Essay About Kind Of Music And Important Distinction

History of Rave Culture
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The idea that “techno usually has NO message, no image etc. it is
faceless” is certainly not one that is embraced by enough of a majority for it
to be considered an intrinsic property of techno itself, but rather an
indication of what Mr./Mrs./Ms. ALLES NAAR DE KLOTE is getting out of it. This
is an important distinction that needs to be made, I think, when discussing
exactly what the nature of the state of the “techno” art is.
I doubt that Mr./Mrs./Ms. ALLES NAAR DE KLOTE can concoct an example of
any kind of music that is utterly devoid of either “message” or “image” without
invoking a generalized (i.e. weak), Cageian definition of music; even then, an
argument that anything perceived as “music” could also be perceived as having a
“message” or “image” practically by definition could be made, for example, by
appealing to the analogy of humankinds search for the “meaning of life” or
something like Iannis Xenakis remarks in _Formalized_Music_ about the tendency
of humans to impose a notion of order on random sequences.
The fact that a lingua franca has emerged in techno (for example, the
popularity of the TR-909, 303 bassline, the Juno-106) is ample evidence that
not only do techno songs have messages, but that these messages are strong
enough to have produced a set of musical styles. Techno is an effective form
of musical communication — it has managed to get pretty far considering that
it cant easily be promoted on television (since it provides no MTV-suitable
visuals and half the fun comes from the fact that the DJ is an active
performer). As an aside, it might be my imagination, but it seems that techno
music is much more easily exchanged among different countries than is the case
with other popular styles, presumably because there isnt as much of a language
barrier as there is with more lyrically-based music (such as rap).
One of the triumphs of techno is a more thorough assimilation of
electronic music idioms into popular music than has heretofore been the case.
Synthesizers — particularly the old Moog-style analog synthesizers — are no
longer popularly regarded as “fake” or “foreign” or “unnatural” — not becase
they have gotten good at reproducing acoustic musical instruments, but because
styles like techno came along and allowed these synthesizers (and synthesists)
to excel in their own context instead of being awkwardly grafted onto other
styles. I think that this phenomenon has accelerated in the last couple of
years, and I can point to three reasons:
1. Dance music is the most accessible format in which to do timbral
experimentation (which is what synthesizers currently do best, although the
emphases in computer music are shifting from “sound” design to “high-level
process” design now that computers have become powerful enough and friendly
enough to make such experimentation practical.
2. Audiences have grown accustomed to the sound of old Moog-style analog
synthesizers, so they are no longer novel but instead an essential part of
our modern musical language.
3. Electronic music synthesizers have historically been notoriously difficult
to control with