Wiardgroup

Grant, 

I love your point about needing new names for music,
but have to add it is very hard to pin down
particularly with what most of us synth geeks make
anyways. 

In general: Anything that is electronic, that isn't
sandwiched between commercials on either radio or
video, and doesn't have a typical arrangement
(pop/top-40 intro,verse,chorus,bridge, chorus, chorus
blah blah blah) is "techno."

It says so in the dictionary... really

Okay, so it doesn't but most people don't understand
the eclectic nature, composition, and arrangement of
various electronic music (sadly)

Although, a comforting though it many look at a Van
Gogh or Picasso and think "Boy, that is *crap*", and
then run off to buy the newest issue of FHM, Maxim,
etc and look for true art. 

We are the few, and as with any other artists we are
almost universally misunderstood now. Only later
will/may things come full circle (once we are dead of
course). While it would be nice to have more fans of
my own music, I have more than some and there is a
certain satisfaction to sounding unlike anything
someone has heard before... even if it means the great
and powerful "*THEY*, Them, Those other popheads"
think it sounds like crap,

Fight on EM soldiers, fight on!

Back to my personal crap-music-fest,,,

Thomas

PS. Before possible flame war begins, yes I do also
understand there is a traditional side to melody and
structure, and song writing which is amazing, takes a
lifetime or longer to perfect and can never be
replaced. But this is also the point that most/some
(at least) electronic music is meant to be flipping a
major bird in that direction. I have great respect for
traditional music... it would just be nice sometimes
is respect would automatically be a two-way street.
But, it isn't so we call it "art" and hope to be
misunderstood, if even by a few... evcen if it is,
after all, just noise




--- Grant Richter <grichter@asapnet.net> wrote:

> You know I have been thinking for a long time now,
> that calling it "electronic music" has 
> really been a one ton anchor around the neck of
> electronic sound.
> 
> That isn't to say you can't make "music" by
> electronic methods, but those methods open a 
> whole new range of possibilities, that we have no
> category for. So they have been forced 
> into the category of "music". And fit is often
> uncomfortable.
> 
> In one sense, I feel this is unfair to music.
> Perhaps we think of music as a container that 
> can stretch infinitely. But the question arises,
> "Should we expect music to absorb ever 
> sonic possibility of the human mind forever". Could
> this possibly be destructive to music 
> itself?
> 
> Secondly, when you call it music, you force upon it
> centuries of tradition. You create an 
> expectation in the listener that is an automatic
> limit on what the artist can present. And 
> you exclude those who love sound, but are untrained
> in the traditions of music.
> 
> Third, supposing we have a very capable electronic
> sound source. Perhaps only 10% of the 
> possible tonalities it can generate fit within our
> traditional description of "musical". What 
> about the other 90%, just throw them away? I have
> heard some very evocative sounds form 
> electronic sources, rich and interesting, but in no
> way could I call them musical.
> 
> As Gary Chang pointed out to me, virtually all
> "music" is associated with some ritual. 
> Weddings, funerals, graduations, coronations,
> arrival of dignitaries, mating rituals are 
> VERY big. But so called electronic "music" has no
> associated ritual. So in the past, they 
> tried to fit it into some existing ritual, without
> much success.
> 
> We need terms like "sound sculpture", "electronic
> tonality", "tone poem", "noise poem", 
> "sonic attack", "tonal protest", "anti-music",
> "music for other species", "dadaist sound 
> montage", "surrealist vibration collage", "invisible
> object", "atmospheric disturbance", 
> "aural archeology" or whatever. These need to be
> accepted as legitimate artistic 
> expressions. Until then, the potential of electronic
> sound will remain largely unheard.
> 
> This assumes we are still on the ascending side of
> civilization, where the refinement of 
> distinction in thought is relevant. If not, then the
> first one to grab the biggest rock wins!
> 
> 


Thomas White
  Natural Rhythm
www.naturalrhythmmusic.com