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fingertrouble) wrote2009-01-21 06:36 am
Interviewed for MIT's Technology Review about mashups and Girl Talk fail
It also has interviews with several other people that have been featured or played on Radio Clash - the ever-lovely DJ Earworm (as interviewed on the podcast in 2005, and regularly played on the show and I made the approved video for the Reckoner Lockdown mash mentioned in the piece) and Lenlow who's mashes I've played many times on the show.
The interview - well I had a great 1-2 hour chat with Larry Hardesty, lovely journalist who had done his homework (so many journos don't - it's why I wanted to make sure he had all the info - a lot of the stuff in the article is stuff we talked about, like the acapella sources but I didn't want to go into proper print saying 'Yeah Tim told me how to get acapellas from video games' - err nope. I may be punker than Girl Talk - not hard - but I'm not stupid ;-).
And nice to see he agrees with me about Stairway to Bootleg Heaven - it is the best mashup, ever as I told him :-)
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Few mashups actually grab me *possibly as most are crappy attempts by the technically inept), but the 'jam a shitload into a set' style (when done well) such as what Gregg does, makes me smile.
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Rather that going 'remember this?' ever 30 seconds, it's going 'remember this - and look how I can make it into something new'.
Girl Talk is just a post-modern reference machine, like Jive Bunny. It gets tired, quick. I bet if he dropped something they didn't know it'd go down like a lead balloon - whereas the likes of ECC and Earworm (among many, ince Team9) push it into new boundaries, introduce people to new music via well known music, or produce remixes and totally new tracks.
It's really if you prefer a McDonalds or a fillet steak - but even in that case GT fails as I like trashy food and music sometimes, but I like my trashy music made a lot more better, like disco or cheesy but good pop, or outsider music but usually in it's original 'genuine' form. But generally I like the musical version of fillet steak - not pretentious but some thought has gone into it, but as soon as post-modernism or irony enters into it then it's spoiled.
Innocent guilty pleasures need some genuine innocence in them.
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I, like you, can appreciate a well written, well recorded song, one with a story, with interesting flow. We can sit and listen to a song, and appreciate it.
Others don't. They, to use the McD analogy, just want the same music they normally listen to, or something just like it. "I want the same Big Mac I get elsewhere". They don't want to have to think about the song, just serve it up and let them eat.
I see the same thing when I DJ - when I first started I tried the "play interesting music" line, and got a few people up. I started playing the "artist whose tracks all sound the same" and got many people up. They don't care if a song is interesting, they just want it to be 'safe' i.e. it sounds like the rest of the stuff they listen to.
In Gregg's defence, I can see how hard it would be to perform his stuff live. Yeah, in the studio he could take his time matching key if he wanted, but live it would take a lot more planning, and I assume his live stuff came before the albums. And he then just recorded a cleaned and treated version of what he's been doing live.
I slap on his albums at home at times, more for the background than to actually listen to them. 60 or so minutes of constant music - mixing tracks I love, with rappers I hate - to work to.
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But - if you record an album rather than a pop single it is going to be a bit more critiqued than the top playlist at Radio 1 (although I critique that cos of it's shitty selection; but some of the choices as pop singles are good for what they are)...and I don't see dance music as 'ambient' music, you dance to it or use dance bits it's usually more interactive.
Anyway if he's using Ableton as I think he is there is no excuse - you can record a set then tweak it after (key etc.) - really in this day and age the 'I recorded it so can't tweak it' excuse is b.s.
And yeah I don't play 'interesting' music while DJing. Only a few places do Aphex Twin or Radiohead work, I play fun music and mashups with eclectic genre blindness...which sometimes confuses them, but usually means I play something someone likes, the non-beatmatching is cos I usually play CDs and never beatmatch them.
My online/traktor sets are beatmixes and tend to be more similar tempo, although I'll happily jump genre if a track reminds me of another. It's similarity in rhythm that the dancers want, and recognisability - I can do that with DJing mashups, and have been doing so since 2003.
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1. Reminds me to actually read his book (sitting beside me for ages)
2. Reminds me that there is music for multiple reasons, and some people forget that at time.
Both the story, your post, and some posts by another muso-friend, all fit together in that area - might think more on it after I catch some sleep.
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Music is different things to different people - but I do think GT invoking the whole punk thing when he's obviously struggling to get stuff in key (hence all the hiphop) which is a basic skill, is a bit disenguous.
Is it punk to take other people's tunes? 20 years ago maybe. Not anymore. He's not the Ramones!
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Now I'd like to get that book....
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I probably should just in case he reveals how he makes his mashups (I'd guess he would) but then we actually all have different ways of working, as far as I can tell.
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