That title sounds kind of porno but don't get yer hopes up, Dagwood. We don' play that game here.
We really do want to raise Dagwood's hopes, tho, as Option Y was playing at Cat's Art MusikCircus tonight and said they would go into a deeper song. This one would be dark and foreboding. They launched into it and right away the spell was cast as I was thinking they're in Rhode Island. RI has lots of bridges. That guy is going to jump off the bridge. Dude, don't do it.
But he does change his mind. He thought everyone hated his music and he steps out with it a little. He doesn't want any words to sing his song and now he sees people listen to it anyway. He pushes it more and brings in some big, rich chord changes as he's liking this. He played and played, hoping to be that juke box hero, and they like it. And then he gets cocky and bad-ass. He's in the lights and he is making the moves with big chords and all the lights blazing.
He fades on the end of the song as this story doesn't end with a tragedy. Option Y made an exceptional canvas and, contrary to the way the song seemed it was going, there was no blood on it. Music is as much about making images as it is making sound. It's the best which brings images with it.
This was one song of about ten minutes and they played for over an hour. If you want one word, go with spectacular.
Frankly, we're really not sure how many people are playing in Option Y so we will go with a lot, meaning at least three. They're an exotic taste as they don't play formula pop songs. They're demanding musicians as are the others who play at the MusikCircus insofar as their music requires attention to appreciate. It's really not music for listening while you do something else. It is music for when you want to be fully-engaged with it, not really sure what they will do next, but knowing what they have played already in the song what seems most likely. Perhaps your prediction will be right or perhaps they will surprise you and that's what makes them fascinating.
One of the fundamental principles of music is that making it to boring (e.g. a march) and people will stop listening. If you make it too complex (e.g. extreme jazz, atonal compositions) then people will walk away. Right in the middle is pop and that strikes the same difficult balance but within much tighter parameters. By its nature, pop has to be repetitive so achieving that without also being boring is a tough move. Here at the Rockhouse, we don't care as we don't like pop anyway. We do appreciate it's difficult in its own way, tho.
The aspect of music most approachable to people is the melody and you know how it goes, "Can you hum a few bars?"
Melody is what many will keep from a song and it brings them back because it haunts them and they want to hear it again. That's generally how music works. "Play it pretty for 'em, Sam."
But then you've got the hotheads who want to know how far you can push melody before it explodes. They want only enough melody to define the structure and everything else is a consequence of it but not necessarily in an obviously-melodic way. There's only so far you can go with this and then people will say, dayum, you crazy, and they will walk away so it's an adventure every time for that.
What do you know ... there's one now. Deceptions Digital played at Cat's Art MusikCircus tonight and she does what I describe in pushing the limits to find how far out it can go without people perceiving it as noise.
Deceptions Digital / DD has been playing for quite a while at the Circus now and that has given time to listen to her music evolving. Initially there was a heavy emphasis on what I call an Industrial beat but I use that synonymously with any heavy house four-beat. Her music was wrapped around that and the result was inevitably a high-impact delivery. That's cool as all she wants to do is dance, dance, dance ... but ...
high-impact has the same vulnerability as melody. If there's not enough of it then you're a wimp and if there's too much then after a while their ears explode.
DD's music has moved to a variety of percussion statements behind it and, in effect, she modulates the impact. This gives her freedom to explore in different ways as a more tentative rhythm permits a more tentative, questioning exploration. This gives an increasing variety to her music and it also results in more extended themes. As with the general theme of this article, part of that is dancing around a melody that's reinforced as much or as little as she feels appropriate at any point in the song.
People are getting into it more and more too. At first, DD would have some difficulty drawing a crowd but not anymore. She grows, her music grows, and her audience is appreciating it. That's not to say she needs to get anywhere as she is already there and it's cool to see more people getting it. She won't stop as she constantly pushes her music and this is why people come back, you don't know what she will do next.
There is some sense of apology as to the somewhat artsy-fartsy description of the content but it's necessarily that way as these musicians don't cover "Daydream Believer" and that's difficult to review. Many of you may be able to immediately identify "Daydream Believer" but you don't know any of the songs these musicians play so the intention is to give impressions of what they do, hopefully that intrigues you enough to come out to check them out.
Maestro Michi Renoir played tonight as well and he started into a lush, romantic set reminiscent of "Chariots of Fire" and this was beautiful work but it was falling into the trap of melody. She's a deceitful one as she sings like a siren to come to her but any sailor who goes too close to her and, WHAMMO, crashed on the rocks.
Maestro Michi has been playing for a long time and he's not going to leave himself up on the rocks. He worked some most unusual changes into it and now you're thinking, whoa, take us away, Magic Man. What will he do, where will he go.
These kinds of inventions are what set Circus music apart and Michi can be exceptional at it. He's also a bit variable with it because he has the same challenge as anyone at the Circus, how weird can I get and get away with it.
Go for it, Maestro Michi, we want you at your weirdest, most demented, lunatic self. We love it when you go nuts with your kit and you swear at stuff when it doesn't work and you are engaged, man. We feel it and come in too. We love this music as it comes to the end of the show and goes quiet. When Maestro Michi is really 'on,' the music will echo in your head while you just kick back and smile, long after the show is over.
Today I wrote earlier that it's a compliment when people hate your music ... because they thought about it. You didn't get the preferred result but they at least considered it long enough to decide they didn't like it. They could have voted the other way but not this time. Much worse is to be dismissed by genre as with jazz, ugh. That requires no thought and your song didn't even get out of the gate. Much better if they hate it as at least they listened.
It can always come out the other way around and they love it, everything is peaches after that. And that is why the musicians at Cat's Art MusikCircus keep experimenting. They want to find that perfect mix of melody and madness.
We really do want to raise Dagwood's hopes, tho, as Option Y was playing at Cat's Art MusikCircus tonight and said they would go into a deeper song. This one would be dark and foreboding. They launched into it and right away the spell was cast as I was thinking they're in Rhode Island. RI has lots of bridges. That guy is going to jump off the bridge. Dude, don't do it.
But he does change his mind. He thought everyone hated his music and he steps out with it a little. He doesn't want any words to sing his song and now he sees people listen to it anyway. He pushes it more and brings in some big, rich chord changes as he's liking this. He played and played, hoping to be that juke box hero, and they like it. And then he gets cocky and bad-ass. He's in the lights and he is making the moves with big chords and all the lights blazing.
He fades on the end of the song as this story doesn't end with a tragedy. Option Y made an exceptional canvas and, contrary to the way the song seemed it was going, there was no blood on it. Music is as much about making images as it is making sound. It's the best which brings images with it.
This was one song of about ten minutes and they played for over an hour. If you want one word, go with spectacular.
Frankly, we're really not sure how many people are playing in Option Y so we will go with a lot, meaning at least three. They're an exotic taste as they don't play formula pop songs. They're demanding musicians as are the others who play at the MusikCircus insofar as their music requires attention to appreciate. It's really not music for listening while you do something else. It is music for when you want to be fully-engaged with it, not really sure what they will do next, but knowing what they have played already in the song what seems most likely. Perhaps your prediction will be right or perhaps they will surprise you and that's what makes them fascinating.
One of the fundamental principles of music is that making it to boring (e.g. a march) and people will stop listening. If you make it too complex (e.g. extreme jazz, atonal compositions) then people will walk away. Right in the middle is pop and that strikes the same difficult balance but within much tighter parameters. By its nature, pop has to be repetitive so achieving that without also being boring is a tough move. Here at the Rockhouse, we don't care as we don't like pop anyway. We do appreciate it's difficult in its own way, tho.
The aspect of music most approachable to people is the melody and you know how it goes, "Can you hum a few bars?"
Melody is what many will keep from a song and it brings them back because it haunts them and they want to hear it again. That's generally how music works. "Play it pretty for 'em, Sam."
But then you've got the hotheads who want to know how far you can push melody before it explodes. They want only enough melody to define the structure and everything else is a consequence of it but not necessarily in an obviously-melodic way. There's only so far you can go with this and then people will say, dayum, you crazy, and they will walk away so it's an adventure every time for that.
What do you know ... there's one now. Deceptions Digital played at Cat's Art MusikCircus tonight and she does what I describe in pushing the limits to find how far out it can go without people perceiving it as noise.
Deceptions Digital / DD has been playing for quite a while at the Circus now and that has given time to listen to her music evolving. Initially there was a heavy emphasis on what I call an Industrial beat but I use that synonymously with any heavy house four-beat. Her music was wrapped around that and the result was inevitably a high-impact delivery. That's cool as all she wants to do is dance, dance, dance ... but ...
high-impact has the same vulnerability as melody. If there's not enough of it then you're a wimp and if there's too much then after a while their ears explode.
DD's music has moved to a variety of percussion statements behind it and, in effect, she modulates the impact. This gives her freedom to explore in different ways as a more tentative rhythm permits a more tentative, questioning exploration. This gives an increasing variety to her music and it also results in more extended themes. As with the general theme of this article, part of that is dancing around a melody that's reinforced as much or as little as she feels appropriate at any point in the song.
People are getting into it more and more too. At first, DD would have some difficulty drawing a crowd but not anymore. She grows, her music grows, and her audience is appreciating it. That's not to say she needs to get anywhere as she is already there and it's cool to see more people getting it. She won't stop as she constantly pushes her music and this is why people come back, you don't know what she will do next.
There is some sense of apology as to the somewhat artsy-fartsy description of the content but it's necessarily that way as these musicians don't cover "Daydream Believer" and that's difficult to review. Many of you may be able to immediately identify "Daydream Believer" but you don't know any of the songs these musicians play so the intention is to give impressions of what they do, hopefully that intrigues you enough to come out to check them out.
Maestro Michi Renoir played tonight as well and he started into a lush, romantic set reminiscent of "Chariots of Fire" and this was beautiful work but it was falling into the trap of melody. She's a deceitful one as she sings like a siren to come to her but any sailor who goes too close to her and, WHAMMO, crashed on the rocks.
Maestro Michi has been playing for a long time and he's not going to leave himself up on the rocks. He worked some most unusual changes into it and now you're thinking, whoa, take us away, Magic Man. What will he do, where will he go.
These kinds of inventions are what set Circus music apart and Michi can be exceptional at it. He's also a bit variable with it because he has the same challenge as anyone at the Circus, how weird can I get and get away with it.
Go for it, Maestro Michi, we want you at your weirdest, most demented, lunatic self. We love it when you go nuts with your kit and you swear at stuff when it doesn't work and you are engaged, man. We feel it and come in too. We love this music as it comes to the end of the show and goes quiet. When Maestro Michi is really 'on,' the music will echo in your head while you just kick back and smile, long after the show is over.
Today I wrote earlier that it's a compliment when people hate your music ... because they thought about it. You didn't get the preferred result but they at least considered it long enough to decide they didn't like it. They could have voted the other way but not this time. Much worse is to be dismissed by genre as with jazz, ugh. That requires no thought and your song didn't even get out of the gate. Much better if they hate it as at least they listened.
It can always come out the other way around and they love it, everything is peaches after that. And that is why the musicians at Cat's Art MusikCircus keep experimenting. They want to find that perfect mix of melody and madness.
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