Re: OT: Drum machines vs. Human beings

[ArsOcarina@aol.com]

Rick,

In a message dated 6/11/02 11:07:18 PM, GLOBAL@cruzio.com writes:

>I love the juxtaposition of the highly processed and artificial
>and the extremely primal and human and idiosyncratic natural.

This is also one aspect of looping I've made it a point to explore 
again and again over the years -- the "natural" organism pushing, 
pulling, straining and ultimately violating/transending a "machine-
made" grid. 

In one "model" of looping, the loops help one person to
expand into several musical tasks (much like your story of 
the trap set). But, like drum machines, loops are not the 
same as human beings. Nobody . . . but nobody could play the 
same phrase over and over with a looper's precision. Nor 
would most "real live" musicians that I know want to. 

Ultimately, a looper's output will almost always have an artificial, 
somewhat mechanical aspect to it . . . to some extent (IMOHO). 
I find it interesting to not try to hide or avoid this . . . but to
exploit it -- and sometimes even highlight it to contrast with
what I'm doing otherwise (on whatever instrument I happen 
to be playing). Anybody else have thoughts on this?

And, as for "models" of looping (since I've mentioned it) 
what I find so very intriguing about Andre's experiments is 
that he seems to have stumbled onto a whole new model 
or way of thinking about what looping is or can be. Just 
how much of this is due to the new EDP software and
how much is his own (very real) musical brilliance is the
"chicken or the egg" question of the day. Whichever . . .
my hat is off to him and the Aurisis Research guys both!

Cheers,

Ted Killian

PS: Oh, and yes I am a guitarist (or I regularly impersonate 
one in public) and I am TERRIBLE at programming drum 
machines. I've owned precisely 3 at various times and have
not been able to program any of them to my satisfaction.
Now I own exactly none. And the world is a much better 
place for it.

Ciao!