[PD] "computer music" WAS: Re: Pd at a livecoding event on the BBC

Derek Holzer derek at umatic.nl
Thu Sep 3 11:17:23 CEST 2009


So let's see, it was 1996, and Bob's making noises like Jungle, 
Drum&Bass or some other megatrend crowdpleaser just arrived to save him 
from the avant-hegemony of the elbow patch professor crowd's software 
diddlings. About the same time, Paul Miller aka DJ Spooky was lamenting 
how jazz has been run off the rails by the (subtextually white) 
"downtown squeaky music scene" in New York (I might argue that something 
called the 1980's killed it already...who actually listens to the last 
couple drum machine- and sampler-plagued Miles Davis records? Bob O?). 
The "high culture" vs "low culture" thing was very big that decade if I 
remember correctly...

But I will have to go with Yves on this one. Any time something 
fossilizes into a genre it's all downhill from there. Keep your 
references clear, quantize to grid, don't step out of line. Bob's 
article only seems to go after one of them, but the academic computer 
music scene and the club music scene(s) both share the distinction of 
being some of the most conservative places I've ever visited.

Trying to think of a few releases that do it for me, that don't go for 
the quantized clubstep grid or the usual academic Fast Fourier Tropes, 
use computers and related technologies in a refreshing way and sound 
really visceral and alive, off the top of my head I'd say:

Kevin Drumm - Sheer Hellish Miasma reissue [2007 Editions Mego]
John Wiese - Bubble Pulse [2003 Kissy Records]
Anthony Pateras & Robin Fox - End of Daze [2009 Editions Mego]
O.S.T. - Waetka [2008 Ideal]
Hecker - Acid in the Style of David Tudor [2009 Editions Mego]

(No I'm not anywhere near being banked by Mego, these just happened all 
to be sitting near the top of the pile due to repeated 
listening...although finding much "computer music" at all around my 
house is a bit of a challenge!)

D.

Greg Pond wrote:
> don't know if any of you have read Ostertag's " Why Computer Music
> Sucks" but here is the link
> 
> http://bobostertag.com/writings-articles-computer-music-sucks.htm
> 
> (this link does not necessarily represent the views or opinions of the sender)


-- 
::: derek holzer ::: http://blog.myspace.com/macumbista ::: 
http://www.vimeo.com/macumbista :::
---Oblique Strategy # 157:
"Think
- inside the work
- outside the work"




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