OOOOOPS! Look what *I* did...

[The Man Himself <altruist@shoko.calarts.edu>]

So I didn't get any mail on Monday, and thought the list might be down. 
Then I logged in this morning and the first message was Motley's
now-infamous, dam-bursting post. 

So much for the list being down.  (There have been nine new messages alone
in the time that I've written this post.)

Since I seem to have (inadvertently!) spawned this whole thing about a
week ago, I feel like I should drop in a few points.  (I had been waiting
for the proverbial dust to settle before piping in again, but it now looks
like I'll be posting in the middle of a sandstorm instead). 

The main thing I want to say is that I'm not aware of a single instance in
any of my posts where I said that music made by a guitar player is
better/more musical/more expressive/more whatever than that made by a
DJ/programmer/whatever.  I have *not* been trying to make statements to
the effect that guitar-based loop music is better than sample-based loop
music, or that growing your own samples makes better music than
appropriating other people's samples. 

Obviously I have some preferences for my own music in some of the
aforementioned areas, and I've gone on at lengths (which, as Stephen
Goodman remarked, have probably veered dangerously close to mental
masturbation) to talk about why I feel strongly about the way that I'm
making music, and what it means to me.  But I *am not* saying that people
who don't share those methods aren't making real music.  Quite the
opposite. 

What I've been trying to get at are the *fundamental differences* in the
way these different types of musics are *made*, and the attendant
statements that are implicit in these distinctions.  Because music isn't
just *what you do*, it's *how you do it*.  When you pick up any
instrument, you making a statement before you've even played a note. 

I think it's worthwhile to look at these distinctions, especially when 
dealing with different sorts of looping technologies and techniques 
(which, up until the last couple of days, was ostensibly what this list 
is about).  *This* is why I've been trying adamently to talk in detail 
about the different statements involved in making music in different 
ways.  *This* is why I feel it makes sense to single out the three main 
real-time loopers in discussion.  

Because there *is* something more to making music than simply the sounds 
that you hear.  The process itself carries a very definite statement, and 
I think these are important things to think about.

I'm trying to underscore this because I think I've been undeservedly and
incorrectly identified as a guitarist bigot who feels that sample-based
music can't be as good as guitar-based music.  Kim, I have high regard for
your reasoning and beliefs, but if you honestly believe that my series of
"philosophy" posts from last week are really saying the same thing as
Motley's first post from Monday, and if you really think that I've been
trying to draw lines in the sand, ostracize people who don't make music in
the same way that I do, etc etc, then I've got to vehemently disagree with
you.  In the highly unlikely event that you find yourself with the time
and inclination, then I'd have to ask that you look over what I've said
again.  I'm *not* making judgements about the quality of the music, and I
frankly find it highly discouraging that you or anyone else would
interpret my postings as such. 

If I really wanted to approach this whole thread in a silly way, I could
give a list of the dozens of sample-based rap, hip-hop, industrial,
techno, jungle, and dance albums that I've been listening to at various
points for the last ten years; I could also list the dozens of famous,
groundbreaking guitarists whose recorded work I don't feel particularly
compelled to add to my collection.  I could also point to the numerous
posts I've made to the list regarding various electronic dance albums I've
been enjoying. 

If we want to talk intelligently about the way we make music, it seems to
me that we've got to be able to acknowledge differences in the way we make
it.  And I really do take issue with the extensive posts I've made (which
have been composed with a considerable amount of thought and care, though
apparently not with clarity of meaning) being misinterpreted as manifestos
of superiority, invalidity, ghettoization, drawing lines in the sand,
whatever whatever yadda yadda yadda. 

If nothing else, I think this thread wins the award for the longest 
electronically-based loop ever known to man.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled flame-fest.

--Andre