an unnatural fashion. that's a big part of that early drum and bass sound that people cream themselves over - the abrupt gaps caused by individual hits being prematurely trimmed become as much a part of the rhythm as the beats themselves... the very essence of syncopation.