Vertical and Horizontal Music
This is an email I sent to my sister. Then I thought my faithful readers might also find it interesting. :-) Enjoy!
I was listening to a "Pandora Podcast" yesterday. Pandora(.com) is an awesome music site where you can type in an artist (or even a specific song) and they will let you listen to music that they think you will like because it sounds similar or has the same musical qualities. To do this, they characterize music to a staggering degree. You should see it. I typed in a song by Shpongle that I really like and they came up with characteristics like "ethereal female vocals" and "slow, deep bass" and "emphasis on flute" and even "downtempo trance". (I'm making up the specific terms, but it was something like that.) Anyway, a great site/service.
So yeah, these guys (as part of the so-called Music Genome Project) really geek out about music. And they've made a podcast series to help others (e.g. me) geek out about music, too. (You know what a podcast is, right? Just a daily/weekly/periodic mp3 that you can download and put on your ipod. Like news headlines, an interesting music track, a 3-hour live trance set, special interest stuff, etc.) So, like, they'll go into the details of recording vocals, or the different types of vocal harmony, or major vs. minor chords, or electronic music genres. I was listening to the latter last night, where they were explaining the difference between house, trance, and techno.
One thing they mentioned that I found particularly interesting was that a lot of electronic music is built vertically, not horizontally. Most rock and pop music we are used to is horizontal: it tells a story in time, and is focused around the progression in time, from verse 1 to chorus to verse 2 to chorus, etc. (It doesn't have to be that strict, the idea is just that it's more about going "in order".) On the other hand, most electronic music is vertical: it's more concerned with the interaction of various layers of sound. It often introduces each layer separately, so that you can understand the interaction of the first, say, 3 layers, so you can better appreciate what the 4th layer contributes. Neither approach is inherently better; they're just different.
In other words, as you said: fugue.
Of course, "vertical" is usually repetitive and often sounds boring to those who aren't used to it. I think that's one of the biggest barriers to appreciating electronic music. But once you can get over that, there's so much fun to be had. They made another point: time passes differently when you're listening to "repetitive", "vertical" electronic music. Case in point: Orbital has a 15-minute track on one of their albums that always seems to go by real quickly. Also, I have 2 CDs full (like 70+ minutes each) of Underworld, and there are a total of 16 tracks on the both of 'em, so the *average* track is nearly 10 minutes long. But they don't *feel* like long tracks. They're right on time.
Anyway, I just thought you might find that interesting.
I was listening to a "Pandora Podcast" yesterday. Pandora(.com) is an awesome music site where you can type in an artist (or even a specific song) and they will let you listen to music that they think you will like because it sounds similar or has the same musical qualities. To do this, they characterize music to a staggering degree. You should see it. I typed in a song by Shpongle that I really like and they came up with characteristics like "ethereal female vocals" and "slow, deep bass" and "emphasis on flute" and even "downtempo trance". (I'm making up the specific terms, but it was something like that.) Anyway, a great site/service.
So yeah, these guys (as part of the so-called Music Genome Project) really geek out about music. And they've made a podcast series to help others (e.g. me) geek out about music, too. (You know what a podcast is, right? Just a daily/weekly/periodic mp3 that you can download and put on your ipod. Like news headlines, an interesting music track, a 3-hour live trance set, special interest stuff, etc.) So, like, they'll go into the details of recording vocals, or the different types of vocal harmony, or major vs. minor chords, or electronic music genres. I was listening to the latter last night, where they were explaining the difference between house, trance, and techno.
One thing they mentioned that I found particularly interesting was that a lot of electronic music is built vertically, not horizontally. Most rock and pop music we are used to is horizontal: it tells a story in time, and is focused around the progression in time, from verse 1 to chorus to verse 2 to chorus, etc. (It doesn't have to be that strict, the idea is just that it's more about going "in order".) On the other hand, most electronic music is vertical: it's more concerned with the interaction of various layers of sound. It often introduces each layer separately, so that you can understand the interaction of the first, say, 3 layers, so you can better appreciate what the 4th layer contributes. Neither approach is inherently better; they're just different.
In other words, as you said: fugue.
Of course, "vertical" is usually repetitive and often sounds boring to those who aren't used to it. I think that's one of the biggest barriers to appreciating electronic music. But once you can get over that, there's so much fun to be had. They made another point: time passes differently when you're listening to "repetitive", "vertical" electronic music. Case in point: Orbital has a 15-minute track on one of their albums that always seems to go by real quickly. Also, I have 2 CDs full (like 70+ minutes each) of Underworld, and there are a total of 16 tracks on the both of 'em, so the *average* track is nearly 10 minutes long. But they don't *feel* like long tracks. They're right on time.
Anyway, I just thought you might find that interesting.