A live improv instrumental cut from an online gig I did today, switching between harp and slide. Not to everyone's taste so feel free to ignore. I posted it as I play with a lot of different FX (on rack harp and slide) so thought it might interest some of the forum members into the more experimental musical side of things.
I call this Bluestronica, fwiw. A mashup of Blues instrumental a la trance blues styles, Downtempo, ambient, chill. Recommend use headphones.
Good observation Ted. My approach to this is very much like painting with sound with a groove base as the frame. That's coming from the ambient influence (eno++) though you could say electronica is also very sound texture based. Blues is as well though too, but a little more constrained in its use.
Interesting sounds. Kudo's for experimentation. Nothing wrong with that.
However, there was really nothing there of interest for me to return to for another listen, so, for me, it was kind of a one of.....my tastes run towards melodic line - whether they be blues, classical, jazz, etc, so what catches and keeps my musical interest was not found here, but others seem to like it and that's ok. ---------- The Iceman
Last Edited by The Iceman on Apr 09, 2018 2:32 PM
I am a boomer, 65 years old, and have a rather strong and developed taste for dissonance, off-script tonality, atonal composition, bracing and abrasive and sonically intense stretches of free-jazz improvisation. This was cultivated while living in Detroit as a teen ager, listening to the Wayne State radio station, to WABX in the wee hours, going to stores like Mixed Media to grab up the latest ESP Disk. Blues , straight ahead jazz and rock and roll are my gospel, but a large chunk of my preferences, the aesthetic dimensions of my version of Plato's Cave, is composed of adventurous, spiky, multi-colored music. Stockhausen, Zappa, Ornette, electric Miles, John Zorn, Derek Baily, Cecil Taylor , Coltrane, Shepp,Ayler,Glenn Branca, Charles Ives...I get it, I dig it. I like what Komuso does here, and applaud the effort to make a new kind of music with the diatonic harmonica, This is grand music. ---------- www.ted-burke.com
@iceman Thanks for listening anyway. That's a very good point about melodic hooks and replayability. A lot of music styles very much revolve around this, as well as vocals/harmonic progressions in song cycles and forms.
There is a method to this compositional madness though.
Low BPM (or even better no BPM) sound texture instrumental music is great as background music while doing other mental work, such as programming or studying. Not Muzak btw, which is a different thing altogether.
Vocals, repeatable melodic hooks, and overly complex rhythmic material act to grab the brain's pattern recognizer and drag it into an active listening mode, which conflicts with the primary job focus task. We still use Tension and release, the common musical formula used to grab listener interest via melody/vocals/rhythm, but it's generally replaced by textural consonance/dissonance (as Ted points out).
This track is still too "busy" in that regards for good background music work, but it's on the edge of that use case.
That could also just be some pointy-headed musical bs I'm using to cover up my inability to come up with catchy repeatable hooks, but that's my story and I'm sticking to it.
Of course, consonance/dissonance is also a key part of the Blues as well, but typically it's in shorter snippets. Just listen to Kim Wilson's masterful use of it here! Tasty tone or what?
@Ted "adventurous, spiky, multi-colored music"
Can I steal that? Great description.
There's a wild and whacky musical world out beyond the confines of the silos we lock ourselves into sometimes. It takes work to listen to some of it but it's a great way to grow your ears and get new ideas.
RIP Cecil Taylor who just passed. Took me a while to get my ears into this on first listen too!
"That could also just be some pointy-headed musical bs I'm using to cover up my inability to come up with catchy repeatable hooks, but that's my story and I'm sticking to it." sez Komuso
Here is where I first heard a simmering musical stew of new sounds in which the heat slowly increased until the simmering was in danger of boiling when - just in time - Miles shows up with a catchy repeatable hook and takes the pot off the stove. Then, he puts it back on the stove and the whole process starts over again and again....
Perhaps this might give you some inspiration for creating a line that floats above the shimmering colors?
@Octafish Hey thanks! I guess that's why Trance Blues is named that way too;-)
It's interesting you mention that though. There are a few people researching non-pharma induced trance states via music directly (age-old music tradition that it is in religion/battle).
