....some forwarded mail -fluid
From: Stewart S. Walker <swalker@phoenix.cs.uga.edu>
To: brit@chopin.udel.edu
subject: try a little flakiness
Anybody who has gained such rapid recognition would be hard pressed to stick
to his or her original purpose. I think Rick James has stuck with his
original manifesto quite well. I read an interview with him, though I don't
dance music anymore (except for the fact that I danced around in gleeful
circles when I first heard some bits of SAWII through the Quadra speaker,
and it was tinny and soft. That was from the techno archive... Aphex does
not make "Everybody in the place" songs (though I'm not dissing the Prodigy)
and instead makes music more noisy than I have ever listened to. I hate
industrial music for it's noisiness but Aphex stuff fits into place
seamlessly. What I am trying to say is that he is a composer. Not a
pop-musician, really, this music (all of the ambient and trance and mellow
orgies of delay) is a new renaissance. I'm really not trying to jump any
bandwagons (to be honest, I don't have the cash for it) but this kind of
music I believe will have books written on it after fifty years when
somebody discovers a 20th century DJ bag lost in some field (much like the
"caveman" in Austria). Very few people know about this music. It's got a
good beat but you can't really dance to it, you can pretty much only stare
at the speaker with your mouth hanging open and your eyes wide. I know I
shouldn't concentrate only on Aphex because I've heard a lot of killer music
from all different cities and countries. But just from what I've heard of
SAWII prompts me to. He makes sounds that were already in my head (weren't
they?) but yet never to the concious mind. That's my two cents.
stewart