the Artist engages in an argument about the quality of their own music

  On 6/5/2011 at 11:51 PM, rex sole said:

  On 6/5/2011 at 11:27 PM, sneaksta303 said:

To me, it reads "insecure". Tycho is making money off this shit. A few wattmers talking shit isn't going to change that. So then what message is he sending other than he loves his work? That shouldn't have to be said out loud.

 

Earning money doesn't suddenly make you impervious to having your feelings hurt! Aww diddums, yes I know it sounds pathetic but for anyone sharing their art, the most of the time they just want share what makes them happy with other people. If you suddenly wander across a cache of strong negative opinions about your work, it's going to offend you, especially from people you don't know. I know I would feel bad if I was making strangers hate me and and my creative output!

 

But as I type all this I realise that I might be giving the impression that I think everyone should be sycophants and Only Say Something If You've Got Something Nice To Say. What I actually think is that when you open yourself up publicly, you are also inviting yourself to be criticized strongly. Everyone has the right to tell you your shit stinks. But I also think that there's nothing wrong with sticking your head above the parapets to address such criticism (especially as on the internets it can end up being wildly inaccurate, cause you know what them message boards are like) and it shouldn't be seen as a Bad Thing.

 

I guess we are coming out of an age where people making creative content were totally disconnected from the consumers at large, and neither party are really prepared for being directly able to communicate with each other. See Twitter for a billion examples of this!

Well I agree with all this pretty much, but that's not the point I suppose. I'm an artist myself. A lot of times, my feelings own me. I'm sure I have responded lamely to crit at some point or points, so I'm not trying to be all high and mighty, I'm just saying that Tycho's earnestness made me roll my eyes. I can't even really pin down why exactly. IMO he would have been better off responding like a smart ass, or not at all. I mean really, arguing about the quality of music on the internet is pointless as it's all subjective right? I'm a bit buzzed, I don't even know. I guess I'm just a prick, but I'm really not at all.

  On 6/5/2011 at 11:54 PM, taphead said:

All tycho was doing was just having an opinion on whether or not he rips off BoC, just like anyone else. He just had a really detailed argument, because he knew the subject pretty well. I don't see anything wrong with that.

 

Now I suppose that can make corners of the internet feel like more of a public sphere, as opposed to the sort of place where you can say the things you wouldn't say to someones face... is that bad?

It could be bad, yes, as the artist is would be getting less honest review.

I don't say anything anymore online that I wouldn't say to someone's face. That's why most of the time I just don't say much period.

  On 6/6/2011 at 12:11 AM, sneaksta303 said:

  On 6/5/2011 at 11:51 PM, rex sole said:

  On 6/5/2011 at 11:27 PM, sneaksta303 said:

To me, it reads "insecure". Tycho is making money off this shit. A few wattmers talking shit isn't going to change that. So then what message is he sending other than he loves his work? That shouldn't have to be said out loud.

 

Earning money doesn't suddenly make you impervious to having your feelings hurt! Aww diddums, yes I know it sounds pathetic but for anyone sharing their art, the most of the time they just want share what makes them happy with other people. If you suddenly wander across a cache of strong negative opinions about your work, it's going to offend you, especially from people you don't know. I know I would feel bad if I was making strangers hate me and and my creative output!

 

But as I type all this I realise that I might be giving the impression that I think everyone should be sycophants and Only Say Something If You've Got Something Nice To Say. What I actually think is that when you open yourself up publicly, you are also inviting yourself to be criticized strongly. Everyone has the right to tell you your shit stinks. But I also think that there's nothing wrong with sticking your head above the parapets to address such criticism (especially as on the internets it can end up being wildly inaccurate, cause you know what them message boards are like) and it shouldn't be seen as a Bad Thing.

 

I guess we are coming out of an age where people making creative content were totally disconnected from the consumers at large, and neither party are really prepared for being directly able to communicate with each other. See Twitter for a billion examples of this!

 

Well I agree with all this pretty much, but that's not the point I suppose. I'm an artist myself. A lot of times, my feelings own me. I'm sure I have responded lamely to crit at some point or points, so I'm not trying to be all high and mighty, I'm just saying that Tycho's earnestness made me roll my eyes. I can't even really pin down why exactly. IMO he would have been better off responding like a smart ass, or not at all. I mean really, arguing about the quality of music on the internet is pointless as it's all subjective right? I'm a bit buzzed, I don't even know. I guess I'm just a prick, but I'm really not at all.

taking part in online discussions will not stop people from buying your releases

who said otherwise?

  On 5/4/2011 at 4:27 PM, Com Truise said:

  On 5/3/2011 at 1:41 PM, jules said:

just the name com truise turns me off so much. it's a gimmick name and not even an original one. makes me think he approaches his music the same way.

 

 

Everyone is entitled to their opinions, so here's mine. Why does the name/alias have to be a direct reflection of the music? I could have called this project "Monkey's Stained Taint." If the music is solid, who really cares what it's called or how it's classified.

haha

All this convo begs the question: When is an artist taking their music too seriously?

  On 6/6/2011 at 12:31 AM, sneaksta303 said:

All this convo begs the question: When is an artist taking their music too seriously?

was gonna say something really cuntish about someone else here, but thought better of it

One thing I liked about the Com Truise / Jules part is that Jules stood his ground and further explained the trendy use of name. CT said something along the lines of not being important. But I fully disagree as I'm into the whole package when it comes to music. It's not just an mp3 that I'm interested in.

  On 6/6/2011 at 12:38 AM, oscillik said:

  On 6/6/2011 at 12:31 AM, sneaksta303 said:

All this convo begs the question: When is an artist taking their music too seriously?

was gonna say something really cuntish about someone else here, but thought better of it

come out with it, you're defeating the purpose of the thread

  On 6/6/2011 at 1:51 AM, asymmetrical head said:

One thing I liked about the Com Truise / Jules part is that Jules stood his ground and further explained the trendy use of name. CT said something along the lines of not being important. But I fully disagree as I'm into the whole package when it comes to music. It's not just an mp3 that I'm interested in.

Jules was forever engraved into my 'cool watmm members' memory after that exchange. com truise coming into the that thread, and jules subsequently not backing down was the inspiration for this discussion...

Edit: why this is extra personal for me is because i've gotten myself into 'trouble' on numerous occasions by speaking strong opinions about people who see it on the net. One of which, Jon Whitney who runs brainwashed.com has actually held a grudge against me for over 15 years, last time i tried to patch things up with him he was still so heated about our exchange that happened when i was in highschool he blocked me over gchat. In a real way not having the support for Brainwashed.com for anything related to RLR has probably been somewhat bad for my label, but it's a consequence i've had to deal with because of my actions on online message boards. basically what i'm saying is i've pissed off a lot of people over the internet

so im going to start a list of artists who read watmm that we know for sure

- Tycho

- Aaron Funk / Venetian Snares

- Machinedrum

- Com Truise

- Keaver and Brause (coincidence of reversing the first 2 letters of a 'retro' personality?)

- Clark's 'friend' (most likely clark himself imo)

- James Blake (or so says kakapoo)

please add to this list of anyone we can confirm

  On 6/6/2011 at 2:49 AM, Awepittance said:

  On 6/6/2011 at 12:38 AM, oscillik said:

  On 6/6/2011 at 12:31 AM, sneaksta303 said:

All this convo begs the question: When is an artist taking their music too seriously?

was gonna say something really cuntish about someone else here, but thought better of it

 

come out with it, you're defeating the purpose of the thread

haha ok, well i was gonna say Squarepusher :p wasn't sure if anyone would take it as i meant it (a joke) or what.

but yeah, at the end of the day, these people are just people like you and me. and i don't saccharine coat my words with people.

  On 6/6/2011 at 2:57 AM, Awepittance said:

so im going to start a list of artists who read watmm that we know for sure

 

 

- Tycho

- Aaron Funk / Venetian Snares

- Machinedrum

- Com Truise

- Keaver and Brause (coincidence of reversing the first 2 letters of a 'retro' personality?)

- Clark's 'friend' (most likely clark himself imo)

- James Blake (or so says kakapoo)

 

please add to this list of anyone we can confirm

I know people who work for Warp must grace these pages for sure but I wouldn't know who exactly.

Global Goon as well.

I think it's pretty helpful to just assume that the person who wrote the music definitely is reading what you write about them. It makes you condider what you're going to write more carefully and probably leads to more constructive criticism and a generally higher level of discussion. I don't think this needs to mean handling everyone with kid gloves - just that if you really dislike something you should try to pinpoint the reasons why rather than just saying "this sucks massive donkey balls."

Having said that there have been a couple of instances where I've held off voicing my disappointment with new releases by not-very-well-known artists just because they seem like cool people and it would probably bum them out.

  On 6/6/2011 at 2:57 AM, Awepittance said:

so im going to start a list of artists who read watmm that we know for sure

 

 

- Tycho

- Aaron Funk / Venetian Snares

- Machinedrum

- Com Truise

- Keaver and Brause (coincidence of reversing the first 2 letters of a 'retro' personality?)

- Clark's 'friend' (most likely clark himself imo)

- James Blake (or so says kakapoo)

 

please add to this list of anyone we can confirm

µ-ziq does too

Lucy, all good points sometimes i over generalize. I agree in part that there is value to pretend that the artist might actually be reading what you wrote, but there are i think many bad examples of this mode of thought that extend beyond electronic music. You could extrapolate it to working for an Israeli ran company, would you feel 'comfortable' or even allowed to (with how good google has become) post anti Israeli government sentiment openly on say Facebook? Of course not, but how far can one take this. What if you have strong political opinions about Israel that you feel the need to share with other people?

Constructive criticism can be good for artists as it can help them to stop flying up ones own arse so to speak which has been a cropper for many big names in the past.

I don't think that's a fair extrapolation at all - I don't see how you can conflate an artist who is creating electronic music with a major global power such as Israel!

Your example seems to introduce ideas of political allegiance, monetary dependency and personal proffessional affiliation which are simply not relevant to what we're discussing - unless I've somehow misunderstood you?

Sure an artist has a right to respond to criticism... might make for interesting reading if I'd heard of either of those two. Don't see how it would prevent people from critiquing though, nor should it.

  On 6/6/2011 at 3:45 AM, xxx said:

To me, musicians should take a long look at Encyclopedia Dramatica or some other primer on how not to take the internet too seriously. If I were a famous artist, my first approach would be to pull "the Aphex". That is to say, be cheeky, obtuse, bizarre and silly. It's clearly working for him. If things escalated, I would resort to the "u mad?" "u jelly?" kind of stuff to underscore the fact that I refused to B SRS. But, best of all, I probably wouldn't pay attention or respond at all and would let anybody say what they wanted because haters gon' hate and fans gon' suck you off so

word, thats the attitude i respect the most.

but since internet privacy is basically an oxymoron by now, i think it's great if more artists are going to be responding to threads about them. they can obviously provide the most information on the topic of themselves. if their feelings get hurt by something it's unfortunate, but they should see it coming and know how to deal with it.

it's like if an artist goes up to a random group of people after a show he just played and listens to what they're saying about him. just by listening he can expect he'll hear some negative and some positive comments, and he should be prepared to absorb and/or react to both, preferably in a clever way.

i guess the weird thing is how hard it is not to hear that chatter when it comes to the internet. fame must be more maddening than ever.

  On 6/6/2011 at 3:44 AM, Lucy Faringold said:

I don't think that's a fair extrapolation at all - I don't see how you can conflate an artist who is creating electronic music with a major global power such as Israel!

 

Your example seems to introduce ideas of political allegiance, monetary dependency and personal proffessional affiliation which are simply not relevant to what we're discussing - unless I've somehow misunderstood you?

it ties in when it comes down to trying to build bridges to further your own musical career. You didn't misunderstand me, but maybe i didn't emphasize that part of it enough. I think politics runs the world whether it comes to Washington or the cash generating culture in Electronic music.

Oh I see what you're getting at now From the perspective of an artist who may have to deal with other artists in the future then yes, I imagine you'd have to choose your words carefully. That's the price one pays for giving up one's anonymity I suppose.

don't give two fucks

artists can make whatever they want. criticism is almost entirely useless and is the work of people who can't create

i think tycho reacted poorly, he should have just stayed away. i think the artist shouldn't say stuff online because it will follow him, almost always in a negative manner. that's my take on that

then again, Tycho's actual response proves his intellect in the face of a bunch of fanboys. i feel interested in hearing some of his music after seeing his real influences.

  On 6/6/2011 at 5:05 AM, vamos scorcho said:

artists can make whatever they want. criticism is almost entirely useless and is the work of people who can't create

I personally know many working critics who are also practicing artists, so I don't agree that critics by definition 'can't create',

  On 6/6/2011 at 4:44 AM, Awepittance said:

I think politics runs the world whether it comes to Washington or the cash generating culture in Electronic music.

this is basically true. however there could potentially be a 'rebellion' where artists stopped sucking so much cock to get where they want to be. it seems like there are so few musicians these days content just to make the music and succeed. then again, you often don't hear about those musicians.

let me tell you, it is the 'critical establishment' which has created this problem, in combination with the usual label bullshit. once people stop reading pitchfork to find music and turn to user run databases such as discogs or rateyourmusic or last fm [entirely disavowing the 'critical establishment'] then all politics will likely dissipate.

people like good music, they just are too stpid 2 find it

hmm what else. politics do run music label stuff, and everything. however, not all musicians should be playing this game. it's a shame in a way, to see it. i know it would take a lot of 'balls' to say, 'fuck the system' and do things your own way, with courage, truly, but it's probably the best thing right now.

as spoon said, cut out the middle man.

the middle man is the problem. I mean, maybe a band like CAN had to deal with politics. honestly I doubt it.