| "The present-day composer
refuses to die!" ~ Edgard Varèse via Frank Zappa |
High-quality
downloads for SALE
at:
...also available on iTunes and Spotify! |
 |
[Suggested
Donation:
$1,234,567.89]
1/31/2013Dedicated to Jerome M. Cohen, AKA Pop Pop (1925-2011)
My grandfather was born on this day 86 years ago. He wasn't a musician, but he loved music (especially jazz music).
He is the reason my dad became a musician, who in turn is the reason I became a musician. If he were still alive,
Pop Pop wouldn't necessarily have liked or understood this music, but he would have been proud all the same - proud and confused...
ALBUM NOTES
"Writing about music is like dancing about architecture."
~ many different clever people in different ways at different times
http://quoteinvestigator.com/2010/11/08/writing-about-music/
That said, I couldn't stop myself from writing a rambling series of thoughts and observations connected to the work on this album. Some of it is designed to explain. Some of it is designed to educate. Some of it is designed to stimulate. All of it, like the music, is designed to entertain. I hope to give the reader/listener some insight into my creative process as well as some food for thought while listening to and digesting this music. Click on a link below to read something connected to the track.
That said, I couldn't stop myself from writing a rambling series of thoughts and observations connected to the work on this album. Some of it is designed to explain. Some of it is designed to educate. Some of it is designed to stimulate. All of it, like the music, is designed to entertain. I hope to give the reader/listener some insight into my creative process as well as some food for thought while listening to and digesting this music. Click on a link below to read something connected to the track.
| 01.
Lucid Dream Spell 02. Steveo Lee.E.O. 03. Happy Go Lucky 04. Space Dance 05. Ken Ken 5x5 06. Chameleon Dance 07. Morphing Images 08. Kaleidoscope 09. Short shAnd hSimple 10. Pop Cultures 11. Hot Johnson 12. Lamenting Unrelentingly Relentless 13. Foreman Hits, 33's Egg Ends Strike 14. Mana Mowaua 15. Polymorphism 1.02 |
Prologue:
Do Nintendos
Dream of Electric Sheep? Level 1: Get a Name, Get a Job Level 2: Playing the Clown Level 3: Warp Drive Level 4: Math Homework Level 5: Camouflage Level 6: Montage Level 7: Back-Stories Level 8: Bonus Round Level 9: Underworld Level 10: Lava and Fireballs --Pause Button-- Level 11: Labor Strike Dada Level 12: Our Princess Is In Another Castle Level 13: Final Boss |
Epilogue:
Wreck It Rob
The
creative process necessarily involves a combination of
deliberate and arbitrary decisions - some of these decided consciously
and
others decided unwittingly (and still others, happy accidents that may
be
rationalized and explained afterwards). The primary decision that
unites this
album is the pallet of sounds employed. With the exception of the first
track,
all of the sounds on this album consist of simple waveforms and
percussive blasts of
"white
noise". These are the sounds producible by primitive computer chips
that
many
associate with the bygone Nintendo Entertainment System.
In recent years, a music community has risen up around the harsh limitations imposed by this technology. While I have appreciated some of that work, I approach this community largely as an outsider. I have broken many of the rules (such as my use of more than 4 voices at a time). All the same, this album has a place somewhere within that community.
The choice of lo-fi "8-bit" sounds served me in a few ways. Long before the concept for this album had occurred to me, I had already composed or begun to compose much of this material. The choice of sounds, in and of itself, served to unite otherwise unrelated compositions.
Prior to my reimagining it with 8-bit sounds, the musical material on this album existed mainly as MIDI sequences or music scores on my computer. Most of it was written to be played by myself with some imagined group of people in the future.
Anyway... having sunk a lot of time and energy into music that was sitting dormant on my hard drive began to eat at me. At the same time, I had made these sequences more as blueprints for people to play rather than as finished instructions for a computer to play. They sounded very harsh, nonmusical, and unfinished. Translating these sequences into 8-bit sounds all of a sudden produced something that at least to my ear was fulfilling as an end-product (if a little silly and quirky).
Aside from liberating a bunch of sketches or blueprints for eventual songs into foreseeable finished products, the choice of 8-bit sounds reinvigorated all of the compositions (or composition ideas) with a new purpose. Reimagining my compositions as at least somewhat connected to video game music allowed me to lighten up a bit and take them less seriously. It gave me a fresh and playful approach to the material.
I see this album as an introduction to my work over the past few years as a composer. Ultimately, my interests still lie more in composing music for people rather than for computers to play, but this process gave me the reassurance that if need be I can still showcase my work independently of the unreliable machines called humans.
~ RoCo signing off!
In recent years, a music community has risen up around the harsh limitations imposed by this technology. While I have appreciated some of that work, I approach this community largely as an outsider. I have broken many of the rules (such as my use of more than 4 voices at a time). All the same, this album has a place somewhere within that community.
The choice of lo-fi "8-bit" sounds served me in a few ways. Long before the concept for this album had occurred to me, I had already composed or begun to compose much of this material. The choice of sounds, in and of itself, served to unite otherwise unrelated compositions.
Prior to my reimagining it with 8-bit sounds, the musical material on this album existed mainly as MIDI sequences or music scores on my computer. Most of it was written to be played by myself with some imagined group of people in the future.
Aside: the
problem
with original music
(Assembling groups of musicians to play original music is an incredibly time-consuming and emotionally exhaustive process. It doesn't help matters that a lot of this music would be at least slightly difficult and counter-intuitive to most musicians. We're talking about scheduling hours upon hours of rehearsals between several people full of different commitments. When all of that hard work stands to offer no money and limited performance opportunities, the proposition becomes all the more unattractive. That said, an enormous number of musicians still participate in these kinds of ventures... Musicians are strange creatures. It's too bad the 21st century hardly lets us work anymore.)
(Assembling groups of musicians to play original music is an incredibly time-consuming and emotionally exhaustive process. It doesn't help matters that a lot of this music would be at least slightly difficult and counter-intuitive to most musicians. We're talking about scheduling hours upon hours of rehearsals between several people full of different commitments. When all of that hard work stands to offer no money and limited performance opportunities, the proposition becomes all the more unattractive. That said, an enormous number of musicians still participate in these kinds of ventures... Musicians are strange creatures. It's too bad the 21st century hardly lets us work anymore.)
Anyway... having sunk a lot of time and energy into music that was sitting dormant on my hard drive began to eat at me. At the same time, I had made these sequences more as blueprints for people to play rather than as finished instructions for a computer to play. They sounded very harsh, nonmusical, and unfinished. Translating these sequences into 8-bit sounds all of a sudden produced something that at least to my ear was fulfilling as an end-product (if a little silly and quirky).
Aside from liberating a bunch of sketches or blueprints for eventual songs into foreseeable finished products, the choice of 8-bit sounds reinvigorated all of the compositions (or composition ideas) with a new purpose. Reimagining my compositions as at least somewhat connected to video game music allowed me to lighten up a bit and take them less seriously. It gave me a fresh and playful approach to the material.
I see this album as an introduction to my work over the past few years as a composer. Ultimately, my interests still lie more in composing music for people rather than for computers to play, but this process gave me the reassurance that if need be I can still showcase my work independently of the unreliable machines called humans.
~ RoCo signing off!
=ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS=
~
Special thanks to
the developers of Gashisoft's GXSCCC software for
allowing me to produce the 8bit sounds.
~ Thanks to all my friends and family (and boo) who gave me input, feedback, and support.
~ Further thanks to the makers of:
Nuendo, Sonar, Sound Forge, Photoshop, the Internet, computers in general,
AND Nintendo
~ Thanks to all my friends and family (and boo) who gave me input, feedback, and support.
~ Further thanks to the makers of:
Nuendo, Sonar, Sound Forge, Photoshop, the Internet, computers in general,
AND Nintendo
The
license below allows you to do
whatever the "f-you-see-k"
you want to do with this work
EXCEPT for making $$$ or using it commercially WITHOUT talking to me first. Mo' money, mo' problems...
8Bit Town by Rob E. Cohen is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.
EXCEPT for making $$$ or using it commercially WITHOUT talking to me first. Mo' money, mo' problems...
8Bit Town by Rob E. Cohen is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.