Obsessed with Sound
Yeah I know I use the word obsess quite a bit. It’s in my nature I suppose. When it comes to sound though, I think I have something wrong with me. It’s a good wrong though. I mean it allows me to be thinking about structure and time without looking at watch. I don’t like watches, by the way. Time is evil. Time is not our friend. But it is always there, just spinning around and around. My brain likes to pick up little noises and turn them into loops. This becomes my inner clock. I’m always thinking of loops. Loops are everywhere.
I’m also fond of white noise. Fans, air conditioners, buzzing refrigerators—the gamut. After a while I don’t hear white noise anymore, I can start to hear choirs and chants. Hymns and Cellos. It’s all there sitting in the fan. Not sure why that is. But I hear it.
Mix this with a good loop of the drippy drop drip of the kitchen sink and I have myself a symphony in my head.
I read somewhere (I think it was in Saucerful of Secrets) about how after they had completed Atom Heart Mother Pink Floyd was going to make an album consisting of only kitchen appliances and utensils. I think they even made as far as recording some of it. But they scrapped the idea and decided to make Dark Side. Maybe I’m getting the chronology wrong, but that doesn’t matter. What does matter is that there are sources for entertainment that extend way farther than guitars, pianos and synthesizers. Though I am obsessed with that stuff too. Our Earth produces so many wonderful and pleasing sounds. Crickets and June bugs. Leaves blowing in the wind. The ocean. Woodpeckers pecking on a tree. It’s all usable. All sound is usable. Let’s use it.
Sound is everywhere, it’s inevitable. I love it. I think an album could be made with non-instruments and still sound musical and melodious. I’d like to try it one day. In the meantime I will keep my head busy with loops and noises from near and afar.
Latronic,
Dee
I’m also fond of white noise. Fans, air conditioners, buzzing refrigerators—the gamut. After a while I don’t hear white noise anymore, I can start to hear choirs and chants. Hymns and Cellos. It’s all there sitting in the fan. Not sure why that is. But I hear it.
Mix this with a good loop of the drippy drop drip of the kitchen sink and I have myself a symphony in my head.
I read somewhere (I think it was in Saucerful of Secrets) about how after they had completed Atom Heart Mother Pink Floyd was going to make an album consisting of only kitchen appliances and utensils. I think they even made as far as recording some of it. But they scrapped the idea and decided to make Dark Side. Maybe I’m getting the chronology wrong, but that doesn’t matter. What does matter is that there are sources for entertainment that extend way farther than guitars, pianos and synthesizers. Though I am obsessed with that stuff too. Our Earth produces so many wonderful and pleasing sounds. Crickets and June bugs. Leaves blowing in the wind. The ocean. Woodpeckers pecking on a tree. It’s all usable. All sound is usable. Let’s use it.
Sound is everywhere, it’s inevitable. I love it. I think an album could be made with non-instruments and still sound musical and melodious. I’d like to try it one day. In the meantime I will keep my head busy with loops and noises from near and afar.
Latronic,
Dee
posted by DeesKnees at 1:52 PM
5 Comments:
Dee,
I am obsessed with sound also, but it is in a different way. I love to listen to really great recordings. I am so picky that even if the music itself is very good, I just can't listen to it for very long if the recording sucks. It is such a shame that recording companies and artists will put out such crap. I think most of the time it is due to too much editing. Although I love digital recordings, the advent of digital recording has made it easy for any jerk to easily record and edit their own music.
It wasn't as easy for someone who didn't know what they where doing to record and edit recordings before the advent of digital, although there was still a lot of crap out there then too.
Too much digital editing can make all the music distorted and mushy sounding. Sometimes you can hardly hear the instruments. It is easy for me to recognize a good digital recording. Right away I can hear the singer’s throat when they sing and I can hear the strings on guitars vibrate. I think I notice it most with base guitar.
I am very happy with a recent album purchase of mine. I just picked up a copy of "Back against the Wall" that was put out by Billy Sherwood . It is basically a remake of Pink Floyds classic "The Wall" recorded by an all-star cast of progressive rock musicians like Keith Emerson, Tony Levin, Steve Howe, and Alan White just to name a few. The sound quality on the album is great. I really like what the musicians did with the album. In a way it is just a remake of "The wall." Most of the songs were done in much the same way as the original, even with the same/similar sound effects and cues. A lot of the singers even tried to emulate the way Rodger Waters sang on the original album. It is different enough though.
It is hard to explain but I both love and hate the album. I like the fact that the differences in the recordings bring new life into an old classic by giving you a different take on the songs. It is hard to accept the changes though. It is such a well know classic album that I sometimes find myself wishing I was listening to the original. I do think it is worth getting a copy and listening to it. There are some really great performances on it and I think it makes you appreciate the original recording even more.
Talking about the wall kind of fits in with your love for sound because that album is filled with sound other than what can be produced by electric guitars and amps, and it sounds great.
Later,
Brad
I once heard this recording of a tree growing. the tree's cells absorb water until they burst and make this popping sound, or something like that, and when they sped the recording up it became this really cool angular beat, like a weird ride cymbal pattern.
Brad,
I'd like to respond to your lengthy response. But I'm not sure where to start. Our obessions with sound, I think, are completely different.
Where you are looking for perfection I'm looking for anything that produces a sound. I couldn't disagree with you more about "anybody makeing recordings and pawing them off" (not your words) Hey, look at myspace. Those sounds on there aren't neat and nicely recorded. But to me they are a production of something that wasn't there before. I embrace anybody who has the ablity to make sound and share it with people. We all might not like it, but some will.
I do have a problem with shoddy 70's recordings though, espeically drum sounds. Listen to any Eagles record and I cringe at those carboard boxes that Don Henley his hitting. The guy's a deuchebag anyway.
But, on a more personal level, take the album "And Then There Were Three" by Genesis. Now the content on this album is superb, but the production is a trainwreck. Everything is burried in hum and hiss. Vocals are mixed down too low,keyboards sound over the top. Etc. It's a shame.
I don't have anything else to say today.
Dee
Tone,
Can we do some field recordings with the minidisc and hten pump them through Protools?
That would be sweet.
Dee
Dee,
You got me wrong. I definitely think bad recordings are better than no recordings. I just believe there is a way to do it better. Quality control if you will.
A lot of the remasters coming out are improvements although some sound exactly the same and some are even worse.
I find it funny that the music industry tries to get people to buy albums again with the words "digitally remastered." It may be remastered, but it doesn't mean it is good. And besides the point there must have been a digital master out there previously or there would not be a crap load of cd's of the older version already in the store. Even better is when they claim it is "digitally remastered for the first time.” I think what they really mean is digitally edited for the first time. A lot of the first cd's that came out in the 80's where created by just hitting the play button on the old analog master tapes. What came off of them is what you got. There definitely was more hiss on them. Sometimes I like the hiss, other times it is just a distraction. That’s what you get when the music industry wants to get the albums out quickly.
I totally agree with you on the Eagle recordings. I have a couple of their albums on vinyl. I thought the records were just warn and that was why they sounded like crap. Unfortunately the cd sounds the same way.
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