Trenton Chang – The Stanford Daily https://stanforddaily.com Breaking news from the Farm since 1892 Tue, 30 Jan 2018 01:52:17 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.4.3 https://stanforddaily.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/cropped-DailyIcon-CardinalRed.png?w=32 Trenton Chang – The Stanford Daily https://stanforddaily.com 32 32 204779320 City pop: The sound of the Japanese postwar economic miracle https://stanforddaily.com/2018/01/23/city-pop-the-sound-of-the-japanese-postwar-economic-miracle/ https://stanforddaily.com/2018/01/23/city-pop-the-sound-of-the-japanese-postwar-economic-miracle/#respond Wed, 24 Jan 2018 01:09:14 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1135484 Groovy basslines, artful falls, four-to-the-floor beats with cheesy claps, flamboyant synths and sensitive fades: that is the sound of disco, the dance phenomenon that took the world by storm in the ‘70s and ‘80s, sweeping every nightclub with its contagious hooks and catchy beats. East Asia, with the trauma of World War II not too […]

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City pop: The sound of the Japanese postwar economic miracle
DENNIS AMITH/Flickr

Groovy basslines, artful falls, four-to-the-floor beats with cheesy claps, flamboyant synths and sensitive fades: that is the sound of disco, the dance phenomenon that took the world by storm in the ‘70s and ‘80s, sweeping every nightclub with its contagious hooks and catchy beats.

East Asia, with the trauma of World War II not too distant but not too close, was not immune to the lavish vibes of disco. It was the 1980s, and Japan, feeling a sense of cosmopolitanism, was living like it never had before; “The Lost Decade” of the ‘90s (失われた十年 ) was yet beyond the horizon. The sound of urban decadence: that was the aesthetic of city pop, the name given to Japanese disco. It’s unfortunate that city pop isn’t listened to more today — I guess saying “I listen to ‘80s Japanese disco” gives off a very particular flavor of that musically-holier-than-thou hipster vibe. But there’s a lot of gems being rediscovered in old records of the time, and thankfully, many of them are online today for our enjoyment.

1. Mariya Takeuchi (竹内 まりや), Plastic Love

That artsy guitar solo in the middle is pretty short, but it’s to die for. This is to say nothing of Takeuchi’s smooth voice and delivery — it’s wonderfully light, yet longing. The chords, played on electric and acoustic piano, are so archetypally disco: warm and velvety. I understand exactly one line of the song, before it all fades away: “I’m just playing games — that’s just plastic love.” It’s a beautiful way to close out a beautiful track.

2. Miki Matsubara (松原みき), 真夜中のドア (Mayonaka no door)・Stay With Me

How is it possible for a chorus to be so catchy? Even now, I can hear those soaring melody lines and strings, that first “Stay with me …” — so melancholy despite the upbeat feel. There’s a very nice key change in the middle that leads right into a quick and simple sax solo — then we’re right back home, back to the wistful stay-with-me’s and mournful strings.

3. Tatsuro Yamashita (山下たつろ) — Music Book

The muzak-like intro, featuring guitars, sax, and vocal woo-woo-woo’s, is a delightful start. Yamashita’s crooning vocals are the soul of the track — not too heavy or dragging, yet emotive enough to make you listen. There’s perhaps some inspiration from gospel and soul in the long and short woo’s that Yamashita just loves to hang on to, and to see — or rather hear — its place in the Japanese musical aesthetic is an amazing reflection on the cosmopolitanism of city pop. The rest of Yamashita’s album “For You” is absolutely worth listening to as well: 35 minutes of the sound of ‘80s Japan, ready for your easy-listening or dancing needs.

4. Toshiki Kadomatsu (角松敏生) — If You Wanna Dance Tonight

This funky, cute beat sounds like it was scrapped together from stereotypes of ‘80s music, pulled straight from the nostalgia-happy soundtracks of “Stranger Things” or “Guardians of the Galaxy.” And the infectious hook — “If you wanna daaaaaance … tonight!” — is absolutely unforgettable. The feeling of euphoria reminds me of the classic “Move Your Feet” by Junior Senior — you just can’t help but get up and dance when you start feeling the beat. Listen to this song if you need a pick-me-up.

5. Mondo Grosso — ラビリンス (Labyrinth) feat. Hikari Mitsushima (満島 ひかり)

This last track is most certainly not ‘80s city pop, but I’m putting it here anyway because I want to. More seriously, this is a pretty recent track, but it still reflects that unique Japanese urban aesthetic that made city pop what it was. It reminds me of a less grungy version of the pop-garage house of Britain crossed with Inner City’s Detroit techno classic “Big Fun” — a new, electronic Japanese take on big-city, cosmopolitan music. After all, Mondo Grosso’s name literally means “big world” in Italian. Mondo Grosso himself has been around for a while. He’s one of Japan’s biggest DJs today, and has been dropping house tracks since the late ‘80s, when house was in its infancy. He’s certainly old enough to have listened to city pop in his youth. A stickler for labels might call this one deep house, but I hear the characteristic sound of disco chords and the four-to-the-floor groove still. Most of all, the soulful, plaintive vocals sell the track — I could listen to that voice all day. House started as a descendant offshoot of disco anyway, so it’s not particularly surprising that Labyrinth has inherited some of those disco vibes.

I can’t understand a thing in these tracks, except perhaps a word or two here or there, an admission that’s likely to earn the consternation of my former Japanese professors, but that’s not what the music is about for me. It’s about vibes and feelings, not words.

My only regret from listening to city pop? I wish that I had committed to studying abroad in Japan — but that’s fine for now. The place can wait; for me, the soul is in the sound.

 

Contact Trenton Chang at tchang97 ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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Trenton’s Playlist: Future beats of the week https://stanforddaily.com/2017/10/24/trentons-playlist-future-beats-of-the-week/ https://stanforddaily.com/2017/10/24/trentons-playlist-future-beats-of-the-week/#respond Tue, 24 Oct 2017 08:30:45 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1131673 EDM is dead. The golden age of electronic music is long gone, now only a distant memory. The biggest culprit of this decline is the dastardly phenomenon known as future bass, characterized by sweeping synths that all sound like the same, strange chipmunked vocals, chants from the latest Cymatics sample pack and a hyper-caffeinated euphoric […]

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Trenton's Playlist: Future beats of the week
Canadian R&B singer Jahkoy. (Courtesy of CBC Music)

EDM is dead. The golden age of electronic music is long gone, now only a distant memory. The biggest culprit of this decline is the dastardly phenomenon known as future bass, characterized by sweeping synths that all sound like the same, strange chipmunked vocals, chants from the latest Cymatics sample pack and a hyper-caffeinated euphoric mood — as if all music producers just watched that same “Make Sound like Flume in 10 Minutes!” video on YouTube. Where are the good old days of big room house? Kids these days only listen to the likes of Marshmallow, Illenial and Frostii — and that’s ruining music.

At least, that’s among one of the most common criticisms of the EDM scene today. No future bass track is complete without a barrage of hate directed at the artist’s musicality, skill and even intelligence. It’s almost like an initiation, knowing that your music has uniquely evoked anger in a small but vocal minority of your listeners.

Indeed, future bass, like any genre, has certain characteristics that define its sound, and inevitably, a lot of similar music emerges from those tropes. Yet there are many lesser-known artists that deserve more attention for their creativity with future bass ideas, and often these tracks fall under the umbrella of the broader “future beats.” Here’s a sampling of some of their tracks:

https://open.spotify.com/user/12127762932/playlist/6CrxVnP1i5XBTiX6ehlXjy

Element (feat. Eileen Tiffany) — “Can’t Have You”

There’s something about Eileen Tiffany’s heavy voice and confident prosody that carries this track. Her voice floats easily through the dense, murky chords despite the complex undercurrent of sounds in the background. The production is excellent as well, featuring a driving beat supporting rhythmic synth chords and listenable hooks.

 

Blap Deli — “Wristfulla Problems”

This track begins calmly, but don’t let that mellow facade fool you. All of a sudden, you’ll find yourself launched into wave after wave of intense synths and vocals. It’s a slow beat, but it’s incessantly driving, beating constant time underneath the soaring vocal hooks and phrases amidst a sequence of swelling synth chords.

 

IDestiny & RonPon — “You Got Me”

This begins with a catchy, slightly annoying vocal hook, but soon evolves into a medley of knocking drums, vocal chops, and gurgling bass shots. A synth melody, reminiscent of WRLD, soon appears, weaving through drums and vocals with ease. Through the entire track, there’s a sense of euphoric wonder and excitement — thought it never becomes hyperactive.

 

GEOTHEORY — “Desiree (Aye)”

“Desiree” begins subtly, quietly, with deep sounds mumbling in the murk. It’s got none of the happiness of the previous track; on the contrary, it’s dark, serious and minimal. It’s a contentious duet between the rhythmic chords and the brooding vocals over the groove. Be careful; this track moves quickly — it’s easy to miss the counterpoint between the dueling ideas.

 

JAHKOY — “California Heaven (medasin Remix)”

Medasin has long been known for his watery, dreamy sounds, and his take on JAHKOY’s “California Heaven” is no exception. The remix begins uneventfully, with dreamy synth chords piling one on top of the another, until suddenly Medasin seems to forget that we’re in F# Major as he drops the beat. Though not explosive, the drop makes a statement with its presence: the distant, periodic “booms” in the background combine with the airy synths for a lightweight, spacious mood. For a moment, we’re put in musical purgatory — then normalcy returns.

 

Låpsley — “Love Is Blind (Sam Gelliatry Remix)”

Sam Gelliatry’s version of “Love Is Blind” offers a tipsy, relaxed take on the future music aesthetic. Either Gelliatry’s forgotten how meter works, or he doesn’t care. In any case, the off-beat chords are nonchalant and charmingly disordered. Somehow I find myself comparing it to vaporwave: though stylistically they’re worlds apart, both feature a certain surrealness, an almost thoughtless disregard for reality.

 

omniboi — “Suspended In Love”

I’m not sure what type of track this is, but it’s certainly got the requisite lightweight, cutesy feel of future bass. It’s something like a cross between loose jazz fusion jam, montage music for a rom-com anime, and Mii channel music. Somewhere in the middle the breakbeat-esque groove keeping time disappears, and the music forgets all thoughts of 4/4, suspending the listener in a metric limbo. I’ve got no idea how to nod my head to the beat for this one — but I don’t mind.

 

Nora En Pure — “Come With Me (KR$CHN Remix)”

This remix is centered around one sound: a bell-like resonance, which loops in an ostinato through the entire track. It never becomes overbearing, though; instead, it’s a clean, shiny sound that ties the track together, never faltering amidst the knocking of drums. The production on this track is flawless, giving the track an unnatural clarity. It’s surreal and blindingly bright — yet you can’t look away.

 

Kai Takahashi — “Party Talk”

Takahashi’s “Party Talk” is a new take on the cutesy future bass aesthetic, anchored by lighthearted riffs on the electric piano and vibrant vocal samples. Nothing in this track takes itself too seriously. It sounds innocent, exploring new melodies and progressions without restraint, and the unfolding beauty of this aimless exploration takes us on a youthful adventure. Despite the overflowing cutesiness, it never gets too saccharine: on the contrary, it brings the listener a concurrent sense of childlike wonderment.

 

Contact Trenton Chang at tchang97 ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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‘A Moment Apart’: ODESZA’s new groove https://stanforddaily.com/2017/10/12/a-moment-apart-odeszas-new-groove/ https://stanforddaily.com/2017/10/12/a-moment-apart-odeszas-new-groove/#respond Fri, 13 Oct 2017 04:49:35 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1131029 On September 8th, electronic duo ODESZA released their highly anticipated sophomore album, titled “A Moment Apart.” Their first release since their first album “In Return” (2014), “A Moment Apart” debuted at #3 on the Billboard 200 to critical acclaim, instantly making the album one of the hottest electronic music releases of 2017. Combining influences from […]

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'A Moment Apart': ODESZA's new groove
ODESZA performs at the 10th annual Decibal Festival (Courtesy of Emerald City EDM).

On September 8th, electronic duo ODESZA released their highly anticipated sophomore album, titled “A Moment Apart.” Their first release since their first album “In Return” (2014), “A Moment Apart” debuted at #3 on the Billboard 200 to critical acclaim, instantly making the album one of the hottest electronic music releases of 2017. Combining influences from future bass and pop music as well as their synth-pop and indietronica roots, “A Moment Apart” both presents a refreshing take on current electronic music trends and further matures their youthful, energetic sound.

Despite the popularity of the album, I wasn’t impressed at first. The album begins with a short, eccentric, spoken word piece, the a female voice relating an obscure tale about a Russian cosmonaut in space, slowly driven insane by an incessant ticking — until he learns to love the sound. It segues into the sound of heavy breathing, which intensifies slowly, then rapidly, into a discordant wash of noise…

A single chord breaks the dissonance, and the music begins to flow. What’s that sound — is it a piano? A synth? No matter — this electric orchestra has now finished tuning up, and, without hesitation, they embark on the first movement of an electronic symphony.

That moment — not even three minutes in — was the moment in which I fell in love with the album.

ODESZA is one of the few groups whose music fits perfectly the “chill” archetype: it’s easygoing and relaxing, something you could listen to whether driving, studying or partying. Yet it’s never lazy — instead, it’s catchy and enjoyable, never vapid, swiftly moving despite the downtempo pacing. It’s wave after wave of sound: the waves come slowly, but steadily, and they rise and fall deliberately with profound depth. ODESZA’s eclectic repertoire of slow jams and danceable tracks effortlessly complements every setting — and “A Moment Apart” is certainly no exception.

When the beat dropped for the first time in the titular track “A Moment Apart,” I was amazed by the depth and clarity of the music, but I had not expected to be so pleased throughout the entirety of the album. Electronic music is always criticized by the public for being formulaic and repetitive, but “A Moment Apart” shatters those expectations, creating moment after moment of refreshing sounds and ideas. The album rarely loses focus, maintaining integrity via a common base of spacious synths, plaintive vocals and driving beats while expanding upon that foundation with an array of intriguing motifs and creative sound design.

I was most impressed by their creative beats, replete with idiosyncratic, foley-like percussive sounds. Most of their songs are based on the ubiquitous hip-hop beat, and yet, despite a common “ODESZA groove,” those sounds, a seemingly minor part of the album, formed an integral part of the DNA of each groove, breathing new life into each track, syncopation by syncopation.

The synths, a electronic orchestra, were intriguing as well, falling into an uncanny valley between the organic and the electronic: those pads in the background aren’t quite violins, but they aren’t quite synths either. That melody sound isn’t quite a trombone — yet it doesn’t seem like a synth either. And despite the musical bells and whistles (literally, at times) splattered generously throughout the entire album, the music never sounds too busy; on the contrary, every sound falls effortlessly into its own space.

In addition, the production on “A Moment Apart” is truly amazing, providing nearly one hour of extremely high-quality sound that places the listener within a vast soundstage. For the music producer, the album is almost a masterclass of sound mixing and design. It’s as if the music is coming from your surroundings, from nature itself. I can imagine myself standing outdoors, in the middle of nowhere, as the music blows gusts of sound from all directions. Out of this immersive wash emerge distinct sounds: the jangling of car keys, the closing of a car door, the dreamy plucks of a harp and the sighs of distant voices. It’s a surreal space in which anything can happen, a scene from a fantastical, mystical world brought to life.

The only complaint I have for this album is that at a few points the music struggles to find a balance between creative originality and predictable familiarity. “Boy” was one such example, sounding like a synthpop version of a Flume track, with only flashbulb moments of brief creativity. In addition, while “Just a Memory” was very musically intriguing, the cheesy Chainsmokers-esque pop lyrics distracted slightly from the track.

However, even as ODESZA straddles a very fine line between formulaic music and experimentation in the album, tracks like “Divide” and “Thin Floors and Tall Ceilings” powerfully capture both of these aspects. With future-inspired sounds in concert with the characteristic ODESZA aesthetic, these tracks indeed sound like something I’ve heard before — yet I know consciously that I’m listening to these tracks for the first time. The familiarity draws me in, the novelty keeps me interested.

In all, “A Moment Apart” as whole is an exciting, fulfilling album, taking the listener on a brief yet fulfilling journey through a carefree, surreal realm. Perhaps that’s what the title alludes to — the brief moment apart from reality that ODESZA has created, one that we experience when the music hits our ears. Music is ephemeral, but good music leaves a mark long after the sound is gone — and I’m certain that I’ll be thinking about “A Moment Apart” in the months to come.

 

Contact Trenton Chang at tchang97 ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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Zedd dazzles Stanford at Frost https://stanforddaily.com/2017/05/24/zedd-dazzles-stanford-at-frost/ https://stanforddaily.com/2017/05/24/zedd-dazzles-stanford-at-frost/#respond Wed, 24 May 2017 07:37:23 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1127935 The Stanford Concert Network (SCN) put on yet another successful Frost Music & Arts Festival last Saturday, featuring performers Charles Calvet, Broods and Zedd. Due to renovations, this year’s festival was moved from its namesake, Frost Amphitheater, and was instead held at Stanford Stadium. I’d heard about the magic of Frost Amphitheater: the feeling of […]

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Zedd dazzles Stanford at Frost
Zedd performing in Stanford Stadium. (NETTA WANG/The Stanford Daily)

The Stanford Concert Network (SCN) put on yet another successful Frost Music & Arts Festival last Saturday, featuring performers Charles Calvet, Broods and Zedd. Due to renovations, this year’s festival was moved from its namesake, Frost Amphitheater, and was instead held at Stanford Stadium. I’d heard about the magic of Frost Amphitheater: the feeling of escape and seclusion, a unique place within Stanford that feels like anything except Stanford. Though this was my first time at the festival, I wondered if it would be possible to preserve that same liberating feeling.

I’m not sure that the Stanford Stadium was the best choice for such a concert. Outdoor EDM concerts often evoke images of bodies packed onto a standing-room only floor, hands waving in the air, people relaxing in the back on the grass – there ought to be a free, festive vibe. Instead, this venue felt a little strange: To the back of the main stage were thousands of empty seats and an empty field, which made the event feel small. Nevertheless, the music quickly uplifted my spirits, and I quickly forgot about the slight awkwardness of the venue.

Charles Calvet ’17, the student opener, kicked off the afternoon with some fresh pop and electronic tracks. Calvet, himself is no stranger to the stage, with a performance at the annual Snowglobe festival at Lake Tahoe under his belt, as well as countless shows at campus parties. He laid down a mellow and playful vibe, breathing little bits of life over the crowd, but it never became too exciting. There was, after all, hours of music to come. As the music gently eased the growing crowd into the festival, Calvet took the chance to show off his guitar prowess, effortlessly picking out riff after riff as students cheered him on.

Broods was an excellent opener as well, instantly captivating the crowd with wave after wave of powerful, emotive music. Their entrance was hard to miss: Above the hubbub of the chattering crowd, there suddenly came a single bass note, rattling everyone’s hearts as they looked up anxiously, waiting for more to come. Soon we were all rewarded as Broods took to the stage, playing the crowd with familiar tunes like “Bridges” and “Heartlines,” replete with their signature echoing beats and spacious synth chords.

Georgia Nott, Broods’ lead singer, was obviously not only a career musician, but also a career performer. Her onstage ethos was fun to watch, exuding confidence and playfulness as she bounded across the stage. One moment she would be belting plaintive cries, the next she was whispering refrains about broken promises, memories and dreams. Caleb, Georgia’s brother and collaborator, brought an unmatched energy to the stage as well: He simply looked like he was having the time of his life. He was banging his head through the whole set, hair bouncing to the beat as he passionately teased power chords and riffs from his keyboard.

Zedd dazzles Stanford at Frost
Broods. (NETTA WANG/The Stanford Daily)

Broods somehow managed to straddle a knife-edge with the emotion of their performance: Any less, and it wouldn’t have seemed genuine, but any more, and their performance would have taken on a laughably faux-emo aesthetic. But they found a perfect balance with no trouble: an elegant combination of catharsis, hope, despair and freedom. I’d never heard most of their lyrics or songs, but that didn’t matter – I soon found myself singing along to the catchy melodies. In fact, I almost worried that Broods would overshadow Zedd – but clearly I had underestimated just how amazing this night could get.

I should say that Zedd means a lot me personally. I’ve been surrounded by music for my entire life, but five years ago, I heard, for the first time, a new type of music unlike any other. I had just listened to “Clarity” by Zedd for the first time. I was immediately drawn in: The beautiful chords, haunting melodies and pure novelty spoke to me profoundly. That song first sparked my interest in electronic music, and that was the day that I, full of inspiration, became an electronic music producer. So Zedd’s appearance at Frost this year felt almost fateful for me: I simply could not miss the chance to experience the music of the man who had forever changed my musical life.

When colors began to sparkle on the screen, I knew that my five-year wait was almost over. The notes twinkled in rhythm, and a wave of chords began to flow. I’ll admit that I was a little apprehensive: What if it wasn’t as good as I expected? What if Zedd had “sold out”? But my reservations were cut short by the sound of beautiful music – new to my ears, yet all so familiar, and I immediately heard those same moments of beauty, that same profound voice that called me to the world of electronic music. Suddenly, Zedd appeared on the stage with a flourish, bathing the field in white light as the sun sank into the horizon.

Not a single person remained sitting on the field as Zedd took us all on a journey peppered with thrill and wonder. Zedd’s music flowed naturally, mixing his signature pop-EDM sound with everything from oldies, today’s pop hits, his older complextro roots and even hard-hitting techno/bass drops. Song after song flowed into one another, taking us from the familiar land of pop into unexplored worlds populated by squelching bass lines and strange voices. And when the music strayed too far into terra incognita, welcome voices singing well-known melodies from oldies and pop songs brought us back to safe harbor.   

Zedd played a plethora of his own works: recent hits like “Starving” and “Stay,” as well as older favorites “Spectrum” and “Clarity.” Somehow, I heard those threads of Zedd I had first found appealing about him music throughout his entire set. But I also wondered at times if I was just enjoying the extravagant visuals. I closed my eyes in those moments, and unfailingly heard thousands of thundering voices screaming familiar refrains, taking in the music breath by breath, word by word, and I knew that it was the music – and the music alone – that made me move. As night unfolded, the crowd only became more energetic, prodded by ceaseless beats pounding dances into our bodies.

Zedd dazzles Stanford at Frost
(NETTA WANG/The Stanford Daily)

What amazed me most about the performance, however, was how Zedd simply had no regard for musical labels – future bass, electro house, trap, hardstyle and many other genres made brief, crowd-pleasing cameos in his set. Despite the brief blunder of playing an unadulterated version of “Closer” by the Chainsmokers in its entirety, Zedd executed these surprising transitions with amazing spontaneity, without the slightest hiccup or inaccuracy. One moment I was dancing to Michael Jackson’s “Thriller,” the next Martin Garrix and Florian Picasso’s “Make Up Your Mind,” then Missy Elliot’s “Get Ur Freak On” and then a strange bass house track – who but Zedd could have joined these disparate artists into a harmonious, musical union?

The night ended all too soon – the beats ceased, and Zedd thanked us all to thunderous applause and cheers. We stood there under the blinding lights, waiting for the inevitable encore – but there was none to come. I calmed down, and only then noticed that my feet were sore, my voice was hoarse and my ears were ringing, so I trudged back to my dorm room, weary from the excitement of the night, head spinning with fresh musical hopes and thoughts.

To Zedd, and all the other performers, organizers, mixing engineers, graphics artists, talent agents, stage crew and others who made this experience possible, thank you. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

 

Contact Trenton Chang at tchang97 ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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Caleb Nott of Broods on movements that make you move https://stanforddaily.com/2017/05/19/caleb-nott-broods/ https://stanforddaily.com/2017/05/19/caleb-nott-broods/#respond Fri, 19 May 2017 07:32:19 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1127745   Brother-sister duo Broods rose to prominence in 2013 with their breakout debut single “Bridges,” an emotive, weighty pop-anthem with powerful, heartrending vocals. Broods proved to be no one-hit wonder, coming out with two more convincing albums titled “Evergreen” (2014) and “Conscious” (2016). Hopefully, there are many more to come. Listening to Broods’ music is […]

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Caleb Nott of Broods on movements that make you move
(Photo by Catie Laffoon, courtesy of Page 1 Management)

Brother-sister duo Broods rose to prominence in 2013 with their breakout debut single “Bridges,” an emotive, weighty pop-anthem with powerful, heartrending vocals. Broods proved to be no one-hit wonder, coming out with two more convincing albums titled “Evergreen” (2014) and “Conscious” (2016). Hopefully, there are many more to come.

Listening to Broods’ music is an emotional experience. You’re tossed and turned around in an ocean of strange feelings, as wave after wave of melancholy, hope and self-doubt crash and crest over your head. You fight to stay afloat, but it’s a losing battle: The song has pulled you out to sea, far from shore, siphoned your fading strength bit by bit; all that can be done is brace yourself for the next wave. It sounds rather uncomfortable, but too soon, the music ends, and somehow you find yourself searching for the next adventure, if only to experience those sublime moments of struggle and tension once more. This is the magic of music. 

Behind this magic always lie great musicians, and I was curious about what made this particular musical mind tick. I had the opportunity to chat with Caleb Nott, one half of Broods, about his thoughts on songwriting, the creative process and music in general.

I could tell from the moment he began to speak that Caleb is a musically minded person. “You know, [making music] excites me… beats, especially,” he offered. “It’s like poetry… like movements that make you move.” His process of creativity isn’t anything especially structured, but he greatly values trying to “write different music.” It’s a dynamic, exploratory method that blends multiple threads of musical thought from his influences with his own artistry, and it’s proven rather successful: Broods’ music certainly can’t be criticized for its regularity or banality. “It’s not necessarily a specific type of music… [it’s] what you just feel like writing down,” he explained. At the end of the process, one of the most amazing things, in Caleb’s opinion, is being able to experience the finished product.

Caleb spoke at length about the importance of collaboration in his musical life. He noted that it was one of the most important aspects of his life in music, and that it has helped him become the musician he is today. His diverse cast of collaborators, mentors and musical friends include famed New Zealand music producer Joel Little, best known for his work with Lorde. Being around experienced and talented musical veterans has given Caleb a versatile set of musical tools with which he composes his tracks. In any case, Caleb enjoys working with others more than he does by himself: “It’s faster, ideas come easier and you can keep it moving,” he noted. With respect to Broods, however, Caleb largely handles the beats, and his sister Georgia (the other half of Broods) works more closely with the lyrics.

So what does Caleb think of his own music? I asked him to describe his own style. Laughing, he said, “I think every musician hates that question.” He offered, “Maybe synthpop?” But I wasn’t necessarily looking for a label or a genre; I wanted to know how about the feelings that he wanted to evoke with his work, and what he wanted to say with his music. I pressed some more, getting, “It’s… emotive? I don’t know… I just write music.” And in a certain way, that was the best answer he could have given, an answer that spoke to the spontaneity and natural ease with which Broods’ music flowed.

I’d gotten some insights on how Caleb created his work, but I wanted to learn a little bit more about what he was about as a person, so I prepared some special questions for him.

Caleb Nott of Broods on movements that make you move
(Photo by Catie Laffoon, courtesy of Page 1 Management)

Caleb takes on Stanford admissions questions

Reflect on an idea or experience that has been important to your intellectual development.

“Collaboration — because how else are you going to learn?” Caleb, who has been a musician his entire life, is no stranger to the ubiquity of collaboration in the world of music. His collaborations — connections with musical mentors, friends and others — have allowed him to learn from other musicians around him, and grow into the musician he is today.

What matters to you, and why?

“Pushing yourself,” he responded immediately. Caleb expressed that he was planning on pushing himself to come up with new ideas for the next album. He bemoaned the “formulaic” nature of much of pop music today, noting that songs don’t become popular through sameness — instead, they gain popularity because of the uniqueness of the track.

If you could witness a historical event, what would it be?

“Ancient Egypt — I’ve just been watching a lot of documentaries about it.” But what was it about Ancient Egypt that appealed to him? “They had a totally different view of consciousness… [and] they knew some things that we’ve lost today.”

Describe yourself in five words.

“Explorative, excited, impulsive, collaboration and friendly.”

Broods will be performing at the Frost Music Festival at the Stanford Stadium on Saturday, May 20, opening for Zedd.

 

Contact Trenton Chang at tchang97 ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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Three years in the making: ODESZA drop singles from upcoming album https://stanforddaily.com/2017/05/12/odesza-drop-singles/ https://stanforddaily.com/2017/05/12/odesza-drop-singles/#respond Fri, 12 May 2017 07:58:03 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1127350   ODESZA looks to please the EDM scene once again with their upcoming new album. Last week, they dropped two new preview singles, “Line of Sight” and “Late Night.” The Seattle-based production duo hasn’t released anything big since 2014’s “In Return,” which featured the hits “Say My Name” and “All We Need.” ODESZA has long been known […]

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Three years in the making: ODESZA drop singles from upcoming album
(Adinda Uneputty, Flickr)

ODESZA looks to please the EDM scene once again with their upcoming new album. Last week, they dropped two new preview singles, “Line of Sight” and “Late Night.” The Seattle-based production duo hasn’t released anything big since 2014’s “In Return,” which featured the hits “Say My Name” and “All We Need.”

ODESZA has long been known for their vibrant, versatile musical aesthetic. Their music demonstrates an impressive stylistic scope, as their palette of synths and chopped-up vocals slide effortlessly between the dark, the dramatic and the upbeat. It feels not only comfortable and natural, but also adventurous, moving forward with an innocent determination. In every one of their songs, synth and voice weave a beautiful sonic synergy, the synths painting the backdrop of the track and the voice animating the music with colorful vigor. It’s truly liberating: It’s as if the music wants to live out its life measure for measure, riding the up-and-down waves of life joyfully, yet ever carefully. It’s controlled, but it certainly knows how to have fun.

For the most part, this spirit remains strong within ODESZA’s new work. I initially had some reservations about “Line of Sight”: It opens with slightly cheesy, plaintive vocals backed with gentle, airy pads that would fit perfectly into a pseudo-edgy, cookie-cutter, vapid pop track. But when the beat dropped, a Troye Sivan-esque groove – complete with reverb-soaked drum hits, a driving synth pattern and “woohoo”-ing vocals – filled my ears with a familiar warmth and soul. Yet, while it was certainly enjoyable, it wasn’t anything new.

“Line of Sight” is a well-executed fusion of the chillwave-trending pop-electronic style emergent in recent years; but due to the formulaic nature of that style, I can’t really compliment this track for its originality or innovation. Sure, the track was a fun, interesting listen, but it was rather predictable, hewing largely to safe chord progressions, hooks and melodies.

“Late Night” begins on a more fortuitous note: Some sparkling synths and guitars quietly seduce you toward the track, drawing you closer with their idyllic tunes. The delicate riffs twinkle softly, until suddenly, we’re greeted with a plain, four-to-the-floor beat in concert with a mysterious, funky bass hook. Wordless melodies float above the synth, and as we go deeper and deeper into the night, the synths expand and recede into a breathy soundscape. The drums fade into the background, and the tender sounds of the guitar begin to shimmer in the distance once more. The beat comes back, more confident and resolute than ever – and all too soon, the song is over. The wordless voices are all that remains, uttering with their last breath the sounds of the late night as it draws to a close.

It’s these small moments – when that simple four-to-the-floor conjure up images that swirl and coalesce for the listener — that it turns extraordinary. “Late Night” undoubtedly embodied all of the musical aspects I enjoyed about ODESZA’s previous work, but it built upon them and swept me away into musical worlds that I didn’t know existed. It was chill and carefree, yet it was imbued with a sense of determination, and I was compelled to follow the music to its end. I may not be able to say the same for “Line of Sight,” but if the forthcoming album has more moments like “Late Night,” ODESZA will have once again proven their mettle in the world of electronic music.

 

 

Contact Trenton Chang at tchang97 ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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The five stages of writing a song: An artist’s perspective https://stanforddaily.com/2017/04/24/fivestages/ https://stanforddaily.com/2017/04/24/fivestages/#respond Mon, 24 Apr 2017 22:01:16 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1126326 Writing a song is difficult. Writing a good song is even more so. Songwriting is a labor of love: Though the average song is usually three to five minutes long, it can take hundreds of hours for a song to develop from a small idea into a full track. But somehow, we never run out of […]

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The five stages of writing a song: An artist’s perspective
(Matt Gibson, Flickr)

Writing a song is difficult. Writing a good song is even more so. Songwriting is a labor of love: Though the average song is usually three to five minutes long, it can take hundreds of hours for a song to develop from a small idea into a full track. But somehow, we never run out of fresh tracks: Every day, we put on our headphones and plug into an endless queue of playlists and Spotify stations with our fingertips. How is this possible?

We’re usually concerned with what happens in those three minutes of listening to the finished product. As a reviewer, I’m interested in the emotions, images and impressions the song evokes as it falls upon my ears. But we rarely consider what happens in those hours before we hear the music, the hours in which the music grows from an idea in a musical mind into a full-fledged track. The sheer improbability of that process, the journey from idea to song — what makes it happen? I’m a songwriter myself — by no means an expert — but as I’ve come to learn my way around music, I’ve gained some insight about what the creative process really means, and the ways in which an idea becomes a song.

Stage 1: The Idea

It strikes you suddenly, without warning. In that instant, the colors of the world seem a little brighter, and the sounds of the world fade away as you become enveloped by the music. Perhaps it’s a bit cliché to pin inspiration down to a single moment, that quintessential “flash of inspiration,” but the moment that a good musical head finds itself inside my head, I’m instantly captivated as it wriggles inside my head, playing itself endlessly as it struggles to escape — and let itself be heard.

I’m a musically minded person — ideas float around my head in every waking moment. Not every idea that comes to me is destined to become a hit, but some ideas are certainly better than others. And those better ideas — the ones that come to me in that abrupt flash, the ones that play themselves over and over tirelessly in my head — are the ones that come to be written down.

Stage 2: Driven by inspiration

I open my laptop. I start up a digital audio workstation (DAW), a program that lets me turn ideas into electronic music with a dynamic array of synthesizers, samples and effects. I like to think of it as a musical interface between my brain and the rest of the world. Slowly, the idea works its way from my head to the computer as I painstakingly enter each note and craft each sound from scratch, twisting knobs and noodling the keyboard.

It’s a slog of busy work, as I try to bring an idea to life, but my drive keeps me going — I simply cannot leave my desk until that idea comes out of my head. I press play, and often the result sounds terrible. No matter. That’s nothing that tweaking, experimenting and a little bit of coffee can’t fix. I close my eyes and listen once again to the idea in my head, this time more intently, trying to capture every colorful nuance in the sounds. Hours pass by fleetingly as I slowly move through the music.

Sometimes this is where an idea comes to die. Sometimes, after hours of trying to translate my thoughts to my computer, what comes out is a garbled mess, a shadow of the idea I had. I find myself unable to articulate my musical thoughts, and the idea dies there, in my head, unheard. But other times, I press the play button for the first time, and beautiful sounds rush from my speakers. I’ll sleep on this idea: if my half-asleep, 3 A.M. musical adventures still sound decent in the morning, then maybe I’ve made something good.

Stage 3: 10 seconds of mediocrity

After hours and hours of work, I’ve created a mediocre, sorta-listenable piece of music. The only problem: it’s only ten seconds long. No one wants to listen to a snippet of a song, just as no one wants to hear just a few sentences from a story. A snippet of a song has no direction, and no momentum — it has nothing to say. It’s pretty to listen to, but at the end of those ten seconds the listener is left wondering: “How did we get here? Where are we going?”

The initial idea, that first thing that strikes you when you try to write a song, can only take you so far. As suggested by its name, the process of songwriting involves many of the same processes as writing. It is a lengthy ordeal that involves quite a bit of slow, methodical work. In a way, it’s like writing a story: you have your main idea, maybe even some sketches of ideas, and from there the details begin to come together. That’s easier said than done: Just as writers suffer from writer’s block, songwriters get songwriter’s block as well. I know I’ve hit that when I listen back to the idea in my head, playing through the music I’ve just written down, and find silence — the flash of inspiration gone.

This is the stage in which my songs most often die — I simply can’t force the music to continue, and that song gets filed into my ever-growing folder known as “8-bar loops/Song Ideas.” Perhaps one day I’ll be struck with inspiration again, and then I can finish the song. But that’s an inefficient way to deal with writer’s block. If I want to finish my songs, from this point on, the creative process must take over.

Stage 4: Coming to life

What do I mean by the creative process? A process has the connotation of something methodical, of a step-by-step algorithm from which a solution can be found. Unfortunately, music is not so easily tamed. In music, there are no right answers, but there are answers that are subjectively better than others. In other words, there are answers that will make you more money, or more admiration from your friends. In the end, however, the creative process is not a means of methodically finding those right answers, but rather one of discovering them through artistic perseverance and chance.

I’m still refining my personal creative process, but I’ve found that a healthy mix of experimentation and crazy ideas can’t hurt. In fact, it’s often happy accidents and a touch of randomness that give rise to even more inspiration and ideas. So, I inhabit this space of accidents and mistakes, if only for a little while, playing with the music and listening to what comes out. I conjure up some sounds, twisting knobs methodically, but randomly, listening to the strange music of my wanderings. I play around and improvise, fingers perched atop my keyboard, curiously prodding the keys in search for glistening moments of beauty. Eventually, something clicks: I get that brief flash of inspiration, and I hear the way forward.

This is the longest and perhaps most tedious stage of the songwriting process, as it forces me to stand up against my writer’s block. I’ll be the first to admit that I sometimes I can’t overcome this block. But that’s okay; at worst, I’ve created more sounds and textures to add to my musical palette, and at best, I’ve just found the idea that will finish the hit song that makes me a breakout star, landing me a deal playing at Coachella in two years (in my dreams, maybe).

Stage 5: Finishing touches 

The creative process is a powerful yet fickle thing. It can’t be relied upon at will, but when it exerts its power, it always leaves me in awe at the art it leaves for me in its wake. Thanks to this process, however, my idea is a song. Now, only the finishing touches remain. I can now step back from the artistry, from the colorful folds of creativity, and focus on the nitpicky details that lend music a “professional-quality” sound — but I’d rather not talk about that. That’s a story of precise knob-turning, of careful listening, of objectivity — a world apart, in my opinion, from the creative work that defines the song.

The most important touch is what happens inside someone’s head when the music falls upon their ears. It’s no secret that music is a powerful emotional force. Music is made to be listened to, danced to, sung to — music is an active, transient experience. Indeed, music demands to be heard. If my music can’t evoke any thoughts in my listener’s head at all, then I’ve failed as a musician. Worse, I’ve failed as an artist.

What, then, makes a great artist? The great artist is one who harnesses the creative process day after day, hour after hour, using its expressive energy in a constant, neurotic drive to create. The great artist lives and breathes the creative process throughout their life, because great artists always have something to tell you.

 

Contact Trenton Chang at tchang97 ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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The sound of anime: Connecting feelings with music https://stanforddaily.com/2017/04/06/the-sound-of-anime/ https://stanforddaily.com/2017/04/06/the-sound-of-anime/#respond Thu, 06 Apr 2017 07:42:46 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1125376 Music is emotional. We’ve all heard music that makes us feel happy, excited, pensive or melancholy. Music is also a universal activity. The question, “What music do you listen to?” usually returns an eclectic range of responses unique to each person; I’ve yet to hear someone respond to that question with a droll, “Oh, I […]

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Music is emotional. We’ve all heard music that makes us feel happy, excited, pensive or melancholy.

Music is also a universal activity. The question, “What music do you listen to?” usually returns an eclectic range of responses unique to each person; I’ve yet to hear someone respond to that question with a droll, “Oh, I don’t listen to music.”

So we partake in this inherently emotional experience of music together. And it seems as though from nothing but literal thin air — the vibrations of particles traveling to our ears — these human feelings emerge, and we listeners are, more often than not, at a loss to explain what gives that music a particular emotion. We listen, and we know that this sound is “happy.” We hear “open-minded” melodies, “angry” strings, “thoughtful” bass lines: We personify the sounds we hear in music.

Or perhaps the music instead affects us, and imbues us with such emotions. It humanizes us by coloring our lives with feeling. The ideas that music evokes are not limited to emotions, either: Sometimes, music sounds “Asian” or “Middle Eastern.” So music connotes identities as well.

Countless auditory cues influence the character of a song — the emotions and ideas that they evoke. While the explicit neurological processes that convert music into emotional ideas remain unclear to us, perhaps we can find something hidden plainly in the music that explains why certain sounds evoke certain feelings.

I’d like to talk about anime music today. I am a newcomer to anime, but I understand that it’s unfair to generalize all anime music into a genre, as theme songs will often include anything from synthpop to hard rock to alternative rock.

Yet, as I was watching a new anime film, “Your Name.”, an animated epic of magical realism and romantic drama (or rather, listening to “Your Name.”there was something about the character of the music that felt very much at home in the movie. My friend turned to me and whispered about the song: “It sounds so anime!” And somehow, without any further discussion, without any hesitation, I understood his meaning. That song felt very “anime,” and that was a simple truth. But I didn’t quite understand just what about that song gave it that feeling.

So what does it mean for a song to sound, in those words, “so anime?”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYZfeY8Vg0E

Of course, by this time, you’ve probably thought of the simple answer: “Hey, the lyrics are in Japanese! Duh!”

Yet that answer was unsatisfactory. I had an unfortunate encounter with an English version of “Cruel Angel’s Thesis,” the theme song to ‘90s anime favorite “Neon Genesis Evangelion.” But despite the gut-wrenching, awkward prosody, it somehow retained that ineffable “anime” feeling. It contained a certain emotion, more than the sum of its parts, something that arose from a combination of the lyrics, the beats, the chords — everything that comprised the backbone of that piece of music.

Some more musically-versed individuals may be familiar with the pentatonic scale. I initially thought that the use of this scale, often associated with Asian cultures and their music, might also explain the “anime” feeling in music.

The ubiquitous “Oriental riff,” famously used in the intro of Carl Douglas’ “Kung Fu Fighting,” sometimes played in parallel fourths, uses the pentatonic scale, and has cemented itself as a proxy for Asianness in the sonic mythology of the West. The introduction riff in “Cruel Angel’s Thesis,” with a few exceptions, largely uses that scale. But other works such as the “Castle in the Sky” theme song appear a little more comfortable outside of that scale, dancing in and out of the pentatonic, while weaving a hauntingly beautiful melody that somehow has a similar feeling.

The sound of anime: Connecting feelings with music
The melody of the introduction of “Cruel Angel’s Thesis” in a piano roll. Notes on the pentatonic scale highlighted in red; notes not on the pentatonic scale highlighted in blue.

 

The sound of anime: Connecting feelings with music
The melody of the first theme of “Castle in the Sky” in a piano roll. Notes on the pentatonic scale highlighted in red; notes not on the pentatonic scale highlighted in blue.

 

“Castle in the Sky” is not alone. Many other anime works such as “Hikaru Nara” from “Your Lie in April” or “Zen Zen Zense” from “Your Name” have various complex melodies that shirk the pentatonic scale, instead using the conventional major (Ionian) scale mode used in many pieces in the Western musical tradition. This major scale, often associated with a “happy” or “upbeat” feeling, is the musical backbone of many pop songs today, from “Closer” by the Chainsmokers to “Faded” by Alan Walker.

But there’s still something radically different, stylistically speaking, that creates the feeling of an “anime” piece. If we cannot find that difference in the melodies, then perhaps we should look towards the form.

In contrast with many European-American pop songs, Japanese anime music often features long, dramatic melodies combined with complex chord progressions that rapidly shift.

Let’s take a look at the form of Taylor Swift’s “Blank Space.” Written in F major, it follows a verse – chorus – verse – chorus – bridge – chorus pattern, a rather conventional pop song structure. The melodic ideas are short, repetitive and memorable, characteristic of pop music, occurring in small units of two or four measures. The chords are similarly simple, both staying within chords present in the F major scale. In addition, “Closer” by the Chainsmokers uses a verse – pre-chorus – build – drop structure repeated twice, with the same chord progression used through the entire track.

“Zen Zen Zense” from “Your Name,” however, changes chords very quickly. Written in B major, it follows a A – B – C – D – D’ – E – E’ pattern (with each letter representing a new section), dynamically substituting chords in and out of the music every few bars. The melodies are longer; they form soaring musical lines above the chords instead of the choppy, memorable hooks of pop music.

“Hikaru Nara” from “Your Lie in April,” “Cruel Angel’s Thesis” from “Evangelion” and the titular theme of “Princess Mononoke” all follow this pattern, despite drastic differences in style: plenty of changes in chord progressions, combined with lengthy, beautiful, melodic lines. Put that together with the upbeat, acoustic rock-like percussion, cheesy brass and analog strings, and that anime feeling begins to emerge. Perhaps therein lies the golden thread that creates the peculiar feeling associated with the music.

Granted, not every song in an anime has this feeling, and perhaps that’s for the better — it breaks some of that emotional saturation. But there’s a certain type of emotion encapsulated within some of those songs that just evokes those images, drawn in ligne claire, with exaggerated eyes, clear-cut shadows and light rosy cheeks. Perhaps we haven’t gotten any closer in capturing what that feeling actually is — but then again, we’ll know it when we hear it.

 

Contact Trenton Chang at tchang97 ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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Enjoying the “Ryde”: JOYRYDE’s C.A.R. tour comes to San Francisco https://stanforddaily.com/2017/02/27/joyryde-san-francisco/ https://stanforddaily.com/2017/02/27/joyryde-san-francisco/#respond Tue, 28 Feb 2017 07:34:28 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1123922 It was hot and cramped; the air was heavy, muggy and dangerously loud — loud beyond measure. Bodies collided with bodies in the sweltering warehouse. The exhaust fans whirled in front of us, tossing a suffocating cloud of smoke over the crowd. The architecture of the nightclub Ruby Skye gave the feeling of a theater […]

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Enjoying the "Ryde": JOYRYDE’s C.A.R. tour comes to San Francisco
JOYRYDE live at the Ruby Skye in San Francisco. (NAFIA CHOWDHURY/The Stanford Daily)

It was hot and cramped; the air was heavy, muggy and dangerously loud — loud beyond measure. Bodies collided with bodies in the sweltering warehouse. The exhaust fans whirled in front of us, tossing a suffocating cloud of smoke over the crowd. The architecture of the nightclub Ruby Skye gave the feeling of a theater — old-fashioned, a passing remnant of a romantic, gilded age, the ornate baroque windows and architectural decor evoking nostalgia — but on the floor, electronic dance music was being born, crying viscerally, violently at the foot of the speakers. JOYRYDE’s music is a similar beast — remixing and chopping up old-school beats and hits into an evolving, growling, monstrous thing unlike anything heard by humanity — that fills up the entire room with its massive, booming body. That body trampled us underfoot, pushed us outward in all directions and choked us in its sweaty breath. It should have been uncomfortable, but instead it was the most wonderful time.

The night began uneventfully. First came Aryay, who dropped an eclectic, housewarming mix of jungle terror and bass house. He was a fine DJ, and his performance was quite good, yet it left something to be desired. There’s something ineffable about a wonderful performance of music that etches itself into your memory — something that reminds you of how incredulous it was to merely exist in that moment — yet that musical ephemera was conspicuously missing. My body danced nevertheless, though it was hard to truly feel the whole emotional picture of the music. Instead, I merely watched lions — a common animal in Aryay’s jungle-inspired aesthetic — in all shades of green and red float across the screen.

Only when Dr. Fresch took to the stage did the heartbeat of the night begin to pulse. It was powerful and enjoyable — Dr. Fresch was filled with energy and happiness. He looked down at the huddled masses in the crowd, carefully though not unkindly, with the eye of a doctor. His unspoken diagnosis was obvious: we had a case of the Thursday night blues, and the only cure was one hour of concentrated thrill and musical adrenaline pumped directly into the ears. Fist-pumping, hair-waving and dancing electrically throughout his set, Dr. Fresch laid down a dynamic mix of darker deep house and bass-heavy beats, playing classic tracks such as Valentino Khan’s “Deep Down Low” and his own original “On and On.” And so the floor came alive with the sound of music and movement — could it get any better?

Enjoying the "Ryde": JOYRYDE’s C.A.R. tour comes to San Francisco
(NAFIA CHOWDHURY/The Stanford Daily)

Suddenly, JOYRYDE took his place, atop the car that had now come to life on the stage below. The crowd looked up for a moment, transfixed in awe at the unfolding messiah. An ominous operatic vocal fell over the room — but suddenly the standard “boom boom” four-to-the-floor beat of “Fuel Tank” yanked us violently back into reality. There was a slight feeling of those warehouse raves of old, that quintessential blurring of reality and music, that took hold of the spellbound audience and entranced them in a collective, spontaneous dance. It was both sheltered and dangerous — we were as safe as could be, yet we were living freely on the edge of danger. For a moment, I could suspend my belief in reality and live through my ears.

In the heat of the music it did not matter who we were — where we came from, who we came with, why we came — it was an uninterrupted flow of crashing noises and screams. Track after track passed through our ears and pumped themselves into our bodies, the stomping beats yanking our feet into a frenetic dance. It was headache-inducing, ear-thrashing and enjoyable. The fuel tank was indeed full, and it was taking us on an epic JOYRYDE.

The highlight of the night, however, was his performance of “Damn.” It was instantly recognizable: the repetitive p-p-popping interspersed with ominous brass hits and wide, booming 808s. The crowd screamed in recognition as the lights swept the jubilant crowd. Hands, arms and bodies waved, and heads swung and bobbed. It was almost too much: the occasional distraction sometimes disrupted the music — a stray arm flew at my face — but the crowd reined itself in, took a small breath, and kept on wilding.

JOYRYDE’s music reflects this scene of savagery: it scratches back at the listener, teetering on a dangerous knife-edge between sonic innovation and musical blasphemy and swerves perilously, sometimes tipping towards one side. You wait for it to tip over and choose its side, but it never fails to strike that tenuous balance amidst its erratic path. It was that sense of danger and thrill — of peril atop enjoyment — that gave his live-set a uniquely swaggering character. It was music, music played the way it was meant to be played, and heard the way it was meant to be heard — bass booming, arms free, head clear.

JOYRYDE’s performance evoked an unforgettable windows-down, head-sticking-out, bass-booming, gas-pedal-down ethos. But most of all, it was a surreal scene, a picture from an urban dystopia through time, as layer upon layer of existence suddenly interposed themselves around me: I was in a warehouse from the days of old electronic music; I was in an old theatre in old San Francisco; I was at a nightclub in the year 2017. And amidst that confusion, amidst that crisis, there was a car, headlights on, staring me in the face while sirens blared amidst a sea of screams.

 

Contact Trenton Chang at tchang97@stanford.edu

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Electronic dance music: Let there be house https://stanforddaily.com/2017/02/24/house/ https://stanforddaily.com/2017/02/24/house/#respond Fri, 24 Feb 2017 10:00:45 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1122134 In the beginning, there was Jack, and Jack had a groove. And from this groove came the groove of all grooves. He declared: “Let there be house!” and house music was born … And so the bodies murmured and moved, indistinctly, uncertainly, in dark communion. They jacked their bodies to the beat; they stepped, danced […]

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In the beginning, there was Jack, and Jack had a groove. And from this groove came the groove of all grooves. He declared: “Let there be house!” and house music was born …

And so the bodies murmured and moved, indistinctly, uncertainly, in dark communion. They jacked their bodies to the beat; they stepped, danced that erratic dance, on a path from nowhere to nowhere, yet somewhere to somewhere … they gyrated and funked, invisible but for the dim pulses of light. A hand, a head, some fingers glowing in the light — then nothing. They were one, a body without organs, swinging in fervid, sweltering unison; they were themselves, and each other, disparate, chaotic. Freedom to move, and laugh and love — this was the rave. PLUR: That was the word used to describe that uninhibiting feeling, liberated from the boundary between human and human. That was then, before electronic dance music was Electronic Dance Music, when it  was called house — not my house or your house, it was our house once you entered it — and it lived a fresh life underground in urban tenements and clubs, sequestered from society.

Electronic Dance Music (EDM) has since become ubiquitous. It is indeed a young music — 30 or perhaps 40 years old, an infant in the world of music — yet it has already become a worldwide phenomenon, with billions of adherents from around the world. Defined by extravagant, light-up festivals like Electric Daisy Carnival (EDC), Tomorrowland and Creamfields, EDM has been remade into an attractive and flashy form of entertainment. But in its current iteration, EDM is an invented pseudonym, popularized and resurrected in the last decade, seeking  to encapsulate the enumerable multitudes of electronic music and repackage them into brand names and market items. The electronic music of old defied such enclosure; it was its free-bounding antithesis. Nevertheless, EDM has presently become a singular commodity: criticized as fungible and commercial, consumed thoughtlessly, stretched into a vapid abstraction of its political roots.

Modern EDM is an agent of popular entertainment culture, the capitalist-driven phenomenon that entrances the masses. Whether or not this transformation has enriched or spoiled this music remains debatable. It is no secret that the main characters of the pop culture narrative are white, and EDM is no exception. Electronic Dance Music today evokes a nearly all-white, all-male cis-het cast of characters playing amidst stunning LED displays and hissing CO2 cannons in front of an excited, homogenous crowd of concertgoers (mostly white). It is lamentably unsurprising that 85 of 100 DJs in the 2016 DJ Mag Top 100 are white. This poll, criticized by DJs and news writers alike as a popularity contest, has nevertheless become somewhat equivalent to fame, creating a pantheon within Electronic Dance Music. The names —  Martin Garrix, Hardwell, Tiësto — evoke recognition in both neophytes and longtime ravers. And for a moment, this spectacle, this hollow extravagance, is quite beautiful. Yet it is a far cry from the obscure, mysterious soul of that electronic music of old, the renegade sounds of the underground.

In this nostalgia we ask, “What happened?”

 

Electronic Dance Music™

Before EDM was EDM, it was just electronic dance music, and before even then it was trance, techno, disco, jungle, DnB, breaks, house — multitudes of music, and of peoples. Born as a safe space for queer persons of color, it was an institution of liberation operating outside the state. The Electronic Dance Music of today is a proper noun, a trademark, given identity by the dominant discourse. Though the abbreviation “EDM” has been in use for some time, only recently has EDM become a mass commodity. It conjures a picturesque image of opulent festivities, neon lights and jubilant crowds. This romantic vignette of Electronic Dance Music is a fixed point — a meme created by the state: a fantastical, capitalistic hedonism that fetishizes and replaces the liberatory hedonism of early electronic dance music. The images of the “raver,” kandi ecstasy bracelets and the mystical PLUR are all for sale today, market commodities in the conferral of “raver” status. The former “sounds of the underground” are a subset of the mainstream, a commodified “underground” identity that has the look of the counterculture but the stench of the sociocultural superstructure of the state.

Moreover, EDM has forgotten how to be political: YourEDM, based on its “political” news coverage in 2016, seemed to have understood the politicity of EDM as short Twitter jests by famous DJs against President Donald Trump, MAKJ’s “FUCK DONALD TRUMP” festival chant and “GOP Presidential Hopeful Marco Rubio Listens to EDM.” This understanding of the political is establishmentarian at best and partisan at worst; the gestures lack in substance, and form is treated as a contrived resistance that engages the common politics of the dominant discourse. This vulgarian activism is a false substitute for the subversive, extrapolitical institutions that defined the dynamic infancy of electronic music. Back then, electronic dance music was imaginative and transgressive; the question proposed was not a partisan one of Democrat versus Republican but a classist struggle between the hegemonic discourse and those excluded from it. Today, Electronic Dance Music is a commodified shadow of that iconoclasm, a perversion — or maybe even a blasphemy — of the previous ritual it embodied. It is conformity to a particular brand of “acceptable” subversion.

Meanwhile, “electronic dance music” uncapitalized is no trademark. Free of commodity, defined solely by its own existence, it is the most humble, most mundane strand of this music. If Electronic Dance Music is the capitalistic baroque, “grandeur incarnate,” with its gods standing elevated on the stage in a baptism of shimmering light and smoke, spreading his hands over the multitudes below, casting spells of thunderous music into the air — then electronic dance music is artistic realism: simple and genuine. It is a subtle form of ubiquity, a fringe act of performance that continually subverts reality from the sidelines. Most of all, it is not a fixed point; it is rhizomatic in musical form, weaving many evolving textures, layers and samples into music, inhabiting all identities and aspects. There is something contentious about the sound of EDM itself, literally assimilating and collecting bits and pieces of sampled music, melding them into a new creation. It challenged the idea of musical creation and performance through its existence. It was emphatically unnatural and digitized, a cyborg on the dancefloor wrought of spare mechanical parts and a human touch. It was the music of the Other; it was music unlike any other heard before.

The counterculture has long been linked to political music, having harbored the anti-war protest songs of the ‘60s and ‘70s, anti-establishmentarian punk rock and civil rights movement hymns. Songs from the folk “We Will Overcome” to “Imagine” by John Lennon to even “Smells Like Teen Spirit” by Nirvana have become nearly synonymous with political music in many circles, embodying an eclectic array of anti-statist themes from rebellion to harmony. Even blues — the sound of Black America in the early 20th century —  was countercultural. The structure of blues itself, with its dogmatic creation of uncharted harmonies, chords and rhythms, was subversive already, and songs like Billie Holiday’s “Strange Fruit” in the era of Jim Crow floated the voice of the oppressed itself past the boundary of the political and into mainstream ears.

But electronic dance music holds scarcely a similar infamy in the present. If it holds any connotation today, it is an infamy defined by all-too-frequent drug deaths and juvenoia. Perhaps it previously held a more  notorious connotation, one stemming from the days of illegal warehouse raves and secret apartment parties. No matter. EDM is one assimilated thread of many in the cultural mainstream. A recent demographic survey by Nielsen shows that the largest block of EDM fans today are young, middle-class, white males. They are perhaps the group most normalized by the dominant discourse; they are the heirs to the political nexus of America, inhabiting a bulwark of privilege within the established state. EDM therefore espouses a banal type of rebelliousness, one that functions within the confines of the state while satisfying the most standard consumers of this entertainment.

Electronic dance music claims to be apolitical. It is a hedonistic space of boundless, interpersonal exchange, unhindered by human difference. Its motto — Peace, Love, Unity, Respect (PLUR) is all-encompassing and all-loving — but it is a conscious ignorance. Electronic dance music is a powerful oxymoron, as its apolitical nature neither recognizes nor knows any human difference: Therein lies its inherent politicality. Its utopian existence was in and of itself a political statement, a subconscious act of protest against the politics of the dominant discourse. Electronic dance music was the lovechild of this sociality, a futuristic performance of technological escapism that beat a frenetic, apocalyptic rhythm into the hearts of the oppressed. Played by beat-juggling disk jockeys — the progenitors to modern DJs — music, once ephemeral, taken song for song, became the a continuous set: a seamless transition from music into music that upheld in perpetuity this impossible space of interpersonality.

As the boundaries between songs blurred, so did the boundaries between people. And so electronic dance music lived a double consciousness, critically aware of its flowering existence outside the boundaries of the political, but simultaneously aware that its apolitical existence was dangerous. Once, it was a foremost countercultural movement, a sequestered space of social interchange unregulated by the austerity and auspices of society. Gawk  at its successor, the EDM of today: It is a farce, a deceptive, romantic display that claims lineage to this house music of old. It dresses as the real thing, perhaps, but the soul is lost. Jack’s groove plays on in perpetuity, but few recognize it.

Our house

The birthplace of electronic dance music in the United States is said to be Chicago. Then, it was called house music, supposedly named after The Warehouse, one of the gay nightclubs that formed a safe space for those of all ethnicities, sexual orientations, gender expressions and economic classes. Blending disco, Afro-Latin and funk influences, Chicago house was a dynamic, nimble music, punctuated with samples of soul and gospel verses and chants. It burgeoned in the underground of the Chicago nightlife, quickly populating various queer and black spaces throughout the city. Later, Chicago house would develop into acid house, the soundtrack of late ‘80s and early ‘90s raves in the United Kingdom, marked by its famous squelching basslines generated by the famed Roland TB-303 bassline generator.

Detroit techno, the other pillar of early American house music, represented an alternate tradition of subaltern socialization. Perhaps some soul of the decline of Detroit’s industries, from the time when the phrase “Rust Belt” entered the American lexicon, ingrained itself in the futuristic, post-industrial, consciousness of techno, creating an austere, almost-paranoid melancholy through music. Influenced by the gay black DJs of Chicago house, Detroit techno became associated with Afrofuturism, an emphatically African-American cultural aesthetic melding elements of magical realism and technologism. Detroit techno was therefore a safe space wherein, amidst the decline and neglect of the Detroit African-American middle class, the imagination of a future became plausible, especially one that transcended the color line and identity.

The concurrent development of the house scene in Europe reflected a similar liberatory sentiment. Unlike the explicitly queer spaces of the American electronic music landscape, the U.K. rave scene had a largely white, young, working-class following, a remnant of the dominant discotheques of the previous decade. Though dance music had been popular for some time overseas, acid house music exploded onto the British scene in the late ‘80s after a group of four DJs, returning from a summer trip to renowned Ibiza club Amnesia, attempted to replicate the open, carefree spirit of the Baelaric dance scene. It was a resounding success, and thus the transformative “Second Summer of Love” began. The raves of this period — described as “underground, forbidden, naughty” — amassed a multitude of youth from all walks of life.

In other cities worldwide — Berlin, Toronto, Paris, New York City, Los Angeles, Tokyo and others — similar pockets of space carved out by the marginalized began including electronic dance music into their nightlife. The thesis of early electronic music was one of dislocation from white-heteronormative social structures: an inherent freedom and liberation. It was a type of utopian anarchy, governed only loosely by the performing DJ at the pulpit-booth — who was in reality a mere channel for the unfettered flow of divine music. Perhaps it was a characteristic of electronic dance music, in which the music existed regardless of the performer; the identity of the DJ was merely incidental. It is important, however, to note that such safe spaces of queer musical liberation catered largely to gay men, with the exception of the Paris lesbian clubbing scene, which flowered in the ‘90s. It may be too idealistic to portray early electronic dance music as a perfect space of social liberation, but it still provided a safer space for the multitudes of the marginalized.

Search and seizure

“SHOOT THESE EVIL ACID BARONS!” screamed the headline of The Sun, a British tabloid. Underneath that shocking headline was an intense account of a mother who had recently lost her child to drug abuse at a rave. Another cartoon depicted Lucifer, masked by a smiley face, grinning as young partygoers fell into Hell through a carpet labeled: “Welcome to Acid House.” Tony Colston-Hayter, the club promoter known then as “Mr. Big of Acid House,” had helped bring electronic dance music from the underground into the open air during that Second Summer of Love. Raves with thousands of teenagers began to fill the streets of London and Manchester at night. Sensational tabloid pieces tore at the fabric of electronic dance music culture as it emerged from the underground, latching onto one aspect of the scene — the use of illegal drugs like “acid” — and associated social degeneracy and chaotic lawlessness with the rave in the dominant discourse, thus demonizing the counterculture. As its popularity grew, the electronic dance music scene, once invisible and populated by invisible souls, now fell under harsh scrutiny from society. In the dead of the night, throngs of youngsters would now fill the streets suddenly after a rave, and the burst of activity would attract the attention of the police. Combined with the “druggie” connotation of the rave and the occasional, statistically unlikely death, a powerful social backlash began to develop against electronic dance music.

Tough anti-clubbing laws were enacted in the U.K., the most notorious of which was the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act of 1994, which criminalized the rave. Police were given power to shut down and remove people from musical performances at night characterized by “a succession of repetitive beats.” DJ Timmi Magic describes such a raid by the police on a rave, recounting the police’s confusion at the peaceable, communal nature of the rave: “They were like … what is going on? There’s no going off and fighting, everyone’s happy, everyone’s just raving. We should let it go on, but we know we can’t.” British youth took to the streets in protest, but to no avail — the Summer of Love had ended. Raves, once a countercultural stronghold, survived only through a reluctant commercialism, allowed only in licensed venues with licensed promoters. The rave was thus incorporated into the regulatory sphere of civil society.

The United States experienced a fleeting revival of rave culture in the ‘90s, centered around California, but even that was short-lived. During this brief renaissance, the Mojave desert in California and Arizona was often the site of massive raves. But as in the U.K., law enforcement was similarly drawn to such raves, perhaps owing to the contemporaneous “War on Drugs” espoused by the presidential administrations of the late ‘80s and ‘90s. Anti-rave pressure intensified as negative press increased, including a 1998 Fox News exposé that featured drug-addled teenagers, turning the rave into a dangerous, immature and potentially violent party in the public imagination. A recently leaked Drug Enforcement Administration factsheet and a Department of Justice information bulletin both focused on drugs as an allegedly “integral” part of club culture, and thus the rave was branded for suppression. That information bulletin also lauded the success of Operation Rave Review in 2000, in which undercover officers, emergency transport records and rave promoter targeting formed a grand scheme by law enforcement to suppress rave culture in New Orleans. The Reducing Americans’ Vulnerability to Ecstasy (RAVE) Act was soon proposed in 2002 by then-Senator Joe Biden to criminalize the staple drug MDMA, which was passed eventually in the form of the Illicit Drug Anti-Proliferation Act.

Electronic dance music was mercilessly assailed by society. What had once been a safe space for the marginalized was now criminal and subject to invasion. The long arm of the state had gazed upon electronic dance music, deemed it dangerous and reached in with the arm of law enforcement and media, subordinating it to the political through a draconian procedure of search and seizure. Electronic dance music was banished once more into the queer spaces in urban nightclubs, where it existed as fragments of the original mundane jouissance of the ‘80s. It was not dead, but neither did it thrive. Today the histories of those spaces following the war on electronic music exist only as fragmented oral histories, sequestered from the dominant discourse. Electronic dance music would indeed become prominent over a decade later, but this second rise would not come to pass through the labor of the subaltern.

In 2016, the shooting at the Orlando nightclub Pulse reechoed the raids and invasions of old. The setting of this tragedy — at a gay nightclub — was disconcertingly poignant in light of the evolution of queer club culture concurrent with electronic dance music. Though this attack came not from law enforcement, but a terrorist whose motivations were less clear, it relayed a hauntingly similar message: Electronic dance music could longer be a safe space.

Telling it straight

The resurrection of electronic music was imperfect. The soul of electronic dance music had almost been forgotten, but some form of it was salvaged, or rather, appropriated, and placed into the engine of pop culture. This straightened-out form of electronic dance music was a mass rebranding effort from corporate interests in an attempt to absolve the rave from its druggie stigma. Such rebranding was not an act of altruism but of capitalism, as the machinations of the dominant discourse allowed the rave and therefore electronic dance music to be abstracted into a money-making engine. By commodifying the counterculture, the dominant discourse thereby could assuage the anger of the ravers by allowing them to relive the spirit of the rave under the auspices of the state. “Raves” became “festivals,” “techno” and “house” became “Electronic Dance Music (EDM)” and “ecstasy” became “molly.” It was a hollow imitation, but it was commercially successful.

EDM has now become the space of the middle-class white. Expensive ticket prices have made participation in the modern iteration of this musical ritual contingent upon economic status, ceding this space to middle- to upper-class, mostly white households, leaving the marginalized with little voice. Judy Park, writing in the journal Dancecult, describes a dichotomy of the “kandi ravers” of the ‘90s and white “frat bros” in the modern EDM scene based on her interviews with Asian-American festival attendees. She notes a concurrent normalization of whiteness as well in those two archetypes: The “default” race of these festival attendees in the public imagination is white. Park continues, explaining this phenomenon succinctly: “While EDM festivals … perpetuate the promise of an egalitarian utopia through the PLUR ideology, both the physical production of the events and the symbolic production of authenticity in the scene reflect the dominance of middle-class whiteness.”

As the rave was the center of activity in the early electronic dance music scene, EDM is similarly marked by festivals. On the surface, they are the same as raves: large gatherings of a multitude of young partygoers dancing to music. Symbolically, however, the “festival” is distinct from the rave; while a rave is defined as illegal, a festival is a celebration. Woodstock, for example, though not free of its own problems with illegal drugs and rioting, was a festival. The festival is, at a conceptual level, free of much of the stigma facing the rave. In reality, an association still exists in the public mind between EDM and illicit drug use, but it has hardly led to widespread reactionary laws against modern festivals. Deaths and hospitalizations from drug use, however, surged at festivals in the past two years, including HARD Summer in Los Angeles and Future Music Festival in Singapore. Still, it appears that commercialized festivals are here to stay as the present incarnation of electronic dance music.

The festival ought to be a cheerful space, but in its material splendor it has renounced its subversive roots. And when EDM thus forgot how to be political, it became blind as well to its history of a music borne of queer, marginalized spaces. Los Angeles club founder Loren Granic explains the situation in the magazine “Resident Advisor”: “We’re currently experiencing a total mainstreaming of dance music in America … many of these newcomers are straight/white kids who are very far removed from the LGBT community … I think it’s important that we highlight the role that the gay community played and that we educate new fans of dance music to the ideals of community, equality and diversity that were so crucial to dance music’s DNA from the beginning.” A music and culture born from emphatically subaltern communities has somehow become a widespread agent of the heteronormative mainstream. The EDM community today still attempts to proffer some an activist, inclusive message, sponsoring fundraisers such as Promote Diversity following Russian anti-gay legislation, but EDM’s double consciousness of simultaneous apoliticality and politicity is gone. The commodified dream of PLUR, now moribund, stirs weakly in the modern space of Electronic Dance Music.

It is possible that EDM has merely walked down the ineluctable path of cultural evolution followed by its predecessors, moving from the fringes into the mainstream. Or perhaps its assimilation was subtler, an all-encompassing envelopment by society. Nevertheless, EDM is hardly the first form of art to be depoliticized by the state and turned into a commodity. In doing so, it has shaken off the quintessence of its revolutionary birth and surrendered itself to an abject humiliation. The images of the rave era are commodities today; the raver archetype, the utopian PLUR are marketing points, salesmen for the state. The carefree nomadism that previously characterized the dynamic raves has scattered; the erratic dance of the itinerant from nowhere to nowhere is long-forgotten, and replaced with the commercialized ritual of modern EDM.

Listen one last time, then, to Jack’s groove, the groove of all grooves:

“… Jack is the one that can bring nations and nations of all Jackers together under one house. You may be black, you may be white; you may be Jew or Gentile. It don’t make a difference in our house … and this is fresh.”

The Birth

  1. Marshall Jefferson — “Move Your Body”
  2. Frankie Knuckles — “Your Love”
  3. Phuture — “Acid Tracks”
  4. Jungle Brothers — “I’ll House You”
  5. Farley “Jackmaster” Funk — “Love Can’t Turn Around”
  6. Mr. Fingers/Larry Heard — “Can You Feel It (Vocal Edit)”
  7. Joe Smooth — “Promised Land”
  8. Adonis — “No Way Back”
  9. Orbital — “Chime”
  10. Drexciya — “You Don’t Know”

Evolution

  1. Inner City — “Big Fun”
  2. Da Hool — “Meet Her at the Love Parade”
  3. Faithless — “Insomnia”
  4. The Prodigy — “No Good (Start the Dance)”
  5. Modjo — “Lady”
  6. GALA — “Freed from Desire”
  7. Madison Avenue — “Don’t Call Me Baby”
  8. Moloko — “Sing It Back”
  9. Nomad — “I Wanna Give You Devotion”
  10. Stardust — “Music Sounds Better with You”

 

Contact Trenton Chang at tchang97 ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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Preview: Calling all RYDRZ https://stanforddaily.com/2017/02/13/calling-all-rydrz/ https://stanforddaily.com/2017/02/13/calling-all-rydrz/#respond Mon, 13 Feb 2017 08:23:32 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1122800 JOYRYDE’s new single, “Damn,” an eclectic bonanza of rap vocals and electronic pops, speaks for itself. It is one of the few songs that captures what the listener will ineluctably say upon listening to the track. In any case, it is clear that his music simply does not give a shit. It swerves and careens […]

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JOYRYDE’s new single, “Damn,” an eclectic bonanza of rap vocals and electronic pops, speaks for itself. It is one of the few songs that captures what the listener will ineluctably say upon listening to the track.

In any case, it is clear that his music simply does not give a shit.

It swerves and careens down the alleyways of the city at night, engines blasting a jubilant, raucous song, tires scraping up sparks, gas pedal pushed deliberately to the floor. Or perhaps it is kicking up flares of dust, swaggering in an empty parking garage. But it also feels somewhat diasporic, negotiating two spaces of identity: On the one hand, evoking that new-underground L.A. bass house sound, with its powerful womps, gritty screeches and urban sirens; on the other, hearkening to that old-skool, broken-beat U.K. garage sound, filled with gnashing hi-hats and aggressive, sampled voices.

His work is filled with materialistic images of expensive cars, industrial rust and street grime, constructing an urban-tenement aesthetic — living on the margins, playing a game of dangerous brinksmanship with life itself.

JOYRYDE’s aesthetic also evokes a singular sense of urban panic. You can hear — no, feel — the hot sweltering of a million souls gasping for air in the concrete jungle. It is a post-industrial sound of dissonant clanks, screams and laser beams; a sound of crashing metal on metal, with voices and sirens wailing eerily over the mix — and it should not sound good. It should just sound like a cacophonous slog of powerful noise — but it refuses to, no matter how hard your ears try.

There is an absurd, grotesque beauty to the music at it romps through your head, tracing deep circles of fire in your brain. And then the booming, angry voices surface, yelling nonsensical refrains like, “maniac material m-murder the dance floor,” “what’s in the fucking box,” and “mah flo’s ahead of your flo two times squared.” Metal scrapes on metal and there’s a scream — surely something’s gone terribly wrong. Nope — the beats pump breathlessly again.

There’s a certain absurdity to JOYRYDE’s music and aesthetic, but it makes for an experience unlike any other. It’s all swagger, no chill. The end result is an apoplectic, apocalyptic and unapologetic mess of headache material that you somehow can’t enough of.

Perhaps I should’ve listened to his warning: “THE FOLLOWING IMAGES MAY CAUSE EXTREME THRILL AND LEAD TO AN OVERDOSE IN BADASSERY,” as the music video for “Fuel Tank” says — but it’s far too late for me, as I’ve come to enjoy the thrill, the frenzy, the energy — it demands to be loud — and if you try to turn down the volume, you’ll find that it creeps back slowly, and before you know it, you’ve turned the knob right past 10 and into the dangerous domain of 11. We’ve all been there.

His music is a wild ryde, but it’s survivable — and certainly enjoyable. Simply heed JOYRYDE’s advice for enjoying his music: “For best results, install subwoofer in car, invite friends and gas pedal, gas pedal, gas pedal…”

It’s fitting that his new C.A.R. tour (“Calling All Rydrz”) features a large car, headlights shining bright, atop the stage. A car is a stranger to the stage — it belongs on city streets and highways — but this car is here for a reason, taking us on this musical joyryde, swerving noisily through the dark streets of San Francisco.

JOYRYDE will be coming to San Francisco on Feb. 16, at the Ruby Skye nightclub as a part of their Thursday “Control San Francisco” series. Dr. Fresch, Aryay and Sam F will also be performing. The venue is strictly 18+. Tickets are $20 for General Admission, and $350 for the VIP Mezzanine Table (21+ only).

 

Contact Trenton Chang at tchang97 ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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‘The Nickelback of EDM’: Selling out and the price of fame https://stanforddaily.com/2017/02/06/nickelback-of-edm/ https://stanforddaily.com/2017/02/06/nickelback-of-edm/#respond Tue, 07 Feb 2017 07:53:24 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1122532 On Jan. 30, Esquire Magazine culture writer Matt Miller set the world of Electronic Dance Music (EDM) ablaze when he called The Chainsmokers the “Nickelback of EDM.” The story, shared 33,000 times the day after it broke, was quickly picked up by major EDM outlets from Your EDM to EDM Sauce. In the article, Miller lambasted The Chainsmokers […]

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On Jan. 30, Esquire Magazine culture writer Matt Miller set the world of Electronic Dance Music (EDM) ablaze when he called The Chainsmokers the “Nickelback of EDM.” The story, shared 33,000 times the day after it broke, was quickly picked up by major EDM outlets from Your EDM to EDM Sauce. In the article, Miller lambasted The Chainsmokers for using bankable cliches that have come to define EDM: generic musical tropes, shameless sexism and phony sentimentalism. Miller is hardly unique: Deadmau5 has likened their music to “cancer” on his Twitter feed. Indeed, The Chainsmokers are guilty as charged, proffering the world a vapid brand of hungover, singalong, earworm pop that gets old after the first play — yet still elicits cheers on the hundredth. Their persona represents one of the most cliché and hated stereotypes of modern EDM: “We’re just frat boy dudes, you know what I mean? Loving ladies and stuff.”

No frat party is complete without at least three plays of “Closer.” But Miller expends a lot of effort scapegoating The Chainsmokers themselves for the downfall of EDM. It is too easy to condemn The Chainsmokers for being sexist and adhering to a money-making, hit-song formula. The music industry is inherently a money-making machine; it thrives on proven formulae of success and profit. This line of reasoning is often used to characterize pop as a musical race to the bottom. But if The Chainsmokers are to be crucified by the media for their — in Miller’s word — “lowest-common-denominator” sound, then we must condemn all artists who ever evolved their sound into something more “marketable.” Where are the diatribes against Dim Mak Records, a bastion of poppy, “frat bro” EDM, The Chainsmokers’s musical homestead? Where are our criticisms of the sexism and exploitation internalized within our music industry? Why must The Chainsmokers bear the brunt of the criticism for these deeper, older faults?

In the early years of the decade, when EDM was just beginning to gain mainstream popularity, many fans bemoaned a similar downfall of EDM. A phenomenon known as “big room house,” epitomized by Martin Garrix’s hit track “Animals” and other reverb-filled, spacey tracks saturated the sets at EDM festival mainstages. Big room house was ridiculed for being formulaic: Its simple structure of buildup-plus-drop ad nauseam combined with generic, ravey drops made it the Friday Frat Bro soundtrack of the 2010s. A YouTube video playing four big room house tracks simultaneously, poking fun at the ubiquitous homogeneity of the genre, went viral in the EDM community. This era of EDM was also characterized by rampant objectification of women — not much unlike the present state of EDM ruled by The Chainsmokers. Many proclaimed the death of EDM in that moment, but it has persevered and evolved into its present form in the face of impending creative doom.

Pop culture does not exist in a vacuum. Though pop culture is a modern invention, everything that is mainstream today was once part of the cultural margins, and EDM is certainly no exception. Pop music is often criticized as vapid today, but ironically, it assimilates an eclectic mix of threads from all genres of music and repackages the most iconic aspects of each into a slog of catchy, marketable clichés that our ears somehow can’t shake. So is it the artist that sells out, then, or is it the culture?

Take Zedd, for example, who reached mainstream success with his track “Clarity.” He has since taken on a more pop-style brand of EDM as well, defined by tracks like “Stay the Night” or “I Want You To Know.” Some say that his sound “matured,” while others still will fault him for “selling out.” They ask,“Where is the old Zedd?” But it is far too simplistic to assume that the musician is static. The musician is always in a state of evolution, developing new sounds and styles with each breath of musicality. But we pay no attention to that and focus our minds on disparate pieces of music from which we construct our musical conception of these artists. Zedd is hardly alone — the explosion of EDM has brought other artists like Calvin Harris, Avicii and Skrillex to the forefront of the commercial spotlight, and they too have garnered more than their fair share of admirers — and detractors. Such is the price of fame: No matter where they go, the haters follow, and they hate, hate, hate.

I am curious. I would like to know what these critics of pop culture artists want from the objects of their criticism. The Chainsmokers, in an interview with Billboard, insisted that they were not making music just to score hits — they had a particular artistic vision in mind. If that vision happens to conform to the pop industry standard, then who are we to fault them in particular? While The Chainsmokers are certainly problematic, utilizing sexist rhetoric in many of their songs and interviews, to ask them to renounce their current musical ways and become bastions of musical creativity is like asking a fish to climb a tree. It is nonsensical; it is not their musical raison d’être. Do fault The Chainsmokers for their shortcomings, but remember that the culture they inhabit is just as guilty. EDM is today a white male-dominated field, and if we are to innovate a new commercial future for EDM, we ought not to forget that.

At the end of the day, music is music. Complaints about mainstream music are hardly a new phenomenon, and the moment that The Chainsmokers reached mainstream acclaim with the arguably cringe-inducing “#Selfie” and mellow “Roses,” a large red target was painted on their backs. I will admit that I have no love for The Chainsmokers, but the problems they embody in the EDM industry — creative bankruptcy and rampant misogyny — are hardly their creations. These problems were part of marketable music long before they appeared on the scene — and the critic’s blame game is hardly a productive solution to the diseases of mass-market music. Amidst all the fuss, I would like to imagine that The Chainsmokers — and Nickelback — are watching over the hubbub, laughing their way to the bank.

 

Contact Trenton Chang at tchang97 ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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Artist Pantheon: Music best served chilled https://stanforddaily.com/2017/01/31/artist-pantheon/ https://stanforddaily.com/2017/01/31/artist-pantheon/#respond Wed, 01 Feb 2017 06:50:54 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1122225 Electronic music has a particular connotation: It evokes images of neon-colored festivals, rambunctious bacchanals and nocturnal excitement. But electronic music is an expansive genre with many sounds and styles. Today, we travel deep into the realm of electronic music and fix our gaze past the chattering festivities — peering instead upon the easygoing, blasé sounds […]

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Artist Pantheon: Music best served chilled
(Sujalajus, Wikimedia Commons)

Electronic music has a particular connotation: It evokes images of neon-colored festivals, rambunctious bacchanals and nocturnal excitement. But electronic music is an expansive genre with many sounds and styles. Today, we travel deep into the realm of electronic music and fix our gaze past the chattering festivities — peering instead upon the easygoing, blasé sounds in the distance.

Inside the calm recesses of this land, we stumble upon our destination. Here, the ways of music are old, but the sounds are born anew constantly. To the ears, the music has the character of innovation superimposed upon relaxation — and most of all, this music has soul. Draw yourself close to the music, so that you can listen to its whispers: this music is meant to be heard by the heart.

Pat Lok

There’s a chill in the air, but you’ve never felt better. You feel like you’ve been here before, but you can’t quite place it — was it all a dream? A distant memory from a past life? You shrug — it doesn’t matter; you’re enjoying the groove. Large, bubbly funk chords intersect with groovy classic house vibes, skipping nonchalantly — yet somehow deliberately — above the waves of sound in Pat Lok’s signature style. It’s not quite old school, yet it lacks that futuristic sound present in so much of electronic music today: no bells or whistles or lasers.

Yet it’s that same plainness, that peculiar normalcy, that gives Pat Lok’s music a timeless charm. Neither should you mistake the mundane nature of the music for a lack of creativity — within the mundane springs capricious, heartfelt moments of intrigue that drive the tune into uncharted territory. The nightclub has four walls and boxes its patrons; but the music of Pat Lok is open-air and freeform. It dances and dances, enticing you to give chase even as you look away. There’s something about this quiet, curious dance that inexplicably draws the ear.

Is it nostalgia? Perhaps it is too terse to pin the feeling of this music into one emotion, or word. This soul is wistful, hopeful, bitter-cold, but most of all, warm — warm enough to wrap you in its homely folds on a cold night.

Indiginis

You’re drawn in by the waist, spinning in this slow dance under the stars. You shuffle your feet uncertainly and shift side-to-side. Indiginis’ music is gentle but reserved. The beat has a futuristic, spacey feel, and it somehow straddles an impossible space between fast-paced and relaxed. But it is never frantic — instead, it is passionate and deliberate. It is mysterious — not in a dark sort of way, but in a secretive, sensitive way, as if it is hiding its soul. Or perhaps it is shielding its weathered heart from uncouth eyes. You listen, you hear every word of its musical tale, but you can’t help but wonder if there’s something left untold, if there’s more than meets the ear. You never ask.

This music is bursting with feeling and sensitivity, yearning to escape and explode from its bulging seams, but it cannot. It comes at you with open arms, and draws your body into its weak embrace. It draws — scratches — its bow across your heartstrings, playing a throbbing tune that begs to be acknowledged. It longs for your touch — but it fears it as well. It restrains itself at the brink, in a state of demure melancholy, but in the subtle echoes of its thoughts, you hear a skyward soaring and a sigh of hope. A teardrop descends, tracing cuts on its face.

Røse

A dusty upright player piano plays nonchalantly in the dark hall. It is not quite that concert-hall elegance you expect from the piano, but rather a playful, jazzy ragtime sound. Despite the emptiness of the hall, you step closer — and find yourself swing-dancing alongside the music. Røse’s music does not hesitate. It flaunts its body provocatively at you, waving its arms and drawing you inward. But even that freshness of spirit never lapses out of control: The quick music still lands precisely, jumping and tiptoeing deftly about the floor, tap-tapping an upbeat rhythm.

Now the scene explodes with the gilded extravagance of yesteryear, reminiscent of the grand balls and masquerades of old, but the big-band ensemble has since been replaced with a cadre of electronic sounds, of kicks and snareclaps and synths juxtaposed among pianos and violins. Perhaps, to parody that name “big room house,” this is “ballroom house”; it retains the liberating spirit of house music while incorporating a superficial hint of haute couture. Do take care, however, to not listen too intently to that thread of formality: Though the pianos may feel slightly classical, the musical soul is young and unrestrained. Hear that soul, take its outstretched hand, and join the dance.

Ben Macklin

Everything draws to a close: the day as the sun sets, and the summer as the crickets die. Shrouded in fog, you hear a muffled, veiled song from beyond. Macklin’s tunes are fading, but remember still an inward strength of spirit. The music, while orderly, is dreamlike — it is almost idyllic, but it is also wayward, and the chords glide uncertainly between resolution and tension in a daze. The curious harmonies are no mistake — while it is not the sprightly, erratic capriciousness of Pat Lok, it is an itinerant search for the right sound — never reached, only imagined.

This feeling is nostalgia, but it cuts deeper than nostalgia. It longs for resolution that can never be found. It is a weary apathy; it is a throbbing ache. All music is evanescent and disappears from the ears at its end, but very little music is aware of its own evanescence, expressed in haunting tones reckoning and pleading in the face of mortality. It sounds as though it is at the end of contemplation, weary of life — yet it manages to stay upbeat. You never lose that hope within, yet you never lose that feeling of dull, wistful yearning next to it. An entire world of emotion contained within sound — such is its beauty.

 

Contact Trenton Chang at tchang97 ‘at’ stanford.edu.

 

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Porter Robinson and Madeon bring magic to San Francisco https://stanforddaily.com/2016/11/27/porter-robinson-madeon-sf-shelter-tour/ https://stanforddaily.com/2016/11/27/porter-robinson-madeon-sf-shelter-tour/#respond Mon, 28 Nov 2016 05:34:35 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1120398 At first, it was nothing out of the ordinary. The music was loud, the lights were bright, the crowd was hot — standard concert fare. Confetti and pyrotechnics abounded, accentuating the music. Then I noticed that my hands were clapping, my arms were waving in rhythm, my head was nodding, and my mouth was forming […]

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At first, it was nothing out of the ordinary. The music was loud, the lights were bright, the crowd was hot — standard concert fare. Confetti and pyrotechnics abounded, accentuating the music. Then I noticed that my hands were clapping, my arms were waving in rhythm, my head was nodding, and my mouth was forming eloquent words I did not understand, but I knew I could not stop. I did not look around me then, but I felt the presence of thousands of bodies beside me and around me, clapping and waving with me, locked in this perfect trance. And in that instant, I knew that I was witness to something special — to magic unfolding before my ears upon the stage of sound.

The openers — Robotaki and San Holo — were both exceptional performers. They played music, but they played the crowd most of all, letting the music ebb and flow between their nimble fingers as the crowd bobbed and swayed back and forth. They screamed when the music screamed; they clapped when the music clapped. As did I, singing, humming and dancing as I saw fit. I watched Robotaki, shrouded in foggy shades of purple, green and red, fingers dexterously sliding about the turntables, his head shaking joyfully. San Holo — music soaring, climbing, rushing — was no less impressive. He was frenetic, in that shade of emotion between hysteria and euphoria. He waved his arms at no one in particular, shook his head in awe, in disbelief, in ecstasy — then left the stage to raving cheers and screams.

And then Porter Robinson and Madeon took to the stage. They were incomparable, peerless in performance. All the distractions of life and work and worry left my head as the music became the distraction. We all listened to San Holo and Robotaki enthusiastically, but the music of Porter Robinson and Madeon cannot simply be heard. It must be felt as well, or else the fullness of emotion contained in the music is lost; it evaporates, evanescent, into the smoky haze above. This is no metaphor — the feeling starts in your feet, as the floor quakes, and then it eases into a place below your stomach. It ascends upwards through the veins and into your heart, into the back of your throat, where it gurgles and bubbles. There it waits, patiently awaiting its release. You bow your head, pensive, and the feeling percolates lazily through your ears and into your brain, exclaiming: “It’s a long way forward! So trust in me! I’ll give them shelter! Like you’ve done for me!”

What transpired on stage then was divine. The two artists, locked in a transcendental duet, drew the crowd effortlessly into a raucous kind of litany. Our arms drew upward, reaching for the sky, for liberation. “Tell me whose side you’re on!” the music proclaimed, excitedly waiting for a response. So it clapped; we clapped back. It sang; we sang back. Then it asked a question: “OK?” We replied, shouting “OK!” — and so we entered in earnest the sheltered world before us. The music changed, growing upbeat, gleeful at the multitudes it had just persuaded. It pulsed and boomed happily, or perhaps that was the sound of our bodies: the beating of our hearts; the nodding of our heads; the perpetual dance of a thousand bodies in perfect step. No matter — the music was sound; the music was us. Here was a world wrought of music. I closed my eyes, and it descended over me, enveloping me in a hazy sea of voices.

We stood and swayed in awed delirium, imbued with a cathartic confidence in this carefree place: we were the lionhearted, we were emboldened, religiously watching this scene of musical consecration. It was a ritual, our bodies moving in ceaseless exultation. The duet on stage — the pantheon of this fleeting, sheltered world — rejoiced in this feeling as well, singing and crying as we sang and cried as well. They jumped and danced in jubilation: they were not merely performers, they were the music. We did not tire or falter in our dance, because we were the music too, and the music depended on us.

Time and its passage grow strange in a world of profound, consummate feeling. To say that it slows is provincially simple. It recedes and advances, as the tides and waves of music wash over the body and the soul. It warms too, as the glow of camaraderie forms hesitantly but surely beneath a translucent haze. Time grows strange, but it grows friendly as well — it grows protective; it grows old. And now it’s the end of the world, the voice tells us, but we shouldn’t blame ourselves. The voice draws closer, leaving only this promise to whoever will listen: it will surround us, and give life to our own world. The promise — etched in white light upon black monoliths, in English and some runic code, vows its timelessness. It says goodbye — the voice grows faint and distorted. And then comes the dark, abrupt silence. Confused, we search for that promise, grasping and chanting in the darkness. Was the promise broken? Could it have ever been kept? The silence does not respond: it is unconscious. And then we realize — it is a promise well-kept.

Porter Robinson and Madeon played music, and it reached our ears, but it also surrounded us. It gave life to an imaginative world of sights and sounds and adventure, touching those unique threads of experience and laughter in our heads, gathering them gently with emotive music. We said goodbye to our world, and entered this world in between; the music said goodbye to its world, and entered this world as well. In the impossible space between music and reality, we danced, we laughed, we cried. But it was ephemeral. The experience of music leaves no record, except for that scant daguerreotype imprinted forever into the memory. It touches you, but you cannot touch it; you cannot reach out and grab that intangible thing. But that familiar feeling in your body stays always. It beats in your heart as you walk, it swirls beneath your nose as you breathe, music to the ears.

 

Contact Trenton Chang at tchang97 ‘at’ stanford.edu

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Preview: ‘Shelter’ Live Tour comes to San Francisco https://stanforddaily.com/2016/11/24/shelter/ https://stanforddaily.com/2016/11/24/shelter/#respond Thu, 24 Nov 2016 23:00:04 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1120328 On Aug. 12, electronic musicians Porter Robinson and Madeon released their long-awaited collaboration “Shelter” to critical acclaim. They announced soon after that they would be embarking on a worldwide tour in support of “Shelter:” the Shelter Live Tour. With 44 shows across three continents in five months, this ambitious undertaking was a well-received surprise. On […]

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On Aug. 12, electronic musicians Porter Robinson and Madeon released their long-awaited collaboration “Shelter” to critical acclaim. They announced soon after that they would be embarking on a worldwide tour in support of “Shelter:” the Shelter Live Tour. With 44 shows across three continents in five months, this ambitious undertaking was a well-received surprise. On Friday, Nov. 25 at 8:00 p.m., the Shelter Live Tour will have its third and final performance at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium in San Francisco as Robinson and Madeon take the stage with opening support from up-and-coming future bass prodigy San Holo.

The world of electronic dance music is no stranger to talent, but it has rarely seen the likes of Robinson and Madeon. At 24 and 22 years old, respectively, the two have already established a reputation for unparalleled musicality and uniqueness. Sharing a distinctive indie dance sound replete with tastefully layered beats and basslines, the Shelter Live Tour was a long time coming. Robinson and Madeon are longtime friends, having met as teens online before the world of electronic dance music exploded into the mainstream. The pair, having found separate paths to success, now find themselves atop the bastion of stardom that defines contemporary electronic music.

Robinson and Madeon began their journeys in electronic music when they were both teenagers. Robinson broke out in 2011 with the release of “Spitfire,” an 11-track EP on Skrillex’s OWSLA Records. Infused with grinding basslines and a youthful energy, “Spitfire” shot quickly to the number-one spot on the iTunes Dance chart at the Beatport charts. His first studio album, “Worlds,” accompanied by an eponymous tour, represented a significant departure from his previous style, infusing Japanese anime influences from the Vocaloid to pentatonic melodies within his music, a pattern that began with his collaboration “Easy” with Mat Zo. “Worlds” is emotional; “Worlds” is heartfelt. It is sadness and excitement and longing and peace — given life through the sound of music. It is not so much listened as it is felt — an apt testament to Robinson’s artistry.

Madeon, meanwhile, found success through YouTube, releasing a live mashup of 39 songs called “Pop Culture.” The video went viral, amassing millions of views within days of its release. He soon released “The City” EP, developing a unique brand of synthy, bouncy electronic dance music. He continued that style with “Adventure,” released in March 2015, embarking as well on a North American tour to promote the album. “Adventure” flows seamlessly from track to track as the waning melodies of one track segue into the central motifs of another. Madeon’s characteristic sample-based, clean-cut musical style shines in “Pay No Mind” and “Okay,” but his artistic capabilities extend far beyond these lighthearted vignettes. Madeon effortlessly crafts light-footed, waltzy dances — only to then create a rhapsodic ballad. “Technicolor,” for example, proffers a fresh artistic perspective on contemporary electronic music, taking the listener on an poignant, cinematic epic through music, traversing multitudes of feelings, emotions and sounds.

Somehow, the two artists have maintained an ineffable thread of artistic commonality — an innovative sense of tasteful crispness juxtaposed alongside profound emotiveness. But until the release of the single “Shelter” this August, Robinson and Madeon had not released any music together. “Shelter” was an overdue but well-received gift to the electronic music community, having accrued over three million plays in the preceding months. Musically, “Shelter” is the spontaneous result of years of artistic maturation, a stark departure from the bouncy, driving complextro grooves of the pair’s artistic youth. “Shelter” has a powerful, emotive feeling that stirs slowly about the sentimental backdrop of chords. It is poignant, nostalgic; it cries for a home, for a “someone.” Or perhaps we feel joy and comfort, a sense of security and safety — of shelter.

As Porter Robinson and Madeon make their last stop in San Francisco Friday night, we the listeners should experience nothing less than unadulterated amazement. Expect scenes of innocence, expect scenes of loss. Expect to hear the sound of euphoria, expect to hear despair. But most of all, expect to be fulfilled. Expect to be awed at the opportunity to stand witness to the ritualistic musical spectacle, borrowed — if only for a few hours — from the imagination of Robinson and Madeon.

Contact Trenton Chang at tchang97 ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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Martin Garrix: 7 tracks, 7 days https://stanforddaily.com/2016/11/17/martin-garrix-seven-tracks-seven-days-review/ https://stanforddaily.com/2016/11/17/martin-garrix-seven-tracks-seven-days-review/#respond Thu, 17 Nov 2016 11:02:11 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1120033 Electronic musician Martin Garrix rose to prominence in 2013 with the release of the dance floor hit “Animals.” Recently crowned by DJ Mag’s Top 100 poll as the youngest-ever number one DJ in the world, Garrix, 20, has already had a prolific year, having released the melodic “Now That I’ve Found You,” the vociferous “Lions […]

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Electronic musician Martin Garrix rose to prominence in 2013 with the release of the dance floor hit “Animals.” Recently crowned by DJ Mag’s Top 100 poll as the youngest-ever number one DJ in the world, Garrix, 20, has already had a prolific year, having released the melodic “Now That I’ve Found You,” the vociferous “Lions In The Wild,” the endearing “Oops” and the smooth “In The Name of Love” on his own STMPD RCRDS label. It was a welcome surprise to the world of electronic music when Garrix announced that in concurrence with the Amsterdam Dance Event (ADE), he would be releasing seven tracks in seven days.

  1. Martin Garrix & Mesto – WIEE

First impressions: “WIEE” begins with a standard house beat that creates a danceable mood. The melody in the drop whistles lazes above swelling pads and chords. Garrix’s music production skill becomes clear in the drop. The full-sounding chords alternate well with the punctuated melodic plucks, with the track fading out under the exclamations of “WIEE!!”

Stylistically, “WIEE” is reminiscent of the melodic style tested in Garrix’s “Forbidden Voices” and “Oops.” It is an uplifting brand of progressive house music that imparts a floating, euphoric feeling. The sweeping pads and melodies of the music seem angelic, yet that character is somewhat altered through spatterings of electronic chords. The song evokes images of  a cartoonish blue sky patched with neat, square white clouds; it is heaven facetiously reimagined in 8-bit. The melodic plucks, while aggressive, are neither violent nor disruptive – instead, the syncopations, tipsy and playful, bound among the clouds.

  1. Martin Garrix – Sun Is Never Going Down (feat. Dawn Golden)

Dawn Golden’s deep vocals open this generic, pop-ish dance track. After laying the base down with the smooth-voiced refrain (“sun is never going down…”), Garrix re-introduces the main melody in the buildup, in what amounts to a rather normal progressive house drop: pounding drums on every beat with a spacey melody on top. No one will criticize this track for its production, but its inventiveness is surely wanting.

“Sun Is Never Going Down” is undeniably well-made, but its generic structure is unsatisfying. The good artist will stay within these formulaic confines – but the great artist takes those boundaries, molds them a little bit here and there, chips at the walls of that enclosure a little more and, paying careful mind to the fickle tastes of the listener, progresses the art form. Garrix has done this multiple times with his music already, but “Sun Is Never Going Down” is merely good, not great work. It leaves the listener with no more than a catchy melody. Hardly a standout.

  1. Martin Garrix & Jay Hardway – Spotless

The airy plucks and the vocal motif fit well with the chords. The drop sounds heavy. I’m not especially drawn to the melody, as it comes off as a generic house music riff. The second half of the track is markedly similar to the first – it feels, disappointingly, as if Garrix and Hardway decided to copy-paste the first half of the track.

This is not the first time that Martin Garrix has worked with Jay Hardway, having produced together “Wizard” in 2013. Jay Hardway’s driving, catchy melodies mesh well with Garrix’s adept control of musical timbre. The buildup segues naturally into the drop, with a subtle vocal motif surfacing occasionally from the fogginess of the murky chords. Airy plucks reverberate in space, leading up to an anthemic drop. The rhythmic progression of the melody is interesting: simplicity and complexity alternate synchronously – soaring gracefully at times; dive-bombing the scene of the music elsewhere. It is an epic scene of battle, drawn in red and white ligne claire, between two enigmatic figures, shrouded in chords, melodies and mystery.

  1. Martin Garrix – Hold On And Believe (feat. The Federal Empire)

“Hold On And Believe” places in the category of simple, orderly music. I like the vocals enough: nice and light. The guitar samples, too, are lighthearted. The acoustic piano is deep and rich, the track sounds huge without being overwhelming. The catchy melody is excellent, and the melodic plucks mirroring the melody are excellent as well – but it all resolves in a straightforward manner.

“Hold On And Believe” displays an iota of the creativity that we expect from Garrix. Lyrically, the song sends a message of personal strength and friendship. The chords reflect this nicely – the progression ascends, and then resolves itself succinctly. The melody is straightforward, as well – there are no extraneous syncopations. It imparts upon the track a resolute sense of answering questions, of finding a path. Within the confines of a standard dance track, Garrix manages to create emotion – this feeling of perseverance and continuation – that I find compelling. Still, the track lacks structural and musical innovation.

  1. Martin Garrix & Julian Jordan – Welcome

The intro features a groovy bass, and the sampled metallic plucks come together to give the track a mysterious, airy atmosphere. Suddenly, we are thrown into a heavy, industrial-sounding bass house jam. The sound design is excellent, assimilating dubstep influences into modulating basslines. The chord progression for the buildup is intriguing; it doesn’t quite resolve, but rather swells further.

There is something abstract about a description of “Welcome,” given its technological and complex sound. This track qualitatively epitomizes the inhuman, artificial side of electronic music, with its robotic sounds and chromatic chords. “Welcome” opens with an organic wash of sound, as plucks and vocals gasp for air amidst the powerful bass. Then the drums invade the soundscape, catching the listener unaware, and then every note, every drum hit, every sound that reaches the ears is quantized with a surgical precision, abruptly creating a technological feel within the track. There are no rhythmic deviations – no syncopations in this sonic world of order. Voices and screams distantly perturb the wall of sound to no avail. The voices culminate in a singular word, spoken clearly: “Welcome!” And now the screams fade away.

  1. Martin Garrix & Matisse & Sadko – Together

I am initially tempted to criticize “Together” as formulaic: It follows a generic breakdown-buildup-drop structure. Somehow, Garrix and Matisse & Sadko still manage to inject refreshing ideas into the music. The track opens with a beautiful and clear piano riff. The vocals might be a little too artificial, but they are beautifully smooth. The lyrics themselves, however, are tacky. The chord progression, driven by the piano, is generic, but harmonious. An overwhelming sense of togetherness dominates the track. Although this track could be criticized as formulaic, the musical motifs are still refreshing.

“Together” has an uplifting feeling distinct from the cutesy cartoonishness of “WIEE”; it is a more mature rendition of heartfelt camaraderie. The vocals float lazily above the wash of piano chords, culminating in a spacious melody. Distance is thematic: The track begins with the distant sounding piano and vocals, and here our imaginary protagonist of the song begins to drift on the frozen river, aimlessly, alone in a spacious cave of blue and ice. Walls of ice and of sound close in – and the seduction of the melody, drawing near, grows irresistible, as the vocals acclaim in exhilaration: “Together! Together! Together!”

  1. Martin Garrix & Florian Picasso – Make Up Your Mind

First impressions: I very much enjoy the vocal sample: “make up your mind” endlessly repeated. The drop is exquisite – the powerful kick drum remains undisturbed by the dominant urban yet rave-esque synth, and contrasts well with that sample on the downbeat. What is that sample? Strings, or a forgotten vintage synth? Here comes the breakdown: It sounds melodically, unmistakably Garrix – the timbre of the chords and emotion of the melody matches his ineffable musical fingerprint.

“Make Up Your Mind” charts new ground for both artists, especially Garrix. The music is boisterous, exploding onto the musical canvas from the first beat as a voice proclaims: “make up your mind, make up your soul!” The beat feels lopsided, yet driven, a hallmark of the Latin-like tom motif. The buildup is powerful – the indistinct yelling and the frantic percussion creates a compelling swell of sound. Little imagination is required for this song – the song screams and shouts directly to your ears, impelling the listener to pay heed to its story: its rage, its excitement and its jubilation.

 

Contact Trenton Chang at tchang97 ‘at’ stanford.edu.

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Trenton’s Playlist: For those cold October nights https://stanforddaily.com/2016/10/20/playlist-forthoseoctobernights/ https://stanforddaily.com/2016/10/20/playlist-forthoseoctobernights/#respond Fri, 21 Oct 2016 06:44:42 +0000 https://stanforddaily.com/?p=1118319 Late Night on a chilly October night: You stroll into the hall with your friends, cradling laptops, papers and books in your folded arms. You all claim a table in the quiet hall. You queue up and order the food. Small talk abounds: Someone nonchalantly complains about their workload. Finally, food arrives: You all grab your portions […]

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Late Night on a chilly October night: You stroll into the hall with your friends, cradling laptops, papers and books in your folded arms. You all claim a table in the quiet hall. You queue up and order the food. Small talk abounds: Someone nonchalantly complains about their workload. Finally, food arrives: You all grab your portions and return to the table. No one will take this for a gastronomic masterpiece of haute cuisine, but it more than suffices — it satisfies the soul, you think, as you open your laptop and amble through your work.

You reflect on the day behind you. It is a third of the way, almost exactly, into the first quarter. It is not quite halfway — but it is enough. You have comfortably fallen in step, once more, with the rhythm of life — of work and of play — at Stanford.

This is the soundtrack of such a night.

  1.    Snakehips — All My Friends (ft. Tinashe & Chance the Rapper) [PREP Remix]

London musician PREP’s remix of “All My Friends” successfully maintains the wonderfully laid-back feel of the Snakehips’ original. “All My Friends” comments on party culture but does not glorify it. On the contrary, it’s a complaint about a disappointing Friday night party populated with “vultures” and “cannibals.” PREP is well matched to the tired yet full vocals from Tinashe and Chance the Rapper, adding suave chord progressions and woodwind riffs atop the mix. The acoustic drums impart a live feel to the track. The vocals perfectly complement the soulful, jazzy vibes of the remix, creating a slow-jam smoothness.

  1.    KOLAJ — The Touch (Indiginis Remix)

Veteran remixers Indiginis never fail to please their fans, and their remix of “The Touch” from the LA-based group KOLAJ is no exception. The easygoing beat suits the remix impeccably. Indiginis combines the chill feeling of the original with their characteristically impassioned chord progressions and sounds. Indiginis’ adept control and spacing of cadences evokes a sense of intimacy and fulfillment. The end result is expressive and heartfelt.

  1.    SNBRN — Sometimes (Bee’s Knees Remix)

The Bee’s Knees have long been practitioners of the indie/nu-disco style of electronic music. SNBRN undoubtedly spends no small amount of his musical adventures in the genre of future bass. The combination of these two styles ought to mesh awkwardly, yet Bee’s Knees manages to create an airy, danceable track. Listen for the key change two minutes into the remix — the chord changes are handled deftly, sans hesitation.

  1.    The Knocks — Collect My Love (ft. Alex Newell) [Lenno Remix]

If Finnish producer Lenno’s talent was not already clear from his skillful integration of retro and house influences, his remix of “Collect My Love” will definitively convince the skeptic. The Knocks’ “Collect My Love” is emphatically upbeat, an unequivocal ode to joy — but Lenno’s interpretation takes a slower approach to the music. His remix feels timeless, nostalgic, a refreshing listen in any circumstance.

  1.    Louis La Roche — The Receiver (Blende Remix)

English producer Blende provides his own disco-style take on Louis La Roche’s original in his remix of “The Receiver.” Dominated by swirling piano chords, Blende’s track sits comfortably between retro house and chill house. There’s a definite feel of longing and hesitation that parallels the lyrical theme of the track: a man reaching for the telephone receiver, presumably to call a romantic interest. The chord progression doesn’t quite resolve: It swings tipsily between two chords, back and forth, surprising the listener every so often with edgier chords, as if the man is about to take action — but, just as suddenly, Blende takes the track back to the safety of the two chords. The groovy, twisted plucks add some extra polish.

  1.    Autograf – Dream

Native to Chicago, Autograf has successfully crafted a brand of mixing live sounds with electronic influences. “Dream” is faithful to that Autograf style. The central piano chords define the track, as the tranquil vocals float above the mix. But “Dream” represents much more than just a well-made track — “Dream,” according to Autograf, is also a nod to their artistic aspirations.

  1.    Pat Lok – Your Lips (ft. DiRTY RADiO)

Canadian talent Pat Lok has crafted a disco-funk sound that is distinctly retro, yet powerfully innovative. His sample-heavy beats suggest a wide, dancehall-type sound, all while maintaining a chilled feeling. “Your Lips” is defined by a joyful, catchy chord progression as DiRTY RADiO’s passionate voice tells a story of attraction and romance.  Featuring uplifting, airy vocals and a groovy bassline, “Your Lips” is the choice ballad for an autumn night.

  1.    Fonkynson — Carresse (ft. Le Couleur)

Funk influences and a chill indie house feel define Fonkynson’s style. “Caresse” is one of many wonderful tracks on his new album “#Followme,” and it is an impeccable testament to Fonkynson’s mastery of funky yet harmonious soundscapes, layering the close, lighthearted French vocals gently above the laid-back beat. The spacey chords slide lazily between pitches, creating a soothing experience for the listener.

  1.    Louis the Child — It’s Strange (ft. K.Flay) [Bee’s Knees Remix]

Chicago duo Louis the Child were already a dominant figure in chill dance music when they released “It’s Strange,” featuring singer (and Stanford alum) K.Flay. The Bee’s Knees’ remix of “It’s Strange”  is a timeless future bass jam. The resonant chords and heavy bass mesh with K.Flay’s husky vocals charmingly. The jazzy steel drum licks evoke a tropical sound apropos to Kygo, but this Bee’s Knees remix uncannily fits into any set.

  1. Rhythm District – Impossible (ft. Linford K Hydes)

Rhythm District premiered “Impossible,” the second single from its debut album “Your Loss,” on edm.com at the end of 2015, and the then-obscure Welsh band quickly exploded in popularity to become one of the breakout acts in indie dance of 2015. “Impossible” has the feel of a plaintive swing encapsulated within a modern sound. Linford K Hydes’ accented vocals provide a charming finishing touch to the work.

 

Contact Trenton Chang at tchang97 ‘at’ stanford.edu.

The post Trenton’s Playlist: For those cold October nights appeared first on The Stanford Daily.

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