Tuesday 23 March 2010
There is a gap when it comes to art. A big gap, and it almost makes me with that I didn't rely on it so much sometimes. Think of a song- it is complete and it feels like a moment and it sounds like the person singing the song is feeling that moment too, and the musicians are playing with their eyes closed. It sounds like they are feeling as lost in the music as you are, but they're not. And it bugs me, but there isn't really any way round it, not even performing live, really. The writer will experience something, they will feel it and they will write it, then the music will happen however that happens, whether they write it or whether their band does it. Then they will decide to record it, they will do it layer by layer, take after take, and spend hours mixing and editing until it sounds like the song you end up hearing. The romance is taken out of it, and so is the impulse, the moment and the spark that made the artist write the song in the first place. Just like with a poem- it is edited, proof read, approved, published blah blah blah. The whole process of recording and publication takes away any initial drama and turns the work into something completely different. Processed. Not natural. This is a very pessimistic way of looking at it because it means that when we 'go' to music to share its power, we aren't anywhere near to the root of what it actually means.
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I think with poetry, there still remains some faint notion that it should all come in one almighty flash of inspiration, fully-formed and complete. It doesn't seem quite so poetic though when you realise the graft that goes into it: the old perspiration/inspiration comes to mind here. But also, there's a beauty and a creativity of a slower, almost glacial form that comes as you chip away at the sharp edges of whatever sudden inspiration you were seized with. In a way, that's the beauty of the whole rabbit in the hat trick that poetry and any creative medium can be - having it received as a fresh, singular work without any sign of the creative paint-flecks and dust sheets hanging over it that were there during its inception.
ReplyDeleteAs for music, well, I know the bloody grind of studio work all too well, especially working with a click. Inevitably every band has that album where they get a little up themselves and decide to record live to 'get the feel'. For me I've never realised the difference, except the timing's a bit looser. I've gradually realised that songwriting is often more grind and graft than anything, and can be just written by one person - usually is, in fact - rather than it emerging out of some orgiastic creative jam, although I do kind of wish it could. What I've realised is that the real live, creative energy comes to being once you're working within the framework of the song and are all tuned into it so to speak. From there comes the fabled 'chemistry' and awareness of the nuances of each member's playing. Obviously this is a lot easier if you're a grizzled, freeform jazz band though...
Hooter, do you want to write something together about this for the next issue?
ReplyDeleteI certainly do! Let's do it! :)
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