looking to create experimental sound.....

[snevens]

i am looking to create an experimental sound, something like the new radiohead...i know what sound i want but not how to achieve that.....any information on what i should/ need to purchase (i.e. keyboards, samplers, etc.) would be much appreciated. Thanks.

 

[regebro]

Haven't listened much to the new Radiohead

but expermintal sounds can be created in many ways, both electronical and acoustical. It is very much a matter of trying to use what you have in new and unusual ways.

That said, obviously good and flexible equipment is useful. I think samplers and analog or analog-emulating synths are the most useful to create weird sounds, of thats what you want (you can be experimental completely without using any weird sounds at all). The more wierd stuff you can do the better. The ultimate synth in this is probably the Clavia Nord Modular.

Also dig through secondhand stores. Find something thats cheap an wierd? Buy it! För 15 years I had this crappy guitar stomp-box that sounded like shit, and actually used it for the first time on a song I recorded this summer with great effect. And not on a guitar (as it's designed for) but on voice... (And I'm not even experimental).

Oh, and but Simple Minds second album "Real to real cacaphony" if you don't already have it. Very good and very experimental.

I'm sure everybody else can give you more (and better) hints than me, because when it comes to experimenting, everything is right! You can do nothing wrong!

 

[adam]

regebro - great point about experimenting. Anything goes. The key is to just keep an open mind. Sure it is good to have a good foundation of sounds/equipment but i've had some interesting successes with some weird combos. I've created some stuff that surprised me using a mix of anything from harmonicas and penny whistels to an old casio sk-1 and quadraverb, through various guitar amps and stuff. Last night I came up with something that sounded like Security-era Peter Garbiel. No joke, using the SK-1. Think about what Brian Eno was doing 20 years ago.

But I digress. I am just passionate about finding new sounds and sometimes it is easy to get caught up in a mind set of thinking you need more equipment. I do it all the time. If you are starting from scratch, a hard/software sampler would be a great start. Also, any recording device would be great from a tape player to stanalone digital recorder to a DAW. Any pawn shop prizes or hand me downs could work wonders too. Lastly, think about how different parameters work and how they impact sound - eq, compression, reverb, delay, distrotion, layering, looping etc. Alternately, forget how all of these things work and just fuck around until something sounds cool.

BTW - the new radiohead is so CRAZY huh!? Definitely goes in my to 20 albums for a while. Can't stop listening to it. The new Bjork CD from the movie "Dancer in the Dark" is great too and feature a cut with Thom Yorke.

 

[barefoot]

Also try familiarizing yourself (if you aren’t already) with some of the groundbreakers in experimental music. Listen to Milton Babbitt, John Cage, György Ligeti, Otto Luening, Steve Reich, Morton Subotnick, Vladimir Ussachevsky, Edgar Varese - just to name a few. Read about their techniques and even philosophies of creating music. Then listen for their influence on the slightly more mainstream (but no less wonderful) music of Aphex Twin, Brain Eno, Meat Beat Manifesto, The Orb, etc...

Stow that all in your subconscious, and forget it. Then go off and invent something like we’ve never heard before! But hurry.... some of us are starving for a new music!