Re: LOOPING PHILOSOPHY

[pycraft@elec.gla.ac.uk (Michael Pycraft Hughes, PhD)]

The Man said to The Moderator:
>> What difference is it really if the sample is recorded on a hard disk
>> or recorded on your brain? 
>The difference is that if it's sampled, you've got a recording of somebody
>else's music.  If it's "sampled in your brain,"  then it's being filtered
>through your own sensibilities.  

One thing I have to add here is that most people remember ideas badly. 
It's also easier to mix ideas from wildly eclectic sources without sounding
contrived when actually "playing an instrument"  (yes I know a sampler is
an instrument, don't get all PC on me here!!).   Bill Frizell is a good
example.

>If you have five different people sample the same Zeppelin riff on the
>same sampler, you're gonna get five identical samples.  If you give five
>different people the same guitar, and have them play the same Zeppelin
>riff, you're going to get five subtly (or not so subtly) different
>versions of that riff, because the riff is being filtered through the
>basic fundamental aspects of what makes each one of us a seperate and
>distinct human being. 

Now I don't think it's as profound as the fact that we're all separate and
distinct human beings.  It's more about being sloppy!  :)

If we (guitarists) all play "black dog" we're playing what we remember the
riff to sound like, played using our sloppily-learned techniques which
may/not be the same as Page's sloppy techniques.  Teach everybody to play
the same way, and....its GIT!!!  :)  

If the sampler looks at the sample as the sound source, the equivalent is
the guitarist looking at marshall&strat as a sound source.  What makes this
sound different in the hands of different players is touch (vibato etc) and
phrasing.  The problem I think many guitarists have with sampling is that
many samplers (ie people who sample) don't vary their sound source much in
these terms.  Of course, when they remix it out of all recognition people
complain that it sounds nothing like the original!

>Of course, you can take that sample and tweak it to make it sound
>different, but you can do the same thing with that riff an a guitar as
>well.  If you're sampling, you've got to deliberately go in and change 
>it. 
>If you're actually playing, however, the "editing process" takes place
>automatically -- and it takes place in a manner that no other human on the
>face of the earth can precisely duplicate. 

The only thing that bothers me about sampling as such is that when a
musician plays a live instrument a lot of the decisions are
spur-of-the-moment.  These things are often lost in studio construction. 
However, in the studio there is the opportunity to create a more focussed
statement than might be achieved simply by improvising.  There are
arguments for both.

If it's any consolation, I have always been a mammoth Art of Noise fan. 
Now _there_ was creative sampling....

>A lot of guitarists I know (including myself) think that Tom Morello's
>solo on "Bulls On Parade," wherein he imitates the sound of a DJ
>scratching a disc by sliding his hand up and down the fretboard while
>toggling his pickup selector, was one of the hippest things to come out
>last year.  Sure sounds like a DJ scratching a record.  So why not just 
>bring in a DJ to scratch?  If you have to ask...

I have to ask.  This makes no sense to me at all.

Finally, one from pt.4:
> I've actually been using sequencers and drum machines for nine years -- 
>that's
> longer than I've been playing guitar! 

Of course, we all knew that from your GP resume...  :)

Michael

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