review of Looping Festival / much looping comment

[Daryl <highhorse@mhorse.com>]

So last night I went to check out the Looping Fest in Palo Alto,
featuring Rick, Goddess, Andre and Jon.  As it was the first time I've
seen an improvisational multi-looper performance, and one of the first
times I've seen such heavy use of an EDP and Repeater, it was kind of a
clinic in contemporary looping techniques for me personally.

I had a great time, first off!  I loved seeing different combinations of
players, as well as percussion instruments - I realized how boring a
standard trap kit can be when compared with all the possibilities of a
clay pot, a steel saucepan, cymbals, tablas, or frisbees (!). The
EDP-mangling was really entertaining, especially when combined with
Rick's facial expressions and Andre's subtle hip-swaying.   The high
point was a screaming duet between Goddess and Andre, as the EDP's
provided an evil dub bassline and a ghostly whine, while Jon and Rick
synced up on 32-second note hi-hats and cymbals.  Yeah!  Each of the
solo sets was also particularly enjoyable, everyone involved clearly has
developed a really unique interaction with their little magic boxes.

The glitching and repeating was really nuts, to hear and to watch.
Still, as wonderful and musical as it was to hear Rick turn
throatsinging into a children's chorus, or Andre turn a bent harmonic
into god-knows-what, I had to think about the question posed earlier
this week about the difference between an instrument and an effect or
processor....and I came out of this event feeling that looping equipment
isn't really an instrument.  An instrument is something that generates a
tone, by definition.  And though the EDP can do insane things with any
tone fed to it - you could probably snap your fingers once into a mic,
then entertain a crowd all night with warpings of that initial tone - it
doesn't actually generate a sound.  I think this is important, for me at
least, because that initial tone is SO crucial, even after twisting it
every which way.  The most interesting and musical things last night
that happened with loops were interesting and musical because of the
source; tweaking it made it exponentially more so.  But when a dry or
flat sound was fed to a loop (which happened rarely, I have to say),
processing didn't really take it anywhere, in my opinion.

I guess my point is that to make good loops with your instrument, you
gotta be good on the instrument.  Even if that instrument is a piece of
Tupperware (Rick!), you have to know how to get a good sound out of it.

For those who feel that an EDP actually is an instrument, I'm curious
whether a turntable would also fit the definition...?

thanks to Jon, Rick, Goddess and Andre for a wonderful time!  I'm bummed
I had to dash off to catch a train and couldn't meet each of you
afterwards.

Daryl Shawn
highhorse@mhorse.com