Archive of the former Yahoo!Groups mailing list: The Mellotron Group

So who likes Peter Gabriel? Anyone want to comment?

Frank

 

Hi y'all,

 

I'm very happy to see that my posting sparked such a great discussion!

SOme of what I said where in jest...like Ecstasy being a bad drug for music making...some where not...I still want to see a musical instrument being played, whatever it is, even a single tambourine,  rather than watch someone playing records with one note beat...it's not just the mechanical act of it...it's the lack of harmony and the one note beat that bothers me...besides it doesn't move me a bit...I just can't relate to DJ's...sorry...besides nothing to do with the Tron, which a a note reproduction system in most cases, not full songs...

as for the downloading..well, anyone who's ever been to a music store knew what a great experience it could be...browsing all the different rows...discovering new bands and maybe interacting with the buyers (I made quite a few friend in record stores)  etc, when I lived in London I'd listen to John Peel and other DJs (quite different eh?) and then on the next day go to Virgin, HMV, Portobello Road etc in search of the records.....now that they are gone...what do you do? Just download something for free (nothing against it) and then delete? (Totally against it, if you know what I mean) In that case music has no value, it's just a disposable thing... I still have hundreds of my vinyls because I had to work hard to get them...

I'll stop here...I have a PhD to finish...great to be part of this group...

 

best,

 

Roberto

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To:newmellotrongroup@yahoogroups.com
From: mike.dickson@gmail.com
Date: Mon, 28 May 2012 13:37:49 +0100
Subject: Re: [newmellotrongroup] Re: Peter Gabriel - So what?

 

 

Chris makes a few good points but a few downright weird ones too.

 

I would agree that a musician is someone who 'makes music'. I wouldn't say that he necessarily'crafts' it, though.  That's the composer's job.  I think there are probably more musicians out there who play what they are told (or what they expect, in the case of any number of bar bands I've witnessed) than people who are actually engaged in creating music from nothing other than ideas and influences. 

 

Perhaps a DJ can be a composer, but to say 'but often times they aren't' is a little like saying a good composer (say, Bruckner) was sometimes great but often he wasn't.  (Anyone doubting this should read the story about Anton and his 'zeroth' symphony) I wasn't trying to refer to the sort of DJ who just plays records, but to the DJ who tries to do something creative with the sound he is playing.  There probably ought to be a term for this type of person, to differentiate. Maybe there is. I dunno.

 

However, the humdinger is that DJ music 'lacks credibility'.  Chris - who hands out the Credibility Tokens in your neck of the woods?  The Credibility Cops?  When does music 'become credible'?  Do they have some sort of certificate to show this?  Maybe a party of some kind.  What is it that makes music 'credible'?  

 

• Is it music?  Yes it is.  
• Do people like it (as if that even matters) Yes they do.

 

That's kind of the end of the argument, unless you want to argue'what is music?' and I am afraid I will have you completely cornered on that one, and the answer is butone word long. Maybe you are trying to say 'is it credible to me and people like me?', in which case you are making an argument of taste,and that's no argument at all. (If that is an argument then I am afraid that most of theSacred Bovines round here aren't credible either as I cannot stand them)  

 

You say that credibility is associated with 'physical innovation'.  I'm not entirely sure what that entails, but innovation is certainly a pretty shaky nail upon which to hang any musical argument. Show me 'innovation' and I'll show you plagarism and what is charitably called influence, and I don't mean in the last ten years.  If you don't believe me then have a look atthis video and tell me what you make of it.  (Good film series, incidentally)

 

Sampling without consent is unethical maybe.  And I mean maybe.  Brian Wilson was a bit bent out of shape when he found out that Air had sampled the snare drum from 'Do It Again' on 'Remember', until it was pointed out to him that (1) it's a pretty good tribute to him and anyway (2) it might mean he's going to sell a few records when Air say where the drum samples came from.  In that case, the sound was the innovation (and a great one too) and Air made Fair Use of it.  If they tried what is known as 'passing off' then it might be 'unethical', but fortunately they didn't.  Hell, I released a tune which has CLEARLY got a huge sample of a very famous tune indeed in it.  It's so obvious that 'passing off' isn't even an option. (Incidentally, I don't think the Mona Lisa is Leonardo's greatest - he has done some far superior work, but that's another argument)  Sampling is a broad argument.  Try readingRemix by Lawrence Lessig.  It's a better explanation of everything. (Tangentially,this book is also a great read and is close to unbelievable.  At what point did someone say'hang on....')

 

You do go on to say that it isn't 'morally right'.  Oooh. That's a personal itch of mine.  Don't confuse ethics and morals.  The two arenot equivalent.

 

Marketing and selling has always been a science, Chris.  Don't kid yourself otherwise.  Stockholders existed in the 1970s, same as now, same as always.  The music 'industry' (a term I hate) cannot sell anyone anything they don't actually want.  They might however oversell it, but that's their problem.  More worrying to me is the way everything ties together commercially, where the song, the burger gift, the film, the tee shirt and the computer game are all part of the same 'immersive experience'.

 

I am dying to hear how 'dragons and fairies' take you out of the Matrix, though.  That angle has been sold to death since JRR put pen to paper and engendered an entire division of depressing guff about..well...dragons and fairies.  And Peter Jackson's film is about as 'corporate' a tie-in film as you can hope to imagine.  Are you picking your bovines with enough care? :-)

 

Mike

 

On 28 May 2012 12:11, Chris Dale <unobtainiumkeys@gmail.com> wrote:

 

 

I think a musician is someone who 'intends to make sound and craft' music.

 

As far as the attention span goes - yes people seem to be getting 'dumber' these days and failing education systems where music and reading have been cut back are partly to blame. There's no question about that.

 

I agree that a DJ 'can' be a musician and composer, but often times they aren't.  I don't think DJ music as a genre has been explored fully and because of that it lacks credibility alongside historic genres of music.

 

We all know of some great technical guitarists, but there are very few proficient or innovative DJ's.

Most are just playing back two records at a time, and re-mixing. That is something that anyone can learn to do.

The difference is there is a world of musical technique involved in physically playing an instrument, and so far there is a real lack of manufactured dynamic turntables that respond the same way a guitar, piano, etc. do .

 

So I personally don't attach the same amount of musical credibility to DJ's partly because we don't see too much physical innovation there. But I do welcome it and can see it happening in the future. 

 

 

As far as sampling goes - the idea of sampling someone else's art without their consent is unethical to me.

 

If I took a piece of the Mona Lisa and put it into my own painting, I wouldn't think I would be that great or inspiring. It would suggest I'm at worst a thief, and at best, someone who needs to rely on the work of others because I can't come up with something better or original. If I painted Leonardo DaVinci painting the Mona Lisa - well that might be interesting.

 

To me Mellotrons and their ilk are different from contemporary sample use because the performers knew and intended the recordings they made would be used in the creation of other music.  Sampling someone else's work or even re-mastering it or altering it after they've died is an artistic rape because it's not in keeping with what the original artists intended.

 

For example, the Isley Brothers, Kraftwerk, etc.etc. didn't consent to having their music sampled and just because it's a common practice, that doesn't make it morally right. 

 

 

 

As far as album credits go, they go from both outright lies to total truth.

You will never have me believe someone like Justin Timberlake (who can't play an instrument) can compose and arrange a  movie soundtrack. I don't care what the movie credits say. That's where politics and back scratching are an influence.

 

The music industry as a whole is completely different than what it was in the 1970's. Marketing and selling is now a science. 

 

In the mid 70's smaller music labels were bought up and absorbed by bigger music labels.

This happened again on a big scale in the 80's when Warner took over Time / Life and Seagrams Liquor bought up most of the major record labels. And it happened again in the 90's and again in the  early 2000's.

 

Today music is completely corporate, and the multinational companies that own the music industry are not interested in selling music with ideas about dragons and fairies, or brewing your own beer, saving your money, meditation, or anything that takes you out of the 'Matrix" so to speak.

 

The simple reason why is that they can't make big money from it.

 

 

They are interested in selling ideologies related to consumerism of products like tobacco, alcohol, and fashion, and also a group-think homogenized mentality where everyone should largely react or think the same way in the world.

Politically, you would do this by removing  or censoring diversity of expression on multiple levels.

 

As record company owners or controllers - they don't want to foster talent and individualism. They would rather have a universe of talentless 'idols' where there is a collective lemming mentality, easily to manipulate contractually, and favouring style similarity over diversity. Why?  Because once you create something unique or diverse, you must be willing to defend it and promote it on your own - requiring a much more costly noble and valiant quest.

 

Record labels don't want to have to fight with individualistic creative artists. The idea of the tradional guitar hero or keyboard hero is not really encouraged.

 

It's in their best interest to sell and promote a 'mass mentality' where they can push products on to a receptive audience, and make money for their businesses and stockholders. So we really can't compare the time of the 70's and back with now.

 

 

This is the reason for the all the observations here.

 

 

If you want to control a country and it's people you must make them subservient to a belief system.

 

You homogenize values through TV, music and magazines so that eventually they all think the same.

And then you've replaced the individualism of invention, innovation, etc. with a dumbed down - go along to get along - collectivism.

 

 

Plato said it himself -

 

“Musical innovation is full of danger to the State, for when modes of music change, the laws of the State always change with them.”  

“Those who tell the stories rule society.”

    

 

 

 

 

 

   

On Sat, May 26, 2012 at 11:55 PM, Mike Dickson <mike.dickson@gmail.com> wrote:

 

 

 

 

1. Digital life made musicians almost obsolete.

 

• What's a 'musician'?  
• Why is someone who puts together music digitally less of a musician than anyone else?
• If '[a]ny moron can "play, record and post it in the web"' then doesn't that fly in the face of the point entirely?  Far from'[making] musicians almost obsolete' doesn't that increase the number of musicians there are out there?
• Are you confusing 'musicianship' with 'personal taste'?

2. Ecstasy is not a good drug for music. People get so stupid that they see a DJ as musician!!!

 

• Why is it 'not a good drug for music'?  Says who?  What about the myriad people who take it every weekend and get off on it and the music?  Are you perhaps (again) confusing what is'good' with 'what you personally like'?
• Why can a DJ not be a musician?  
• In fact, given the definition of the word, why is a DJ not viewed as acomposer?

 

3. People are so anxious and neurotic that they can't  'listen'to anything without pressing the FWD key to the next song.

 

• Maybe.  I suspect attention spans are getting shorter because music (among other things) is so easy to get your hands on now that it's a disposable commodity.  But has it evernot been?  Who says it has to be anything but?
• Maybe the music lends itself to the whole ideal.  Do you have to be'anxious and neurotic' for that to be true?  Are you seeing a stereotype where none exists?

4. "Total lack of identification with the band. Digital made bands/record covers/credits useless...nobody knows who's playing and nobody cares.."

 

• To come out with an absurdly sweeping statement like'digital made bands/record covers/credits useless' requires some form of evidence.  
• To say 'nobody knows who's playing and nobody cares' is plainly flat-outwrong.  If anything, the speed at which music (digitally played and recorded or otherwise) can be put together and uploaded to the web so a musician is indirect contact with his or her audience is such that it cuts out the middle man entirely.  Who needs a publication deal when you can publish it yourself?  Why is it that a musician speaking directly to his audience (or market) is a bad thing?  Do you think record labels and music publication deals are a necessary thing?

You sign off with'All in all...nobody cares for music at all I'd say'.  How do you know?

 

Mike

 

On 26 May 2012 15:06, Fritz Doddy <fdoddy@aol.com> wrote:

 

 

I agree with point #3, but vehemently disagree with 1,2 and 4

Sorry for the brevity as I am replying from a remote region of iPhonekstan.

 

fritzdoddy

On May 26, 2012, at 8:38 AM, R l <bluesrock77@hotmail.com> wrote:

 

 

Hi Chris,

 

I totally agree. So much so that I said I'd rather visit the Pompeii arena empty and feel the vibes of a bygone concert by the Floyd than see the band nowadays (last 30 years). 

As for why this is happening, there are many possibilities of course, my theory.

 

1. Digital life made musicians almost obsolete. ANy moron can "play, record and post it in the web". Just like picture taking.

2. Ecstasy is not a good drug for music. People get so stupid that they see a DJ as musician!!! Bloody hell...

3. People are so anxious and neurotic that they can't  'listen'to anything without pressing the FWD key to the next song...3000 songs in the Ipod and most never listen till the end...

4. Total lack of identification with the band. Digital made bands/record covers/credits useless...nobody knows who's playing and nobody cares...

 

All in all...nobody cares for music at all I'd say...Saaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaad: but true!

 

best,

 

Roberto

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To:newmellotrongroup@yahoogroups.com
From: unobtainiumkeys@gmail.com
Date: Sat, 26 May 2012 02:53:12 -0400
Subject: Re: [newmellotrongroup]hris,

 

 Re: Peter Gabriel - So what?