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Your opinion on electronica/technology in music


Batman

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Well, what do you think of it?

I'm all for it. Electronica is slowly becoming one of my favorite genres, and while I see why people might not like it, I think it's just great. I'd like to kick off this conversation with a quote from Roger Waters of Pink Floyd:

(In response to people who said that Pink Floyd wasn't a talented band because electronics do all the work, and anyone with enough electronics could make good music)

"That's like saying if you give a kid a Les Paul, he'll become Eric Clapton"

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Playing a guitar is completely different from using synths or other computer controlled instruments. Despite your claims, any idiot can program music to be at least listenable. Just like the brilliant hip producers (they make DA BEATZ) electronics guys are meaningless to me.

As a drummer, I vomit when I hear about guys who trigger their sets. Same goes for anyone with a heavy reliance on machines to play their music for them. It doesn't impress me if it's not real.

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Playing a guitar is completely different from using synths or other computer controlled instruments. Despite your claims, any idiot can program music to be at least listenable. Just like the brilliant hip producers (they make DA BEATZ) electronics guys are meaningless to me.

As a drummer, I vomit when I hear about guys who trigger their sets. Same goes for anyone with a heavy reliance on machines to play their music for them. It doesn't impress me if it's not real.

It's not that different...it takes a ton of practice to make good electronic music, and the guitar is one of the easiest instruments in the world to play (the easiest is probably the recorder). And I agree, it's easy enough to make a basic beat...but to make a full song (and a good song) is incredibly challenging and impressive.

However, I agree with you about drum machines in rock (that's what the 2nd paragraph was aimed at, correct?). I mean, a repeated beat is just so...repetetive. And when rockers use drum machines, they don't switch the drums up much, like electronica guys do.

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It's not that different...it takes a ton of practice to make good electronic music, and the guitar is one of the easiest instruments in the world to play (the easiest is probably the recorder). And I agree, it's easy enough to make a basic beat...but to make a full song (and a good song) is incredibly challenging and impressive.

However, I agree with you about drum machines in rock (that's what the 2nd paragraph was aimed at, correct?). I mean, a repeated beat is just so...repetetive. And when rockers use drum machines, they don't switch the drums up much, like electronica guys do.

How can electronic music have emotion? It's not organic. Machines can't feel the music. They can't improvise. They can't make mistakes and they can't enjoy a good performance.

I was talking about drum machines to some extent, but there's also something called triggering where you hook up electronics to your drums and they produce sounds/notes that you want. You can make it so that 1 stroke = 4 strokes or some BS like that.

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How can electronic music have emotion? It's not organic. Machines can't feel the music. They can't improvise. They can't make mistakes and they can't enjoy a good performance.

Machines can't improvise and make mistakes, but humans can, and it's human who are operating the machines. Electronica can have emotion..."Phaedra" by Tangerine Dream sounds nervous, for example. Happiness and sadness can also be found in electronica. Often, electronica contains a lot more emotion than rock.

I think one misconseption about electronica is that it is all mindless and repetetive dance garbage. Electronica goes far beyond dance and house techno, but most people don't experience electronica beyond "Numa Numa" and "What Is Love." Those do not typify the electronica genre at all. I actually do like some dance/house though...Daft Punk for example...but I can see why someone would hate dance/house.

I was talking about drum machines to some extent, but there's also something called triggering where you hook up electronics to your drums and they produce sounds/notes that you want. You can make it so that 1 stroke = 4 strokes or some BS like that.

Oh, well in that case, I agree with you, that sounds totally lame. But I've never heard it before, so I guess I shouldn't pass judgement.

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In my opinion, when it comes to synthesized music there is no one better than Rick Wakeman. A keyboard man by right, he took the synthesizer to new levels back in the early 70's. When he broke from Yes and began producing his own albums his genius came alive.

I have to agree with Batman who said that while machines can produce the sounds without error, it is human intervention that produces the variety of sounds to orchestrate a piece of music.

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Thank you Batman for the vote of confidence. If you have not listened to Wakeman I highly recommend you pick up some early Yes albums but more so pick up Journey To The Center Of The Earth by Wakeman. You will be amazed what he does with the synthesizer on that album. The vocals on the album like his others are somewhat less than to be desired. I would also recommend Myths and Legends of King Arthurs Court and The Knights Of The Round Table (I think that is the name) and The Six Wives of Henry VIII. Those are his three early solo albums and perhaps one of the more influential pieces of synthesized music in rock history. His later stuff was pretty good also.

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I clicked other because I could not begin to describe the genre. If it is that thumping or repetitive music as demonstrated by Stewie in Family Guy last night, than it does not do anything for me. But if you like it, enjoy.

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Wakeman played keyboard with Bowie a great deal, here's a Wakeman quote:

David Bowie is far and away the cleverest man I've ever worked with. Far and away. Absolute walking genius, David Bowie was, to work with. I did about 2,000 sessions in four years, and of all those sessions the person I learned more from, was David.

Rick Wakeman

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