nckn.music.

In my last post I wrote about how today‘s over-availability of music leads to a switch in music-listening. One of the commenters suggested to try listening to ambient music. Actually i don‘t like the term ,Ambient‘. I don‘t know where these associations come from, but I then have people in my head, who normally don‘t listen to this kind of music and label everything as ,ambient‘, that is slow, has no beat, is melancholic and/or laid back. Often these people equal Ambient with background music. I more like to call it ,silent music‘, since – yes – it can serve as a background atmoshphere to tasks you do, like working, writing. But good silent music also invites you to come closer and listen carefully. The elements don‘t scream at you, they want to be discovered. Maybe more like paintings. You can look at them from greater distance, just to grasp the atmosphere, but also come closer and discover details, that weren‘t imminent at first.

One of the musicians who do really great in painting these pictures is Pascal Savy, aka Static. Don‘t know anymore how our paths crossed, but I found his pieces to be really ,well-painted‘. They create a really dense atmosphere – dark, drony and sometimes even a bit creepy. He has a blog over at blogspot, where he describes his concepts and thoughts driving the creative process. Reading through them, you can say, that he already dug deep into the matter. Learning about sonic concepts, he tries to incorporate them into his music. In his blog, I first read about the phenomenons Microsound and Granular Synthesis. Touching these now would go beyond the scope of this post, but still interesting concepts, worth exploring. You can hear, that elements in his pieces are deliberately placed, and not just got there per accident.

Vortex (above), one of his last pieces utilizing Granular Synthesis, brought up a memory of my childhood. We often did summer-vacation in countries you had to cross water to get there. As a child, spending a night in a ferry, there is not too much to do, so you just walk around the ship and discover things. We sometimes did a dare: what would be the deepest floor we dare to be for more than just a second? In these ferries, the deeper you go, the creepier it gets. Corridors get uglier, the sound of the engines gets louder and louder and – since you are below the water suface – the doors start to be heavier. They then have these big opening wheels on them. For a kid, this was really creepy. And I remember I couldn‘t stand this for long.

And this static piece reminds me of exactly these moments: Like in the bottom floor of a big ferry. Water leaking in somewhere near. Astonishing if you keep in mind, that most of the sounds are synthetically created.

Disclaimer:
the idea of this series is to have a conversation. On single pieces of music and through them on musical aspects in general. Imagine the time you were putting up vinyl, drinking red wine, discussing with your friend about things you hear at this very moment. When was the last time you listened to music and did nothing else? Really concentrated?
So if the tracks above trigger anything, just share it. A picture, a small thought, a general impression you have, please share it in the comments. If not, maybe next time. It’s an experiment, I know. Thanks again!

Kyrie Eleison by petersauces

Once I received a Souncloud message saying:

Seems like every user I check out is making minimal techno. [Your music] was a breath of fresh air. Danke schön!

Of course this is the stuff I like to hear. But this is also what came to my mind stumbling across Pedros music. Just some freshness in that ocean of tracks that all follow the same scheme. When you listen to some of Pedros work, you can hear, that this guy is classicly trained, but practices electronic. For me, it feels good not being the only one between the lines of genres. He has also similar feelings towards his music.

[It's] hard to find a place I “belong” these days…

Could sign this statement. All the established genres have their own rule-sets. How you produce, how you perform. What is most likely to make your track big. They have big word-leaders who are the scenes darlings. What they recommend will be heard.
None of that holds true if you try to go new ways. Of course every position has pros and cons, but this feeling of being a bit lost, although doing great craft, is one of the cons – i guess. Though never met, Pedro from Brazil has won my sympathy. Totally.

This is what says about “Kyrie Eleison“:

Song made in 2004, when I started experimenting with counterpoint composition and electronic music. Very intriguing yet evolving atmosphere that ponders antique music in today’s times.
My own voice recorded many times for each layer. I used counterpoint, that’s a composition technique from the 16th Century. So what I did is I wrote a piece for 5 voices and recorded all of them myself… pretty tiring ater a while…

My friend and former band-mate AK (design student) said something, that holds true with this work also:

Always try to bring ideas from outside into your production. Don’t reference the status-quo of the scene. When you do digital bring in inspiration from analog.

This translates to: Bring in your acoustic understanding, sound and ability into electronic composition. This is what Pedro does. Or: bring your aesthetics from electronic music into acoustic music. This is what Hauschka does. Either way you choose, it is a good way of staying original.

Funny, Pedro manages to undust that image of old men singing church songs in a choir. He has a original way of creating tension within the track and surprises the listener several times. The way I like it.

Don’t miss to check out some of his other works over at Soundcloud. I recommend  Harmo and 7 Onions. He also has a blog, which is in Portugese, unfortunately (for the most us). Google translate could help

Disclaimer:
the idea of this series is to have a conversation. On single pieces of music and through them on musical aspects in general. Imagine the time you were putting up vinyl, drinking red wine, discussing with your friend about things you hear at this very moment. When was the last time you listened to music and did nothing else? Really concentrated?
So if the track above triggers anything, just share it. A picture, a small thought, a general impression you have, please share it in the comments. If not, maybe next time.  It’s an experiment, I know. Thanks again!

The Detroit Sun by sundur

Okay. I’ll start off with no stranger. Actually I already made music with this guy. I don’t know exactly, if Sundur is to be his Artist-name… for now it is. (He is also spinning minimal records. Check his MySpace)

The deal: Considering his level of skill, it’s absolutely inappropriate, that this track is his only audible fragment available anywhere. The first time we met to mess around with Ableton, I was totally surprised both by his sound and his way of working in Ableton. In a very positive way. His approach to Ableton looked like an ever ongoing flow. He constantly builds up his loops, drags sounds around, sends them through effects, adds new ones. All of that in a speed, you won’t recognize this beat was never around before / done on the fly.

“The Detroit Sun” completely represents his sound, as I experienced it. The whole beat feels like a big wheel, that just rolls really slowly on uneven ground. The sometimes odd clicks really add to an overall warm feeling.
He put the phrase Trip-Hop in the genre-tag. In my head, the term TripHop usually triggers really different sounds. But still, this track feels like the succesful translation of Massive Attack-influenced Triphop  into todays’ sound. More Flying Lotus than Kruder&Dorfmeister.

I can’t wait for him to put out more stuff. He should. And (as I remember it correctly), he will.

Disclaimer:
the idea of this series is to have a conversation. On single pieces of music and through them on musical aspects in general. Imagine the time you were putting up vinyl, drinking red wine, discussing with your friend about things you hear at this very moment. When was the last time you listened to music and did nothing else? Really concentrated?
So if the track above triggers anything, just share it. A picture, a small thought, a general impression you have, please share it in the comments. If not, maybe next time.  It’s an experiment, I know. Thanks!

I’m a huge fan of Soundcloud. Always wanted to take some time to write down a kind of Manifesto ala “Reasons why I love Soundcloud” (as opposed to MySpace). Maybe that will follow some time in future. There are several things Soundcloud does really different, thus making it a superior music-service.

I also always wanted to somehow spread the good music I come across now and then. Often stuff by some guys, just like me, doing music for the sake of it. Living in other corners of the world, with no big fanbase or following. Still, they are doing great stuff. One idea was to start doing a podcast. Just collecting the nice tracks and putting them together into mixes. Again, maybe that will follow some time in future.

But until now (as I recollect my energy for Bachelor-thesis finals) – there will be a new series of posts, called “Found in the Cloud”. I will take one track I found on Soundcloud, embed and discuss it. Or maybe just stress one element or idea in it, which I think is remarkable.

Maybe – no promise here – I can contribute to a small moment of focused music-listening, which got somehow lost in today’s music-landscape. But that, again, is another topic to be discussed…

So watch out, there’ll be one post per week. Starting today…