Why are these views prevalent in electronic music?

[kaiori breathe]

Yes, this post appears to be a more terrifying read than a 10,000 word thesis on tentacle rape. No, surprisingly it's not really a rant more just a discussion with myself, you might benefit from it, you might not. If you have a ton of time on your hands reading it might kill some time as writing it did for me. And yes, this could be seen as more appropriate for SNF or General Discussion, but the people I'd like to read it are here and as far as I'm concerned it's all relevant to production.

Electronic music is one of the few realms of music where some of it's listeners and even musicians seem to promote and endorse views that promote a lack of knowledge as an almost perfect, god-like, messianic truth that must be adhered to at all times, it's one of the few realms of music where those who deviate from holding these views are just plain wrong and will be 'proven wrong' no matter how well or diplomatically (hence my never bothering to be diplomatic - except in this post) they present their counter simply because the majority don't agree and will swamp them with the same arguments over and over and over again and crush their opposing views via a sort of verbal war of attrition. So what are these views I'm talking about...

1., Writing using any formula makes your music devoid of emotion. It's 'cookie cutter', it's 'painting by numbers', it's 'mass produced rubbish'.

2., Writing using theory hinders you.

3., If your music isn't original it's not good

I'm going to try to tackle these as diplomatically as I can with logic rather than emotion and silly metaphors and childishness (even though being childish is obviously way more fun) This is a long read, so there are biccies at the end for anybody who reads it.

1., Writing using any formula makes your music devoid of emotion. It's 'cookie cutter', it's 'painting by numbers', it's 'mass produced rubbish'.

[*] I don't understand this one on ANY level whatsoever. Some chord sequences and song structures, stimulate certain emotions and feelings better than others, you're not going to write a song about the death of your father in a major key using a 1-4-5 chord progression are you? ... Well, maybe you would, but I imagine only if he was a total bag of dicks as a person, or Hanz Fritzl, but if you're trying to create a sense of sadness you're far more likely to write in a minor key and follow a standard minor chord progression, like a 1-6-5 or maybe a 2-3-1 in a minor key. Jumping straight to these chord sequences and applying them is following a formula, sadness = 1-6-5 in a minor key, happiness = 1-4-5 in a major key, hope and elevation = 1-2-3 in a minor... etc - but what does that matter? The formula works, it instills and presents the correct feeling you're trying to convey. As for structural formula, the most well received and memorable songs usually are around 3:30, this usually means an intro, verse, verse, chorus, verse, verse, chorus, chorus, out. Since that structure is proven to work, and proven to have enough changes at the right points to keep people's attention why not use it? Why use something less effective than what has been proven to work?

[*] Two words. Bob Dylan, re-uses the same chord sequences in different keys. The man pretty much wrote the same song over and over again. But the content is always moving. While he's clearly found a song formula that works and is sticking to it the creativity, the emotion, and the fact his songs are 'good' as opposed to 'painted by numbers' comes from his ability to voice the same things in new ways in each new song he writes. Great song writer, emotive songs, following a formula.

[*] All pop music follows basic formula. The very reason pop music can be sold to the masses is that it stirs up feelings in the listener, they listen to the tracks, they relate to it, they interpret it in their own way and emotions are stirred - something devoid of emotion couldn't do that, certainly it couldn't do it to such a mass audience - yes you could argue that it only reaches a mass audience because of labels holding a monopoly and forcing it in people's faces, but the argument doesn't really work, since labels have no way to force people to like and embrace the music they shove in their faces - you could argue people only like it because they're musically ignorant but it's a weak argument because even if you educated the public in music the only situational change that would occur is that labels would start making music with a more complicated formula that appeals to people's newly 'developed' (in inverted commas because I don't want to imply one taste is of a higher order than another) taste.

[*] Even classical music, a genre that could be argued to be one of the most complicated and, it's listeners would argue, full of emotion, follows typical structural formulas and the same chord movements will recur infinitely within this genre. Baroque music is notorious for rigorous structure and theory application. Is all baroque music devoid of emotion because of this? No.

[*] The biggest problem with this argument is that it isn't an observable truth. The biggest and best epic songs in pop, Hallelujah by Leonard Cohen, Aerosmith's Don't Wanna Miss A Thing, Who Wants To Live Forever by Queen and November Rain by Guns & Roses (sorry for all the rock examples, I don't listen to as much electronic music as most of you guys so I'm not as well versed as to have big tunes from the electronic scene jump into my head as quick as those ones do), for example, all follow a standard structural formula and use fairly similar chord progressions as others from the whole 'epic' genre (I know it's not really a 'genre' as such more a collection of songs from different genres that hit the 'epic' mark) and they all stir up great deals of emotion in their listeners and most of them were written by people who poured a lot of love into their song and into honing their craft.

2., Writing using theory hinders you.

[*] This is the most annoying and confusing one, it's also voiced quite a bit as the 'Jimmi Hendrix didn't have theory and he was the best guitarist ever!' argument...

First off, it's silly, because, EVERYONE WITHOUT EXCEPTION KNOWS SOME THEORY, some know more than others and some don't even realize they know it.

There are a few ways to learn theory. The first is the most commonly practiced path. You go and get lessons, you get taught it directly. The second is harder, you learn it on your own. There's a third path to learning theory too... People's observance of people who follow the third path is where this argument seems to come from in my estimation.

The people who follow the third path are the ones who learn to use a DAW or an instrument without knowing anything about music or how it works (nothing wrong with this) then they start trying to write songs. They learn by trial and error, they learn by ear, they learn by listening to their heroes and trying to emulate them, or by cutting themselves off from listening and writing on their own getting their peers and using their own ears to judge their tunes, and eventually, they start cranking out great tunes, because they've developed their ear so effectively that they naturally pick the best possible chord sequences and melodic movements.

They start writing songs that follow the 1-4-5 chord sequences because their ear has learned that it works, they start adding strong chord embellishments, and they write what would be theoretically strong melody lines, according to standard structures (structures they've heard being used by their favorite artists and subconsciously stored in their heads) - they won't have the words to attach to it, if you ask them what chords they use they'll probably tell you they don't know, or that they just did it by ear, but when you sit and look at the works of great artists who 'didn't know theory' and you analyze it, you'll always see it abides by the rules of theory just as strongly as the songs made by others who learned theory directly.

Just because you didn't sit and read about key signatures and time signatures and scales and modes doesn't mean you don't know theory. You know it, you just know it in a different way.

Since everyone knows and uses theory (even if by accident) this view no longer works.

[*] The other side of this view is that knowing theory will trap you in a box. To counter this, I present Schoenberg, Debussy and Berg. Pioneers in serialist writing and 'atonal' writing. They built upon the theory knowledge they had to write an entirely new rule set, a new system for writing or expanded on the new system of writing. Romantic composers such as Liszt before them did the same. There's also a simple prefix that when attached to any genre utterly destroys this argument... Avant-Garde... Any 'avant garde' genre is usually highly based in theory, but still really interesting and creative.

[*] The other problem with this argument is that it, again, simply isn't an observable truth - partly because of the fact that everyone knows theory anyway, even if my assertion that everyone knows theory - they just don't all realize it and we all have different levels of knowledge - was wrong (which it isn't) and people did either know theory or not know theory it wouldn't be an observable truth that the people writing using theory were any less original/creative/composing good songs than those writing without.

In summary, as far as I'm concerned view number 2 is nothing more than a vast and unrealistic generalization that puts people off learning something new that they could enjoy. For anybody who wants to know, I learned theory the second way, on my own, I just read and read and read, I genuinely enjoyed it, then later I took it up at A level and got tutored. For me the idea that somebody could be put off having that same great experience I had, or simply be put off learning, is almost painful to deal with, hence my so vigorously assaulting and lambasting this view every time it crops up.

3., If your music isn't original it's not good

[*] First off, it's pretty much impossible create an original chord sequence given that in any given major or minor key you've only got 7 notes to work with (unless you go chromatic). Even if you work around the chromatic scale, there's only 11 notes to work with, if each chord has 3 notes in it and you have a 4 chord progression that doesn't leave a whole lot of room for originality, you can double those numbers if you start writing bitonally, but even that's been done before, and apparently it's not very appealing... Music's been around a long time, I'm pretty sure we've exhausted every possible chord progression, so from a musical perspective originality is dead, the best you can do is come up with something that isn't commonly used - you might consider that original, but it probably won't be a strong piece, as if they aren't commonly used it's probably because they fail to entice the listener or because it fails to stir emotion in the same way a 1-4-5 might.

So how do you make original music if not in the actual composition? Well the only way to be original anymore, since musically all the harmonic and melodic movements you could think of have already been done at some point, is in your voicing of old ideas.

In my estimation these artists are original, Michael Hedges, Steve Vai, Eskmo, and I'm told Burial is original (haven't really listened to a whole lot of him to be honest so can't guage but I'm using him here since he's one you're all familiar with and will probably be able to agree on the originality count) - I've chosen 3 different genres just to expand this whole thing a bit beyond electronic music - look them up if you're not familiar with them, they all came up with original ways to voice old ideas and that's great (you can find sheet music or just listen and work out what's going on in their tracks, none of them are doing anything spectacularly new or original in terms of the actual harmonic and melodic movement, it's great music obviously, but it's nothing really insane, a few Fmadd9s here and there, maybe key changes, or modal changes, eskmo can be quite chromatic at times, as can Vai, but that's the height of the craziness - not saying I could write anything that compares, just saying, technically it's not original, from the perspective of what's being voiced, since a lot of their chord progressions and melodies have been done before)

But... Do we all really need to be the next Eskmo/Burial...etc? If everyone was original then surely none of us would be... You NEED unoriginal music for original music to exist. It's this horrible irony that people are constantly tripping over, lambasting unoriginal music while failing to realize that the only way to gauge something as being original is if you have something 'unoriginal' (I'd use the word 'standard' rather than 'unoriginal' though as unoriginal implies it's bad which I'm not a fan of) to compare it to...

[*] The other painful part of this view is that pretty much everyone is striving to be original now. Everyone is trying so hard to get outside the box. Surely the most original thing you can do is not give a shit about being original and just write the music you want to hear? Write the way you want to, if you want to follow typical chord sequences and you like the sound of typical structures and you enjoy typical voicing and using standard instrumentation, then do it! Equally if you want to be just like Burial then do it, there's nothing wrong with being a 'copycat' musician if that's what you want to do (just don't plagiarize) if you feel the way Burial writes is the way you'd like to write and is the best style you've heard for voicing how you feel then go write tunes like Burial. If we didn't have copycat musicians the music you love that comes from an original artist wouldn't be recreated by new artists in slightly different ways thus creating a genre you enjoy.

One more thing that ties in with all of this... Well, one more thing that comes before the last thing...

Forums are problematic.

A lot of people who state these views on a forum don't actually believe them (bear with me here)

Hypothetical:

Somebody makes a 'having theory vs not having theory' thread. Somebody else responds. Somebody else does the same, a debate is opened up, it naturally degenerates to name calling and childishness (yes I do it too, we all do it at some point, it's natural and nothing to be ashamed of, if everyone hates you you're doing it too much though... I'm probably dangerously close to that point but I'm an opinionated prick so that's natural for me, you should try to avoid it though, you're probably not a terrible human being like I am).

The problem here isn't the debate or even the childishness that it turns into, in fact, sometimes that's the best part of it, the problem is that when somebody voices their views on an issue like this on a forum, the post they make, the post you read, is more often than not a simplification and generalized form of what they really believe, it's a watered down version of their actual thoughts.

An extension on my hypothetical - A lurker comes in and reads the words "you don't need theory, it puts you in a box, get high and just hit random notes" the problem, a lurker has just read a watered down simplification of your thoughts and you potentially have influenced him/her to think, not in the same way you do, but according to your generalization. This is problematic. Equally when somebody like me comes in and writes a 10 page essay on why everyone but me is wrong and why theory is the most important thing in the world what you end up reading is at times a ridiculous exaggeration of my own views, a mixture of an expulsion of verbal bile for my own amusement and childish wankery spawned from my being an intolerably prick, my views are in there somewhere but you're going to need to dive pretty deep into the pool of verbal revulsion I've created to find them and if you really want to do that I recommend taking a harpoon for when you inevitably find yourself wrestling a giant metaphorical argument squid born of childrens' tears - so just as the watered down views should not be taken to heart and followed as truth neither should mine (yes that includes this entire post - painful irony of making everything I've argued for here redundant is painful).

What I'm trying to say is nothing you read here is what anybody actually thinks or believes, everything is laced with truth but it's either watered down in a summary post or exaggerated in the heat of a debate. So to anybody undecided on any debates that crop up here, the best thing you can do for yourself as a musician, is detach yourself from what you read and weigh it up and keep in mind that what you're reading isn't an absolute truth even to the person who posted it.

The last thing

If you read that sorry, I have a lot of time on my hands, it's not a rant, I'm not angry, I might have come across as aggressive, if so it wasn't intended, sorry if anything I've said offends, if you want to disagree with what I'm saying here you're more than welcome, I won't be posting in response to anybody who disagrees with me though, as for once in my time on this forum I'd rather this didn't degenerate into wank (although I'm sure somebody will help it do that, and I can't say I'd blame them, because I'd do the same in your shoes, ruining threads is fun, let's not pretend it isn't)

Oh and there are no biccies, I lied.

[Neff]

tldr?

[Phigure]

impressive wall of text. second one bugs the shit out of me as well

[stompzi]

Surely by definition if you write music by pure trial and error then you don't know theory? Whether the outcome fits the theory or not, you don't know theory.

That's like saying anyone who has ever been moved by Die Verwandlung is a scholar of German literature because they got it. Heh.

[3za]

[tripwire22]

Surely by definition if you write music by pure trial and error then you don't know theory? Whether the outcome fits the theory or not, you don't know theory.

That's like saying anyone who has ever been moved by Die Verwandlung is a scholar of German literature because they got it. Heh.

but does that itself even matter

[stompzi]

I don't think so, but then I wasn't the one complaining about it

[tripwire22]

its not like we are tryna write symphonies i dont feel knowing 100 percent of music theory is needed and alot of times its more about the rhythm than the notes. i think its entirely possible to make "music" with out knowing anything about music. just by using ur ears and trial and error from emulating what u hear in other tracks and applying them in ur own ways. cuz thats all ive done.

[kaiori breathe]

Surely by definition if you write music by pure trial and error then you don't know theory? Whether the outcome fits the theory or not, you don't know theory.

You're free to disagree but I think my rhetoric for considering the end result of trial and error as 'theory without the words to describe it as such' was fairly effectively laid out. Or at least as effectively laid out as I'm capable of it.

Like I said, it was a discussion with myself more than anything else, I'll assume from your snoozing you didn't find anything of any value in it, apologies for that.

its not like we are tryna write symphonies i dont feel knowing 100 percent of music theory is needed and alot of times its more about the rhythm than the notes. i think its entirely possible to make "music" with out knowing anything about music. just by using ur ears and trial and error from emulating what u hear in other tracks and applying them in ur own ways. cuz thats all ive done.

Yea I agree, you don't need 100 % of the theory, it's impossible to even know that much I think, it would take lifetimes to learn all theory. Like I said in my estimation using your ears and trial and error IS knowing theory, just not learned or applied in the same way I know it.

[stompzi]

Then I'm somewhat interested (and honestly not sticking the boot in ) as to what your definition of "theory" would be.

[paravrais]

Great post, especially the bit about learning music theory. I think me and you had a minor disagreement about that before but actually we both feel exactly the same way about it. Must have been a communication error where I didn't explain what I meant properly. Basically was trying to say that you don't have to learn music theory from a book to become a great musician, not saying that that isn't a good way to do it just that it *can* be done via trial and error and self discovery though it is probably a much harder and longer road to do it that way. Personally I like to think I do numbers 2 and 3. I'm slowly teaching myself theory through various resources online but at the same time a lot of days I just jam on the keyboard and try and figure out what sounds good for myself.

[mks]

i think its entirely possible to make "music" with out knowing anything about music. just by using ur ears and trial and error from emulating what u hear in other tracks and applying them in ur own ways. cuz thats all ive done.

You pretty much defined today's kids with a pc that wants to make beats.

@ Kaiori - There are so many grey areas with music and art in general, best to use those grey areas as strength, not a weakness. Nothing is truly original as nothing appears out of nowhere from a vacuum. In fact, I would venture to say, that often anything considered new, is often a reaction against something or choosing a different way to go. I think that the rise of Minimalism as a reaction against Schoenberg and Serialism is a perfect example.

EZ

[tripwire22]

i think its entirely possible to make "music" with out knowing anything about music. just by using ur ears and trial and error from emulating what u hear in other tracks and applying them in ur own ways. cuz thats all ive done.

You pretty much defined today's kids with a pc that wants to make beats.

i am a kid with a pc that wants to make beats but i think it depends on ur influences and how willing u are to experiment to make a sound cuz you really can just about make any sound u can think of if u fuck about in ur daw a bit

[mks]

i think its entirely possible to make "music" with out knowing anything about music. just by using ur ears and trial and error from emulating what u hear in other tracks and applying them in ur own ways. cuz thats all ive done.

You pretty much defined today's kids with a pc that wants to make beats.

i am a kid with a pc that wants to make beats but i think it depends on ur influences and how willing u are to experiment to make a sound cuz you really can just about make any sound u can think of if u fuck about in ur daw a bit

Absolutely, and for some it will never be more that that but for some there will be a new source of inspiration leading down different paths of study. For me in my case, I would have never gotten into jazz if it weren't for fusion, but I came to that via a circuitous path via punk and dub...

[kaiori breathe]

I think me and you had a minor disagreement about that before but actually we both feel exactly the same way about it.

I've had disagreements with everyone, I'm the verbal equivalent of a violent ape on PCP

Absolutely, and for some it will never be more that that but for some there will be a new source of inspiration leading down different paths of study. For me in my case, I would have never gotten into jazz if it weren't for fusion, but I came to that via a circuitous path via punk and dub...

For me the transition was rock> shred metal > death metal - then a massive turn > acoustic fingerstyle > jazz > drum and bass > dubstep

and all the other genres I've dabbled in and listen to were just found during transitional periods. But each genre led me to another one, the movement from rock to shred was because I wanted to be a better guitarist, from shred to death was because I wanted something heavier, with death metal the massive turn was caused by my disliking the scene, the movement from acoustic fingerstyle to jazz was a sort of quest for more knowledge and the movement to electronic music was again the same because I'd felt I'd learned as much theory as I could keep in my head and wanted to learn something practical, i.e., production. I'm sure one day I'll move genre again. It's always interesting to see people's progressions laid out.

[Neff]

after saying it was too long and i didnt read it...

i did read it and i think i agree nearly completely, you are clearly very knowledageable about all this theory buisness

but i personally fail to see how thoery is important in the music making process and listening for that matter

my view is if it sounds good then its good (yes im a kid making music in my bedroom, and what) and knowing that they used a specific chord sequence or timing then that wont make it any better or worse, but dont get me wrong i can see how you can appretiate the difficulty and i suppose skill in witing in a wierd timing/using complex chords, melodys whatever

sorry if this is not the point you were getting at i probably read it wrong

anyways it was very interesting

[paravrais]

I think me and you had a minor disagreement about that before but actually we both feel exactly the same way about it.

I've had disagreements with everyone, I'm the verbal equivalent of a violent ape on PCP

And that's what we love about you XD

[corpu5]

i think sometimes people shouldnt over think what they're producing and stick true to themselves. If it works it works, if it doesnt, it doesnt ..... thats life, some people suceed, most fail. Dont spend your time mulling these ideas/opinions over, you're just wasting time imo. Get off these forums and write some music innit

EDIT : actually no you should express yourself but tbh there's nothing to get frustrated over now is there? slash was never musically trained and if he was what difference would it make? he'd still play the same sounds he had in his head ...

[decklyn]

I agree with alot of what you said. I see the same stuff coming out of the melodic mixing discussions I've had. Naysayers are mixing melodically and they don't know it - they just pick by ear instead of using a tool (or they are just shitty djs)

People just like to fight and recent studies show 96.5% of the surveyed human population has some degree of downs syndrome. Scientists estimate that this number may in fact be higher.

And people say that you shouldn't emulate or blah blah blah blah blah. Don't think of writing music in such as static context. Writing music is a process that happens over the entire period of your life. Maybe today I'll try to make a wobble - don't bash me for it because tomorrow I'll build on it. Maybe today i'll focus on the stereo field in my tune. Then the next tune I write when I'm focusing on something else I'll be working with space and not even really thinking about it. It's a process, and at the end of the day it doesn't really matter what you do or think about or focus on or emulate right now, it's the fact that you are
1) enjoying yourself
2) enjoying yourself
3) enjoying yourself
that matters.
Even if your tunes are shit, if your life is enriched by writing, you win!

[kaiori breathe]

sorry if this is not the point you were getting at i probably read it wrong

To be honest there is no point to anything I said here, like I said, it's a discussion with myself and on forums it's rare you change somebody's mind so that wasn't my intention, I suppose in a way I was consolidating my own views by writing them out, and I ended up posting it in the hopes people might take something from it - so if you asked yourself a question, went away with a new artist or composer to listen to, found yourself disagreeing with me as you read, or at least found what I said interesting in some way, then I consider this thread a success.