Have we lost something since we killed "the demo"

[Angstrom]

Way back in the distant past of last millenium the recording process went like this
Band or bandmember records a demo on a reel-to-reel, cassette, or a 4 track.
Bands argues about it for a bit, it gets played live a bit, your mate shows you a bassline, but you cant remember it properly and the half assed version you remember makes its way into the track.
Eventually it goes into the studio and is rerecorded
But the drums are weird, you don't like it
Later that year you get some studio time again and you have another go at the track when you are all drunk and it sounds great!
That's the new demo. everyone loves that one.
You rerecord that 6 months later and although the band prefer the drunk demo everyone else likes the new version. It goes on the album and becomes a classic track.

Something about the song sitting around, mutating, stewing over time, being kicked around, replayed, rerecorded - it makes for a rich listening experience. The song has depth.

So in the year 1995 technology happens the world stops being black and white, SCSI is invented by Lord Apple, Jazz Drives overflow with 16 bit samples of black guys saying "Awww Yeaaah!!" and shit 808 kick drum samples, and the new era of music making begins.

Incremental music.
Now we start making a track, and we just keep going until its done. Perhaps some bits get re-recorded, some other samples get swapped.
Bit by bit the boat is replaced. The Ship of Theseus school of music production.

Of course we are still capable of recording a Demo and then sitting on it for a while and then starting a completely fresh recording using no parts from the original. But we would never do that. That would be crazy. We have all the files here, so just swap the kick drum, mute the hats, layer a pad on top, gate the pad with the original drums, use a better compressor.

I wonder if the Incremental Ship of Theseus method is not actually the best for the musical outcome.
I wonder if having to start over every time had merits too. Merits we could easily claim, but won't.

As an example : here's the evolution of Strawberry Fields by The Beatles. It mutates from dirge-like folk, to noise, to pop in 2 years of evolution
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9M8m-Z7Yrec

[pinkpaint]

but demos still exist.. at least if your working with a label.. which is most people in dance and pop music.

[Angstrom]

but demos still exist.. at least if your working with a label.. which is most people in dance and pop music.

Yeah, I guess I'm skirting around the elephant in the room. Most electronic musicians self-produce, or produce in an environment where there's no break in the production continuity.
I'm not talking about Miley Cyrus here, I'm talking about the lower 80% (?) of the music industry.

It's my understanding that most electronic producer types program their tracks at home and then bring their Ableton Session in and render the tracks out to be loaded up into Protools and then that be overlaid with whatever fairy dust.
I mean, I've heard engineers grumbling because the Artist thinks the reampling process has made their MPC sound "too clean" or something. There's a continuity now. There's not going to be a stage in the process where an orchestral version is commissioned, then slowed down and spliced on the back end. The modern process is too contiguous for that sort of thing to happen.

[TomViolenz]

I don't know, I wasn't making music back when demos were still a thing. But honestly that process you describe sounds atrocious. I'm glad I don't have to work that way.
In a way this all sounds to me like asking: Did we lose something when multi track tape recorders were invented/become affoardable. We probably did, but we also gained so much that I won't shed a tear.

It's my understanding that most electronic producer types program their tracks at home and then bring their Ableton Session in and render the tracks out to be loaded up into Protools and then that be overlaid with whatever fairy dust.

Really?! My understanding is that most electronic music producers do EVERYTHING at home and then, maybe, send it online to some guy that does mastering.

I expect that last step to go away as well.
Who can still afford to do that, when record sales don't bring in anything anymore, everyone streams your stuff for pennies, and the only money you make is live, where the mastering doesn't really matter?!

[Richie Witch]

I record demos in my studio for my friends who insist on living in the past.

Still seems to be a lot of singer/songwriter types in my neighborhood with nothing more than a guitar and an idea. I have the gear and enjoy the recording/mixdown process, so they come in for half a day or so, and a few days later, I burn them a CD that they carry around, hoping to be discovered.

We both live our separate dreams.

[beats me]

I miss the days when your release (in whatever form you want to call it) could be less than perfect and not loud as fuck and still be enjoyed by the masses. I knew my mixes weren’t perfect but was fine with that and wasn’t constantly second guessing myself to the point of not releasing things.

Usually when I have an arrangement done I don’t have the fortitude to go back and spit shine everything one element at a time. Hopefully I did a good enough job mixing as I go.

[H20nly]

I record demos in my studio for my friends who insist on living in the past.

Still seems to be a lot of singer/songwriter types in my neighborhood with nothing more than a guitar and an idea. I have the gear and enjoy the recording/mixdown process, so they come in for half a day or so, and a few days later, I burn them a CD that they carry around, hoping to be discovered.

We both live our separate dreams.

this.

but even that is fading.

still, I understand your sentiment Angstrom.

[Angstrom]

I think there's something to be said for recording the song once - then using that as a template for what the song should actually be.

Take a listen to one of your songs and ask yourself: What is the most memorable part, what motifs and moods define this song, and what is really only in there because you reached for it early in the process? That 808 kit, that breakbeat, that analog style pad. Not really serving the song, just scaffolding you kept in the track.

Now ... what would it sound like if you remade the song using only the best bits you remember and omitting the shit bits?
Distilling the song down into a concentrated essence. Discarding the scaffolding.

I know all you singer songwriters and label artists on here don't need telling this

[Tarekith]

I wonder how feasible that is where so much of the music today is about the sound design used in it, and less about the actual melodies or notes being played?

[H20nly]

I wonder how feasible that is where so much of the music today is about the sound design used in it, and less about the actual melodies or notes being played?

i think that sound design is a sort of justification for not being the band... a sort of digital replacement for most of the organic elements. not that i mean that in a good or bad way.

either that or;

the Grammy nominations for most interesting composition go to Alchemy, Zebra, that self generating Ableton template Angstrom made, Operator, TriqTrack, FL Studio 12 plugins, Drum Racks, etc.

Now ... what would it sound like if you remade the song using only the best bits you remember and omitting the shit bits?
Distilling the song down into a concentrated essence. Discarding the scaffolding.

i'm worried that my songs would be 96 - 128 bars of a really great kick but

[oddstep]

Nice thought about the increasing contiguity of recordings. I think that in the West, musical evolution has slowed down since the 90s... maybe the ability to reuse and rework material from earlier recordings has made for a more conservative music culture. Really tho', from the moment people started sampling breaks (and resampling other people using those samples), the game was over for that beatles model of rerecording new versions of an idea. A lot of modern recorded music is effectively a curated gallery of audio material.

[TomViolenz]

Now ... what would it sound like if you remade the song using only the best bits you remember and omitting the shit bits?
Distilling the song down into a concentrated essence. Discarding the scaffolding.

i'm worried that my songs would be 96 - 128 bars of a really great kick but

But are you really sure that this kick is so great?!

[H20nly]

gawdammit!


there goes my entire demo...

[mrgrim3]

graet kick drum m9 but i think tiesto™ has this preset patented

[ian_halsall]

I know that Beethoven for instance had bits of unfinished works all over the place he lived in and would recombine them later on.

Probably everyone does that - if you don't you're daft.