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Re: Rick's percussion post



Hi all,

I'm totally on board with what most of what Rick says. I have a member
in one of my bands who attempted to use pre-recorded drum machine
tracks. It was banned by me, since when he kicked on his drum machine:
1) The rhythm would be too dense - it jumped in sounding like a
completely recorded song rather than like a collaborator.
2) The drum machine would be the only member of the band that was not
playing live - it was like having a drummer who was completely
ignoring the other musicians.

I'd take it a step even further and say that many songs don't need to
have all the "rock band" elements (rhythm, bass, chord progression). I
agree with Mark that waiting for someone to build all the elements can
be just as tedious as listening.

I often feel like my solo sets combine elements of magic shows and dj
sets. When I say magic shows, I'm not saying "the music is magic" -
rather, I'm trying to create illusions that I'm not using loops. I do
that by:
--Using non-rhythmic loops.
--If I use rhythmic loops, I don't loop in phrase repetitions of 4 for
a 4/4 song. Instead, I'll loop on repetitions of 5 or 7, so that that
the elements of the drum loop only fall in the same place every 4th
loop repetition.
--Playing occasional variations of the loop live. Say you have a drum
loop. You could occasionally play an occasional bass drum or snare on
top of the loop (not into the loop). Or even better, record 2 or 3
spare non-sequitur snares and/or kicks on a separate looping device
that's cycling at a different interval. Voila - you have fills! Of
course, whether that actually sounds good depends on the musical
context.

The DJ elements involve trying to keep an ear as to when a particular
element gets too repetitive. That's a clue that it's time to take it
out. One way I like is to shut off the loop and start playing that
part live again, then transition it to something else. Or play
something that complements it on a separate loop and take the first
loop away, making a transition into a different song.

Another thing I often do to mask the task of me building up a pattern
is to quickly build a loop of something non-melodic/non-rhythmic for
the audience to listen to while you gradually build up the elements on
another channel. I usually try to imitate field recordings, loop it in
a non-predictable point, then start building rhythmic/melodic elements
on a different device.

My ears got tired of many contexts of rhythmic looped music at about
the same time that rave music started getting old for me. I need my
variation. Strangely, I can listen to irregular loops (such as in the
much of the music of Rapoon) for much longer periods of time before I
get bored. It accesses a more passive portion of my attention span.

-- 
Matt Davignon
mattdavignon@gmail.com
www.ribosomemusic.com
Rigs! www.youtube.com/user/ribosomematt