Tuesday, December 7, 2021

another point of ambiguity is the question of compression and limiting. the music is presented with a wide dynamic range, which is a conscious compositional decision. that keeps getting flattened out, and squished down, removing the changes in volume in the mix. it would seem that whomever is doing this doesn't understand the concept of mezzo-piano and mezzo-forte, and rather thinks everything should be presented at the same volume, and the same level of aggression. i know what they're doing - they're putting it through a limiter, and they're doing it because they think they're "cleaning it up". but, they're just ruining the detail and subtlety. the changes in volume are intentional parts of the composition, not relics to be removed in mastering.

i suppose it is possible that i'm getting upset about the playback process, and the answer is to realize that the playback algorithm is necessarily flawed. i might be getting upset about the downsampling done by the server, and deducing something is being altered. ok. so, i'm going to try to download the files after i reupload them and see if i can mathematically compare them to the correct versions on my hard drive.

and, if i have to accept that, so be it.

but, i actually expect to download altered files, and i'm going to be very upset if i do.
at
this is a synth pop record created in the 90s that should sound vaguely like a tears for fears or genesis record, but with a much more digital sounding recording footprint. it's not contemporary music, and should not sound like it. it's not intended for use in car stereos or nightclubs, it's intended for basement or bedroom listening through headphones. it may be music for reading, for doing homework, for doing employment, for exercising, for cleaning, for travelling, for shopping or just for active listening. but, it's meant for an alienated individual to listen to alone through headphones, and not to be experienced in a group setting with other people, through loudspeakers.
at
at specific point is a question as to the bass response on the mixes. i desire a minimal bass response, because most of the detail and interesting parts of the music are actually in the high end. i also dislike guitar parts with exaggerated low ends, and prefer my guitars to have a tinny, mono sort of sound. i like brittle, trebly, fuzzy sorts of digital distortion, and not deeper, crunchier sorts of amp distortion. i spent a lot of time getting that to sound correctly.

if the end user wants to play the music through a subwoofer, i suppose they have that choice, but i would not recommend it. rather, i would recommend that the music be listened to on as flat a system as is possible and through an entirely flat pair of headphones, and further that little attempt be made to exaggerate the low end, as the actual music is mostly in the upper mids.

i do not desire to be an artist that produces music intended for a deep bass response. i do not listen to or have an interest in bass music. and, i don't want it to sound chunky or analog or heavy - i want it to sound airy and digital and sharp and light.
at
the corruption is, unfortunately, returning to re-uploaded sound at the bandcamp site, and i'm remembering back to the fucker at the mixing desk, recognizing all of the apparent attempts to control my machine and putting 2+2 together.

the bottom line is this: if i can't present my mixes as i want to present them, they will not be presented at all. i don't want to resort to it, but i may have to unpublish everything as a means of protest.

i've unfortunately had to unpublish my first lp. i will be replacing the files with the corrected masters until the site stops corrupting them. if it will not relent, i will have to start unpublishing further documents, sequentially.

i'm not blaming bandcamp, exactly - i think this is exceedingly unusual for them, and i think it's deeper than them. i don't fully understand what's happening, but it's consistent with a broader narrative of outside control. somebody wants control over my body, over my thoughts and over my art, too. in the end, it's just a lot of resources wasted over what's truly a set of trivialities - especially considering that my tendency is to fight against the current, rather than go along with it. i will fight something like this out of spite.

i thought merely replacing the files would be enough to get the point across, but, again, they don't seem to have any kind of respect for individual autonomy, or artistic expression, whoever it is that they are.

if i have to, i'll put the files up at a google drive share, instead, with a direction to wire me money. it's not like i'm selling a ton of things over bandcamp, anyways.
at
this is inri016, updated to remove any sound corruption, and let's hope it stays that way.
at
this is inri015, updated to remove any sound corruption, and let's hope it stays that way.

i was supposed to do legal stuff today, and clearly i'm not. i'm in the groove on this filing, taking advantage of the working machine and trying to catch up to the process i described early this morning.

the second run is going through the source material for inri000-inri074 and

1) making sure it's complete
2) making sure any files related to period 3 are pulled out and categorized correctly
3) making sure all files are mirrored, for redundancy

the third run will be going through the years 2003-2021 and making sure everything for period 3 is pulled out.

the fourth run will be pure redundancy.

at that point, i should be able to click back into the three phases in a smooth manner, as i'll be able to pull data out of the "file", put it back into the "file" and then store it when i'm done with it with greater clarity and ease.
at
this is inri014, updated to remove any sound corruption, and let's hope it stays that way.
at
this is inri013, updated to remove any sound corruption, and let's hope it stays that way.
at
this is inri012, updated to remove any sound corruption, and let's hope it stays that way.
at
this is inri011, updated to remove any sound corruption, and let's hope it stays that way.
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this is inri010, updated to remove any sound corruption, and let's hope it stays that way.

this process might actually be helpful. if it takes an hour to get through each re-upload, i can spend ten-fifteen minutes going through the appropriate folder. so, i could conceivably be finished with the major part of the filing by the time i get the uploads done.

10 down, about 65 to go.
at
i have training as a blues guitarist and as a classical guitarist, and i grew up playing grunge. those are the components of my guitar style, not anything else.

i write classical guitar songs ported to electric noise guitar.
at
the way to save what we call "emo" as an artform is to write really elaborate lyrics, which is what la dispute was able to do, at least at first. stupid songs about getting dumped by your girlfriend aren't the same thing as hour long shakespearean epics with detailed character development, even if the end point of the hour long shakespearean epic is, in fact, getting dumped by your girlfriend. it's the same basic criteria: if you're going to create music as art, it has to actually qualify as art. there wasn't a lot of this that came out in the late 00s/early 10s, and it hasn't sustained itself because it's a difficult task, but there was a little bit of it. in hindsight, these are really exceptions in a genre that is almost impossible to work with.
at
i tend to separate music into two purposes.

on the one hand, music can be purely abstract art, in which case it requires no thematic direction. the best "classical" music, jazz, electronic music and other mostly instrumental forms are simply to be experienced as sound, and there's nothing wrong with experiencing music strictly as a form of escapism, on that level.

on the other hand, music can be a type of propaganda. it can be agit-prop, it can be commentary, it can be satire, etc, but this type of music doesn't need to have characteristics of music to be interesting, as the function of it is strictly as propaganda. this is the value of folk, and derived forms of folk such as punk rock.

i tend to do both, and i tend to listen to both, but i expect either to function properly in their purpose. so, i'll criticize led zeppelin for being shitty artists, because they were - while listening to the much simpler dead kennedys, because their function as propaganda is exceedingly effective. what was labelled "emo" often failed for the same reason that led zeppelin failed, in the sense that it existed in a category error - it had no propagandistic value, and it had no redeeming musical characteristics. 

if you're going to exist in a folk genre (which would also include hip-hop, although i don't listen to hip-hop), you should be exceedingly focused on the propagandistic value of your music. conversely, if you want to produce art for the sake of art - for pure listening value - you should realize that you need to transcend the limitations of folk culture, which are just going to make your music boring, if it's intended to be listened to as music. i'm not as ideological as your strictest punks or your most literal socialists on this point - the end point, after the revolution, when we have freedom and anarchy, when we abolish the proletariat, is to engage in art and science. that's why we want communism, in the end - so we can spend less time working and more time existing. but, that means that if your music is intended to be art - and not to be propaganda - then it had better be actually good.

and, as art, emo sucked - it co-opted a form meant as propaganda, and watered it down to the lowest form of artistic expression imaginable.
at
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