What does Noise mean to you?

[Chankgeez]

(Inspired by bigchiefbc's "help me spend my money" thread and kosta's friend Alex Braidwood.)

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ViyTZLWrs-M[/youtube]

He makes it sound so academic:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jGSO6hgbiR0[/youtube]

I also recommend reading The World Is Sound: Nada Brahma: Music and the Landscape of Consciousness & The Third Ear: On Listening to the World by Joachim-Ernst Berendt among other books.


What does noise mean to you? What else is there?

[D.o.S.]

http://www.esoterra.org/merzbow.htm

If music was sex, Merzbow would be pornography.

In America, pornography is often viewed as vulgar and offensive-- especially to women. Are you implying that Merzbow is for men?

No. I mean that pornography is the unconsciousness of sex. So, Noise is the unconsciousness of music.

[jrmy]

I don't have a good (or rather clear) answer, but I am very interested in the subject. Will have to keep an eye on this thread.

[Mudfuzz]

I don't know anymore.. I like a "style" "called" noise a lot but if you go buy the definition of the word mainstream pop is noise and noise art would actually be more like music as it is more enjoyable to listen to.

[Chankgeez]

One man's noise is another man's music, one man's music is another man's noise.



(BTW, nice Merzbow interview, D.o.S.)

[Ghost Hip]

I've been wanting to do a vlog about this topic because I think it applies greatly to what interests us about fuzz and other effects. I had a class a year ago called "Interpersonal Communication," and in that class we read a chapter out of this dude, Alphonso Lingus' book, The Community of Those Who Have Nothing In Common. The chapter was called "TheMurmer of the World," which sounded totally up my alley so I signed up to write about that reading for the class. In it he talks about how noise is an essential part of the message and totally shows this dumb philosopher "Michael Serres" how totally wrong he is about eliminating "noise" from our lives. And it was right up my fucking alley because it applies directly to music and fuzz and basically everything we talk about here.

Here's my "explication" on one of the paragraphs that I think applies to us as effects users and musicians:

My friend Alphonso describes in these two paragraphs what I tend to enjoy about the music I listen to. The voice cracks, slightly out of tune guitars, the yips and yelps, the textures, feedback, and little nuances of the music are what I enjoy most because they tell me or even convince me what the musician is feeling. Just as we love the wrinkle in the eyes of our lover's smile or the way they say the word "chocolate," the nuances, tone, pitch, etc. of our communication are connected to and just as important as the message itself. This is where my man, Alphonso, shows Michael Serres what is up. The way we speak or write language tells us as much about ourselves and our thoughts as the message does. It is the reason why certain people find alternative forms of music more interesting or believable. The singer does not sing the same way each time, maybe the guitarist bends a note, or the pianist slides his fingers down the keys at some point; it is all to add emotion, significance, and meaning. "Anyone who thinks we are only emitting noise is one who does not want to listen."

Reading that chapter really helped me understand why we love and use fuzz and effects. During the entire time reading I was pretty much: It helped confirm that the noises (fuzz, reverb, delay, chorus, phaser, etc.) that we add to our music and songs are natural and necessary for us to communicate our thoughts. Just as it is necessary for someone to plug straight into an amp.

Anywho, thought I'd add that to the discussion. Sorry for the tl;dr.

[Chankgeez]

Nah, PP, I didn't think that was either too long or unworthy of being read.

I can probably go on for days on this subject.

Your post provides a lot to think about. I'm still trying to decide how to respond to it. It's a very complex subject.

I get the gist of what you're saying, but I'm not sure I totally agree with it.

As our society continues to grow more industrial/use more and more technology, our music incorporates more elements of noise. We become desensitized to noise as noise. We hear sounds throughout the course our day and become accustomed to them. Is it a natural progression to want to hear similar sounds in what we listen to deliberately as opposed to what we hear by chance? Noise becomes more musical to us? Is it a conscious decision or mere unconscious mimicry?

[Ghost Hip]

As our society continues to grow more industrial/use more and more technology, our music incorporates more elements of noise. We become desensitized to noise as noise. We hear sounds throughout the course our day and become accustomed to them. Is it a natural progression to want to hear similar sounds in what we listen to deliberately as opposed to what we hear by chance? Noise becomes more musical to us? Is it a conscious decision or mere unconscious mimicry?

I don't think unconscious mimicry is the word. More unconscious response. Like you said, noise is natural throughout our day, and I think we naturally respond to the noise. Like talking about the weather with a stranger. It's just commotion to respond to and make sense of. Without the noise I don't think we'd have anything to say. And I think it can be a conscious decision too for us musicians and artists who decide to use devices to add noise.

I'm interested in that idea of becoming accustomed to noise. But are we desensitized, or are we becoming more aware? Maybe we as musicians are more aware of noise and understand how to use it? I'm not sure how to flesh out my thoughts on that either. Because there are people who call anything that isn't clean cut music "noise." And as more aware musicians/artists we have come to understand and better interpret why an artist used an effect, shouted that lyric, photographed with grainy film, or painted a certain way. I didn't put this in my original post because it didn't fit in with what I was saying, but I think artists are sort of masters of noise. We learn how to arrange colors, textures, notes, tones, words, etc. to represent and signify how we feel or even how a whole group feels.

[Chankgeez]

Some good points, PP.

I don't think "noise" can be clearly defined to everyone's satisfaction. It's too subjective.

[Ghost Hip]

Some good points, PP.

I don't think "noise" can be clearly defined to everyone's satisfaction. It's too subjective.

True. Lots of different contexts to use the term noise as well. Not sure if this makes sense, but my definition of noise, is the subjective part of something. Like an apple has it's shape, form, and purpose to provide nutrition. The noise to me is the color, taste, and texture of the apple. As with music, anyone can play an A chord which is made up of A, C#, and E. But the way the musician arranges the chord, what instrument it's played on, the echoes, sympathy notes, phrasing, fuzz, etc. is the noise.

[D.o.S.]

I just want it to be really fucking loud.

[aen]

What does noise mean to you?

Well, as a sort of "final" meaning, noise is Extraneous sound.
But "music" being Organized Sound, as soon as you compose, record, or even think about noise, it is music.

WHICH MEANS NOISE MUSIC DOES NOT EXIST!

[Ghost Hip]

What does noise mean to you?

Well, as a sort of "final" meaning, noise is Extraneous sound.
But "music" being Organized Sound, as soon as you compose, record, or even think about noise, it is music.

WHICH MEANS NOISE MUSIC DOES NOT EXIST!

Through that logic adding "noise" to a genre name really does sound silly. I agree.

[jrmy]

PP's point about mimicry is interesting - a long time ago, in a galaxy far far away, I was an anthropology major. Which means you should probably run now.

BUT I remember a bit about a tribe from New Guinea (that's where my prof did all her field work - many fascinating stories about that for another day). We got to read about a tribe who had a musical tradition based on bird calls, and to the Western Missionaries that were constantly trying to do stuff to the native populations, it sounded like complete noise. But it had a vocabulary, admittedly one that Ornette Coleman may have recognized as being close to "free jazz" - it was totally polyphonic, and had a crazy sliding scale, and all sorts of stuff.

And... I forget where I was going with that whole thing. Something about the definition of noise being flexible, and nature, and mimicry, and... stuff.

Damn, I'm glad I never went to grad school. I would have sucked as a professor.

[Chankgeez]

jrmy's post opens up a whole 'nother can of worms.

Tuning.

That's subjective as well. It all depends on what your ears are used to hearing. Maybe what's out of tune to you is perfectly acceptable to someone else?