kent williams wrote:
Are you talking about the VH1-ing of Techno?
I'm a Dad, and there are many parents on this list. There's nothing
worse, in my opinion, than musicians who, at a certain point, cede the
cutting edge to the youngsters, and settle for reinforcing the
nostalgia of the people who grew up listening to them.
Kevin Saunderson is 42, Derrick May is 43, Juan Atkins is 44, Carl
Craig is 37, Richie Hawtin is 36. Techno, as a genre, goes back 25
years. Is it still relevant? I like to think so. Are new records by
the 'youth of today' better than stuff recorded by the old masters of
the form, or somehow more relevant? Some of them are great, but they
aren't the whole story.
My son Sean, who is graduating from college next May, heard techno all
the time while strapped in a carseat, riding to preschool. To him,
all techno is Dad Techno.
But I don't listen to techno to wax nostalgic about parties I went to
15 years ago, I don't listen to it to try and retain some shred of my
cool. I listen because it speaks to my condition. If anything I'm
probably the least cool sort of person on the planet -- the older guy
at the rave, jacking like he think he still cool. At least I'm not
the old guy at the rave, trying to pull a girl less than half my age.
That guy needs to die.
If anything, the older techno fans have one up on all the kids -- we
love the music, but it's not a fashion accessory or an identity we're
trying on. We caught the disease a long time ago, and we're still
sick.
Great points, Kent.
I'm 37 and my first child will be born soon (my wife's at 18 weeks in
now; just went to our first prenatal class last week). My parents
had an extremely small record collection when I grew up--Barbra
Streisand and Abba (not a fan these days) vs Fleetwood Mac
and Supertramp (*am* a fan these days) were literally pretty much
the gist of what they had. (It's funny, cos I don't own a single
Fleetwood Mac or Supertramp record, but due to hearing their
entire discography relentlessly growing up, I don't *need* any
of the physical products--I can pretty much remember every song
from them in my head instantly due to the constant exposure).
So...I spent my childhood knowing there *had to*
be more out there musically, and didn't get an aha moment until
Human League (Don't You Want Me) and Depeche Mode (People
Are People) made it onto commercial radio (all I had access to
growing up) and later hearing Brave New Waves on CBC and
going to the big city (I grew up in a village of 500 people--so no
nearby record store) and seeing records in the store like Skinny
Puppy, Foetus (pardon the pun, I spose), and others of that era.
So... for me, I *do not* want that to happen to my child (ie having
literally just 4 artists on constant rotation). So I've been going through
my records and picking out things to start with (Stevie Wonder ranks
at the top at this point, plus Commodores, Bobby Womack, Bill Withers,
George Benson, EWF, Isaac Hayes, Minnie Riperton, Sly Stone,
etc) before moving on to the rock (Led Zep, Queen, Def Lep, Sabbath,
et al), disco and electro and techno; can't wait
to see the reaction to Drexciya, Terrence Dixon, Shake, Atkins, et al.
Can you tell I'm excited? ;)
I can tell ya one thing: my child is going to know what a turntable is
and how to use it (I've got students in my sound design/music production
class who've never even seen one in use! Geez, what's happening to this
world?:))
Andrew
--
sound design/music production course:
http://andrew-duke.com/course.html
Chain Reaction downloadable samplepack:
http://www.audiobase.com/product/SACR
Andrew Duke--Consumer vs. User album:
http://www.phthalo.com/cat.php?cat=phth40
artist features column:
http://cognitionaudioworks.com/read.html
http://myspace.com/andrewduke
http://myspace.com/cognitionaudioworks
