I remember once hearing an interview with cEvin Key where he described Dwayne Goettel as someone who would have probably turned out to be Aphex Twin had he not died, given the era of it all. And that made me take another look at Aphex twin, and appreciate his work.
Richard D. James aka Aphex Twin speaks to Tatsuya Takahashi (2017)
41–50 of 105 posts
Re: Richard D. James aka Aphex Twin speaks to Tatsuya Takahashi (2017)
#42Earlier quoted context omitted.
A different opinion about their music is that it all seems rather ostentatious in an aural sense, and leaves a doubt if some of the praise being heaped on it is 'perfomative'.
Uhm. If I understand correctly, you are saying that some people are pretending to like his music because it is over the top and showy rather than actually good or enjoyable? While it is possible these fake enjoyers exist, I'm fairly certain a lot of fans of Mr Twin's work like it in a straightforward sense of most music appreciation. Personally, 'Vordhosbn', 'Windowlicker', 'Rhubarb'... etc are all great tracks. Are…
I'm an example, in fact I've loved his music since the 90s and never played it for friends because I always assumed they wouldn't like it. And I'm definitely not being performative for myself. It was a bit surprising to me that his music became kind of legendary recently.
Re: Richard D. James aka Aphex Twin speaks to Tatsuya Takahashi (2017)
#43Earlier quoted context omitted.
A different opinion about their music is that it all seems rather ostentatious in an aural sense, and leaves a doubt if some of the praise being heaped on it is 'perfomative'.
Uhm. If I understand correctly, you are saying that some people are pretending to like his music because it is over the top and showy rather than actually good or enjoyable? While it is possible these fake enjoyers exist, I'm fairly certain a lot of fans of Mr Twin's work like it in a straightforward sense of most music appreciation. Personally, 'Vordhosbn', 'Windowlicker', 'Rhubarb'... etc are all great tracks. Are…
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Re: Richard D. James aka Aphex Twin speaks to Tatsuya Takahashi (2017)
#44The depth of knowledge of Richard James surprises me every time I come across articles about him. No wonder Aphex Twin's music stands out the way it does. He's always a fair way ahead of the curve.
A different opinion about their music is that it all seems rather ostentatious in an aural sense, and leaves a doubt if some of the praise being heaped on it is 'perfomative'.
Agreed, been this way for 30 years, and significant amount of effort by him and warp have been adding to cult of his mystique(actually many electronic music artists in the 90s/early 2000s). He is one of the last popular electronic musicians younger generations of "#DAWLESS" guys like now because he kept up that mystique which is basically impossible to have now in the current social media era.
I remember buying some of his tapes and cd's from Amoeba music in 1999 and the feeling they gave me. I often wonder what its like to been born in 2010 and never experiencing this.
Re: Richard D. James aka Aphex Twin speaks to Tatsuya Takahashi (2017)
#45Programming synths with Scala sounds pretty fun!
And before the wrong Scala crowd gets too excited, the Scala referred to is the musical tuning software from 1985
https://www.huygens-fokker.org/scala/
(Not the programming language from 2004.)
Re: Richard D. James aka Aphex Twin speaks to Tatsuya Takahashi (2017)
#46Re: Richard D. James aka Aphex Twin speaks to Tatsuya Takahashi (2017)
#47The depth of knowledge of Richard James surprises me every time I come across articles about him. No wonder Aphex Twin's music stands out the way it does. He's always a fair way ahead of the curve.
A different opinion about their music is that it all seems rather ostentatious in an aural sense, and leaves a doubt if some of the praise being heaped on it is 'perfomative'.
Eh, Aphex fans and IDM more broadly has always been pretentious AF. I think there's a kayfabe effect going on where both the artists and the fans lean so far into the earnestness of it all that it surely has to be somewhat tongue-in-cheek. I suspect that's part of the appeal for some folks, the delight in being obtuse.
It doesn't bother me too much. Many indie scenes have this sort of self-consciously avant garde sub-movement - theater, dance, fashion, games...
While I find 99% of braindance to be aggressively unlistenable and/or thoroughly tedious, the 1% that isn't tends to be truly great. Imo the best thing that ever happened to this genre was digital record stores, because casual fans can skip over all the limited edition vinyls and albums full of abstract noodling and just pick up the bangers.
Re: Richard D. James aka Aphex Twin speaks to Tatsuya Takahashi (2017)
#48Placeable.
>I’ve since gone on to learn more about this damn 440 Hz.
Re: Richard D. James aka Aphex Twin speaks to Tatsuya Takahashi (2017)
#49Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's not in vogue these days, but rather than forgiving, we can compartmentalise and rationalise. Being a bad person in one domain doesn't mean that someone can't generate value in another.
Why are you putting "value" above human decency? Maybe you shouldn't be considered to generate any "value" if you put misery on others, how can any "value" make up for the direct suffering? There are plenty people just the same, with the same capabilities without the quality of being a tarpit of suck.
A lot of James' discography is predicated on making other people suffer. The album art is offputting, the track listings are usually cluttered and useless, his music videos are scary and confusing, random tracks are designed to torture you (eg. Ventolin), and half of his music is released under unrelated aliases.
If you're not familiar with Aphex Twin, it's hard to understand that this hatred does nothing to inhibit his success.
Re: Richard D. James aka Aphex Twin speaks to Tatsuya Takahashi (2017)
#50Earlier quoted context omitted.
A different opinion about their music is that it all seems rather ostentatious in an aural sense, and leaves a doubt if some of the praise being heaped on it is 'perfomative'.
Agreed, been this way for 30 years, and significant amount of effort by him and warp have been adding to cult of his mystique(actually many electronic music artists in the 90s/early 2000s). He is one of the last popular electronic musicians younger generations of "#DAWLESS" guys like now because he kept up that mystique which is basically impossible to have now in the current social media era. I remember buying some…
> I often wonder what its like to been born in 2010 and never experiencing this.
It’s always amusing to see these cycles continue. If his music is indeed as good as you claim it will still be listened to - just as so much of the best music of the last 75 years is. People have been lamenting the loss of the thing they felt was their transformative experince, and each generation keeps finding a new generation defining experience