as i’m sitting here watching silent hill speed runs, i have to wonder what roger ebert could have possibly been thinking when he began his one man crusade against the notion of video games as art. the post was made almost 4 months ago and after 4000+ comments, who knows how many blog responses, and a concession, this is both late and redundant. but it’s an idea that popped in my head and this is a blog so you are powerless to stop me.

we are, as always, unable to agree on a consistent definition of art. it seems that art is some vague notion, and nobody really knows what it is, except that we know it when we see it. so i must fall back on the only definition of art that has ever made sense to me: art is the document of human experience. life interpreted and represented through our eyes. ebert argues that the nature of games (in the most general sense) precludes them from being art: you cannot “win” at the mona lisa. this is a distortion of the argument, and a misunderstanding of video games as a medium. video games are an interpretation and representation of games. a field or a dead shark aren’t art either, taken by themselves.

but back to silent hill. this is a game that i would never in my life try to play. i remember being too scared to enter the shadow temple in zelda when i was younger (who am i kidding i am still scared). but for some reason i’m drawn to silent hill. i have the soundtrack and i’ve read the plot summaries and i watch other people play it. yeah, i just got done arguing how video games are art in the most fundamental way, and aren’t required to be measured in terms of emotional response, or social relevance, or anything. but there’s something about this game, even just watching it, you experience something. that should be worth something, right?

Cadence Weapon – Grim Fandango

i must’ve seen harry potter and the half blood prince four or five times in our hotel in italy. i don’t know why, but between the world cup and harry potter there was just nothing on tv. each time it was on i managed to catch the scene where dumbledore has to drink the Unhappiness Water in order to obtain the Magical Hidden Prize. dumbledore breaks down, and harry has to force it down his throat, with dumbledore crying and begging for it to end.

in all my fuckedupitude, making music has become this agonizing process of existentialism and self-doubt. it always ends the same. i know that no song, no piece of art, nothing ever created in the world ever – nobody ever gets it right, right away. it’s only once i’ve spent hours banging my head against the wall that i’m able to force myself, kicking and screaming, to just write it, just write the damn thing, write anything. and the floodgates open. and i look at the finished product and i wonder about that crazy person from the week before. who let him into my office?

i’ve been given a prescription for a medication whose possible side effects include anxiety, depression, and feelings of worthlessness. well, how much worse could it get, really?

Wild Nothing – Live In Dreams

the opening notes of hunted by a freak just hit me, like that moment of recognition when you’re standing in the audience and the familiarity of a song washes over you and you can’t stop smiling. mogwai have a gift with melody that is, at the same time, not melody. vocals that are barely discernible as such ebb in and out over the steady backbeat and constant guitar. there’s something happening between the vocals, guitar, and bass that i can’t put my finger on, it must be something to do with overtones or harmonics (i should have paid more attention in physics). it’s like looking at something through wet glass, morphed, always changing.

Mogwai – Hunted by a Freak

]]> http://www.thisetc.com/2010/07/mogwai-hunted-by-a-freak/feed/ 0 http://www.thisetc.com/2010/07/d003-summer-mansion/ http://www.thisetc.com/2010/07/d003-summer-mansion/#comments Sun, 18 Jul 2010 03:32:12 +0000 alex http://www.thisetc.com/?p=807

new mix new mix new mix new mix

i know i know, that mason track is overplayed. it’s just such a great opener i couldn’t help it. this one went a little over one hour which bugs me because i am ocd about that sort of thing. but i had to squeeze in that solee track, too good. special thanks to mcdade for the track selection, you should keep up with his tumblr and/or youtube channel if you aren’t already. he has good taste in sound.

“beach fantasy” by robert prinsen.

Tracklist:
Mason – You Are Not Alone
Spooky – Little Bullet (Ballistic Mix)
DBN & Neon Stereo – Delta
Norman Doray – Krystal (Jean Elan Remix)
Dinka – Never Cheat On Strangers
Jerome Isma-Ae, Chris Reece & EDX – Ready To Go
Young Rebels & Francesco Diaz – Damascus (Dada Life Remix)
Ronski Speed pres. Sun Decade ft. Emma Hewitt – Lasting Light
Super8 & Tab – Needs To Feel (Wippenberg Remix)
Simmons & Blanc – Whatever It Takes (Orjan Nilsen Remix)
Lentos – Forget About Us (Barnes And Heatcliff Remix)
Schadenfreude – The Road Leads East (Meat Katie Remix)
Solee – Legends

?D003: Summer Mansion

this album has been sitting in my amazon shopping cart for like, 6 years now. just one of those things. you scrape together enough quarters to buy a shiny new music-disk, and you see that $16.99 price tag and it’s like, ohh man, 16.99 huh…maybe next time buddy.

from what i understand, blockhead takes a sort of Endtroducing approach to beat-making: that is, each beat is made entirely with a record player and a sampler, with minimal alteration of the samples themselves. the samples are layered one over the other, more or less untouched. sounds removed from their original context are thrust together to become something new. when he succeeds it is profound, like finding something you thought you had lost.

unfortunately some samples were just not meant to be stacked on top of one another. the reluctance toward any sort of adjustments inevitably result in some awkward rhythmic or harmonic clashes. the beats sound like the way they were made: you can see the seams. blockhead’s tendency to use saxaphone and harmonica licks for melody can be a double-edged sword at times: they are grating if they are too specific, but forgettable if they are not specific enough.

in the interview i linked, blockhead says that he isn’t interested in learning to use new equipment. while i think there is something to the idea of becoming proficient with a single instrument, there seems to be something in his process that limits any sort of development. a blockhead beat from 10 years ago sounds an awful lot like a blockhead beat from a week ago. when i talk to people about blockhead, the conversation always seems to lean towards once-you’ve-heard-one-you’ve-heard-them-all. i’m not sure if this means anything. there is certainly a different mood between music by cavelight and, say, uncle tony’s coloring book. but somehow it isn’t enough.

i guess it sounds like i’m beating up on blockhead pretty hard. i’m not saying this album is bad, it’s actually one of my favourite of his solo albums. maybe i’m thinking too much as a producer rather than a listener. but if the problems with a piece of music draw me out of the listening experience, i think it is alright to address technical issues.

all that said, listen to this song. you won’t give a shit about anything i just said.

Blockhead – Sunday Seance

this is my entry for the Peter Gabriel remix contest over at Indaba. i wasn’t familiar with the original at first (though after 7 straight days of work i could probably recreate it myself), but the idea was immediate. the female vocal melody and the pseudo-rap delivery in the verses lent the song to electro house fairly easily. this was my first honest attempt at electro house, not to mention i am still familiarizing myself with ableton live, so there was a lot of trial and error in creating this mix. all things considered, i feel good about how it turned out.

Peter Gabriel – Games Without Frontiers (Them Stars Remix)

been doing a little crate digging lately (technically youtube and blogspot digging), and i came across a lot of really great music by underground artists and labels i’d never heard of. so i threw together this little 30 minute mix, my tribute to them, and for anybody else who appreciates that old school 90’s ish.

In The Back Room (right click + save as)

Tracklist:
Da Nuthouse – A Luv Supream
Kode 1 – Lonely
Fierce – Crab
K-Otix – ???????!?!?
N.O.N.-E.Quation – Transparent
SOP – Styles
Moonshine – Sad Sombrero (Maintain Mix)
Fabe – L’Axe
Lost Cawz – Hooks
HDM – Real MC’s
L. – Check The Flow
PHD – Keep It Real (Sha’s Remix)

lovesong is an old favourite, makes me think of 2004. i came up with this “arrangement” (if you want to call it that) based on a fragmented memory of the song. it’s not exactly note-for-note, but maybe that’s the point. you stick a shiny coin in the machine and it comes out flattened with a picture of a train on it.

woo another mix ! mostly progressive/electro house this time. these livestreams are essentially freestyles, so some of the transitions are a little rough (the boys noize track was a bitch to work out).

but that’s what makes them fun

thanks again to mcdade for the track selection. i’m thinking hip-hop next week??

?D002 (right click + save as)

Tracklist:
George Acosta feat. Fisher – Beautiful (Gerry Cueto Remix)
Jerome Isma-Ae, Chris Reece, EDX – Ready To Go
Adam K – Complicated (Instrumental Mix)
Fedde Le Grand feat. Mitch Crown – Let Me Be Real (Hook N Sling & Goodwill Remix)
Sander Kleinenberg – T.I.O.N. (5K Remix)
Faithless – I’m Not Going Home (Hervé’s Heat Up The Club Remix)
Boys Noize – Sweet Light (Boris Dlugosch Remix)
Dennis Ferrer – Hey Hey (Dim Chris Remix)
Gui Boratto – Trills
Cristian Varela – Colmedream

pretty much anybody who asks me what my favourite album of all time is has to sit through me rambling on about this album and how one day, when hip-hop is a legitimate field of study, it’ll be required reading. so yeah, i sort of like this album. of course, i realize that it is sort of a ridiculous thing to say about an album, but i think there is something to it. the cold vein is a groundbreaking record, an album that simultaneously acknowledges convention and transcends it.

thematically, the cold vein is not exactly subtle. the pigeon/phoenix metaphor is simply a variation on the rags-to-riches themes that have defined hip-hop culture for decades. vast aire is especially occupied with the notion of the phoenix, which for him is about the ascent of the soul rather than socio-economic status. cannibal ox aren’t interested in a new pair of shoes.

vordul mega rhymes in snapshots,  each line dense with fragmented imagery and metaphor. when i hear him rap i imagine that i am looking at black and white pictures of buildings through one of those little viewfinders. the relentless staccato of vordul mega’s delivery can be overwhelming and impenetrable, yet it isn’t difficult to see how that might have been intended.

in contrast, vast aire’s rhymes are given room to breathe. he is the more showy of the two. whereas vordul mega’s verses are almost universally bleak, vast aire injects comedy  and does not shy away from personal confession. vast aire defies the traditionally accepted concept of the emcee. he raps with words cut out of magazines, a delivery that sounds like the hip-hop equivalent of a collage. he is not above the typical emcee braggadocio, and yet each verse is laced with self-deprecation and irony. he lacks the raw metrical precision of his partner, yet never comes across lazy (cough mf doom). the f word, which is essentially a solo feature, turns the typically dreaded requisite “girl song” into one of the most genuine love songs i’ve ever heard. just ask my grade 12 english teacher about the analysis i handed in for a poetry assignment (i did poorly).

el-p’s production is a work unto itself – the instrumental only release is one of the few among hip-hop albums where i’ve felt it was justified. the beats fuse traditional breaks and jazz samples with synthetic flourishes, conveying the cold oppression of the streets in a way that hip-hop had never quite managed before – or since. the line between organic and synthetic is blurred. the f word hums and whirrs like a mechanical jazz trio. notice how the synth fuses with the lead guitar in the opening notes of pigeon. jaco pastorius’ rich bass sound is transformed into something otherworldly, hovering. i bought this album immediately after hearing that beat.

Cannibal Ox – Pigeon