23 replies to this topic

[Pat]

While browsing this forum I was just wondering, my, are ze amerikahns all about country music and rock as far as their musical taste is concerned?

Not to be controversial (well to be honest I love to tease), but here in europe we have quite a large oevre of fine electronic music. Admittedly the spiritual content of those works might be a bit thin, but some of them are very well done artistically.

Examples? Massive Attack, Underworld (to some extent), Daft Punk, LTJ Bukem, Speedy J, Laurent Garnier. The problem is: there are far more one-man-in-a-room-with-a-sequencer projects out there than bands. Only a few real standouts, but the trend goes to bands even in this sector of the musical universe.

Electronic film music: Vangelis (Blade Runner), Zimmer (the Thin Red Line)....

Theres a lot of stuff that I love, from often unknown artists, but especially the older, rave-oriented stuff (acid and the like) I can easily do without.

So, are there any electronic music lovers here?

[The Baptist Death Ray]

I was once in a techno-punk band called Tetragrammaton.

You've never heard of us, but we did the best techno-punk cover of "The Devil Went Down to Gerorgia" that you've never heard.

As far as electronic bands go, I was very fond of Sheep on Drugs. Ever hear 'em?

[opus]

I'm a big fan of electronic music, in all of its myriad forms. Warp/IDM stuff like Aphex Twin and Autechre, downtempo stuff like Massive Attack and Jute, glitchier/"experimental stuff like I/Dex, Oval, and Tujiko Noriko, more dance-oriented stuff like Underworld, acid-y stuff like 808 State, synthpop, etc. I tend to lean more towards the darker, more atmospheric side of things, and am a big fan of ambient music when done right.

BTW, if you can't tell your HI NRG from your Nu Italo, or your Psytekk from your Goa, might I recommend Ishkur's Guide to Electronic Music? The Flash interface is a bit clunky, but the commentary, as crude as it can be, is hilarious. And best of all, it comes packed with samples.

[Kyle]

For the past year or so, I've been a big fan of the Books. Their two albums "Lemon of Pink" and "Thought for Food" are absolutly fantastic. Some of the most fresh stuff I've heard in a long time. It's a mash-up of found sound, live instrumentation such as banjos and acoustic guitars, as well as some original vocals. It gives it a really ecclectic folk sound.

They also have a new album "Lost and Safe" arriving on April 5. I'm looking forward to that one.

[jfutral]

Not to be controversial (well to be honest I love to tease), but here in europe we have quite a large oevre of fine electronic music. Admittedly the spiritual content of those works might be a bit thin, but some of them are very well done artistically.

So, are there any electronic music lovers here?

Never been a fan, myself, although I have enjoyed Philip Glass. Modern choreographers seem to love his stuff. Probably not the same thing, though.

However, this past Christmas I heard this crazy techno/electronic-esque cover of _Dance of the Sugarplum Fairy_. As someone who lights any where from 2-6 different Nutcrackers a year from pretty much Thanksgiving through New Years, I can't tell you how much this tickled me. I want the recording, but I can't find it.

None of this is probably what you're talking about, but it was what came to mind.

Joe

[jfutral]

Also, I got into a discussion about alternative worship with a guy. His explanation of it seemed to center around visual images set against a musical backdrop of non-specific Rave music. He kept calling it non-linear music. He saw it as "anit-Big Music with Big voices contemporary church music". www.alternativeworship.org is a pretty good site. So someone thinks there is spiritual potential for the stuff.

Joe

[Pat]

I was once in a techno-punk band called Tetragrammaton.
As far as electronic bands go, I was very fond of Sheep on Drugs. Ever hear 'em?

No, as I have no connections w/ punk whatsoever.... they seem to be pretty ironic and critical of society, like U2 and their zooropa stuff. (bud worlds apart musically I guess). Anti-consumerism look-in-the-mirror like. Interesting stuff!

[Pat]

Alan: I always confuse orbital and orb, I have an orbital cd here (w/ the well-known halcyon on and on tune) which I like but I wouldnt count as one of the best personally. Are (the) orb much different musically?

BTW, if you can't tell your HI NRG from your Nu Italo, or your Psytekk from your Goa, might I recommend Ishkur's Guide to Electronic Music?  The Flash interface is a bit clunky, but the commentary, as crude as it can be, is hilarious.  And best of all, it comes packed with samples.

Thanks for the tip, opus! MUCH appreciated. Had a blast there.
Just to inform you where I come from: About 10 years ago I usually listened to prog trance stuff and european techno, esp. german techno. I also had an acid phase. Then I discovered nu electro (courtesy of a dj friend of mine) and the tech house stuff. Would count those styles as my favourites among (a little bit of synthron) and (more) minml techno. Tech house is also nice. Ocasionally french house. I would not touch jungle and hardcore w/ a 10 foot pole though. Awful stuff.

[Pat]

Also, I got into a discussion about alternative worship with a guy. His explanation of it seemed to center around visual images set against a musical backdrop of non-specific Rave music. He kept calling it non-linear music. He saw it as "anit-Big Music with Big voices contemporary church music". www.alternativeworship.org is a pretty good site. So someone thinks there is spiritual potential for the stuff.

Joe

Joe, this soulds a lot like the way music is used in the emerging church movement. I guess they try to see the bigger picture how modern music can be used in a church context and try to develop new forms of services, events and churches as a whole. In this case "form follows function" -- music is used as a mood creator, as a backdrop, to amplify the experience. (again: I guess it is so, need to dig deeper to understand the EC concept fully).

[rathmadder]

I'm a big fan of what I suppose could come under the blanket term Electronic Music, going back all the way to Kraftwerk and then into the Detriot Derrick May dance stuff in the mid eighties and on to the whole English house movement etc. Shoot me down if this sounds ridiculous but I was in London at the beginning of the Acid House craze in the late eighties/early nineties and, even at the time, it was obvious that there was a huge spiritual yearning driving the scene. It was a kind of a reaction, I think, to the consumerist synth pop of the eighties, I'm thinking of some of the records that were big, Reaching by Phaze II, Promised Land by someone who's name I've just forgotten, Joe Smooth or something like that. Like many movements in popular music it was then taken over by big business and more or less dissolved into drug led hedonism and the cynicism of super-clubs co-opting an underground movement in order to make a lot of money. But, to my mind, there are few pieces of music as transcendentally beautiful as Belfast by Orbital and Little Fluffy Clouds by The Orb. And, a very different song, but you did mention the group. The Hymn Of The Big Wheel by Massive Attack which would have to be seen as a piece of spiritual music and is absolutely beautiful. Funny enough, I do like country music as well and though maybe this should be in another forum I just saw that CMT were doing a 20 greatest songs of faith special today which might be interesting for those of you who can see it.

[jfutral]

Joe, this soulds a lot like the way music is used in the emerging church movement. I guess they try to see the bigger picture how modern music can be used in a church context and try to develop new forms of services, events and churches as a whole. In this case "form follows function" -- music is used as a mood creator, as a backdrop, to amplify the experience. (again: I guess it is so, need to dig deeper to understand the EC concept fully).

I, too, am not all that up on the emergent church concept. New terms seem to fly fast and furious. So far it seems a lot like alternative or post modern worship. Glenn Kaiser offered that as a topic at a local discussion group, but most everyone here is just catching on to the whole contemporary thing. A couple of churches have experimented with the Labyrinth once or twice, but that is about the extent of pomo worship in my area. One church bills a post modern worship, but so far they mean rock music and some rave in a traditional structure. Ah, the deep South! This is my South.

Joe

[amo]

I like Kraftwerk, Portishead (not quite the same thing, I suppose), Massive Attack, and the Chemical Brothers, as well as a wide variety of eclectic stuff I've downloaded (legit) from the internet from time to time. I guess the short answer is that I like a great deal of the electronic music I have been exposed to, just haven't been exposed to much.

I also played bass in a "contemporary" worship service for a while (NOT at my current church), but it was far more of a "5 songs and a sermon" format than a continuous backdrop of sound. I've gotten away from the "contemporary scene," but I have a hard time imagining a rave church service, much less wanting to be at one. . .

. . . "5 songs and a sermon," reminds me of a funny thing my optometrist asked me once. He asked me if I played in a "seven-eleven" service. When I asked what he meant, he asked if we sang the same seven songs eleven times. (Okay, might be an old joke for you folks, but I had never heard it before.)

Does anyone know of any "overtly Christian" electronic music?

[opus]

Does anyone know of any "overtly Christian" electronic music?

2 words... Joy Electric. If you like early 80s synthpop (Erasure, Anything Box, etc.), than Joy Electric is an absolute must-hear. The man behind JoyE, Ronnie Martin, also has his own label called Plastiq Musiq that has released some pretty solid stuff.

You might also want to check out Flaming Fish if you're looking for something a little darker and heavier.

Edited by opus, 25 March 2005 - 03:30 PM.

[amo]

Thanks, opus; listening now

[sevry]

While browsing this forum I was just wondering, my, are ze amerikahns all about country music and rock as far as their musical taste is concerned?

It's interesting you'd phrase that in terms of nationalism. People might point to the US as being as split, or 'balkanized', as ever. But in the past, all these groups came together on behalf of the nation, in an emergency.

But musically, I don't see such nationalism, or those borders. Country music is the last really dynamic and vital pop music in general play, in the US. And it has included Mexican mariachi themes for as long as there have been such. Reduced more to niche, R & B 'hip-hop' may have borrowed some things from techno/dance-pop. I don't know, but it wouldn't surprize me. Certain pop-rock groups perhaps as well. And the metal bands and the 'heroes' like Zakk are now part of a relatively small and proudly independent sub-culture, of various sorts, but even they, too. And as a nationalism, today, much of pop music in the US, is British or from 'euro'. Even Ozzy survives, thanks to his sidemen, mostly. There will be a 2005 'Ozfest'. PBS has recently been showing the guitarist concert sponsored by Englishmen, Eric Clapton (second, third?, Brit 'invasion' - one loses track), including everyone from the Thunderbirds, Jimmy Vaughn (less gifted brother of the surpassingly gifted SRV), to Buddy Guy (once in duo with Hendrix in the late 60s, and all-around sometimes self-proclaimed genius), to BB King. His moving song has been annoyingly pressed into commercial service in two, not one, ad running repeatedly on US tv; leading some to remark that the great legacy of the 'boomer's, rock n roll, is now reduced to mere jingle for selling computer services and new cars.

As for the style you mention, that techno/dance-pop may not borrow from all of this, from blues and jazz, from the 'stoned' sound or African sound (if you prefer) of trance 'hip-hop', from the guitar windings of Hendrix through SRV to Ted Nugent, from the design of Randy Rhoades and Ozzy to that of Stanley Turrentine or Robert Johnson, the Dukes of Dixieland, Neil Young, or who remain of Lynyrd Skynyrd (who didn't like Neil Young), it probably has more to do with the restrictive nature of the mechanical sound. The odd dirge of the publicly manaical composor of Dragula caught on with people only for a while following the film, The Matrix. I think it's been long forgotten. But Clapton might still listen to and study Robert Johnson. And classical composers might well still consider Dvorak, and Tchiakovsky. And on the mp3 sites, where regional artists might still even post, you might hear Pachelbel by guitar, of course, and strains of Two Gentlemen from Verona in the echoed guitar of a quartet, with extra fuzz. I think for 'techno', it's just the form.

But since all is 'fusion', if not between styles then within the same of different variants and performers, perhaps dance-pop mechanical is of such variety, among certain groups, that one dare not characterize it broadly? I don't hear anything resembling it in the states, of course. But maybe I just run with the sort that doesn't. Probably be true whatever country I was in. Do you believe the 'euro' see this dance-techno-pop as somehow a nationalistic or even broadly 'euro' art, as they might root for a soccer team against the US because it was their country's soccer team, against the US?

[sevry]

I love trance and electronic. The Orb is one of my favorites. I like *real* country and Western music, but that's not the stuff you hear on country radio these days.

Maybe if not put off by the braggadocio of the man, but Hank's son does play real country on occasion, as do Skaggs and various others. The tendency among more of the touring groups is like that of Hank Jr., a blend of hard southern rock n roll among the old Hank Williams songs. I think, to be fair, you'd also have to include the southern electric slide blues, typ. of TX like SRV (and Tinsley Ellis, Ronnie Brooks, and too many to name), up to and including ZZ Top in that range of country music. Or is that what you meant by real country, as perhaps against country 'mall-pop' of assorted female artists? Country music is really the last big pop sector of American music not submerged into its niche of fans. And it includes a lot of styles. In that way, I don't know that we'd both lament, frankly, the demise of any popular taste for classical music, however, as the very idea of a classical music broadcast station 500 miles in any direction, in the middle of a metroplex/metropolis of five million or more people, is fast fading to memory, in any metroplex you want throughout the US.

[rathmadder]

I don't think electronic music is seen at all in jingoistic European terms. OK, you can trace it all back to Kraftwerk and a general Germanic pop take on Stockhausen etc. But the real driving force behind the electronic music explosion were (A) the house music of Chicago, Frankie Knuckles, Marshall Jefferson and so on. ( The Detroit proto-techno stuff, Derrick May, Rythm is Rythm, Cybotron etc. And the likes of The Orb, Orbital, Prodigy and so on generally give credit to those pioneers. The poppier euro-trance stuff is different perhaps but I think the likes of Paul Van Dyk, ATB and so on who churn out this stuff bear the same resemblance to the real house heavyweights as Garth Brooks does to Merle Haggard. Hank Williams Junior I haven't heard again but those seventies albums, And Friends and The New South are wonderful. My perception from here would be that country seems to have be taken over by that whole Twain/Rimes not very different from awful seventies AOR stuff but then like you said it's a broad church and you can't really tar all country with the same brush. I suppose the success of the Oh Brother soundtrack showed a real hunger for the authentic thing. I still reckon the Jennings/Haggard/Newbury/Glaser Outlaws stuff was some kind of artistic peak for the music. Country music, by the way, was for many years the most popular music in rural Ireland, perhaps because it spoke to people who had a lot in common with the singers, being from farming backgrounds, not particularly well off, religious or at least from places where religion was hugely important. We also identified with that whole pull between the spiritual and the profane and with emigration, to the auto factories of the North for Americans to London or Boston for us.
To this day if you walk into an Irish pub you'll have more chance of hearing Mama Tried than When Irish Eyes Are Smiling.

[Pat]

Do you believe the 'euro' see this dance-techno-pop as somehow a nationalistic or even broadly 'euro' art, as they might root for a soccer team against the US because it was their country's soccer team, against the US?

No, I dont think so. As rathmadder correctly pointed out above, there have been numerous influences from this side and also from across the big pond. What I can perceive however ist that a unique european flavour of techno could develop because it fell on, so to speak, "fertile ground" in Europe and accordingly it was more of a mass movement among youth than in the states. I say "was" because techno euphoria is dwindling significantly. It is now reduced to club culture -- where it originated; in the states techno, with a few notable exceptions perhaps, never was a mass phenomenon and is rather confined to club culture in the big cities.

Now synthpop and derivates might be a whole different story, and admittedly I am not too familiar with its history.

Note also that I started my sentence with "While browsing this forum"... so this forum might or might not be a representation of whats hip in the states as of now (at least in some circles ), given that the majority here is from the U.S. Thats why I phrased it in nationalistic terms (albeit intended in a humorous way). I was surprised to see country music on the rise, which for example in Germany would probably never happen (neither american country nor german folk music, which has the distinction of being almost painful to listen to ).

Edited by Pat, 26 March 2005 - 07:23 AM.

[David Smedberg]

I like Kraftwerk, Portishead (not quite the same thing, I suppose), Massive Attack, and the Chemical Brothers, as well as a wide variety of eclectic stuff I've downloaded (legit) from the internet from time to time.  I guess the short answer is that I like a great deal of the electronic music I have been exposed to, just haven't been exposed to much.

Same here on the legit downloads. I oftentimes go to www.ampcast.com to listen to the music available there, or nowadays one can also go to download.com and find music there also. I have heard some of the more mainstream artists (like Nine Inch Nails, Meat Beat Manifesto, etc.), but not to the degree where I could make a judgment.

Does anyone know of any "overtly Christian" electronic music?

Unique Werkx comes to mind, although they're just another group among many . . .

Edited by GreetingsEarthling, 20 April 2005 - 07:44 PM.

[Thom]

Joy Electric immediately comes to mind.

Back around 1990 there was a band called Painted Orange that was more of a Depeche Mode kind of thing but some early electronica feel.