Creative Finality Vs. Infinite Choice
It goes without saying that today’s music production technology, advancing as it has from the days of tape and consoles through to the formidable Audio/MIDI workstations many of us sit in front of (for increasingly worrisome chunks of our lives), presents a very different creative paradigm to us than was on offer to musicians in the past.
When I began working in audio, much equipment was expensive, fickle, and limited. Not limited by the standards of the day- these tools were already worlds cheaper and more powerful in many ways than those of the previous generation- but compared to 2008, they were primitive. They were a means to an end- these blunt instruments helped me make my ideas tangible. I learned their ways, I bent them to my needs, and got the job done.
They did have their inspirational moments. The rush of ones’ first arpeggiator, the promising smell of a new keyboard, a really game-changing new signal processor, another 4 tracks to work with- these all came with their own motivational magic. However, a lot of times they yeilded a “Right on! I can finally do that thing I’ve been wanting to do” breakthrough, rather than a push past the idea in one’s minds’ eye.
Fast forward to today. Virtually every DAW system comes with near-petabytes of loops, pre-sequenced drums, preset effects and virtual instruments of every stripe- more sounds than the entire pro audio department of your local music store could have mustered in 1999. A relatively small amount of money will get you anything else you need, and I won’t even get into what loose morals and a Bittorrent client are capable of. Continue Reading »