tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3505022452508665567.post6257535522059053400..comments2024-03-27T21:40:29.799-07:00Comments on RETROMANIA: SIMON REYNOLDShttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01282478701882900354noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3505022452508665567.post-26699976534161200412011-10-28T16:53:13.767-07:002011-10-28T16:53:13.767-07:00cheers
yeah mark fisher had a good point that mos...cheers<br /><br />yeah mark fisher had a good point that most of the developments in digital technology in recent years have been upgrades -- bright supercrisp images, high definition, etc... games getting more dimensional and vivid... CGI getting better and better (but still not real)<br /><br />and so with the digital audio workstations and ableton, do they allow people to think new musical thoughts or is it making slicker/easier/more densely layered/crisper what was already possible just more cumbersome and unwieldly<br /><br />i guess my gut feeling is that digitalisation = ever-exponential rises in facilitation but then all tech has its unintended capacities, ways of being used against inventor's intentions eg. Roland 303, or timestretch, or most recently distorto-uses of autotune... so perhaps there is all this unused potential in Ableton<br /><br />what did you think of that group Sleigh bells? i found their music almost unendurable at first, got into it but from the initial discomfort i started to wonder whether digital distortion is radically different from analogue distortion, analog noise is an overload of signals whereas digital distortion is like pixelisation, it's an underload not overload -- a dearth of signals.. a kind of pocking of the sound surface with lack, a riddling of holes in the sound and it hurts your ears to fill in the gaps. in other words it's a concentrated, instant version of the aural fatigue you can get from listen to digital sound particularly relatively lo-res mpf3s for a long period of time. am i on the righ track?SIMON REYNOLDShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01282478701882900354noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3505022452508665567.post-46222832772294501792011-10-26T13:49:58.737-07:002011-10-26T13:49:58.737-07:00Hi Simon,
Loved your book, came to see you talk i...Hi Simon,<br /><br />Loved your book, came to see you talk in London and we hung out a bit afterwards. I asked a question about the break down in the economics of the music industry leading to a brain drain away from music as a career option, and comparing the atrophising of music to the vibrancy of the present day video games industry. I remember you liked the question.<br /><br />I think what you say here about the lack of musical technology breakthroughs is interesting. Ableton live is a piece of technology that has been massively overlooked by contemporary bands. It really is a brilliant bit of kit. Indeed, apart from autotuning of vocals and the bass twiddling of dubstep, I think artists, particularly the hip fringes are deliberately avoiding the most radical formal possibilities available even now. I'd put this down to a lot of music functioning now as a comfort blanket in the onslaught of information and largely bad news. I seem to remember talking about how unattractive the future is now and how this throws people into forgiving arms of nostalgia. <br /><br />But then again, the ever real threat of nuclear armageddon underpinned nearly all of the golden age of pop and rock - 1955 - 1995 in my opinion. (minus 1986).<br /><br />Best wishes <br /><br />RogerBl-roghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07055912653610870161noreply@blogger.com