The Minimal artistic ideal

[scratch_eddie]

maybe you are not interested in history. this is fine. but i think its pretty cool when i hear something thinking its some new hot sht and find that its been done 40 years ago.

Too right... If you haven't heard 'something' before, then the first time that I hear that 'something' it is new to my ears. It doesn't matter that if I buy a Patrick Moraz solo album from 1975 many other people have heard the record before... I've never heard it, so to me those sounds are new.

I think people are becoming too caught up in a culture of novelty, where things ostensibly are only of any value if they have just been released. Music is such a personal thing; nobody hears anything in the same way as anybody else and all sounds mean different things to different people, so why should everything have to be new or use the newest technology?

I teach DJing and music production to kids, many of whom have very little sense of musical historicity, and I find it a shame that many of them hear samples of old tunes used in new releases and are totally unaware their background. All music and art has grown from that which went before it, whether in continuation with past forms or as a reaction against past forms, so I think we would all do well to know a bit about musical history... if only because it is a fascinating subject.

At the end of the day, it doesn't matter what you are listening to or how new it is (or whether or not it is "minimal")... if you enjoy it then it's all good!

Peace, scratch_e

[gmschroeder]

Real minimal is making a four-measure bassline on an mc-303 and running it for 11 hours.

Posers.

[gmschroeder]

Oh yeah.
Pure sine wave patches only.
quarter notes only.
c major pentatonic.
full velocity.
No drums except a heavily tweaked 808 kick.

fck, I've almost talked myself into a new pseudonym.

[Smear]

Just thought i'd dig this thread up again purely to see what everyone's thoughts are a year later. Plus this was posted long before i registered and i've just seen it.

I've got a lot of contradictory views on this, basically in terms of techno i've always associated minimalism with not necessarily(but sometimes) efficiency of sound and space, but more efficiency of composition. In my eyes that leaves the 'style' a lot more open than it currently is.

I think one of the problems, and i've seen it happen in other styles of music too, is that there are certain devices you can use to keep people's interest, like little variations in percussion at certain points, certain types of breakdown, and you hear them in a lot of music, and these changes are always along the same lines. Sometimes it seems to me like an easy way to appear clever and creative without actually having to go to the trouble of being clever or creative.

It's quite good to see guys like Mike Parker, MDR records, Sandwell District and the like getting some degree of praise now and again because they throw a lot of these vulgar ideas out and hopefully it continues.

[Torque]

Minimal = Nothing (In many different senses of the word)

The term never really made a whole lot of sense in the first place yet it's been turned into a marketing term so sell the music to you all. Trying to analyze some thing like the term minimal and what it means in music is a futile effort and with every bad description people put forth it will make the term mean less and less. fck minimal, it's all just techno to me. Topics like this on this board just end up turning it all into one big circle jerk.

[Smear]

Yeah but you could take that idea further and say that the word Techno means nothing. Techno's an accepted term though because to many people, the word Techno was being used before they started listening to it. But because 'Minimal' a word that more people have watched come into common use, it makes it harder for them to accept it being used. But 'Techno' is as much a brand name, and has been for longer. And it describes a vague sub-genre of music, therefore it doesn't really mean anything.

[maks]

I suggest you read this book to "understand" where the term "minimal" techno came from and why.

http://www.amazon.com/Microsound-Curtis ... 0262681544

CASE CLOSED!

[Torque]

Yeah but you could take that idea further and say that the word Techno means nothing. Techno's an accepted term though because to many people, the word Techno was being used before they started listening to it. But because 'Minimal' a word that more people have watched come into common use, it makes it harder for them to accept it being used. But 'Techno' is as much a brand name, and has been for longer. And it describes a vague sub-genre of music, therefore it doesn't really mean anything.

You can't honestly sit there and tell me that the average joe on the street has any idea what the hell minimal even is. If they hear it most likely they'll just call it techno. I'm an average Joe too that even knows what minimal is and i still just call it techno. Does it even matter? I don't spin what people would readily call minimal but if i come across a hot minimal record i'll pick that sh!t right up and throw it in a set next to some Underground Resistance record. The only people who give a crap about that kind of thing are not really the average cats on the street. On my last mix cd i took Decompression and spun it over top a Joris Voorn record a Red Planet record and a Kraftwerk record some minimal cats i know around here were like "WTF?" but the Minus guys thought it was sweet. It literally IS all techno to me, why should it even matter to anybody what sub-genre it's called? If i found one that would sound good being mixed with Mothership Connection by Parlaiment Funkadelic is minimal Zeus supposed to strike me down with lightning?