The five-part mini-series investigating the musical legacy of Karl-
Heinz Stockhausen and his influence on today's music - which was
broadcast on BBC Radio 3 last week - ended with comments from the Man
himself on works by Aphex Twin, Plastikman, Scanner and Daniel
Pemberton. So what did he think? Well, you're not far off if you guess
he didn't like it.
He started by saying Mr. James should immediately stop using "Post-
African rhythms" (!) - as if he would musically corrupt himself if
he didn't - and he later extended this statement - when commenting
the other artists - to the rejection of using loops in general
(loops as in time-locked repetition). This seemed to be his major
concern; Stockhausen is apparently obsessed with the connection
between time/tempo and content, which makes his comments on loops sort
of understandable. Locking music to a specific tempo means locking
every musical object to the same pre-defined time-scale, and ending
up sounding lifeless and dull.
He didn't make any definitive conclusions, but he did call the music
old-fashioned (loops and repetition have already been properly
expolored by the Musique Concrete movement), which is probably as
conclusive as one can get on the topic of music or art in general
these days.
I don't share his views on loops or repetition, which, in my opinion,
doesn't have to be static/boring/whatever per se, but the mini-series
was an excellent introduction to another world in that it provided a
different perspective on electronic music than the ones you usually
hear or read in NME or Melody Maker.
BTW, does anyone know where to get hold of Stockhausen releases? They
played excerpts from a piece called "Kontakte", which sounded very
interesting. Any other recommendations (or condemnations :)?
/Oivind Idso/