Electronic music live on stage, what is the point!

conny · Post by **conny** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 12:35 pm

I have not much to add.
Have never been to a DJ'ed modern dancefloor etc.
But for some years I visited the annual Electronic Music Festival in Skinnskatteberg. Small village. Many of the pieces were presented outdoors, with speaker on an old rail way platform and people sitting in the grass.
Some one presented the composer, the composer sat down at the mixer table, the tape was run and he adjusted levels (the wind could change etc).
That felt very honest. His/hers prescense felt valuable and even when not much was touched on the mixer, we knew the composer was highly concentrated and alert if anything should have to be adjusted.

As with Live, I do electronic type of pieces. My problem is that I get bored very fast when listening to things, recorded, uploaded etc. I think it has to do with the lack of feeling of work being done. Listening to my own stuff is quite different, because I know and feel the work, the choices, the wrong and right turns. It's like going to a theatre where you are familiar with the actors.
So even if I'm interested in electronic stuff, I prefer listening to a live jazz band or a organist in church. Prescense, again. Being part of the here-and-now act.

A little far out, but I think this issue has to do with some gliding things in the postmodern culture and techniques. It's getting more and more hard to trust the prescens of an act and to know or feel the effort, time, work, the choices made etc that make up the act.
It's the same thing as the distrust for photographies - O what a beautiful hillside, the photographer has climed all the way to get this wiev. Or maybe he just modelled it in his 3D app?
"Reality" and "Fake" are becoming blurred nodes.
As are "Effort" and "Result".

I touched these thought in a small piece I made some time ago:

http://bluemoose.greatnow.com/Div/real_record.mp3

// C

mosca · Post by **mosca** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 12:50 pm

I used to work at Glastonbury every year since 94, havn't been since 2001 (or was that 2002?) every year the PAs get smaller and smaller as those stages get filled up by more of radio1's playlist artists. the emphasis more on fashion and less on sound.

I really miss it actually, just the smell of it all going on Crying or Very sad

glasto 2000 - best ever (i was one of the people who didnt pay for a ticket and ruined it for everyone else)
glasto 2002 - worst ever (i was one of the people who paid for a ticket and wondered what exactly had gone wrong)

its finished as a festival

mo

Angstrom · Post by **Angstrom** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 1:02 pm

Thanks for the comments.

It just so happens that traditional acts can make a song from scratch with
just a guitar a memory and ten fingers. We cant,
We can.

to me its all about the sound not the visuals

these are the most common things that come up when I mention this.

Yes, we can make something from scratch, it takes me about a week to a month to make a tune from scratch. Not a spectator sport, and my girlfriend tells me it's no fun to listen to. If someone put me on stage with just a fresh install of Live and some samples and VSTs and said - play me one of your songs .. how long would it take me to play that song from scratch ?
The crowd would be in for a big wait.

and yes it is all about the music.

So why are people pretending to make a noise if it doesnt matter what they look like? Why do people stand on a stage visibly pretending and then tell me it is all about the audio. I have had this argument put to me by people who just play a DAT .

" it doesnt matter what it looks like, but I will be visibly pretending anyway"

talk about have your cake and eat it!
If it doesnt matter - why visibly pretend to play then, why not be honest ?

There was a big list of acts a page back .. most of these LOOK like they are playing live and some actually are.

One of them I did a tour with years back and they disapointed me massively with the lack of anything other than two guys watching a timeline.They may have changed since.

I'm sorry to say that I know for a fact that one of those bands named on Page 2 play a backing tape to this day with EVERYTHING on it! Yes EVERYTHING. One of my oldest friends is the 'drummer' and tours the world pretending to play drums. He just laughs about it, it pays his bills.

I know that this band use Live to create their tunes (although that's not widely known) and that they may just be on this board under another name. Please, get a grip. I mean DAT tapes ? that's weird, at least use a big sample.

Sinjin · Post by **Sinjin** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 1:29 pm

im with ya angstrom. this is the point that keeps me up all night thinking, and not yet getting an answer.

see, i cant cooperate with 99% of musicians just due to a difference in indeas and scope of vision, so i choose electronic music. i like having full control. but when you talk live, well, damn...it just presents problems.

most of the time that ive been an electronic musician ive written what amounts to some sort of electro-rock. i like synths, i like guitars n bass, i like singing. good for the studio, but how the hell do u do it live? ive tried doing 'guitaraoke' before, where ive got live playing prerecorded tracks and i sing and play guitar to it...but..well...it just isnt right, is it?

ive done a -rather lousy- live remix once, and while i was working hard and i brought way more equipment on stage than i needed just to make sure the audience was suitably impressed (i even brought a small tv and my xbox and had the dvd for 'a fist full of dollars' playing) well...it still wasnt quite right.

so i understand and agree that theres got to be SOMETHING we can do, but i just dont know what. the only thing ive seen thats got my attention whatsoever is dj shadow and portisheads synchronization with film on huge screens behind them.

Martyn · Post by **Martyn** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 2:10 pm

mosca wrote:
I used to work at Glastonbury every year since 94, havn't been since 2001 (or was that 2002?) every year the PAs get smaller and smaller as those stages get filled up by more of radio1's playlist artists. the emphasis more on fashion and less on sound.

I really miss it actually, just the smell of it all going on Crying or Very sad
glasto 2000 - best ever (i was one of the people who didnt pay for a ticket and ruined it for everyone else)
glasto 2002 - worst ever (i was one of the people who paid for a ticket and wondered what exactly had gone wrong)

its finished as a festival

mo

Ah! yes, totally ruined isn't it?

Actually i was resposible for the boy/girl faces artwork on the Energy24/ Kodak stage in 2000, also did the indigo one in 1999.

2000 was a SEMINAL glastonbury, if i'd known it was to be my last true Glasto I probably would have ODed on something and died happy.

mosca · Post by **mosca** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 2:32 pm

this thread is in danger of descending into musical snob territory.

i play live, i dont move - so what
i play live, i jump about and put on a show - so what

i mime to a backing - so what
i control all the parameters i can - so what

if you like my music and want to dance - great
if you like my music and want to come and watch me stand still - great

if you want great visuals - go see star wars

when i play live - which is rare - i control as much as i can with my UC33 (and now my trigger finger) - i look like a twat when i dance so i tend not to move much.

i cant remember the last time i went to a gig and thought 'wait a minute, that guys just watching a timeline - this gig has now become shit and i want to leave because my illusions have been shattered'

blah blah

it's all music innit?

,o

Sinjin · Post by **Sinjin** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 4:08 pm

"i look like a twat when i dance so i tend not to move much."

heheheh....i saw AK1200 do a parking lot gig a coupl emonths ago..talk about looking like a twat while dancing behind his decks...it was like hed only given his right leg up to the hip permission to dance, and then it was like someone shouted "fetche le can can dancers!!" was hilarious.

onyxashanti · Post by **onyxashanti** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 4:26 pm

this very topic has been the primary reason for me leaving a couple of other forums. the rigidity of perception of we, as artists.

we are pioneers in the midst of pioneering. we don't have the luxury of picking convienient check boxes to define what we do or how we do it. I, personally, play live with my wind synth, with some well known DJ/ producers, AND i dj mp3s with Traktor and my nostromo, AND I do a live PA with ableton LIVE and FL studio. sometimes I do them all at once, and sometime i do them each seperately. I have been doing these thing for years. I find that punters could care less what you use, as long as there is passion, whether the passion is in the programing, the song selection, the stage performance or some combination.

where alot of electronic artists fail is that they don't connect with their audience. when i play, i set my rig up on the dance floor, and run all the requisite monitoring to my headphones. i find that it's fairly easy to direct a crowd with a few choice hand movements. when i was beginning my trek down the electronic path, i studied turntablists. they have it down to a science. every hand movement, head nod and finger flick is done with purpose and intensity. i incorporated this form of physical communication in to my performance, and it has made all the difference in the world. it's not about faking it, but rather about communicating intent and passion to your crowd....and a wireless midi contrller doesnt hurt either. i go fo more of a hacker aestetic; i setup and look as if i'm going to get caught by someone. when i get the inevitable asshole who gives me the "he's lip syncing" look, i get th DJ to drop out, and i start hitting em with basslines. when i play, i usually have the laptop facing the crowd, so they can see all the little meters bouncing around when i play, and not bouncing, when i dont.

if you don't have something to do, give yourself something to do. if you have too much to do, automate a few things, so that you can look up every once in a while. great guitarists practice thier asses off to be able to make those crazy solos look easy so they can stand on stage and pout. performance is not an after thought. it takes alot of work to play live, especially with computers, and look cool. when i saw ritchie hawtin in london, he looked very cool. he had passion and he commnicated that very well.

onyx

Angstrom · Post by **Angstrom** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 4:39 pm

i set my rig up on the dance floor, and run all the requisite monitoring to my headphones

yes, that's exactly the sort of thing I am looking for.

Something that (for your way of performing) makes much more sense than buying into an outdated and inapropriate staging. IE 19th century stages designed for theatrical visual displays. Our work should be more 'interactive' and forward looking, or at least modern. IMO
I used to set my gear up in the dancefloor - but when the venues get larger the stage managers and promoters get a lot more nervous about this. How do you handle that?

I know quite a few players do set up on the dancefloor and it really gets the crowd going - I have no idea how a big act would get by though!

Rx · Post by Rx » Sat Jun 25, 2005 5:32 pm

it's good when people actually play - i've seen Massive Attack and Groove Armada (the live band tour) and they were awesome musical experiences. i also had the misfortune of being dragged to a Chemical Brothers show and they were irritating, tho they did make a big show making bad histrionic faces when twisting filter cutoff knobs.

onyxashanti · Post by **onyxashanti** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 6:50 pm

a stage creates an automatic focal point, so if you are more sound designer than stage diver, avoid it at all cost. I like using a wizard of Oz metaphor; find an accesible hiding place [like on the corner of th dance floor], and make your presence known by the sounds and music you are producing. for instance, when Andy C. gets ino the DJ booth, you know that you are about to hear something special, because he spins loads of dub plates that no one else has. couple that with the fact that he looks as if he is genuinely enjoying himself. he doesnt need to talk or sing or even dress up...as soon as he gets on the decks, you know it, whether you seen him or not. he has a definable sonic sigature. that is what you must develope; a sonic signature so that when you do what you do, however or whereever you do it, people know that it is you [other cats with definable sonic sigantures; aphex twin, photek, roni size, timbaland, ritchie hawtin...]

the speakers are th stage for your creation. if you create good enough aural imagery for them, people will not care whether you "look like you're checking your email".

ethios4 · Post by **ethios4** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 7:07 pm

onyxashanti wrote:the speakers are th stage for your creation. if you create good enough aural imagery for them, people will not care whether you "look like you're checking your email".

Exactly! Thats awesome!

dirtystudios · Post by **dirtystudios** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 7:12 pm

Does this thread crash Safari for anyone else?

k

Macrostructure · Post by **Macrostructure** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 7:36 pm

The point is everyone has a good time...

nuperspective · Post by **nuperspective** » Sat Jun 25, 2005 7:52 pm

this thread is a nonsense. i can end this topic in four words

[1] Hybrid
[2] and
[3] Roni
[4] Size

end of story.

is anybody on this forum going to disbute that Hybrid or Roni Size cant cut it live.