Hi,
 
Given the bad postings, recently, about folks experiences, something like this documentary, all of a sudden is more important.
 
But in the end, it only shows, how much some folks in America are so removed from it all, to the point of thinking that it never happened, and no one could possibly have gone through that, because they didn't. I have a friend that was in VietNam ... and our neighbor thinks he is just milking Disability and other institutions. I guess I can not tell my neighbor to go see "Deerhunter" or "Apocalipse Now" ... because he will say immediately that it was just a movie!
 
Europe had a lot more perceptions destroyed, than America, whose perceptions were "controlled" by the media and movies. Europe had its very foundations of everything, destroyed twice, in two World Wars, and this destruction hurt, a lot more, the arts, and the individual family structures, so something like "krautrock" can happen and take place ... whereas there is no applicable history that harsh in America that would shake the very foundations of the social fabric ... and I'm not sure that I can convince many Americans (check out James' bs on the other thread!) that this was an issue, and that there were thousands of films made, even as far as the year 2000 in Film Festivals that still went over these things ... so the "hurt" lasted 50 years.
 
To me, then, "krautrock" (hate that term!) makes sense ... whereas the SF/LA psychedelic scene, fails to take hold, because there was not enough interest in the promoters, to protect the music, and thus, we barely have a couple of albums with long cuts (Chicago 1 and 2 notably), where as many other "experiments" appear to just be a blues/chord designated piece, as is the case in Iron Butterfly ... but even then, today, we make fun of that and kill the long cut ... it's just a jam! We never said that about Beethoven or Mozart, and Mozart has more jams than anyone out there!
 
Too much of GREAT music history, is a reaction to the social upheaval ... and this is the part that is harsh/hard in America ... the only major "upheaval" they have really had in the arts is black music ... but even then, black film makers are ignored, black artists are still mostly ignored, and black musicians are making it on their own these days, but the jazz guys? Only a handful! In other words, it is not even considered an "art", or a "movement", and I think this tends to hurt the interest and the ability of these arts themselves, getting better understood and appreciated, and years later ... they are forgotten, and all we appreciate is the "image" ...!!! Not even the music ... Elvis being a perfect example!

I'm fine with so-called "progressive" or experimental music in smallish doses, but too much of it is thoroughly pretentious, pompous and lacking in elegance or charm. I hold the same opinion on most modern art. You have a tremendous number of so-called "artists" who feel superior just because they're doing something which is "outside the box," but clearly ones distance from the box is not necessarily in direct proportion to ones artistic merits. You have to sift through an ungodly amount of crap to find the good stuff, and even then I find that it wears pretty thin in a short space of time. I have found some pretty far out electronica which has impressed me on the first couple of listens but which became a drag to listen to after that. I guess I just find much of it to be an academic exercise which is lacking in soul.

This video has been pulled ...

BobF
This video has been pulled ...

It's on Vimeo (where I watched it this morning) and there was another YouTube link that was still up.
 
Great documentary. Thanks, Bit!

sharke I'm fine with so-called "progressive" or experimental music in smallish doses, but too much of it is thoroughly pretentious, pompous and lacking in elegance or charm. I hold the same opinion on most modern art. ...

 
(BTW ... I don't call these progressive any more than I do regressive! They are artistic scenes that had an effect on the arts and the public ... the kind of thing that Americans have a hard time working with because everything is a top ten, and nothing else but, but them hippi's can't possibly be smart and have something to say!)
 
I'm not sure that's fair. But all the other advertising for the top ten, and all the summer concerts is not?  Hmmm ... never thought that Genet was about charm and elegance, but man, those descriptions and visuals are insane!
 
I'm not sure that your "looking" is wide enough, if you don't mind my suggesting that. It's different in every country, but the German one, was wider, than otherwise, because it also involved film, theater, literature and music. The American scene that compares is the psychedelic/beat poet thing, that even then gets trashed silly and now one person, or two think that Tom Waits is great, and they never even heard of all the others that were there before him! And all of them FAR BETTER, and interesting! Tom, however, probably is more of a musician than all the others!
 
What is missing, is not you're finding something or not ... it's the historical perspective that helps create the material, because all of a sudden it is not "empty" ... it's much more than we think, but if all we can find is the 4 beats and the knob twisting (my joke about Kraftwerk!), then the whole conversation is lost. Gone. There's would be nothing more to say.
 
Read Patti Smith's book about her experiences with Mapplethorpe and where it led it all ... there is a side of NY that is not about money, but the ability to concentrate on their art piece ... so most Americans think that Pollock is just throwing paint from a distance ... it's not art ... but the amount of work suggests there was more to it ... and where is that "it" that helped create the art?
 
it wasn't just a person sitting in front of their computer ... and turning on the DAW ... you know there was more to it ... but we don't read about it.
 
Patti's book is magnificent, but it will also tell you that NY had two Gods and no one else could do anything because their mafia took you down!
 

sharke ... You have a tremendous number of so-called "artists" who feel superior just because they're doing something which is "outside the box," but clearly ones distance from the box is not necessarily in direct proportion to ones artistic merits. ...

 
I've never met one, and I spent time with some of the best. About the only one that ever showed an EGO to me, and tried to display it as a Hollywood star, was SW and John Wetton. No one else. Vander and his wife were wonderful, Gomelsky was a heaven send, Daevid and Gilly were supreme folks and fun, Ferry was excellent fun, Froese was hilarious despite all the stories, Zappa was not my type but he was OK ... and just so you know, the only place I see an "ego" is (sometimes) on a place like this ... because folks can only discuss their ego, and not the art!
 
You are white and someone else is blue, one is from Venus and the other from Mars ... we just have to put that in a perspective, and some will say that they don't mix and we don't want no christians here, but right away you find others saying we don't want no moslems, either, or spanish speaking bums! The musical landscape, or artistic landscape is starting to feel like that and I find it sad ... all of these different cultures have great music ... but none of us will spend the time to listen to it, and then think it is boring and not an art form.
 
Somewhere, we have to come to grips with the "quantity vs quality" kind of thing, but here it is hard to discuss, since most know the "quantity" and when told about the "quality" they think it sounds the same!
 
It isn't! Either way you look at it, it's people looking for an expression, just like YOU!
 

Experimental music serves the same purpose as a brainstorming session in marketing or engineering. The goal is to generate ideas, and not qualify them up front. Later on, others will pick and choose the elements that they deem worthy of developing further.
 
Most of the stuff that came out of the pre-synthesizer experimental "music" movement in the U.S. is quite unlistenable. But they were cutting up tapes and looping them, and sampling everyday objects to use musically, both common practices today.

bitflipper
Experimental music serves the same purpose as a brainstorming session in marketing or engineering. The goal is to generate ideas, and not qualify them up front. Later on, others will pick and choose the elements that they deem worthy of developing further.
 
Most of the stuff that came out of the pre-synthesizer experimental "music" movement in the U.S. is quite unlistenable. But they were cutting up tapes and looping them, and sampling everyday objects to use musically, both common practices today.

The cut up part has another side, though ... and it was that a lot of the stuff could not be repeated well enough, and thus, the only thing one could do, if recorded, was to put the tapes together. But I think that by the time of Beaver and Krause, that "controls" of the basic instrument were already in place, and then Walter Carlos came about, and right after folks like Tomita and Emerson came around ... and things changed. Even Terry Riley was highly repetitive, suggesting the controls were not that great.
 
But, here is "influence" for you ... we know that well known composers frequented the music schools in Berlin, and that various folks and groups of people studied there (pretty much all of the major electronic folks!), and one of the things that you can read on CAN's home page, is Holger Czukay discussing how "Tago Mago" was pulled together from 20 hours of tapes and simply cut and paste and nothing else but ... and it kinda shows how one slight detail can easily influence others and help create something ... when you listen to the album, and it's side long pieces, and the rest, you would never think of about 20 hours of tape at all ... maybe from the two long cuts, but even then, it's hard to not think where the cutups are ... they flow pretty well as they are.
 
 
You and I would be very hard pressed to find any American band that even considered that. But too much of the long cuts and experimental stuff was buried and dumped and not considered as music ... it's still one of the weirdest things ... Grateful Dead known for long cuts, and none of their albums have them! And their bootlegs had whole sides, some 45 years ago! That have never been released!