Re: Jungle beatz (WAS is using Pre-recorded Loops Cheating)

[Daryl Shawn <highhorse@mhorse.com>]

I love this so much. It's a fascinating example of the give-and-take 
between technology and human musicians, in this case working the 
opposite direction from the norm. People use the limitless capabilities 
of machines to create things hitherto impossible or unthought of by 
human drummers, and while I'm not necessarily a jungle fan, I adore the 
result when a human then emulates the style. Tom Rainey will do this 
sometimes, on Torn's "Prezens" for example. There's also a guy I went to 
music school with named Johnny Rabb (the "fastest drummer in the world", 
supposedly) who shows obvious influence from the machines in his setup 
and style.

I gotta hear your kit!

There's something elusively distinctive about the jungle beats I'm still 
trying to figure out. What is it, technically speaking? The asymmetrical 
rests, combined with extremely fast groups? I mentioned Veronica May 
last week (http://www.myspace.com/veronicamay), she has a tune called 
Sandpaper that manages to evoke the feel within a bar, just tapping on a 
guitar body.

On the other topic, I'm listening to Reich's "It's Gonna Rain" right now 
on headphones...a near-static loop...that completely fascinates.

Daryl Shawn
www.swanwelder.com
www.chinapaintingmusic.com

> I have just loved that the technique of forward thinking drummers in 
>recent 
> years has soared because they have purposefully tried to emulate the 
> seemingly impossible computer cutups of styles like Jungle and D and B.
>
> Indeed,  I have worked hard on creating a drumset that has three tiny 
> (6",8",10"= snares, 8" hihats and  little 12" and 14" kick drums on one 
>side 
> (to emulate pitching up a drumset an octave on a sampler) and a 26" 
>kick, 
> huge 16" hi hats and a deep 10" X 14" 'coliseum' snare drum,  all tuned 
> extremely flabby and flat to simulate pitching a drumset down an octave 
> (jungle meets half speed trip hop).
>
> Even trying to emulate a drum machine perfectly is fun for me because 
> I'm a human being and can't do it.   It's just fascinating to me the 
>really 
> minor imperfections that occur when attempting to do something silly 
>like 
> this.