the great deconstructor

.forum – week ten.

Frederick May kicked forum off this week by letting us all know that there is one secret elusive formula behind every number one song, making it number one, and which lacks in songs that do not. It is an interesting idea, but I tend to think is a very western view of music – one that tends to build pop stars up to be ‘larger than life’ all to often. This is something that has happened for centuries in western culture, for example the famous writings of Ernst Hoffman in ‘Beethoven’s Instrumental Music’:

“Mozart is concerned with the superhuman, the miraculous element that inhabits the inmost spirit.”

To be honest, I actually much prefer the pre-Romantic view of the musician as the ‘craftsman.’ I really do not think the musicians who are rich/famous sit on some other plain to... anyone else. Musicians are musicians, lots of historically famous musicians only reached acclaim after their death, so what does that say about their formula? There is no (one) single secret formula to musical success. Unlike when creating KFC.

Dragos Nastasie spoke next. Well actually he mainly played music, with the
Prodigy, the Chemical Brothers, as well as Nine Inch Nails making a welcome
Appearance into the forum. He talked mainly about the construction and deconstruction that can occur within a single song. This is approach to composition can be quite effective, especially in tandem the mechanistic aesthetic of ‘Techno’ and ‘Industrial’ music.

Craaaaazy Matt Reverie presented a television commercial he created for the Media Resource Centre. Alas, his presentation went quite amiss with the technology crumbling around him! He talked about how he came to create the music, using major and minor tonalities to construct matching moods to the visual sources. It was interesting really, I appreciated his honesty about his whole project, specifically, how he came to land the project and then how he went about doing it.

.sources.

May, Frederick 17.05.07, “Construction/Deconstruction,” Forum of the Electronic Music Unit, Adelaide University.

Nastasie, Dragos 17.05.07, “Construction/Deconstruction,” Forum of the Electronic Music Unit, Adelaide University.

Reverie, Matt 17.05.07, “Construction/Deconstruction,” Forum of the Electronic Music Unit, Adelaide University.