Noise/Experimental music: can someone explain it to me?
 

I certainly don't mean to be facetious, and I don't mean to denigrate this style of music, but I honestly don't get it. After listening to Merzbow I'm thinking, I could go out and record cars on the road, dogs barking, people laughing, mix it all together and record it, and would that then constitute noise rock? Experimental music? I'm not for one second suggesting that Merzbow has no talent --- he's released hundreds of albums and is very highly respected, so obviously he knows what he's doing --- but Venereology just sounded like noise to me, all the way through. Literally. If there had been someone digging up my garden like when the extension was getting built I could not have distinguished what I was listening to from that outside noise. It really was that bad.

So, what's the attraction? Do people really listen to hours of this for fun? Do people go to see artistes like this perform basically static in concert? If I wanted this kind of sound I could off-tune my radio and leave it between stations. I got nothing out of that album. Nothing. At all. It even made me appreciate Grindcore a little. At least those guys are playing, if not what I would recognise as music. Does Merzbow use instruments? Or so he just use all samples?

This is the kind of thing that, were I a parent and my kid played it, I'd clap my hands to my ears and shout "That's not music! That's just noise! How can you listen to that? How can you call it music?"

So, how can you?

And again, understand I am not sneering at this sort of music. I clearly don't have the ear to distinguish and pick out the nuances, and appreciate the artistry. But what is there in that? What do you hear that I don't? Is it just a musicians thing, that you play so you understand what he's doing? But not all his fans can be musicians.

Also, I don't mean just Merzbow, though this is the first real exposure I've had to this sort of music (and will likely be the last) so I'm using him as my only example. And please don't post loads of videos saying listen to this: I don't want to hear more if it's like that album. I really don't. You won't get me into it. But I am interested as to how other people can listen to it and call it music?

Be nice: I'm not putting down your music, I'm just genuinely baffled as to how anyone gets anything out of it. I'd really like to know.

Don't go into it expecting to hear conventional music and the rest is easy. Preconceived notions about what makes good music is a bad route to take when you're listening to experimental music. Cage once said developing an ear for musical sounds is like developing an ego, you begin to refuse sounds that are not musical and thus cut yourself out from a great deal of experience. Plus the amount of effort or skill doesn't really matter to me as long as I like the music. I mean, look at Malmsteen's music: takes a lot of skill and practice to get there but on the other hand it sucks ass. In the end it just comes down to personal taste though. I wouldn't expect anyone to enjoy experimental music in the same way I hope they wouldn't expect me to enjoy Van Halen.

Live experiences are a bit different because in that setting you really feel it and it's worlds away from listening to it at home unless you have an amazing system.

There's not much to explain. Once you get into it, you start hearing the "sense" in the music and just enjoying it.
If someone is only into softer, more melodic music, all extreme metal might just sound like stupid noise as well, but once you start really listening, you start noticing the structures and the skill involved.
A lot of Merzbow albums are pretty boring and half-assed, but on some of them and especially on his collaborations, you notice how he utilizes his noises in a purposeful, even masterful and often beautiful or just awesomely kick-ass rocking way.
You can't explain such music, one has to experience it like any other music and embrace what's going on. But ultimately it comes down to taste, I'm sure the "weird stuff" isn't just anyone's cup of tea, no matter how open-minded. I'm extremely open-minded and there are lots and lots of styles and genres I simply can't stand.

Ima say this in the nicest way possible, you seem very narrow minded when it comes to music TH.

You're very dismissive of certain genres, i remember posting alternative vids on your Riff war thread which you instantly dismissed as a crap, hell, you don't even care for watching office space.

This boggles me cause as a member i think you're awesome, personality wise i think you're great but music taste wise you're very hard to relate to.

He's not being narrow minded he's asking us to help him understand, he wants to see the appeal.

I've always found the easiest way to explain experimental abrasive styles is by comparing them to horror films, or more so smut / gore films. For a lot of us it isn't about "enjoying" the music in a conventional sense, it's about the experience and impact, visceral emotion, letting the sound get under your skin. When you watch a gore film and feel repulsed, disgusted, and uncomfortable, the film has done its job. Sometimes we don't want to feel good, we just want to feel something intense, that's what extreme music acheives, it stirs up an intense feeling, whether that's being overwhelmed with confusion, getting pumped up, or feeling terrified, disgusted, unsettled, or claustrophobic. People don't go to haunted houses to feel good, they go to feel that visceral rush of terror, its exciting but not happy, people generally don't go to noise music to be impressed musically or feel good, they go to feel something extreme and intense. If you don't welcome those sorts of emotions into your head it's perfectly reasonable that you don't enjoy the music that conjures up those feelings.

Yea i get that, i called him narrow minded for previous statements he has posted around the forums not because of this thread, at least in this thread he's trying to understand Noise and experimental music and i actually commend him for that.

I like Noise and experimental music but in small doses, i find the beauty in that genre is that the music is a puzzle your mind puts together. it's not music that's easily defined most times you have to familiarize yourself with it for awhile before it starts broadening your horizons.

Im thankful to Sonic youth because they gradually made me appreciate this genre, specifically thankful for the intro to No queen blues



it took me years to hear the groove in that intro at the beginning all i heard was just sh*tty distorted guitars and an awful drummer but now i can appreciate all the nuances of their broken melody.

I think TH needs his own Sonic youth, an artist in this genre that can gradually get him into it.

To address the bolded bit: I still do not get why the hell it's so important that I should want to watch a film just because a few people tell me I should? I explained myself I think well enough in that thread and I would appreciate you not bringing it up again as an example of my mindset. I do not dismiss movies in general but explained I had neither the time nor the interest in watching it. I should not feel bullied or cajoled into doing something I don't want to do. Suppose I told you you should listen to "Gotterdammerung" or something, something you have no interest (let's assume) in, and no intention of ever being into? Would it bug you if I kept saying "You should listen to it! Why won't you listen to it?" and then other joined in, and you eventually got a sense of people being offended because you would not listen to it? Well that's how I felt about "Office space".

To be perfectly frank, the pressure on me in that thread has only served to ensure I will never watch it, out of spite. If people had said you should watch it and then left it at that, fine, but all I got was "Why won't you watch it?" up to a point where I was almost sneered at for not wanting to watch it. It angered me, and it still does, and I would ask those who pressurised me into trying to watch it to remember not everyone likes the same things they liek and not everyone has the time to "just give it a go". I'm very busy and I'm very picky about what I watch. So anyway, kindly drop that as an example of my being narrow minded. Thanks.

As to that, why is it that I can't say I don't like a particular song/genre but Urban for instance can make a comment like "got through seventeen seconds of a prog song. Rubbish" and nobody calls him out on it? Answer: because he's allowed not to like certain stuff. So am I. So please get off my back. If I don't like your music I don't like your music; you probably feel the same way about stuff I like. We're all different. I don't think I ever labelled any of your music as crap specifically, but even if I did, so what? People have said that about my music. It's their opinion, nothing more, and nothing to get annoyed about.

Thanks. That really helps. Unfortunately I'm not into gore movies, but I do understand what you mean. The kind of "peeping out from between your fingers" thing, yes? Problem is, I didn't get that from Merzbow. I got nothing, only a headache. It literally was noise from the first moment to the last. But thanks for the explanation of what these musicians are trying to do, even if it doesn't do that for me.

I would say the reason I can do it is because if I do that I'm only dismissing one song, not the entire genre.
If challenged on it I can give reasons as to why I don't like it and offer an alternative of that genre that I do like, which is something you're unable to do if it's something you're unfamiliar with.

I can dismiss a prog record in 17 seconds but I can also get excited about one in that time too.

lol i was just giving you sh*t with the office space thing. :p:

im all for you getting into a new genre but if may ask, are you interested in getting into this genre or are you just asking why other people like it?

And forget all that noisy stuff that'll do nothing to convince you. Listen to this instead. It's just a guy and a tape recorder and the ambient sound in the room and it eventually transforms into melodies & basslines. It might help you understand what you're looking for when you listen to this stuff.
Don't just dismiss it after 5 mins saying it's boring, turn the lights off, lie down and listen to it the whole way through.



It's one of the most ingenious original albums I have ever heard and it's just one guy saying a sentence over & over.

I'll do that when I can give it the time. I'll let you know my thoughts.
Okay, but just realise it did annoy me and it's a sore point with me now. If you meant nothing by it that's fine. I just don't want to hear about it again. (Cue Batty posting the movie eleven times in eleven different threads) .... :rolleyes:
No, as I said in the OP I am NOT interested in getting into this genre (notwithstanding the piece Urban has posted): I purely want to know what people who enjoy it get out of it, as I don't get it at all.

Obviously you know whereof you speak, and I was not saying you can't do that. I just wanted people to know that I am not into everything they are, and when I try (as with Merzy) I often find I was right not to be. Some things do not appeal to me, and having listened to a few Grindcore albums I know that, assuming that's how the subgenre goes, I would not be interested in exploring it further because I see nothing in it for me. Punk I am biased by the little I've seen on TV, but the whole ethos of punk does nothing for me so I doubt I'd enjoy much of it. Jazz, I tried, but I can't help it: it leaves me cold. Although Eric Dolphy was good, and obviously there's a huge amount of jazz out there I have not tried, so something might click.

But as with all the genres/subgenres I'm not into, I feel it's a waste of time I could be using to do other, more important or enjoyable things to try to get into genres I do not like. That may be my loss, certainly. It is also my choice.

I've listened to all four of Wagner's Ring Cycle operas. Does that mean you'll watch Office Space?

Here's a short example of experimental / noise music that's a bit easier to digest:



There's still a strong musical element here but the sounds and mood are still wildly abrasive. Let the music get under your skin, turn off your lights and use headphones if you're willing to. What's interesting about Pharmakon's music is that it's extremely empowering for her, but extremely confrontational and almost humiliating for her listeners, especially new listeners, even more apparent in her live performances where she often skulks off stage into the audience and literally screams in their faces, her eyes inches from yours. For her it's about injecting all of her visceral and primal emotions into the music (this album was written during her recovery from massive surgery), for the listener it's about confronting those emotions and letting them sink in, learning to appreciate intense experiences whether they're positive or negative, it's not about feeling good or bad necessarily, it's just about feeling a lot.

I don't want to throw albums at you, I know your queue is seemingly endless, but I think Pharmakon's Bestial Burden is a fantastic entry into this kind of music. It was even featured on Rolling Stone Magazine's website upon release, that's very rare for music like this.

That was fantastic. Whenever she started that wailing it always put my hackles up, cause I knew in about ten seconds, that awful screaming was about to start. It was like watching somebody putting their nails up to a chalkboard and just waiting for them to rake them across it.

I'm surprised you don't know the album, there's so much more where that came from, man. Please track down a copy of Bestial Burden in any format possible, if that track resonated with you the album will enter your highest ranks, at least in this style, one of my all-time favorites fo sho, absolutely terrifying.

Round 2:

Do you ever enjoy sound simply on its own terms? I mean like the sound of crashing waves or a refrigerator humming or traffic in the rain or footsteps in a high-ceilinged space. I'd imagine to some degree or another you do. I really do. I love the texture of sound and I tend to appreciate experimental sound stuff in the same way that I enjoy sitting in a space with a lot of sonic texture, like a train station. That's really all there is to it, if it washes over me and takes me somewhere mentally, then I enjoy it. If it doesn't, I don't.

Oh absolutely. After all, I really dug the Dead Voices on Air and Gnaw Their Tongues albums. I just don't enjoy harsh, screechy, abrasive noise. To me, that's like someone saying "I'm going to come into your room and drill holes in the wall for an hour. I'm sure you'll enjoy that and want me to come back again." Or listening to, as I think Batty mentioned, nails on a blackboard. I just would not listen to that of choice, and that's what Merzbow, at least that album, brought to mind.

Of course I love birdsong, whalesong, the sound of rain, even humming can be relaxing. But I don't like loud, discordant, static-ish noise.

It really picks up around the 2nd hour.

I can only fall asleep to this.

To me noise and expiremental music is best listened to when I'm looking to be disturbed not by a poet or songwriter and their daily turmoil, but instead through sound. I like music that's ugly and twisted so noise music really fits the bill for me. Like listening to Totem by White Suns in a pitch black room with my eyes wide open and volume all the way up was an absolutely brutal expirience and one I don't think I'll be able to recreate with the same magic. Like a bunch of people have said before me, it's less about the structure or visibility of the piece, but instead the overwhelming apocalyptic nature a lot of harsh noise music can grasp. Where I'll listen to punk to get out energy, or listen to pop when I'm happy, I listen to noise when I want something that hurts that actually forms a negitive reaction inside of me. Call it masochistic, but it works.

I agree with most what's been posted, but I want to add that a lot of this stuff takes some aclimating to. For instance, Eric Dolphy aside, most people have to work up to something like free jazz. Most people don't like Peter Brotzman at first because they lack the context to interpret it. More often than not, you revisit a piece that you originally found really insurmountable, and you end up finding to not be a big deal.

You just need to exercise those mental music muscles for this type of stuff. A lot.

Honestly I'm still not completely sure on free jazz and I've tried for a while, there's some I really love and then other stuff that I can't help but burst out laughing when I hear it.

Hey, sorry about accidentally sending the post before it was finished. I edited it now.

Personally, I'm not super into free jazz, although I have a few favourites that I regularly spin. I haven't listened to as much jazz as I'd like though. Although, recently I went on a binge that got me into a few things.

That's basically how I am

See, that literally never happens to me. I have never been, nor ever expect to be, in a position where I want music (for want of another phrase) so loud and abrasive and atonal that it hurts me. I don't enjoy it, and since there's no melody in this anyway, if I for some reason did want that, why not go listen to a guy use an angle grinder on sheet metal for hours?

Trollheart, do you like the sound of someone cutting grass with a mower? That is nothing but loud noise, but it's one of those "life noises" that I enjoy because it evokes images and scenery in my brain that I wouldn't otherwise get from silence. Sometimes those types of sounds, as well as other types of sounds found in nature (I think that was mentioned to you previously) can be enjoyable to listen to because they can take you to a different place...provoking images in your brain just from the sound alone. In that sense, it would be using the music to evoke the feeling, which is somewhat different from simply listening to music because it sounds good to your ear. City sounds would be the same.

TH, I enjoy experimental music for the cerebral engagement of it all. It's music you interact with, perhaps consciously and deliberately the first few times, and perhaps later just existing in the environment of the sounds. Try a piece like pianoforte by Dick Raaijmakers (aka Kid Baltan) and Tom Dissevelt. It's a treated piano composition, and they really explore the range of sounds once can create with the instrument.

The more familiar you become with the piece, the more key sounds or clusters of sounds develop a logical and concrete identity in your memory - you'll find yourself waiting for specific crescendos or rests. But remember - it's just a bunch of noise, right?

I like stuff that sounds cool.

Sometimes. If it's in the distance it can be nice, if it's next door it can be annoying As I say, I listen to plenty of non-music noise, but I don't like loud, discordant, abrasive noise. I wouldn't for instance lean out of my window and listen to the raucous cry of a magpie, someone bawling drunkenly in the street (yes, this is Ireland!) or somebody smashing glass with a hammer...

I actually think that noise as a genre is rather boring and repetitive and very one dimensional. Viewing noise as a genre, I have zero interest in it. When I view noise as an element of music, as a technique... It becomes much more interesting. To me, noise is just another element of sound.

As a genre, noise is probably the most uninteresting and predictable to me. People try to claim that noise is unconventional but from a meta perspective, noise is absolutely conventional. I think it is best when treated as another element of music (rhythm, melody, harmony, noise, etc)

Noise in of itself is completely uninteresting. What is interesting about noise is the interaction between it and things like melody and rhythm, and the contrast between these elements.

I think that when you single out any element of music and made it the singular, sole aspect of your music, it becomes very boring very quickly. Strict noise music to me is like a big bowl of unseasoned, uncooked onions. That is probably why it is so offputting to you. A lot of people can enjoy onions, but it takes a special kind of person to pull an onion out of bag and start eating it straight up.

When it comes to experimental music in general... Maybe you just don't have the capacity for it. Pretty much 100% of mainstream, accessible music is just streamlined from something once experimental. That's why I find most mainstream music so dull. Because all of it is 15+ years outdated. It's interesting that you don't get how people can really enjoy experimental music, because I don't get how people can be genuinely satisfied by mainstream, unexperimental stuff. It's literally art. Why wouldn't it be experimental?

I can't even put myself in the shoes of a non experimental artist. It's almost abstract to me, the fact that someone can approach art with a conventional ideology.

That's why mainstream, streamlined stuff is so boring to me. It exists solely because of the experimental art that cleared the path for it. If something can be labeled conventional, or non experimental, it means you've heard it before. So what's the point? Obviously it's a more superficial level of enjoyment. I think that non experimental music is very shallow. There's nothing wrong with that, but I think it's important for people to realize how important experimental music actually is. Experimental music exists with or without mainstream, conventional music, but conventional music lives and breathes based on the ebb and flow of experimental sounds.

So I guess that's why I prefer experimental music. Because it's new. Because it's fresh. It's raw and it's pioneering and it's fearless and I just think it's more powerful in every conceivable way. The mainstream, overall, has a tendency to make me feel dead inside. Especially when you make music, or when you're extremely interested in music, you begin to instinctively predict the chord progressions, the rhythms, when the chorus is to happen, what the chorus is going to sound like. It's really boring when you hear the latest mainstream pop hit and you can wrap your brain around it within 15 seconds. I guess if you're not super duper into music or art, that's enough for you, and you aren't really there to have this intense, existential engagement. You're not there to have your perceptions altered. You just want fun, easy music. I have this friend that is really into mainstream Katy Perry level stuff and she isn't pursuing music or art in any conceivable way but she tries to act like she's on my level with music, and that she gets it the way I do, and that music is her life the way it is my life. I kind of just let her think it because I don't want her to feel like I'm degrading her but honestly I find it kind of insulting.

^^^
Aye ur back!

And for the most part I agree although I think noise music on its own is another expirience entirely I pretty much agree. If I write a song and I play it for my mom and she says "oh that's really good it could be on the radio" that's my cue to **** with until it's a lot more ugly then it had been previously. Honestly mainstream music can be fun, but it's a very shallow poop of ideas.

Just my personal opinion but the noise part of the "music" is what kills me. I can't handle all of the white noise in the back ground as it hurts my ears too much. So generally, it's a waste of my time to listen to it.

The noise part is my favorite part :p:

Idk why but ive always been a fan of loud bendy guitars that border on obnoxious, i always try to incorporate an ugly or abrupt riff when im making a song too cause to me those are the parts of the song you initially don't like but later love.

I find that most times what is easily liked is easily forgotten but with genres like noise and experimental you have to take your time to get it.

i would say these genres are for people that like to learn and deconstruct music, it's less tangible so it has more potential to be anything and to mean anything and be more open to individual interpretation.

You're the king of making sweeping generalizations that sound downright stupid. I love to learn and deconstruct music, but I absolutely despise noise music. Please think harder about perspectives other than your own when you post.

Hmm likewise.

Shouldn't you be somewhere else telling people that they're lesser than you for liking to watch sports/esports or how the artists you think are brilliant are objectively brilliant etc etc etc etc etc etc

Shouldn't you be out there defending them? You took someone's perspective, told them it was ****, then told them to respect other perspectives. Maybe practice what you preach from time to time.

It wasn't his perspective, it was his generalization of the type of people that like noise music and it was a horrible generalization

It's the way he sees noise music. Sounds like a perspective to me.

As far as I see it I think that there's a lot more texture and intricacy to noise music than people who generalize it. It's a diverse as **** genre. It's not all just static or warbling, although harsh noise is less diverse than noise as a whole.

How is

"these genres are for people that like to learn and deconstruct music"

the way he sees noise music?

That would actually be described as the way he sees people that like noise music

Turns out there are people that like to learn and deconstruct music while still disliking noise music. *insert mind blown gif*