Re: the perils of live looping (addition question)

["Steve Lawson" <steve@steve-lawson.co.uk>]

Expectation is indeed a key thing, though I do think that you can do an 
ambient drone based thing and get the audience to go
with you... Max's point about working with the audience was a good one - 
as well as Mark's suggestion to give some sort of
explaination of what's going on (even though we as performers can't 
imagine how anyone could think it was a backing track,
I've had people suggest that I put 'mistakes' on the track to make it 
sound live...????? what's worse, the mistake was part
of the tune... :o)

I tend to try and explain a little of what's going on, and also to give 
people liberty to respond however they like, so long
as it doesn't upset anyone else's listening experience - if it's a social 
setting and everyone is chatting, that's cool,
no-one gets upset, and I can noodle away... if half want to list and half 
want to talk, you're in the shit - very hard to
pitch a gig half way, I find. But I do let people know that it's OK to 
close their eyes, doze off, chill, eat, drink - just
don't do it near the mics if I'm recording the show! :o)

I'm also fortunate that I tend to react to what's happening physically - I 
find much the music I make hugely funny (it's just
the notion of sitting on a stage with a bass and a bunch of toys and 
having people pay money to watch me do it...!!!) and do
react to what I'm doing facially. I remember seeing Michael Manring build 
up this insane multiloop noise-fest thing and then
just look in horror at his amp with his head in his hands - it changes the 
way that the listener relates to what you're
doing.

If there's a story behind the tune (assuming there's some composed element 
to it) that can help to give people a focus - or
hey, you could hand out paper and pens and turn it into a creative writing 
seminar, inspired by your music... :o)

Whatever - I tend to feel a huge amount of gratitude to anyone who comes 
out to see me play, and try to convey that - they
don't have to be there, and I hope they have a great time. If they don't, 
that's a shame, but if you're not playing
'commercial' music, then you've got to learn to deal with people not 
'getting it' in some way... After all, perception is a
wonderful and random thing...

BTW - on the subject of gratitude, I'd be very grateful if any of you in 
California would check out the gig page on my
website for details of my dates in Thousand Oaks, Santa Barbara, 
Sacramento, San Jose and (hopefully) Santa Cruz dates in
January - I'll post the full details here soon...

Steve
www.steve-lawson.co.uk


> > -- One reason I personally have been trying tooth and nail to steer 
>away
> > from effects-laden, ambient-styled loop work is because I've found that
> > it hard to capture and hold a live audience with that approach.  Now,
> > for a lot of ambient musicians, that's exactly the point -- to NOT
> > necessarily demand their focused listening, and to function as a
> > background environmental aspect just as much as a foreground element.
> > For me personally, though, I want to be able to grab and hold a
> > listener, and I've found that it's hard to do that with the
> > ambient/ebowed/droney/rubato/soundscapey angle.
> >
> Exactly Andre!  Expectations are what can get you in trouble.  Playing
> an ambient set and expecting an audience to hang on your every note is
> unfair to the audience.  I for one, like playing
> ambient/bowed/droney/rubato(what the hell is that?)/soundscapey stuff,
> but at things like art openings, or at a cafe where the art or social
> interaction is the focus, not me.
>
> You'll still get that random person at the end that asks about your
> gear, or say, "Do you know the band Can?"
>
> Mark Sottilaro
>