Noise

[rainier]

We were talking a little bit about noise on the Tomorrow's Harvest thread and someone asked what about it appeals to me about it, so I thought I'd answer here instead of clogging up that thread.

I'm not really hugely knowledgeable about the noise genre to be honest, but I like some of what I have heard and it's really just about my interest in sound in general. Ever since I got a tape recorder as a kid I've liked experimenting with it and recording anything that sounds interesting to me, whether it was something on the tv or some natural or mechanical sound or how things sound different depending on the size and shape of the room you're in.

I like the ambiance of certain sounds and the emotions it can bring up and the ways it gets distorted and how it can define a space and how you can start detecting rhythm or melody in seemingly random noise , but mostly when I like a sound it's really just a matter of "hey that sounds neat".

I don't really spend a lot of time questioning what is and isn't music or art, I spent a lot of years talking abut those things and it doesn't interest me much anymore, although I can understand why people like talking about it.

I think a lot of noise artists are interested in sounds the same way I am. I really like field recordings too, and radio static and things like that. I really love the Conet Project, it appeals to me aesthetically for a lot of reasons. It's hard to talk about why you like certain things. I love the color teal, but if someone asked me why I don't really have an answer beyond "it looks pretty". Certain sounds that aren't necessarily music appeal to me. I bet even people who aren't into noise could list sounds they like, but have a hard time explaining exactly why.

Anyway, not sure where I'm going with this but anyone feel free to add your thoughts about noise and sound etc.

[WeHadNormality]

Sometimes it's nice to be sonically pummeled.

[rainier]

When I was little I had this old fashioned tv in my room, and I don't know the mechanics of it, but some of those put off a really weird hum, and I'd sometimes just listen to the hum of it, and after awhile I'd start hearing melodies and songs, I think it's just the brain looking for patterns or filling in the gaps. I think that sort of illustrates the appeal of it to me too.

And I love the meta sound of someone recording something from another source, because you can hear them in the room with that source and it gives me a sort of warm feeling, like another person is somehow there (boards of canada does this sometimes, it sounds like things are being recorded outside or that there are people in the room with them).

[chronical]

I can see the fascination with noise. I'm fasicanted by field recordings/ambient as much as others are by noise, in the end we all have our own taste.
I guess noise lacks melodies as well as patterns, right? that's why it's so inaccessible to most people.

(sorry if this doesn't make any sense. a bit too stoned )

[var (x)]

http://www.jliat.com/txts/index.html

[FernieCanto]

When I was little I had this old fashioned tv in my room, and I don't know the mechanics of it, but some of those put off a really weird hum, and I'd sometimes just listen to the hum of it, and after awhile I'd start hearing melodies and songs, I think it's just the brain looking for patterns or filling in the gaps. I think that sort of illustrates the appeal of it to me too.

When I was a kid, there were certain sounds that I really enjoyed as well, but I always had a preference to sounds of rushing air. My mother had a clothes dryer in the bathroom, and the sound it emitted was incredibly pleasant. Even more so was an old fan we had, which in hot summer days we would leave turned on through the night. When it was set to turn left and right, it produced a very slow, lulling hum. It greatly upset me when my mother got up, in the middle of the night, to turn it off.

I was never very big on the appeal of harsh noise, though, but I can definitely understand it. I think, though, that people like me are not in the minority: this enjoyment of mundane sounds might actually be pretty widespread, but not many people are willing to admit that. Therefore, noise music produces a kneejerk reaction due to this. I mean, I'm not willing to believe that I belong to the 0.1% of people who finds pleasure in assorted, "non-musical" sounds. Once in a store I heard one of those little printers that emit receipts, and I swear the sound it produced was just like a samba. I can't be the only person who gets the appeal of that.

[rainier]

http://www.jliat.com/txts/index.html

Hey thanks, this looks great

[var (x)]

http://www.nonmusicology.com

[Keeoaddi]

A lot of 'noises' are very interesting, but I don't really like the genre of 'noise' with merzbow and friends.

The closest I come to listening to straight noise is probably something like Fuck Buttons, where the noise is prominent but rhythmic and only one element among many.
Having said that I also like a lot of 'lo-fi' music which is a similar area I think.

[Cab Dreaming]

I find noise / non-music wholly unlistenable in a regular context, but played out live it does have quite a transformative quality. For example, I went to see Autechre a few years ago and Russell Haswell was supporting. From memory it was pretty much a barrage of white noise and static for the most part and initially my response was just to go out and come back later, but moving around the room you realised the shifting of different frequencies and harmonics and it slowly engulfs you to become almost meditative and by the end of it I was perched in a corner in a bit of trance.

The one thing I've realised after being to few gigs of noise or where it's been a part of the set is that it's a deceptively hard discipline to master. Anyone can make a big ton of fucked up racket and ramp the PA to meltdown, but really understanding the dynamics of sound itself, how things as simple as volume or how you tweak the EQ can be a very powerful tool in the right hands and in the right space to hit that spot that's almost the opposite end of the spectrum of an isolation tank with the same experiential end point: it's actually quite an art.

[var (x)]

http://mattin.org/material.html

[The Telepathic Kid]

I like both the pummelling type of noise and "ooh that's interesting" type noise.

I like the pummelling type (eg Merzbow, Masonna, Whitehouse) less and more infrequently, but sometimes I just want to be hit on all sides with my headphones on. It's a little sobering, kinda makes you appreciate silence.

Here's a piece from Kazumoto Endo's While You Were Out, a great noise record which features ear shattering screeches along with some strange samples interspersing the noise.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WXkP3Nv4gRw

I also enjoy Fuck Buttons a lot, if you want more rhythmic noise go with Black Dice, as well as Black Dice solo member Eric Copeland.

I'm just intrigued by what sound can do, and how it can be manipulated and given life in so many forms and ways.

[pianoforte]

Personally,

I'm fasicanted by field recordings/ambient

I also like a lot of 'lo-fi' music which is a similar area I think.

At the same time, though, I also love this. I'm just so musically eclectic and all over the place that I don't even know what to say here, haha.

[var (x)]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qQGBm2UsGpo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HAn-ljy7J8Y
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vgkNkBovI3k

[El Camino]

I hate straight up noise like merzbow and wolf eyes but i really love a lot of noise rock and music that incorporates "noise" into other styles of music.

Lightning Bolt, early Animal Collective, Mr. Bungle, Black Dice, This Heat, Caroliner and A Place to Bury Strangers are all bands that i'd recommend that incorporate noise into their music.