Sep 172011
Sounds of the Hall in roughly 33 1/3 minutes!
In this week’s edition of Saturday Night Shut-In Mr. Moderator is likely to bum out our audiophiles. That’s right, he’s dipping into his vinyl collection, featuring mostly beat-to-hell 45s. You may hear scratches that threaten to wear out your hard drive, but the grooves run deeper. Issues of “cool” are explored, and your host announces his possible starting song (rather than pitcher) for a possible elimination game.
[audio:https://www.rocktownhall.com/blogs/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/RTH-Saturday-Night-Shut-In-45.mp3|titles=RTH Saturday Night Shut-In, episode 45][Note: The Rock Town Hall feed will enable you to easily download Saturday Night Shut-In episodes to your digital music player. In fact, you can even set your iTunes to search for an automatic download of each week’s podcast.]
Mod, is this your attempt to shame me into more Thrifty Music posts? This is really good stuff, but surely the RTH listening public would appreciate material that’s, you know, scratchier.
BTW, I took the time a few days ago to go back through the voluminous archives of Thrifty Music volumes past, and I have to say, there’s some really good stuff in there! I encourage new arrivals to the Hall to seek out this material. Nice n’ scratchy! (Wasn’t that a Humble Pie song?)
You’re not speaking for this member of the RTH listening public! Patina and wear may be acceptable for furniture and other antiques, but in my book they have absolutely no place in music. Scratches, noise, and pops are flaws – they’re annoyances that add no “charm” to the listening experience whatsoever. It was almost painful to listen to some of the records Mr. Mod played.
Would you prefer to watch a faded and scratchy copy of a film or a fresh one? Do torn and stained pages in books turn you on? Is a painting enhanced by layers of grunge? Would you watch a Shakespeare play in a heavy fog? Music is meant to be heard as clean and pristine as it was when recorded.
HVB, as the future author of the best-selling book Shame-Based Parenting, my answer is a resounding YES! 🙂 Do it, brother, do it! You are the master of this medium. Honestly, I simply felt like pulling out some of my scratchy vinyl, knowing full well I’d be held to your high standards.
So that was you on the message board! Clever handle: “olatony”!
What message board?
In response to the second paragraph, I would say it depends.
http://markgleason.wordpress.com/2011/08/19/well-worn-music/
I would also add this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wabi-sabi
Doesn’t it boil down to a stylistic preference?
I would be rather chilly but would love to see a performance of “King Lear,” “Macbeth,” or “Henry V” in the fog as it would add to the atmospherics, symbolism, and etherealness of the scene.
Mr. Royale is a figurative painter and these days he is working with a technique in which he scratches out whole sections of his previously-laid paint so that over time the “body” of the painting is built up and that the marrs reflect a more natural form of human skin. This is in direct contrast to some of his previous techniques which have included airbrushing, layers upon layers of carefully applied glosses, etc. Again, I think he would say one style is not necessarily better than the other but may be truer in getting across a statement.
I have to admit that I sort of like the “warm” pops and flaws in a record, unless it was a skip that ruined the flow of the music.
I’ve never heard of that before, and I think to accept that a contaminated or degraded version of an artistic work is somehow better than a clean version is both false nostalgia and an insult to the artist. Recordings from the 1920s and earlier are already severely limited because of the technology of the times. Adding noise and wear only hurts. I’ll bet the artists would much prefer to be heard as originally played and recorded.
In short, I call pretentious bullshit on the concept of wabi-sabi in the arts.
If the artists and performers intended that a performance of Macbeth have a foggy setting, then fog would be fine. Otherwise, it’s not. If an artist intends that a work has a rustic, primitive, or flawed air, that’s OK too. However, deterioration over time takes away more than it adds. This goes back to my old post about music media. In this fully digital age, there is no longer any reason to accept that degradation over time must be inevitable. I applaud that wholeheartedly and it’s a prime reason why I think the digitizing of music has been so revolutionary.
I hear your point but I do think there can be a beauty, functionality, and sometimes emotional connection in the degradation/trasnformation over time. Perhaps this works better with the visual arts rather than with music?
Do you throw out a baseball mitt as it gets older and softer and worn with time? It bears your impressions and molds to your hand. You probably remember the first time you wore it and subsequent experiences. I wouldn’t call that false nostalgia.
Since Wabi Sabi refers to the innate simplicity/pureness of a form, then it is the opposite of pretentious. However, in this day and age, there are plenty of faux Buddhists and faux artists who ascribe to the notion of wabi sabi in a way that it was not intended.
Well now, hold on there. While I’ll grant you that Louis Armstrong was probably thrilled by the advancements in audio fidelity in recordings throughout his career, and would never choose to record into a giant tin horn onto a wax cylinder — he would also be the first to say: hey, if you prefer the sound of my music as played on a Victrola with a babmboo splinter needle, go for it! It is *I* who call bullshit on pretentious artistes who insist we should only be able to enjoy their music if it’s reproduced according to a method of *their* choosing.
Speaking for myself, I am frequently pissed off that the best versions of songs I find in garbage cans are those crappy old, scratchy singles. (What I would give for a digital copy of that Phaetons song from a recent Thrifty Music episode!) But there are also certain tracks that I’ve grown used to on vinyl, and the CD versions sound too bright and perfect for me. Clearly, this is in the ear of the listener. As Bruce Lee once said: “there is no way as way.”
A baseball glove is supposed to mold itself over time to the player’s hand. Is music supposed to mold itself to suit your ears? I think not. Now what do you do with the mitt if it gets torn or worn out? You replace it.
I see nothing wrong with artists setting conditions on how their work is experienced. It’s their creation, right? There’s nothing pretentious about that. For instance, I have no conceptual problem with George Lucas’ “improvements” to his Star Wars films. So what if fans howl? It’s his work and he can do whatever he damn well pleases with it. If he wants to replace the Ewoks with Smurfs, he has every right to do so, even if I might not like it. My insisting that Lucas be forced to meet my expectations – now that’s pretentious.
Hey this is a really interesting line of discussion that’s developed from what was pretty much a fun stance I take over the value of MY scratchy records. I could get into my personal preference for certain recordings on one medium over the other, but I don’t have a strict “rule” about this. For some artists I’m totally cool with hearing their music the way Lou Reed intended it to sound. For others, I prefer to hear the music through the technical filters of a more “primitive” medium.
tonyola asked:
He says no, while I say HELL YES! Why shouldn’t music suit us and our lives? Even when I’m trying to hammer out some “objective” agreement here for the good of rock ‘n roll, I’m really trying to get you to see my way. You don’t have to agree with it or accept it, but I intend to leave a footprint. I see that as a big part of what we can do goofing off around here. If we’re to live in a world where we’re doing nothing more than trying to identify some “objective reality” of recordings, we’d be a little less interesting, wouldn’t we?
tonyola, there’s nothing “wrong” with your preference for hearing music delivered in the highest technical media available. It doesn’t necessarily make you an asshole – and considering we know you and your love for music, that’s not even a question! I’m standing by the value of my scratchy records and how they fit *me* like my old first baseman’s mitt. I wasn’t trying to promote what I agree would be a pretentious vinyl-only stance or anything like that, just as I know you’re not suddenly revealing yourself as a pretentious audiophile. I was having fun with that comment and the comments coming through on our Twitter feed. I hope we’ve reached a better understanding!
My main point was that I was taking issue with hrrundivbakshi’s statement that we all want to hear scratchy stuff. If someone wants to listen to worn old vinyl, that’s fine, but I would prefer that the podcasts here include clean recordings as much as possible. I know it’s not feasible in every case, but for most works, it’s not difficult or costly to find playable-sounding recordings these days thanks to the internet. I take no joy in listening to scratchy stuff just because it’s scratchy.
When I was a teenager, my first experience of hearing Seattle Garage Rock/Proto-Punk band the Sonics, was on an extremely sratchy, scuffed 45. It blew my mind. I had never known that someone was recording stuff that dirty in the early 60’s.
I was a bit dissapointed when I finally got around to hearing them on CD. I still love them, but a lot of that “dirtiness” I attributed to them, was just dirty vinyl. I gotta say that I prefer that ol’ 45. With digital media no one will ever have an experience like that again.
Thinking about tonyola’s comments over the last few hours, I do agree that there are some types of music that would feel marred by less-than-stellar musical recordings. Primarily, for me, those would be recordings that try to sound futuristic or modern, such as some synth electronica or avant garde compositions. It would be like a pristine air stream trailer, all silvery and sleek, with a dent in it. It would still be functional but lose that special bullet modern appeal.
Thanks for clarifying the direction of your comments and making it clear that you’re sticking to your guns. I’m a little disappointed that you seem unwilling to engage over what I’m sure HVB was getting at as well as I was trying to get at, but I know you’re not “one of those guys,” so we’re cool.
Listen, I am thrilled that anyone takes the time to listen to an episode of this homemade, labor of love podcast. Truth of the matter is, I don’t really broadcast live from some studio, or I am doing the show from my home studio, but it’s nothing like a “real” radio station. The point of the show, for me, is to use my collection to express stuff I feel about the music, stuff I feel about the goings-on here. I don’t always have pristine versions of the records I play. I don’t always have interest in acquiring pristine versions, especially digital remasters, which often change the way the records sound because the remastering engineers apply their perceptions and technical expectations to the original tapes. See, that’s what really bugs me about all these pristine digital versions of music I grew up with. My shot-to-hell copy of Beatles Again (ie, the “Hey Jude album”) would sound much better today if I didn’t spend 12 years playing it on a little green plastic record player. But I can’t really get that whole album as a CD, can I? And if I did some engineer would have “helped” bring out the hi-hats more, or whatever, and made it a different album. Why should I worry about that? I want to turn you onto what I hear, what I feel when I listen to these songs. I never try to hide the fact that I’ve got my own take on things. For that reason, I usually don’t bother to pick up better-quality recordings of records I already own.
For all these reasons, I strongly encourage any Townsperson to put together one of these podcasts and turn us on to what YOU hear and feel when listening to music. I don’t expect anyone to follow my model. If you want to do a Shut-In using only German True Stereo recordings, by all means do so! If you want to use the cutting-edge format that T-Bone Burnett wants to use exclusively for his music, even though it’s recorded on 1920 equipment, go for it!
I would love to hear what you hear, tonyola – and any of you who come here and make this place as fun and interesting as I find it. Thanks.
My scratchy 45 of CCR’s “Commotion” says “RIGHT ON, jeangray!”
Now remastering and remixing is a whole ‘nother issue and I agree that the results are often a mixed bag. I’ve been listening to some King Crimson and early Genesis remasters and while I appreciate the newfound clarity, I swear there are things I don’t hear anymore. In the case of Genesis, I kept both versions in digital form because as far as I’m concerned the jury is definitely out. I do like the new Beatles mono remasters but I wonder about the upcoming Pink Floyd remasters due out later this month.
My main issue was about playing music on damaged or worn media, not so much about how the music was recorded in the first place. I’m certainly no audiophile – I do much of my listening on a $100 3-way set of Altec Lansing computer speakers. They’re perfectly adequate but they’d make an Absolute Sound-reading wannabe audiophile nauseous. If I feel like rattling the walls, I’ll just plug into my Peavey PA.
Well, that’s disappointing. It seems all this interesting back-and-forth stems from a misinterpretation of some silly sarcasm on my part. For the record, I don’t really think RTH readers prefer to hear their music “extra-scratchy.”
My favorite show yet.
Hilarious!