Is the dream of the underground dead?

[pete_bubonic]

seems like it needs regulation, there are definitely a lot of people out there who won't think twice about ripping people off with something like this.

Not to constantly make things about me, but this very related to what I was saying in response to Wub. If you go and back some dodgy kickstarter / indiegogo / etc without knowing the people running it or at least have solid info / recommendations on them. then you're gonna get all your paper taken.

Those producers/labels that have a solid fan base, those that have built their following (and for those of your who are nerds on the online business models: the CwF model in effect), then I reckon it's golden.

[wub]

Also, for sheer comedy value, here is a project about an EDM comedy;

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/109 ... w?ref=live

A wild, sexy & techie comedy about the hilarious perils of being a DJ in the ever-growing trend-setting Electronic Dance Music culture.

[Pedro Sánchez]

Nice Electribes though, her hands also look large enough to handle all them knobs.

[garethom]

Should point out, that on Kickstarter (at least about a year ago, when I looked), you don't get ANY money until you meet your goal. As for what happens when you get the money, god knows.

IndieGoGo, a similar site to Kickstarter gives you access to the funds raised as you're going along, iirc.

[wub]

Should point out, that on Kickstarter (at least about a year ago, when I looked), you don't get ANY money until you meet your goal. As for what happens when you get the money, god knows.

Is there anything to stop you from 'donating' the final amount to yourself to break the barrier though? Say I want $3500 but only have $2000 donated...if I pledge the remaining $1500 to myself I still get the $2000 from other people?

[garethom]

Hmm, guess not!

[wub]

Hmm, guess not!

brb pledging myself a holiday

[hugh]

fuck wub that's genius

[Johoosh]

Has this been posted yet?

[ezza]

that is such a good song

[kay]

Girls Aloud can fuck off.

[garethom]

^^^ madness, Sound Of The Underground is a tune.

[Harkat]

What about actively disconnecting your community from the internet? Going dark? It is something I'm thinking about. I'm thinking about doing analog only releases, and local live performance/playing, that doesn't make it to the internet. Doesn't exist there. No preview tracks, nothing. Doesn't even exist. Can something like this happen?

I reckon this would just result in even more fakeness in the end. In the same way Burial's anonymity ended up making his tunes the exact opposite of "just tunes from the underground, bruv", that kind of deal, provided it gets off the ground will just manifest as "THE MOST EXCLUSIVE, AUTHENTIC PARTY OF ALL TIME" and will start a giant hype wagon eagerly documented by Fact magazine.

It's the hipster paradox. Like that article about deep house bros once said, the only way to live the rave dream truly is to embrace something that's so horrendously uncool nobody will ever be able to spin it into trendiness: Gabba.

[ultraspatial]

What about actively disconnecting your community from the internet? Going dark? It is something I'm thinking about. I'm thinking about doing analog only releases, and local live performance/playing, that doesn't make it to the internet. Doesn't exist there. No preview tracks, nothing. Doesn't even exist. Can something like this happen?

I reckon this would just result in even more fakeness in the end. In the same way Burial's anonymity ended up making his tunes the exact opposite of "just tunes from the underground, bruv", that kind of deal, provided it gets off the ground will just manifest as "THE MOST EXCLUSIVE, AUTHENTIC PARTY OF ALL TIME" and will start a giant hype wagon eagerly documented by Fact magazine.

It's the hipster paradox. Like that article about deep house bros once said, the only way to live the rave dream truly is to embrace something that's so horrendously uncool nobody will ever be able to spin it into trendiness: Gabba.

gabba can be alright tho. and look at stuff like mpia3 that sounds like slowed down gabba i reckon speedcore is more unpopular

but yeah it's a bit of a paradox. your try to keep it as "underground" and exclusive as possible to keep hipster types away but most likely they're the ones who'll jump on it. plus what's the point in doing that? i mean, i assume that if you build your own platform either by putting on nights, making tunes etc you want to get out there and reach some people at least, no? the whole point in building a scene is to attract like-minded people, not put on night with 3 of your mates and act like you're so above everything else.

[jaydot]

The birth of the internet killed the underground imho,

[nousd]

if there's to be a final word
on here about the underground
this isn't it

but just as the term implies buried and undisinterable,
so something underground can never become crass, kitsch, understandable or replicable
because that would mean it had never been truly underground

the essence of the underground is that it won't allow itself to be extracted from its time & place,
can only be an influence, a stain, an aspiration
eluding any attempts at possession, removal or exploitation

literally
under the ground
is no longer under the ground
if dug into and exposed

not a thing
but a quality
not an entity
but a seep

[kingbananathe]

you should try working in the real world you realise 90% of people are boring fucks with no real interests

truth

[nowaysj]

What about actively disconnecting your community from the internet? Going dark? It is something I'm thinking about. I'm thinking about doing analog only releases, and local live performance/playing, that doesn't make it to the internet. Doesn't exist there. No preview tracks, nothing. Doesn't even exist. Can something like this happen?

I reckon this would just result in even more fakeness in the end. In the same way Burial's anonymity ended up making his tunes the exact opposite of "just tunes from the underground, bruv", that kind of deal, provided it gets off the ground will just manifest as "THE MOST EXCLUSIVE, AUTHENTIC PARTY OF ALL TIME" and will start a giant hype wagon eagerly documented by Fact magazine.

It's the hipster paradox. Like that article about deep house bros once said, the only way to live the rave dream truly is to embrace something that's so horrendously uncool nobody will ever be able to spin it into trendiness: Gabba.

I'm quoted here, so I'm responding as if you're responding to my scenario.

but yeah it's a bit of a paradox. your try to keep it as "underground" and exclusive as possible to keep hipster types away but most likely they're the ones who'll jump on it.

Hipsters are not a problem in my life, on a personal level. There is a problem with their material aid to the rise of the terminal babylon system. What I'm wanting to do is not in reaction to hipsters.

plus what's the point in doing that? i mean, i assume that if you build your own platform either by putting on nights, making tunes etc you want to get out there and reach some people at least, no?

No. It is not to build a scene and reach people. It is about creating an environment where failure is a possibility. Where failure is an okay result. When a group of people set out to do something new, to find new ways, failure is the result 99/100. Invention of novelty is crushingly difficult. If there is a penalty for failure (beyond the loss of investment in the project that fails) there is a natural tendency not to reach for novelty, or to be less ambitious in the reach. Not to create something new, but to stick to safer, more widely accepted forms.

People are taught new ways by the avant-garde. The avant-garde is so laughable to the majority of simple people because the avant-garde is silly, is unintelligible, makes things that don't fit within their simpler consensus reality. I would like to create an environment where producers can be ambitious in their reach, in seeking out new possibilities, or new hybridizations of current sounds. And I think it is key to do that in what I perceive as the underground. In a place where followers, negative critics, and just shitty people don't have access.

the whole point in building a scene is to attract like-minded people

I'm not suggesting building a scene. A scene is possible only if the avant-garde actually produces something of value to a wider audience. If they return with spoils, they can be shared. But that is only after a new and different thought has had time to develop, to become individual. The problem I see, and others have mentioned, is the velocity at which information moves on the internet. The speed is too quick. It takes time to conduct what are essentially experiments, find hints of success, to pursue and strengthen those successes until the music becomes rich enough for wider consumption.

not put on night with 3 of your mates and act like you're so above everything else.

This is troubling to me. This type of statement is very common and is so steeped in hierarchy. I can't find a way for me to discuss this without my comments being filtered into the pyramid consciousness that produced this statement, where I can only be perceived as standing in opposition to you and am perceived to be seeking dominance over you. This is not my intent.

My intention of creating a place where producers can play experimental beats, and release very small scale analog recordings is not an attempt to be superior, or appear superior. It is just to exist here, in this time and place, and be free from the external demands of making something good.

Also, the local, underground, physical aspects of performance and recording are a reaction against the ephemeral nature of digital music. I don't discount the significant upside of digital, but I know I am more invested in physical music, and would be more invested in the production of physical music. I see the internet and digital music as a giant entropy inducing vacuum, that sucks the physical into essentially nothingness and the material just dissipates into a gray saturated wasteland of really good but unimportant music. I'd like to avoid that. And it is also interesting as a project. Can it happen. Just, can we do it?

[Harkat]

Also, the local, underground, physical aspects of performance and recording are a reaction against the ephemeral nature of digital music. I don't discount the significant upside of digital, but I know I am more invested in physical music, and would be more invested in the production of physical music. I see the internet and digital music as a giant entropy inducing vacuum, that sucks the physical into essentially nothingness and the material just dissipates into a gray saturated wasteland of really good but unimportant music. I'd like to avoid that. And it is also interesting as a project. Can it happen. Just, can we do it?

That bit struck a chord with me. But all the stuff about how exclusive it's going to be, how there'll be no followers or critics and all that just makes it seem a bit hopeless, doesn't it?

Hipsters aren't after hipsterism, they're after authenticity. The bigger deal you make of how authentic your party or listening club or whatever will be, the more attractive it is to hipsters. I dunno man. It seems like what people want is an underground movement that's unpretentious, young and popular, in the "of-the-people" sense AND still bound to physical spaces, outside the suffocating network of facebook links and soundcloud and all that shit. But people in general, especially youth who are into the edgier types of dance music, who you'd want at your raves, live so much of their lives around the internet. It seems to me the circumstances that gave birth to the music we love and allowed it to be a genuine movement just don't really exist anymore. I suspect "nuum" music won't ever be a genuine popular underground thing, in the same way Jazz doesn't seem to be that way in America any more. Maybe it's just something for specially interested nerds to discuss and wank over on the internet now. Exactly like you said, very good, but unimportant music.

Of course, I probably know fuck all about what I'm talking about. The kind of underground movement which I (and probably a lot of people on here) idolize is one I probably wouldn't know about, cos I'm not on the streets of London or whatever, my access to the UK dance music scene is mostly through the internet.

[nowaysj]

It seems to me the circumstances that gave birth to the music we love and allowed it to be a genuine movement just don't really exist anymore.

What were the circumstances?

====

I'm less interested in a movement. This little listening club thing I'm thinking about isn't really to create a movement, it is just about creating a physical place where music can potentially be innovated. Whether that is of interest to anyone outside of the listening club is 95% unimportant to me.

We were discussing in another thread - google's policy of innovation - my point is why not have people purely dedicated to innovation, people without any kind of demands to make something good or useful - THEN have a separate set of people who are good at exploitation.

That model is reproduced in the old music model of: you have your artists who create novel content, and then a record label who exploits the novelty of the music. Then they both benefit (depending on the ethics of the record label).