Bruce, while I admire your well-researched theory, I think you've been reading too much Orwell.

I certainly have my opinions of what sucks the life out of music. I agree that DAWs (Digital Audio Workstations/computer-based recording), which give you the quick and easy ability to visually edit and "correct" your music into oblivion, can facilitate and even encourage one to make lifeless music, you're looking at the train and blaming the caboose for running over the damsel tied to the tracks.

Let's forget about the dawn of the vinyl LP and radio which let music fans enjoy music at home instead of going out to see live musicians. Let's just go back a few years to the early 80s. The same sort of things could be and have been said about the invention of digital sampling, MIDI-connected and synchronized electronic instruments, and electronic sequencers/drum machines themselves. I remember when the Synclavier digital sampler/audio workstation was first released in the very early 80s. Yes, you too could be a one-man-band with the investment of a mere $300,000.

In the early 80s, we had spent the last 5 years inundated with the most banal, cookie-cutter dance music which became of the fantastic soul, funk and pop music that was made in the early 70s. Save for a few worthy classics it was not so much about songwriting as it was about keeping the beat going for another five minutes. A good example of major commercial use of "lifeless" electronic music is the many cheesy movie soundtracks done by Harold Faltermeyer in the 80s. You know "Axel F" from Beverly Hills Cop by heart and you love it. Faltermeyer probably put a hundred musicians and songwriters out of work between him and his Drumulator.

Blame synthesizers and drum machines for that. Blame cocaine. Blame Barry Gibb.

The funny thing is, at that time were weren't complaining about how the music industry was losing money because people were just going to dance clubs, not sitting at home listening to Jim Croce records, but we were complaining that they were putting musicians out of work. No one wanted to see live music, they wanted a DJ. Drummers were running for their lives for fear that the Linn Drum would put them all out of work. (By the way, the axe that the music industry had to grind at that time was home taping of vinyl records was cutting into their sales. Kind of ironic that nowadays a company like Sony is both a major recording label and manufacturer of what few cassette tapes there are still available).

Being a recording engineer, I have a unique perspective to debate whether DAW-based recording has affected the quality of music or not. If you were to ask me what I thought was the major contributor to the proliferation of what one might consider sub-par music, I would be looking more toward computer culture in general. The fact that in the last 10 years, we have seen the cost of blank CD-Rs go from $35 a disc to pennies, and I don't think I know anyone who isn't tied into the internet, at least at their work, and at most on their hand-held Iphone.

People have been making bad music as long as sound has existed. You used to have to play it live in someone's living room. Now you record it in Garageband and post it on Myspace. Because of the internet, it's way too easy to self-publish your music, without the filter that record label A&R departments once had. That used to be the barometer for what music was "good" (or at least, "ready for consumption") and what was "bad". Of course there is endless debate on that subject, as most mainstream music that is released by major record labels is arguably not "good" to many music fans. At least there was some sort of filter to separate some of the prime-timers from the basement hacks.

The major motivator in any industry is money. That's a given. The fact that recording and self-releasing music via the computer has gotten to a price point that there is sometimes no monetary investment involved beyond purchasing your home computer and paying your monthly internet access fee is hard to argue with. The gates have opened to pretty much everyone.

I have been an engineer and musician for long enough that I have worked with every format from my old Panasonic mono tape recorder, 2" 24 track analog to DAW-based recording on a laptop. I see young musicians and engineers who have never even touched a cassette tape, let alone an analog mixing board and all they know is working completely in the digital domain, clicking a mouse instead of plugging in a microphone. This is no better or worse than the fact that I didn't "have to" cut my teeth recording straight to a wax cylinder in 1930. You use the tools that are available.

I see life being snuffed out of music every day. The many contributors include the DAWs ability to copy, paste, tune, quantize and simulate almost any instrument. They also include bad taste and laziness and simple economics. Why spend another two hours singing 8 perfectly-tuned vocal harmonies on the second and third chorus when I can just copy and paste the first one? Time is money, especially when you're a major record label conglomerate and you're not into this to make art, you're here to get rich.

So think of this when you're complaining about the fact that it's too easy to "correct" things that may already be perfect in their imperfection when you're in the DAW world: You're probably typing on a computer right now, and not an old Smith Carona without any correction fluid/tape. Thank god for spellcheck, right? This Christmas, while you're drinking your eggnogg by the warmth of the fire, think of all the poor proof-readers who have lost their jobs.

The bottom line is that just because you have the ability to do something, be it quantizing a drum track or driving head-on into oncoming traffic, doesn't mean you have to do it. You always have the discretion to work the way you want to work. There is "misuse" of the power of DAWs everyday, if you choose to look at it this way. There is also a 15 year old kid in Billings Montana making the greatest song ever heard on his parents' laptop right now.

Roger Lavallee
copyright 2007

(also posted on www.volcanoboy.com)

Another reason why you don't see as much development of new artists over time is that the turnover rate for label A&R people is insane. They're all struggling to keep their job and they jump from label to label. They're so focused on trying to ensure their next big hit that they don't have the time to nurture a new artist and let them grow. Somewhere in the mid 90s the tide shifted to signing an artist, getting a quick hit, watching every other label sign artists just like that one, all get one hit, and then within a year, they're all totally faceless and irrelevant. If that artist was, or had a good songwriter in the band, then they might have lucked out with a decent publishing deal, but as far as their career as an artist, they were dead in the water. Meanwhile, their A&R person along with any other label staff that they had a relationship with was long gone, off to other labels. So even if the label DIDN'T drop them, they were left without an ally anywhere in the system and that's probably scarier than being dropped altogether.

So if you look at an artist like Dave Matthews, he's one of the last ones who was able to build up on their success, record after record, to the point where no one would drop him now. He's a great card to have in your back pocket. You don't even need to promote him and he sells records. Meanwhile a great artists like Fiona Apple has to fight tooth and nail to get her music released.

Roger

Hey Bruce,

Super interesting post! Did you happen to read the NY Times piece on Rick Rubin? He's also a big time advocate of producing timeless, fully-baked and well-thought-out music.

Thanks for the kind comment on my latest post. But it wasn't me! It's actually a post by my music junkie friend and DJ, Shawn, who asked me to post it for him on my blog, precisely to reach people like you. He's currently going to med school, and doesn't think much of his own writing. But like you, I think it's real good, and soulful, and a bit of a shame that he's not pursuing something involving music. I'm going to let him know your thoughts.

Here's the prob in a nutshell.

You're right. Over use of the capabilities of DAWs IS part of the problem.
The industry joke where the engineer says to the musician, "That sucked, come on in" isn't funny anymore.

But here's the other side.
If you say artistes should just give away their recordings for 'free', then who pays for QUALITY production that isn't reliant on cheap, fast, amateurish DAW methods?

The records you, and I, want to hear are made by professionals.
Professionals cost money.
The artiste may see a revenue stream from other places down the road.
But how does the producer, the engineer, the arranger, the hired extra musicians, the studio... what's in it for them?

a brave new future in which we ONLY see handmade, cinema verité records is not a step FORWARD.

Bruce,

Lots of insightful commentary re: DAWs. Noticed this comment from Wyclef Jean on the Berklee Music Blog. I think it sums up the current malaise pretty well:

"What changes do you see coming in music?

I feel like we’re going into a very eclectic mode now, where the strong will survive. Kids can create beats now through their computer in two hours, so to last in the long form, you have to bring a musicianship to it. If you’re hearing the track I did on the CD with me and Serj from System of a Down, you hear how the movement is syncopated, then I stop the record at two minutes, screw it up, then I pick it back up with a classical part, go back into the groove. A kid goes, “Damn, how did he do that? I can’t really do that on my computer. On these Fruity Loops [software], I’ve got to keep it a certain way.” I think this will inspire kids to say, “Man, I’ve got to learn more music and put more arrangements in the music.” People are making music and they’re getting it out there, but we’re losing a sense of the live elements inside their music."

Cheers, Jake.

Great topic; hi I'm a musician and have been for over 20 years I've been in & out of studio with various bands and all it cost a lot of money, necessity been the mother of invention I built my on studio and learnt to be my own producer/engineer/Dawg because of technology and its easy use this became possible at low cost plus a great learning processes i Think the pay of came when a film producer ask to use two of my songs in his movie he taught the production quality was very good and the songs where to (recognition for my Art)

I suppose what I'm trying to say is if artists are to survive and get the quality they feel they deserve they'll have to provide it for themselfs not depending on other people i.e A&R or record labels to provide the time they cant. achieve self sufficiency and then present your art to the music world,

I believe you still have to write a good songs or good music, whats Good? well beauty is in the eye of the beholder and theirs alot of beholders out there looking for your music you have to embrace the new and use it to your advantage as for the old some things just never change

just trying to keep it real;Jimmy

Pro Tools and their ilk are tools like any other tool. Not everyone wielding a hammer can build a house and having the best hammer in the world is not going to help someone with no carpentry talent.

Good music is and will continue to be created by talented people all over the planet. The tool is secondary. It simply makes it easier for the talented musician to create. The hack will never be able to compete no matter what he does.

Plus there was alot of great music in the 80's that was not preprogrammed, banal schlock. REM, Elvis Costello, XTC, and scores of others.

nice article, however. i am a dawg. a top dawg.

we are handed the projects by the labels. studios are struggling to survive. we take any work we can get because so many other people think they can be dawgs. we still work on ssl's in my world. tell mtv to take the hills off the air and then talk to me about saving culture, which is what we are really talking about here.

You're right, but you're only talking about half the problem here. Sure, the proliferation of DAW software and hardware into the hands of people less and less likely to use them to good ends is partly to blame for the crapification of music.

But the other half of the problem is the business side, specifically media ownership. You would think that everybody and their mother producing their own record would make the industry more competitive. Well, that's not taking into account massive media ownership consolidation.

Clear Channel is probably the best example. When I was a kid (in the 80's) you could turn on the radio and you had a choice from a variety of stations playing a variety of music. Now, you turn on the radio, and you have Clear Channel station after Clear Channel station playing not only the same genres but the same PLAYLISTS. At the same time, as many radio stations become merged into one megastation, their audience grew. And as the audience grew, it became this huge, faceless, grey blob. You no longer had separate audiences for rock, country, rap, and r&b. All those separate groups just became the pop audience. Turn on pop radio today and you hear gwen stefani, puff daddy, and shania twain BACK TO BACK. There is NO GOOD REASON for those three to share a radio station, because they don't share a common listener base. But because of ownership consolidation, radio has become demographically neutered.

The same holds true for record labels. Look back to the fifties, when some of the best music and most successful hit records were produced by one guy, running a label out of his garage. There were literally HUNDREDS of record labels in America alone. While many of them sputtered out, that diversity and competition resulted in artists being signed who would never be given a chance in today's monolithic, corporate pop music environment. Sun records was started in a STOREFRONT, not a towering office building. Johnny Cash would never get signed in today's pop music environment. Why would he? Nobody gets signed today unless they present the "total package" - music, good looks, movie crossover potential, etc. If Johnny Cash came to LA today looking to sign a deal he would be considered a bad investment.

And, in today's pop music business environment, he WOULD be a bad investment. New recording artists today have to go platinum on their FIRST ALBUM to BREAK EVEN. Not to make it big, not to guarantee their futures, to BREAK EVEN. Artists signed up through the 80's were given an introductory period to build their names by touring and recording. Today, you are expected to be fully competitive with the biggest music stars in the world when you walk in the door. And if you're not, then you are a bad investment.

Now that I've talked about the flipside of music crappification, let me talk a little bit about the OTHER flipside - the flipside of DAWs.

While it's true that DAW and internet ubiquity has resulted in a FLOOD of crap music, it's also true that it's resulted in a smaller flood of really really excellent music that would have otherwise gone undiscovered. Sure, you've got to sift through the haystack to find the needle, but trust me, it's worth it. Thanks to home recording and myspace, I was able to move across the country, and within days I'd discovered excellent local bands and where they played. Within days i was out buying their merch and supporting the scene. And many home recording techniques have given way to some truly amazing albums that probably wouldn't have turned out as great if they'd been recorded under the financial and creative constraints of a major label contract and a multi-million dollar studio. True, many bands take the freedom afforded by home recording and do little with it, but others take full advantage of the opportunity to expand and explore, and the music world is a better place for it.

All in all, I think the positives of DAW ubiquity outweigh the negatives, at least for me. Myspace and file-sharing have replaced radio's historic function of bringing new music to new listeners - even if most of it sucks, at least you've never heard it before.

Just my opinion.