recording culture
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On Pop Music Production Geneologies: Ester Dean’s Compositional Process
In his recent New Yorker article “The Song Machine”, John Seabrook explores the songwriting process behind contemporary pop music. Today’s Top Forty hit, says Seabrook, “is almost always machine made: lush sonic landscapes of beats, loops, and synths in which all the sounds have square edges and shiny surfaces, the voices are Auto-tuned for pitch, Continue reading
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On (Making) Recordings Versus (Living) Live Music
“Record stores”, a friend of mine once memorably observed as we drove past one, “are where music goes to die.” And with the demise of record stores, music recordings–and by recordings I mean CDs–have had a tough time surviving since MP3 downloading became the primary way most people get their music. For musicians, it used to Continue reading
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On Janet Cardiff’s Forty-Part Motet
When you go up to the second floor of MoMA PS 1 in Long Island City, Queens and walk down the hallway you can already hear the ethereal floating voices of Canadian artist Janet Cardiff’s sound art exhibit coming from a large room around the corner, beckoning you to take a closer listen. Walking into the room Continue reading
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On The Allure Of The Worn
If you’re a smartphone user, you may have noticed the plethora of apps for your phone that allow you to process the photos you take on it. Among the most popular apps are FX PhotoStudio and Hipstamatic. For the average user (that would be most of us), the appeal of these apps is their ability to Continue reading
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On Making Music Tangible
“How physical is music?” asks Clive Bell at the outset of a recent article in Wire magazine on the English musician Richard Skelton. Part of what makes Skelton unique is his approach to trying to make music making a more physical thing than its evanescent sounds might suggest. Thus, the composer-musician embraces a unique recording process: he Continue reading
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On Daniel Lanois’ Soul Mining
“Letting something you don’t understand come to fruition is an intelligence in itself.” It’s not that often that a renowned record producer/engineer/musician/composer shares his thoughts on the creative process–from the nuts and bolts of technical things all the way out the mystical side of how to carefully, mindfully mine one’s life and create meaning in addition to hit records. In his book Continue reading
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On Audio Cassette Technology
Today I went to a local dollar store to buy a plastic storage bin and while at the checkout counter I noticed they were selling Maxell blank chrome cassette tapes. I did a double take–it was a little like seeing an old friend for the first time in years–and almost tripped over myself while waiting Continue reading
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