Nothing Left To Invent (or possible even recycle to good effect) In Music aka Dooooooooom!

Is "radically new" really a necessary ingredient of music? Maybe we could start scaling back our expectations of how quickly and how radically music ought to change. Many people are busy happily creating and consuming music that isn't entirely, earth-shakingly, new. That's not to say I'm sure there won't be a next new thing, but I didn't really like the last several new things anyway.

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This will sound very Luddite, I'm afraid, but maybe more of us, not necessarily professionals, should get back in touch with the physical act of making music.

nowdays music/bands/artists are thrown in the face of the consumer like prob nevah before. the range of music available is quite something.

but i would argue that all this technology (guitars, turntables, electronic equipment) has not been used to it's full potential because ppl are into the technological aspect so much that they get the equipment and don't do as much as maybe can be done. I find a lot of techno so rigidly structured it's a turn off for instance.

A lot of things you mention like grunge aren't 'new' forms of music (or rock). Grunge was more like an 'update' on an old form. I believe the same to be true for some of the other things you mention. I still think thre are endless possibilities.

I figure as long as technology helps break down the boundaries of international distance (christ I sound like an IBM commercial) we'll have a pretty big wellspring of cross-cultural potential -- like the African house mentioned elsewhere, for instance. I wouldn't be surprised to see a continued upsurge in the sort of trans-Pacific appropriation that Japan was bringing in the late '90s (music: Fantastic Plastic Machine; other pop-cult: Cowboy Bebop), or more reaching out by the chart-rap producers towards "exotic" music ("Get Ur Freak On"=the first sign of an impending bhangra-hip-hop?).

Impending? Surely something was already being done along those lines in the UK in particular for quite a few years, though obviously Timbaland and Missy helped bust it through the public consciousness pretty damn dramatically.

I never understand this sort of complaint. Isn't "Get Ur Freak On" at least as innovative as "Papa's Got a Brand New Bag"?

But if you really want something that hasn't been done before, how about microtonal soukous-hop, or good trance?

20th Century avant-garde composers without the technology of the 90's turned musical expectations upside down in ways that just about any electronica I've heard doesn't come close to. I'm not necessarily saying that it's better (since I don't equate turning musical expectations upside down with musical quality).

I agree with Julio that there's still a lot that can be done with this new technolgy, but I also think that technological advancement doesn't translate into higher quality music, and I am afraid that is often lost on people. Which is maybe his point: you have to do something with the technology.

I'd like to hear some sort of Drum n Bass using Arabic rhythms as a foundation. Would it be any better I don't know. Also, speaking of microtonal this or that, I wonder if a modal/microtonal approach could be incorporated into a salsa structure. For all I know, some of this may already be happening. I'd also like to hear what listeners from other cultures might create in response to some of Sun Ra's less jazzy, more idiosyncratic, recordings. But alas, I am covering all my predictable bases.

I've kinda been thinking about this sort of thing lately (esp. as a 30 something w/a mofo mortgage etc). I've been searching for the thrill of the first flushes of a 'new' music since I discovered punk/the smiths/acid house and I've come to the conclusion that I'll probably never get it again - not that there won't be anything new/different coming along, just that it won't feel like that to me - I now have too much(?) musical baggage that I bring to anything I hear new (refer to jaded thread etc) that I think I can't truly experience the thrill of discovery. That's what the great thing is - hear something completely different, find out there's more out there and go for it. As such, I think it's probably a 'young' person's game - the wider/longer/further you search for the ever-diminishing 'thrill', the less thrill you get.

There's a theory (I can't recall who or when unfortunately - my mind's going you see) that no matter what you listen to, you generally return to listening to the music you were listening to in your teens [formative period etc I guess]. In my case this seems to have held true, tho' I still have a voracious downloading appetite for new music. I'm still looking for the new and the now, but I know I'll probably be a little disappointed with it when it arrives.

Apologies for the babbling...

''but I also think that technological advancement doesn't translate into higher quality music, and I am afraid that is often lost on people''

I'm in absolute agreement here. It's also abt what do you do with the instruments not just the instrument.

I like the way an improvisor will play on an instrument. the way in which they create the most amazing sounds by using these diff procedures. The best improvisers don't just make sounds but incorporate it to their playing as well. they are restless.

Oh grow up the lot of you.

perhaps music technology has just hit an impasse?

Has anything come down the pipe that has been really new in the last few years? I really cannot think of any products that have been fundamentally different from anything that was out there in the mid- 90s. You can do it cheaper, faster and more convieniently, but not really different. There are more whistles and bells, but the underlying principles are pretty much the same.

The most far out computer programs are only extentions of the funtions of the Emu Emulator Operating System. As far as electronic music has been concerned, the last 20 years have only been about synth/drums machines (Think pre 1985 Hip-hop, Acid House, Detroit Techno, early/pre-jungle UK IDM...) and audio manipulation (think post 86 Hip-hop, Jungle, current idm, loop Techno...)the technology has been pretty stagnant since then.

I think there is still a lot of ground to be discovered, for me at least. I am starting to become interested in Latin music. I have a pretty firm grasp of conventional Euro and African-American musics, but the rest of the world still seems pretty strange and forign to me. There are so many musics out there that I am wholy unaware of. I do not see myself running out of music any time soon. I am 25, so perhaps I will feel differently in 5 years.

One thing I would recommend is to stop worrying about NEW so much and start worrying about GOOD. I am really enjoying the Velvet Underground and Brian Eno albums that I liked in the mid 90's. It isn't new or fresh or underground, but I enjoy it for what it is. I am also into Biosphere, Herbert, and Monolake among other more obscure stuff. I am not so concerned about staying on top of things and being the hippest anymore, I am just enjoying the music itself and not the novelty buzz of brand new music.

Personally, I can't get that buzz anymore. I know how to make just about any electronic record I hear. "oh, he is using that reaktor trick..." "oh that's lexicon reverb..." Novelty buzzes are lost on me anymore. I am just looking for a good vibe that I can enjoy. I like Ella Fitzgerald as much as I like Baby Ford or Mono Junk. I do not expect to have the musical carpet ripped out from under me every five minutes. I would rather hear great well-written records in genres I already know rather than most of the novelty trend driven stuff I hear these days. Icon by Derrick May still kicks the shit out of 99.9% of the trendy plug-in of the month IDM records that are coming out these days.

Nick Tosches and his Goddamned Ecclesiastes quote to thread!

You can make any sound you want. Oh shit, what now?

I tend to think that the greatest challenge is always how to make meaning, not reduce it. Art doesn't come from technology -- it comes from people, and that makes it much more of a pain in the ass.

Here's what I said re. the Internet on another thread, slightly edited:

"Rave and punk and etc. were exciting because they caught on and developed socially in the way they did. i.e. it wasn't that this music was being made precisely, it was that this music was being listened to and then made by loads of people. But if you'd been listening to the right things in 1973-4 or 1984-5 you could have heard the 'revolution' coming, I think (and plenty did). What the Internet does is put everyone - or everyone who wants - in the position of listening to the 'right things', all the time.

The Internet doesn't stop big new things happening and catching on in music or anywhere else - whether your attitude to them is rabidly populist or disdainfully snooty, weblogging is surely an example of this. But the person who gets involved online, writing about stuff, downloading music, taking advantage of the enormous free libraries of music and knowledge online, is making a Faustian pact of sorts - they get all this stuff but they can never again share in the public surprise and excitement that happens when something big 'breaks'.

In other words, if you want to hear kwaito then go into soulseek or whatever and type in 'kwaito' (this is the difference from MTV again) - but in doing so you're forfeiting your chance of being surprised, sharing totally in the public excitement, if kwaito becomes The Big Thing, like punk was.

(In some ways, it's like studying history. You study history because you love it, it excites you (you = "I" here, obv.). It excites you because of all the big things that happened. Then when you study it the big things tarnish and fade away, replaced by lots of tiny causes and influences and long-term trends. And you can't unlearn that. So you give up, or you find your joy in the little stories not the big ones.)"

Ageing does the same thing but the Internet speeds the process up.

i was reading down this thread and thinking what i was going to say, and then Toms answer was there, and that was almost exactly what i was going to say. theres to much focus on 'new' and not enough on 'to who?'

for something to have the shock of the new you have to have missed out on all the lead in to 'the new', but all the lead in stuff is easily available, diffused media. this is what happens when you democratise the gatekeeping, people!!!

punk, acid house, whatever, NEW TO WHO? those that were unaware of what was about to happen (easily done when the media was tighter, less availability, not many people knew). it needed to storm the barricades to get attention, but now there are no barricades - its all out there for anyone...

Fukuyama to thread.

Fuck *new sounds*, fuck *done all before*, I am interested in music that MOVES me.

the new isn't in music, the new is in you!

Of course its not the be all and end all to try and do something new. In fact when these 'new things' emearged it seemed that most of the time they were not really intentional. When you listen to the stories of how records like 'Blue Monday' came about they're often total accidents, or at least the way they get blown up and become so popular are.

I'm in the position of having grown up with the technology boom that resulted in genres such as techno, hip hop and house all emerging in a short space of time and I'm quite bogged down in them all. Because I've grown up in parallel with the music was a little hard adjusting to the idea that not every generation might have that and that there wouldnt be some other kind of revolution for me to encounter (and struggle to keep abreast of) in my mid-late 20s. It did occur to me that the whole 'music and the internet/new technology' thing is the revolution of our time though. If you ask people to name an exciting musical form from the 70s they'd probably say punk, the 80s = acid house, the 90s = possibly drum n bass/garage/the mutations of acid house but for this decade perhaps the most memorable exciting thing has been Napster, AG, p2p file sharing and perhaps even the explosion of blogging. None of it a musical genre as such but equally as inspiring as the music itself in many ways.

But perhaps it is irrelevant that there's nothing new around the corner (people's suggestions such as bhangra hip hop, arabic drum n bass etc. - they've all existed for 10-20 years already at least and thats not what i'm talking about). I didnt mean whats about to become trendy or popular, I meant what could be really qualify as a new form of music. I am putting this down to technology and rhythmic structure but I dont see how else to define it because making music that moves you regardless of how its made has always been elemental. If anyone could name some records that they think delivered new ideas that were not dependent on the technology used to make them then please give some examples - I'd be interested to see what you come up with. Perhaps Radiohead's last two albums might be a good example. What sounds like 'Pyramid Song'? And that track coulve been recorded at any point over the last 10 or 20 years because it doesnt seem to rely on the latest developments in music technology...sorry i had to use Radiohead, I'm sure there are better more obscure examples...

There can't be "an end" to something like "music" can there? I mean it's just so ridiculous an idea. Only evolution surely, and maybe an end in your interest.

"Fuck *new sounds*, fuck *done all before*, I am interested in music that MOVES me."

I agree. I'm not waiting for a scene, an explosion, or a new type of music. I just want each album I buy to sound brilliant, fresh and exciting. Some will, some won't. Sure, I see the need for innovation, but I demand it more on an individual band/artist level. I'm not waiting for one, singular sweeping trend.

sure the making of music is never going to stop. i'm just getting quite fascinated about what kind of music will be popular/trendy in 10, 20 and 50 years time now. if you look at every single in the charts now, is there one of them that couldnt have been sitting in the chart five years ago? I dont actually think you could say that in 1995 or perhaps even as recently as 1998...or do you think tracks like 'Emerge' could only have come out now that the climate seems to be right (whatever that means)?

"Is music like an animal of which we've identified every kind of species?"

there are LOTS of species that havent been discovered

I would say that the music world is still digesting, plundering, recycling, reflecting on the three major new forms of music, new paradigms that emerged between 1985-1995: the house/techno revolution, hip-hop and extreme metal. I can't think of any other period in time, apart from maybe the '20s Jazz era, where so much innovation happened simultaneously. In comparison, the 1975-1985 era was also somewhat of a recycling decade, recovering from the preceding revolutions. Punk as a return to basic rock 'n roll, prog as a sublimation of the 60s meandering experimentation, new wave as a return to basic pop.

Oh come on! you can't say "oh all this could have been in the charts 5 years ago". I mean maybe it could maybe it couldn't but you're basically saying someone could have had this thought process 5 years ago and came up with this single, er how could they? They didn't. If you're saying the charts 5 years ago contained very similar music to the charts now I'm sure a quick chart dig out would lead to alot of people disagreeing with you.

dam, my reply to ronan got wiped...if i can muster the energy i will re-attempt later

i do stand by the 5 year thing tho - whats the most innovative thing in the charts right now? is it the Neptunes productions? Timbaland had set that ball rolling with Missy's first releases back in 96/97...The Streets and Fischerspooner owe too much to what was happening ten (or even twenty) years ago - as Mike Skinner says 'same sights, same sounds, new beats tho'

i'm not saying music was better then, just that its NOT better now

Big upheaval due in 2005. You heard it here first.

Next big thing: link