Reynolds hardcore continuum event

[padraig (u.s.)]

props to ory, chris (except, no offense, for that bit about "music majors" - I understand what you meant & find that kinda mentality to be immensely aggravating but you can't just lump 'em all in together), evergreen & of course blissblogger himself for saying it better than I could.

Personally I take a more formal approach to the idea of "innovation" in music. If others don't, that's obviously fine, and their prerogative. I just don't agree with thm.

fair play then. so long as there's not the added implication that your "more formal approach" is somehow a better or more worthy one. not that you're making that implication, just tbc.

If anything the thing that makes it stand out is its use of technological innovation to overcome the limitations of the human voice, i.e. when it speeds up vocal samples to a frequency/pitch that most people can't sing.

to make one "technical" point this is also true of the drums. that's what I was driving at about the breakbeast - not the increase in tempo but the simultaneous & far more important imo increase in complexity behind anything that could possibly be replicated by even the most skillful of human drummers. & not just total Amen rinseouts like Remarc & Bizzy B made, also dudes like Photek & Source Direct with their intricately layered, absurdly complex & detailed layers of drums. this could also be fairly chalked up to technology but 1) the junglists (including Alec Empire & his cohorts as junglists) were still the guys to pioneer it (all the mashed up drill n bass IDM business came in later, specifically in response to jungle) & 2) more generally to your point about technology I think that producers finding ways to use the available technology in ways it wasn't originally intended are the definition of "innovation" - if you want to differentiate we can perhaps call them innovations in sound engineering or whatever rather than innovations in "music".

 

[empty mirror]

ha i just read k-punk's piece in fact mag; the pic of zomby is not him but an e-friend of mine (ordo) from a fashion forum --- i remember seeing that pic in a pitchfork review --- reaction on the board was wtf is ordo really zomby? ha

zomby just appropriated ordo's image

 

[Chris]

*unrelated to larger issue, everyone but padraig and nomad ignore*

nomad, sorry, I didn't mean the thing about music majors as a dig at you. I thought you were probably a science major or something. I like formal music theory too, know it inside and out, and also have perfect pitch (my whole family does). I'm one of those bastards that can hear a song the first time, pick up a familiar instrument, and play the song perfectly, first take, without having to look for the first note or chord. Which has made me less reliant on formal music theory (not to be confused with music theorie(s), if you get me), esp a definitive approach to it, and let me consider other aspects. Judging music from a purely formal view, would, to me, be like studying a book by only analyzing the grammar while not going near anything to do with the story. That's wanky and open-ended of course, but that's the point. There's so much more going on on other levels I think.

you're right of course, padraig, I was being a bit unfair about music majors, but I speak as a former one myself. Seriously though, their cred goes from 0 to the negative when you see their Andrea Bocelli cds, right after they wrote off Techno or Hip Hop because it couldn't be bracketed into some rigid formality or footnoted to some dry text. Intellectuals of that mentality are worse than dumb people, they're unimaginative, unintuitive people. Why they even go near something like music makes no sense. The recording/engineering students had taste and good ideas though.

 

[mms]

well there is clearly alot that makes drum and bass different from yr average western music, ie it's rhythmic not melodic, it's atonal, not to mention that a piece of written music is, at it's simplest level, written down for reproduction by a group of musicians, which is something you'd be hard pressed to do with a remarc track, not would you want to really, as the music is not about human performance, it's alien to that empirical practice. Also it's all 4/4 it just seems like its not which is a feat in itself. There is really little point in transcribing a piece of jungle, i dont know what that's really meant to prove.

 

[subvert47]

well there is clearly alot that makes drum and bass different from yr average western music, ie it's rhythmic not melodic, it's atonal, not to mention that a piece of written music is in it's at it's simplest level, written down for reproduction by a group of musicians, which is something you'd be hard pressed to do with a remarc track. Also it's all 4/4

mostly 4/4
there's a bit of stuff in other time signatures

 

[mms]

mostly 4/4
there's a bit of stuff in other time signatures

yeah of course, rule of thumb though, and rip too

 

[Tentative Andy]

to make one "technical" point this is also true of the drums. that's what I was driving at about the breakbeast - not the increase in tempo but the simultaneous & far more important imo increase in complexity behind anything that could possibly be replicated by even the most skillful of human drummers. & not just total Amen rinseouts like Remarc & Bizzy B made, also dudes like Photek & Source Direct with their intricately layered, absurdly complex & detailed layers of drums. this could also be fairly chalked up to technology but 1) the junglists (including Alec Empire & his cohorts as junglists) were still the guys to pioneer it (all the mashed up drill n bass IDM business came in later, specifically in response to jungle) & 2) more generally to your point about technology I think that producers finding ways to use the available technology in ways it wasn't originally intended are the definition of "innovation" - if you want to differentiate we can perhaps call them innovations in sound engineering or whatever rather than innovations in "music".

Excellent points. Of course, she most likely won't be here to read them now...

 

[Tactics]

as Sick Boy said...

ain't the nuum a European thing?

 

[mms]

ain't the nuum a European thing?

Think you might be thinking of bedet's?

 

[mistersloane]

bedet's?

That's a much better name for it than w*nky.

 

[craner]

Tony Colston Hayter.

This clip great on many levels!

"As far as these untruths go...as for biting the heads off pigeons...I mean, how do you catch the pigeons?"

I love the careful stepping around the big E-lephant in the room, too.

I respect TCH, as it goes.

 

[craner]

Never seen this until tonight. Fantastic footage, great interviews.

 

[craner]

Final reel of Part 3 is hilarious.

 

[swears]

Never seen this until tonight. Fantastic footage, great interviews.

"Is Jungle sort of like Ragga and Rave? Yeah!"

 

[craner]

She says, as the film eases into Bukem's 'Atlantis'. What's great about this film is that it catches the thing before it was ever codified, calcified. A really beautiful, rare moment. A couple of years before, this music was something else entirely. It defies belief now, how fast it moved, with things having now been so stagnant for so long.

And then 2-step came along, and it was like winning the lottery for a second time.

 

[craner]

Kenny Ken is the MAN in this film, btw. So wise and handsome and dignified.

 

[elgato]

that was so good, thanks for the link. inspiring and beautiful

 

[elgato]

i can't stop watching that bit when Atlantis comes in, that vocal is just too much

 

[psherburne]

re: the jungle "transcription," congratulations, you've written the dead-tree equivalent of a MIDI file. and so?

you say "-i actually like the production values quite a bit-" -- if that were really true, wouldn't you realize that "production values" ARE *musical* qualities in and of themselves, that formal innovations aren't restricted to tuning or tempo or time signature, for crying out loud. when the harpsichord eventually morphed into the pianoforte, did formal innovations not accompany the shift from plucked string instrument to mallet instrument? of course they did. the same thing happens in "electronic" music when core musical values are adapted to new technologies and techniques. you claim to be interested in new systems of tonality, as an example of TRUE innovation. surely then you should concede that there's no way your notation system there could capture the timbres of that jungle track, at least not in a way that it could be reasonably reproduced.

also, in decrying jungle as some sort of false idol, remember that the hardcore continuum wraps up more than just jungle; acid house, bleep techno, UK garage and plenty more are all in there. now, i have plenty of my own problems with "the nuum," in part because i think as a DESCRIPTIVE theory it's overly parochial; it's a very nationally-grounded theory (which shouldn't be so surprising, given that simon's talking about how he's interested in nationhood, if not nationalism) that, to my mind, excises a lot of parallel developments in the US and europe. i'm all for debating the 'nuum. but you seem to be letting your personal distaste for jungle, and your readiness to portray scholars running circles around kids using FruityLoops, cloud your arguments.