Actress - R.I.P

  On 4/25/2012 at 3:25 PM, Obel said:

See: VHS Head.

whaaaaaaaat

  On 4/25/2012 at 3:25 PM, Obel said:

See: VHS Head.

Not trolling. I thought Trademark Ribbons of Gold was another overhyped, mediocre release. This is my point though, you assume I'm trolling.

  On 4/25/2012 at 3:57 PM, Obel said:

Not trolling. I thought Trademark Ribbons of Gold was another overhyped, mediocre release. This is my point though, you assume I'm trolling.

What about Midnight Selection? Video Club EP?

I liked Video Club. I don't think album length works for that sound, after five or six tracks I'm bored senseless.

I never bothered with Midnight Section.

  On 4/25/2012 at 3:57 PM, Obel said:

Not trolling. I thought Trademark Ribbons of Gold was another overhyped, mediocre release. This is my point though, you assume I'm trolling.

i was joking.

this might sound a bit offtopic, but it actually makes sense. there is a church in a town called Klippan, in Sweeden, built by architect Lewerentz, that uses brick as the dominant material of construction. roof, floors, walls, all brick. it's truly built as a whole.

think of VHS Head's LP and how it was created using exclusively tape samples, manipulated digitally and you can't ignore how consistent and fresh it is.

i don't think it is a masterpiece, but it sure is innovative.

You might want to at least check out Sundown and Nightmare Park from Midnight Selection, because those ones are a lot different.

I'm not doubting innovation for a second. And I do 'get' the album. But it's not interesting to my possibly broken ears/brain.

I don’t think the Actress album is particularly "innovative" but it is gorgeous and it has his own vibe and sound to it

Its not as easy to be innovative as it was in the 90's and although its nice to hear something completely different and new I think that’s pretty rare now-a-days and anyway its more important for it to be good!

for me this album strikes the right balance of a guy putting his own spin on something and engaging me emotionally and for that reason it will be in my top albums this year.

i don't think actress is good because he is innovative and i don't see why that is the standard against which all music should be judged. it seems a bit ridiculous to me to suggest that fans of autechre and pan sonic should not enjoy actress because he isn't as groundbreaking as them; i'm a huge fan of autechre and pan sonic, but i like actress for different reasons.

if actress is innovative (and he may well not be), it's in his ability to put together what on the surface seem like kind of dodgy tracks which reveal their subtleties over time. i don't know of many producers who walk such a fine line between really poor production and brilliant composition, but actress does it well. and you might wonder why that is a plus, but i think the messiness of the music gives it a humble immediacy, like a really awesome track that your friend threw together on some broken old hardware or something. i love ae, but that doesn't mean i always want to listen to music with that level of production quality. and i know that lots of people do the whole hazy/messy/lo-fi thing, but none do it quite like actress (similarly, tons of people do the whole super-polished glitchy hip-hop thing, but none do it quite like autechre).

but the reason i really enjoy actress is just for the atmosphere of his music. he does a nice job of mixing straightforward, danceable beats with more unsual textures and ambience. a decent comparison would be with gas, although their music sounds very different. one thing i really like about gas is the tension between the ambience and the driving beat undernearth, which creates a very hypnotic atmosphere without the stillness and sleepiness of a lot of ambient music. i think actress has something similar going on, albeit in a different way.

regardless, it's no surprise that some people will like it and others won't.

I'm not sure what all the fuss is about either.......

I didn't really engage with Splazsh, so perhaps Actress is just not for me.

this is beautiful album and actress is brilliant imo for who he is, not in comparison to other artists. i will continue to enjoy this newest release, most likely for years and years to come. 'raven' has been affecting me and 'jardin' and 'caves of paradise' and 'IWAAD'. wonderful work in this which leads me to be quite curious what will be revealed as 'ghettoville'

  On 4/25/2012 at 6:00 PM, Redruth said:

actress is brilliant imo for who he is, not in comparison to other artists

if we are avoiding comparisons, than all artists are brilliant, no doubt about it. me included

everyone has their favorites and that's ok. actress is one of my favorites

Everything is amongst your favourites.

this just in: people have different opinions

  On 4/25/2012 at 6:22 PM, KY said:

this just in: people have different opinions

Roger that KY. Beerwolf over and out!!

I think the fuss was about VHS Head, not Actress.

  On 4/25/2012 at 6:20 PM, Obel said:

Everything is amongst your favourites.

where is the logic in this statement? clearly i have musics that i endorse more strongly then other musics. look into my posting record and you will hear patterns, you will hear variance and selectiveness in my tastes

  On 4/25/2012 at 6:22 PM, KY said:

this just in: people have different opinions

Oh yeah, forgive us for having a discussion about music on the Music DIscussion forum.

Troon I'm yanking your crank.

obel, thx u for servicing me friend. i had know idea you had such strong, masculine hands

edit: moving on - 'N.E.W.' is really special trac. i'm glowing with praise for this album, so light-filled and warm

  On 4/25/2012 at 6:41 PM, Redruth said:

  On 4/25/2012 at 6:20 PM, Obel said:

Everything is amongst your favourites.

 

where is the logic in this statement? clearly i have musics that i endorse more strongly then other musics. look into my posting record and you will hear patterns, you will hear variance and selectiveness in my tastes

edit: forget it, time to snooze.

In response to thereactions of people not onboard the hype train:

Well yeah, electronic music isn't progressing the way it was 10-15 years ago because there has been a halt on the technology for the most part. But Actress is a unique voice in my opinion. He reminds me of Autechre in that his music is audio grafitti. He does established types of electronic music is his own warped way, and it took a couple stoned listens to realise that each track might be his answer to Drexciya type electro, or wonky, or dubstep, or hip hop, etc. He's got production skills, yeah, but the most interesting thing about him is the odd environment he creates. I was sort of baffled by the reaction towards Splazsh at first, now I think it's something cool and different.

I trust a lot of your opinions on music (that's why I am here after all) so I will give this more listens. Perhaps because I am not so familliar with his music it's taking a while to sink through. Sometimes the best music is like that.

Do people on watmm like to just go against the grain because? Most average album you have heard in ages? Please share recent music that isn't average then. What albums are attempting something similar to RIP that do it much better? Give me some examples other than VHS Head who is miles apart from the style of actress. So much sensationalism on watmm, makes you wonder if there is even a point to being honest on the internet anymore. I'm just another opinion in a swamp of attention whores.