The "terrorism" of modern music making...

[davin]

A R T I C L E
As much as I support giving creative individuals the means to orchestrate things to every fine detail....nothing R A W K S harder than a tight band that meshes well. You just can't match the intensity level otherwise.

[Esty]

Are you scared to go to the music/gen board for some reason?

[davin]

I fear nothing!

Did you the read the article? It mentions Billy Corgan by name, and I think this article is very relevant to the TFE/Adore/musical mastermind vs. "band" debate that has been going on.

My bad....

[Izzle]

for the most part i wasn't sure what that article was about. it didn't sound very convincing either, whatever it was arguing.

if it is indeed about the dictatorship/democracy debate, i'd say the article is pretty much irrelevant. there will always be musical visionaries like Billy or Bjork, for example, and there will always be tight, democratic bands like Sonic Youth. everyone has their own ideal way of working, whether it is with other people or not.

but if you are working with someone who does demand more creative control, like billy or brian wilson, then the only question left to ask is whether or not you think that person's talents and ideas, proportionate to everyone elses, earns them the right to be in control.
take billy and the pumpkins as the obvious example here: would siamese dream be what it was if billy hadn't played virtually all the guitar parts on the record? would machina have benefitted from the inclusion of a token sappy lovesong by james? who knows. but i think you need to look outside of just the music- billy was and is, in many ways, an incredible bandleader. as he said so eloquently, the pumpkins were "a progressive art concept", and the stylistic progressions they went through were largely his ideas- would they have been as magical a band if they had just worn regular clothes all the time and done regular, unremarkable things like every other rock group? no way. he is worthy of his status as the head pumpkin, as is robert smith to the cure, for a further example.
a list of less-worthy musical control freaks might incIude individuals like the guy from Dexy's Midnight Runners, who even went so far as to tell the band what to wear each day, and bob geldof, who, despite being charismatic and well-intentioned, couldn't write music to save his life.

now i may or may not have missed the point with all that, but i hope it makes some sense either way.

[DeviousJ]

What the christ was that?

[davin]

Originally posted by Izzle
for the most part i wasn't sure what that article was about. it didn't sound very convincing either, whatever it was arguing.

if it is indeed about the dictatorship/democracy debate, i'd say the article is pretty much irrelevant. there will always be musical visionaries like Billy or Bjork, for example, and there will always be tight, democratic bands like Sonic Youth. everyone has their own ideal way of working, whether it is with other people or not.

but if you are working with someone who does demand more creative control, like billy or brian wilson, then the only question left to ask is whether or not you think that person's talents and ideas, proportionate to everyone elses, earns them the right to be in control.
take billy and the pumpkins as the obvious example here: would siamese dream be what it was if billy hadn't played virtually all the guitar parts on the record? would machina have benefitted from the inclusion of a token sappy lovesong by james? who knows. but i think you need to look outside of just the music- billy was and is, in many ways, an incredible bandleader. as he said so eloquently, the pumpkins were "a progressive art concept", and the stylistic progressions they went through were largely his ideas- would they have been as magical a band if they had just worn regular clothes all the time and done regular, unremarkable things like every other rock group? no way. he is worthy of his status as the head pumpkin, as is robert smith to the cure, for a further example.
a list of less-worthy musical control freaks might incIude individuals like the guy from Dexy's Midnight Runners, who even went so far as to tell the band what to wear each day, and bob geldof, who, despite being charismatic and well-intentioned, couldn't write music to save his life.

now i may or may not have missed the point with all that, but i hope it makes some sense either way.

Well said!