[NewMusic] Slaves to off-the-shelf software?

[Travis C. Johns]

Wow, has a day ever gone by when Momus hasn't had something to rail
against? Then again, the article was quite elegant and sophisticated -
being that it came from an artist whose discography includes quite a
high percentage of harpsichord-addled odes to his penis...

My opinion: Software = tool. Computer = tool. Guitar = tool. Effects box
= tool. Staff paper - tool. Amplified bucket of mud - tool. "Prepared"
parakeet... well, you see where I'm going with this. Granted, yes, the
over-commodification of software and plugins, etc has lead to some
pretty generic, homogenous-sounding, "look how tech-savvy I can be
without really knowing what I'm doing..." type music/video/ etcetcetc -
but at the same time, hasn't there always been generic,
homogenous-sounding commodity-music/video/etcetcetc??? Why is it
suddenly so vogue to blame the technology and the software for creating
mundane compo-slop? Let's face it - computers only do what you tell
them to do so the blame on this one is on the collective "us."

And true, many, many companies offer oodles and oodles of flashy voices,
plug-ins and effects with even more oodles of snazzy presets for
out-of-the-box satisfaction, but that doesn't mean you have to use
them! Explore! Tweak! Make something original - I dare you! Try to do
something you wouldn't expect your flashy new box to do...

Whoops, out of nickels for the soapbox machine - next contestant please!

t.

Quoting "Robair, Gino" <grobair at emusician.com>:

> A topic I've been interested in since I first visited Mills, when
> HMSL was
> king....
> http://www.wired.com/news/columns/0,72705-0.html?tw=wn_index_5
>
> _______________________________________________
> Bay Area New Music Discussion Group
> NewMusic at music.mills.edu
> http://music.mills.edu/mailman/listinfo/newmusic
>