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My wife once told me that when I sit down with my
acoustic guitar and just play freely, that what she hears sound more creative
than anything else I do with my gear, looping, etc. I find that sort of
interesting (sometimes discouraging)...makes me start to question what is really
necessary for me to express myself artistically, vs. hiding behind the
gear. Heck, if I can sit down at a gig with just my acoustic, and satisfy both
myself and others artistically, I'd probably be retired right now with all the
money I would have saved! :)
But I just love the effects, and I openly admit
that "sometimes" they do substitute for true, raw creativity. I would be
surprised if anyone on this list who uses a lot of gear thought or felt
otherwise. It would take quite a artistic genius to ALWAYS, 100% of
the time, have effects acquiesce to one's talent and creativity, rather than the
other way around. Either an artistic genius, or a complete liar.
Kris
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Friday, March 17, 2006 2:39
AM
Subject: Re: what a loop has to say
i do find the clean acoustic guitar to be my muse.yet ill mangle it with
reverse and speed control.varible delay times seems to keep the sound
pure.maybe just a phase im goin thru but nothing beats a good ole acoustic
source into a looper.
my best regards,
scary visionary.
Kris Hartung
<khartung@cableone.net> wrote:
>
Yep, to me a loop says, "Freedom."
> G
Speaking of which, does
anyone find it easier to freely improvise when you
aren't using layers
and layers of effects, tone mangling devices, etc? I've
found this to be
the case with me. I love all the cool effects at my
disposal - the Boss
VF-1, hundreds of VST effects, LXP5, etc - but they
sometimes produce
artificial restrictions or boundaries on my creativity. I
tend to be
more intentionally and genuinely creative, and less enamored and
influenced by technology, when I just play with a clean guitar sound
with
just a touch of reverb and delay for ambiance. You have nothing but
the
notes, basically, no window dressing to distract the creative
process. I'm
sure this is quite subjective and relative, but I'd be
curious what others
think of this. I guess just the simple sound of the
guitar forces me to
think more out of the box, rather than relying on
the box. For example, you
have a effect patch that has two octaves and
panning delays that go on
forrrrrrrever....you play one "note"...just
one human data-point of
interaction, and the gear takes credit for the
rest of the interesting sound
for the next minute. And I start to think
to myself, what is really creative
about that? I could play 10 notes in
3 minutes and produce a song that
requires very little creative energy.
It would be interesting to take all
of our looping songs and strip every
single cool effect from them, resulting
in just the initially, humanly
generated notes and natural sound of the
instrument...what might we
discover? How much of the intrigue of the song is
generated by the gear
vs. human creative energy? These are just open
questions for discussion.
I'm not necessarily making any categorical point
here.
And in
this regard, I really respect a lot of the work of Derek Bailey,
where
its just him and his hollowbody guitar...quite amazing what a guy can
do
with just a guitar and amp.
...I'm off to bed now. It's been a long
day.
Kris
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