Words About Things

June 28, 2010 - Making Choices for a Label

I thought it might be helpful for anyone sending out music demos to a record label to get a perspective on how decisions are made when releasing someone's work. I can only speak for myself, and my labels, but I bet the sentiments cross over to some other people in a similar area of independent music.

Why This?

I think everyone is aware that we live in a time of immense clutter. More information and communication is available, but that creates overload and it is increasingly difficult to express something interesting and original (and good) and reach people. That being said, everyone has an individual definition of the words original and interesting. Let's not forget love. For an independent label like Anticipate or Microcosm the main force governing these decisions is am I in love with this music. Do I want to listen to it over and over again and do I hear something extra special in it? Do I connect to it in a way that goes beyond whether it sounds good or is produced well? Does it connect with the concept of the label and its sound? Because the label is a personal extension of an idea, it's essential that a release both fits in with, and adds something new to the whole. Occasionally the commercial perspective comes into play, but it rarely sways a creative decision for me.

A Personal Connection

Even in a segment of the music industry that is driven more by art than by commercial considerations there is a benefit to knowing someone; probably more so, actually. Because a label like mine is so personal, it can feel odd to release music by a complete stranger, to enter into a creative and professional relationship with someone knowing so little about them and how they carry themselves in the world. Having some sort of friendly relationship (or a relationship with someone who recommends or vouches for an artist) helps to understand one's music better: where it's coming from, what it's trying to accomplish, how it defines the person. I have released music by total strangers and been happy with the results and then grown to be friends with some of those people, but it is incredibly rare for a random demo to grab my attention enough to want to spend a great deal of time, energy and money on bringing it out into the world. I'm sorry to say it but it's true. I have heard plenty of demos that I thought were good, but still didn't compel me to release them, didn't make me feel like I would regret not working with this music. On the rare occasions that I have felt that way, it has been a combination of the music's quality, its style, timing and probably mood. It's difficult to align all these things, but occasionally they come together.

How To Present Your Work

Speaking of sending a demo to a stranger, to begin with, find a label that your work would fit with. Too often people blindly send their material to a label that they have done no (or not enough) research on and it's simply a waste of everyone's time. If you make metal you wouldn't send it to a hip-hop label. Find an organization that you love and that you can see your work being compared to. Remember, a small label is a personal statement and the music needs to work within those boundaries. It can stretch them a little, but it probably can't be part of a different universe (depending on the label). Also, almost as an aside, because I think it's fairly obvious: don't send a mass email to a bunch of labels at once. It looks cheap, as if you don't believe enough in your music to spend a bit more time writing emails. It's not personal and you're asking someone to then invest some of themselves in your creations. Why would they if they don't even get a direct note from you? Similarly, don't send an email with just a link. If someone doesn't know what your work sounds like and you don't feel the need to tell them, why would they care to listen? Presentation is important in all things.

I hope this gives some helpful information to anyone who's lost out there in the sea of finding a home for your music. It's a weird time and there are lots of options and no strict answers. Stay true to your work, find your own voice and if you connect to people in the right way good things should happen.

June 2, 2010 - Less Definition = Awesome

I was listening to Grouper's Dragging a Dead Deer Up a Hill the other night, for the first time in a while (though I think it was my favorite album of 2008, released on the stupendous Type label). It's kind of painfully good, in that listening to it can almost be too much concentrated goodness to handle. It just reminded me of what caught my attention the first time I heard it, that it has clear melody lines and vocals but is so obscured that it gets into a place I love that combines pop elements with the smearing and blurring of those lines; not just the lines of pop vs. not pop, but the lines of the songs themselves. The borders which surround a vocal or guitar or piano are porous because of the way it was recorded and processed and those pores fold outward and mesh with each sound source, and yet it is still more defined than a big slab of sound. This is something I find kind of magical in lots of music but when it's done with such a clear "song" at its core it manages to create even more dark/light and pretty/dirty contrast. I'm not sure that pretty and dirty are opposites, but I'm going with that.

This lack of definition - obscurity, smearing limits - adds layers of meaning, implied meaning and most importantly, the meaning of the listener attaching it to the music. Though I realize it's not for everyone, and not for every time, I think it does a great service to leave an openness for the listener to fill in their own blanks, whether it's an assumption of what a track 'means' or simply the experience and associations a track evokes individually. I believe the way we use art is as important as the way we make it and that music becomes somehow more completely finished when the circuit is completed by a listener. If it's more open for one's personal interpretations, all the better.

May 18, 2010 - The Place of the Album

I've been thinking for a while, but maybe a bit more lately, about the role of the album in our immediacy-obsessed world. If music is consumed at a faster and greater pace than ever before and 95% of it is not paid for, then the album becomes an even grander statement: a document of a large body of work at a time when one could, if they want to, finish a song and post it for anyone to hear in the same day. In this context an album represents not just a complete grouping of material, but an act of patience. For an artist (and label) to wait until an album is finished when it is the norm to obey a certain schedule for manufacturing and promotion and release is an incredibly different process than to slowly work on something of a different scope when quickly distributing material into the world is so easy and commonplace and probably necessary. If the rate of exchange is so quick and the commercial necessity so minor, how long will the album reign as the standard form? How long will it last at all?

Admittedly, its origins are one of commerce, not art, but the art has taken it on as its own and used it as both a limit and a freedom to explore new possibilities. A container is needed to define the extent of one's work, to give it both breathing room and a place for that air to stop. If albums are so few and far between then what is the degree to which artists should be disseminating work in the space left from one full-length release to another? If the ease of transferring a piece from hard drive to the ears of strangers (and friends) is so simple, to what degree is in-process material acceptable? Do people want to hear unfinished versions of songs that then end up on a larger release in their final form? Does that tip the quality vs. quantity scale too far? I realize these are questions with no definitive answer, or rather, with numerous answers that differ for each listener, artist and piece of work. We should all be thinking about this in our producing and consuming efforts.

March 19, 2010 - Accumulation as a Replacement for Narrative

What is it that attracts someone to art forms like experimental music, non-representational visual art, and sparse films where little happens? Why do some people find solace in expression that is more elusive and has less of a traditionally identifiable narrative arc? I mean that term in many senses: as much in an overt melody as a story with a conflict and resolution, in a painting of a plant on a table as much as lyrics that mean something specific (regardless of whether they are literal, metaphor, etc).

In works like these, it seems that concentration on moments, or the accumulation of these moments can be enough of an emotional payoff for some (myself included) while others still desire a different kind of structure. Are people constructing the story in their heads from the threads of what's there or is it a different mentality altogether, gaining meaning and insight from moment to moment and how they and the reactions to them accrue; it's not about any kind of resolution at all, but more of an ongoing conversation (with oneself, with the creator of the material, with the material itself). Why is it that a single piano chord in a song can work as enough of a melody for some people while for others it's a sound effect? Why can the texture and composition of certain images be the elements that hold meaning for some while others focus on the specific series and sequence of events to organize their experience?

Peripheral ideas, images, sounds, practices are important and can be elevated to the foreground, and then if communicated correctly can be the sole occupant of that foreground, and carry the weight of the entire material, regardless of medium. Granted, to a certain extent this is part of the continual process of culture and at several points in history someone came up with a genuinely new idea, even if it was built on what came previously, and people were either ready for it or they weren't, but it began a trajectory that kept moving. For some, part of that trajectory is focusing closely on smaller pieces, microscoping in to the way a certain sound or image or combination thereof feels, rather than a large statement like the hook of a pop song or the climactic moment where the hero saves the day. (Nonetheless, I acknowledge that it's dangerous to put these ideas into completely discrete categories, because they aren't entirely distinct from each other and beware the person who only wants to see and/or hear one thing, because that's just boring.)

Now we take certain things for granted (a canvas painted entirely white can be art, a tone that's modulated slightly over 40 minutes can be music) but they came from somewhere and were way more revolutionary at first because they had to create their own context. It goes almost without saying that creative statements like these aren't for everyone, but is it just cultural or is there a personal, biological process taking place? Perhaps there is an introvert/extrovert equation at work. One accepted socio-psychological idea is that introverts have enough internal stimulation, so they require less from outside (which causes them to be introverted), and in turn, extroverts want and need more stimulation because they provide themselves with less (hence the extroversion). Nothing holds true all of the time for all people, but it certainly sounds like a plausible enough scenario for a generalization. The more abstract and less defined a piece is, the less on the surface energy it exudes, the more it might be the perfect vehicle on which one can project their own internal goings-on, the more the perceiver gets to add to their experience and understanding of it if they choose to, which often means that even if it doesn't require this effort, it does at least reward it.

Isn't material like this functioning on its own internal logic, of what makes sense for itself within the universe it created? This allows the viewer / listener to find new elements / objects / layers / relationships within by concentrating differently, shifting the observational focus to perceive nuances that appear for the first time, and perhaps only to that person, unintended by the original creator of the work. I'm a huge proponent of people allowing this to happen, arranging tiny layers in a way that they become the main focus - the story to be followed - giving them more weight than the usual foreground material could have by the sheer virtue of the required attention to discover them in their full potential. The way they are handled and presented can then have this accumulation effect and the emotional impact usually afforded traditional audiovisual storytelling.

March 8, 2010 - Finding a Voice Through Mistakes:

I was on a panel recently (Feb. 2010 at Unsound Festival NYC Edition, with Sebastian Meissner and Sasu Ripatti), which was about making music with technology and finding an original voice. During the Q&A portion someone asked how can one do such a thing, find an original voice as they begin their journey through music-making within the modern electronic field, at this stage, where people are using similar technology and genres are codified and formulaic to a degree even when they aren't formulaic. Well, that was the gist of the question; I paraphrased it a bit. (As an aside, it's sort of depressing to think that everything has been done, but luckily I don't think it all has.) I didn't have a prepared answer for this but as I was responding to him I realized that I agreed with my thought enough to repeat it. My answer was basically, when you're starting to learn how to work and how you want to work, it's okay to copy people who you respect, and then, hopefully, you aren't very good at copying them, and you make mistakes or just do things differently because you're a different person, and through the process of trying to emulate you find your own voice: one which is relatable to another, but nonetheless your own. All music is relatable and influenced by something. There is no completely original idea free of the thoughts embedded in the work of others. So, my advice to you (person asking this question) is, go make mistakes. Find your own process through doing things wrong. If there's any way to find a sense of personal uniqueness it's in the way one works towards a certain result, the way one's mind works, the way one processes information. Hopefully the results come out of the process and not an automated system of arriving at the goal. This way you and your individuality are actually part of the equation, regardless of the technology you use or the genre you work in.