quoted 6 lines essentially, the main point that reynolds criticizes> essentially, the main point that reynolds criticizes
> about this genre is one that even its own members resent, and dispute
> ceaselessly : the bug of 'elitism', the secret desire that no more than 300
> people should deserve this record, the quest for more music and the delight
> in connoisseurship, the selfish joy in owning and knowing something secret
> that the the rest of the world finds unattainable.
ah, the reynoldian fear of the hole inside geekdom where releases fall
only to lose all meaning & influence forever...
the bug of elitism as we currently know it is indeed a plague. but the
fact is, it only marginally happens: the problem is that it is extremely
visible on lists such as these, where records trade at the speed of
light & news from every obscure label flies just as fast. a great
'source of information' as many have pointed out, & this is indeed the
very reason why i subscribed & began participating to this list in the
first place.
what is so interesting in marginality, experimentalism, etc.? well, it
stimulates the mind because it offers a different view on music: not so
much how it immediately appeals to you but what it makes you discover,
the strange places it makes you visit. sound boring? well, so be it: i
like it. not so much 'idm' itself: other types of music interest me as
well, but i find many idm acts to be fairly worthy of a listen,
especially when they don't fall prey to 'proven formulas' (such as the
dreaded 'autechre sound') & redundancy in general.
needless to say, these records would likely fall without a public if it
weren't of the little 'scene' created around them. we buy them so that
they are heard, listened to. notice how that contrasts with the
reynoldian fear of limitedness of releases: he's absolutely right in a
sense! releases should be distributed as wide as they can, but many
things come in the way, among which:
1) the reluctance of the general public to purchase marginal releases,
resulting in less sales;
2) the amount of marginal releases as opposed to mainstream, diluting
the sales (ideally as more people look into this pool of releases, this
could be less of an issue; & i am certainly looking forward to the day
where the means for art is so immediately available to everyone that we
can all be famous for 15 people);
3) small labels usually have to deal with lighter budgets... that
certainly doesn't help either.
& while i'm at it. another common reynoldian pick at idm is the
'unavailability' of its recorded production. looking solely at a label
such as skam or mask, which has often seemed to calculate its print runs
to half the expected demand, he has ammunition. but in fact, most of
the records we're talking about are relatively easy to find, & their
relative obscurity mostly has to do with the fact that most record
stores simply won't carry them because of limited demand: it's a vicious
circle which is only solved with the aid of mailorder & certain
specialized shops.
this however leads to a sad recognition: that to keep up with all this
production, one has to have a certain amount of time & money to put into
it, which the majority of america clearly doesn't possess. in a perfect
world, this is the sort of hobby that everyone in a civilized society
should be able to indulge in. unfortunately we live in a rather
pathetic society, & it's only getting worse.
~ david
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