On Sat, 9 Sep 1995, For Our Stenographer wrote:
quoted 6 lines Michael, that's the great thing about a techno, the new thing about it in> Michael, that's the great thing about a techno, the new thing about it in
> a musical sense is that there is a developing aesthetic for music that
> has "timbral progression" instead of just melodic or harmonic or
> narrative. Part of that timbral change is done through rhymthic changes
> and part of it is done over actual mutation of the sounds ('brighter and
> duller' as you said).
I didn't want to give people the impression that I had something against
Autechre's lack of melodic and harmonic activity!!! I love the stuff, I
was just interested in discussing what was actually going on.
I'd dispute that rhythm is part of the timbre of the music. To use the
term Thom Heilleson (hope I spelt that right!) used, it's a separate
"axis" on which change can occur. I did an accoustics course in which
timbre was described as a part of the make up of an individual sound, so
what rhythm you put individual sounds into is something else.
quoted 4 lines A lot of synths (old analog) have key-transposition buttons and tempo> A lot of synths (old analog) have key-transposition buttons and tempo
> knobs, which would allow the programmers to make key changes easily
> enough, but there are often 10-50 other parameters (all timbrality) that
> are much more fun.
I've also played around on a sampler which basically used all the
functions of FM synthesis, but on a sample rather than a generated tone.
Listening to 'Garbage' particularly makes me think that Autechre have
access to that kind of thing, as well as synths.
Anyway, I swore to myself I'd avoid gear discussions... :/
quoted 3 lines Autechre tends to repeat patterns over 16 bars and make a series of basic> Autechre tends to repeat patterns over 16 bars and make a series of basic
> chord progressions across them, and often on the '1' of each bar (listen
> to the pads), so there is 4/4 and 3-8 chords under there...
I don't get this at all. Do you mean they have bars of normal time with
triplet quavers or something? Or does "3-8" mean "between 3 and 8" - as
in that's how many chords Autechre fit across 16 bars.
There may be an interesting observation in there, but, sorry, I can't
figure it out. :)
quoted 1 line They use mixes of 4/4 and 3/4 in the same bars, too.> They use mixes of 4/4 and 3/4 in the same bars, too.
How? I have absolutely no clues about polyrhythmic notation (any pointers
would be great), so I don't get what you're saying. Is it either:
a) There are riffs/rhythms/whatever that repeat every 3 beats, and others
that repeat every four beats, but in the same tempo, so they'd be back in
sync every 6 bars.
or
b) They have riffs in 4/4 and 3/4 simultaneously, where the 3/4 rhythm is
slower than the 4/4 one, so they each fit the same bar space. Like really
slow triplets in 4/4, I guess.
Of course option c) is I have no idea what anyone's going on about, and
my explanations are more confusing than what I started with. :)
Michael
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scrot@sans.vuw.ac.nz (Michael Upton)
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