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draft 7.30


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just forget about it and come back to it in time. may click again

 

Unfortunately, I already tried numerous times (for months). It is not working. I consider the pattern to be a compositional "mistake". Hard to ignore :-(

 

My post was just my confirmation that the enjoyment is gone. Fucking hate these discoveries.

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Oh well...

 

I have found a repeating pattern in the last third of Surripere in which I first thought was an unpredictable flow of rhythms. The discovery ruined my enjoyment of the track. I hate it. It completely ruined the flow of the finish to me. That bit from 8:08 to 8:11 is what always ends the loop. I really dislike it. The finish used to be like some chaotic decomposition finale. Now it's just a pattern that stops and restarts again and again with some variation. The flow is gone. The magic is gone. My OCD is triggered. That is what I got for careful listening. My favourite AE track ruined. Fuck.

 

I have also spotted a repeating pattern in that seemingly random rhythm at the end of Xylin Room and while it took some time to accustom to it I, luckily, quite enjoy it even if it is different (and regular).

 

Had to share it with you. This really hurts (I am not crying it just fucking sucks big time).

 

:catrage: :catcry:

Huh, I noticed this years ago and was just kinda like well that is some pretty weird hip hop. They do that kind of stuff sometimes. It tends to be my least favorite part of Autechre, I think their drums are better when they're more pared down and funky, with a few notable exceptions.

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Oh well...

 

I have found a repeating pattern in the last third of Surripere in which I first thought was an unpredictable flow of rhythms. The discovery ruined my enjoyment of the track. I hate it. It completely ruined the flow of the finish to me. That bit from 8:08 to 8:11 is what always ends the loop. I really dislike it. The finish used to be like some chaotic decomposition finale. Now it's just a pattern that stops and restarts again and again with some variation. The flow is gone. The magic is gone. My OCD is triggered. That is what I got for careful listening. My favourite AE track ruined. Fuck.

 

I have also spotted a repeating pattern in that seemingly random rhythm at the end of Xylin Room and while it took some time to accustom to it I, luckily, quite enjoy it even if it is different (and regular).

 

Had to share it with you. This really hurts (I am not crying it just fucking sucks big time).

 

:catrage: :catcry:

Huh, I noticed this years ago and was just kinda like well that is some pretty weird hip hop. They do that kind of stuff sometimes. It tends to be my least favorite part of Autechre, I think their drums are better when they're more pared down and funky, with a few notable exceptions.

 

 

Dunno if we are on the same page. I love complicated patterns. I simply dislike that the pattern is predictable and is repeating itself because it stops the flow with each repetition. I also hate that it has such a prominent "melodic" properties which makes the repetition even more annoying. It is hard to explain and very subjective I guess. The rest of the music is flowing and running to the finish, tension is rising, while the beat is still stopping with the same "melodic" ending pattern. Completely off in my book. Hate it. Fuck fuck fuck.

 

/ therapy

Edited by Jev
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Hmm yeah the first three sentences there aren't quite clicking for me.

As far as the "melodic" part - when I first started playing with samplers it used to infuriate me that I couldn't make a sample that was completely atonal. I think it was around when Draft came out, as a matter of fact. Then I read an Autechre interview from the time where Sean said that all sounds have some tonality, and I realized this was just something I would have to accept and deal with. That's about when I started shifted from thinking about individual sounds to always thinking about the context of sounds because it really changes everything.

 

And on that tip, I think that the feeling you're hearing, where that beat is kind of pulling everything else back, galloping for a bit and then digging in its heels and rearing back, is part of the point of the track. There's this tension that's trying to find an outlet to release but something is blocking it or throwing up a smoke screen so it can't get through or find a way though. Like, the frustration you're feeling might be part of the feeling the fellas were going with here. The bass lines back up with it at the end too, so it does feel like there's an outlet here.

To me it's pretty similar structurally to the percussion in pen expers - they did a similar thing where there was this flowing, rolling, funky hip hop rhythm and then it repeatedly collapsed on itself like it was backpedalling.

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Hmm yeah the first three sentences there aren't quite clicking for me.

 

As far as the "melodic" part - when I first started playing with samplers it used to infuriate me that I couldn't make a sample that was completely atonal. I think it was around when Draft came out, as a matter of fact. Then I read an Autechre interview from the time where Sean said that all sounds have some tonality, and I realized this was just something I would have to accept and deal with. That's about when I started shifted from thinking about individual sounds to always thinking about the context of sounds because it really changes everything.

 

And on that tip, I think that the feeling you're hearing, where that beat is kind of pulling everything else back, galloping for a bit and then digging in its heels and rearing back, is part of the point of the track. There's this tension that's trying to find an outlet to release but something is blocking it or throwing up a smoke screen so it can't get through or find a way though. Like, the frustration you're feeling might be part of the feeling the fellas were going with here. The bass lines back up with it at the end too, so it does feel like there's an outlet here.

 

To me it's pretty similar structurally to the percussion in pen expers - they did a similar thing where there was this flowing, rolling, funky hip hop rhythm and then it repeatedly collapsed on itself like it was backpedalling.

 

Interesting.

 

I know that every sound has some approximate tonality but it is a different result when you put those sounds into melodies. And maybe you know those melodies that can be put in a loop no problem while other melodies does not really flow well in loops (same goes for drum patterns). And I think in Surripere that is the case. The pattern does not flow well when in my opinion because its sequence of tonalities end it on a tone that does not really fit for ending a loop and also the rhythm is too predictable in that context imo. I love stopping and restarting patterns, I enjoy stop-times etc but here it does not really work for me. I find it extremely annoying and more like an oversight than an actual deliberate decision in the composition. It really feels to me as if the guys themselves considered the pattern to be chaotic and missed the repetition in it (these are just my feelings of course). To me, the ending was supposed to be free-jazz.

 

On the other hand, Pen Expers' noticeable repetitions flow extremely well in my mind. Pen Expers does not give me this sluggish OCD triggering feeling of "wrong" patterns... (I know, I cannot be more subjective than that but maybe you understand).

 

Maybe you are right, maybe that Surripere OCD horror-pattern was an intention but I hate it so much. When I construct my "ride" beats I really give big attention to how it flows when looped so that I can easily spot if it drives just right. And it does not has to be a perfectly on-beat pattern. It can be off but it has to make a seamless loop (rhythm and tonality wise) in my mind if it's supposed to really drive the track. So I am quite sensitive for anything that goes against it. If the loop does not fit, an ever-evolving flow of notes might be a better choice.

 

If the Surripere pattern did not contain that particular 3 seconds long part it would be so much better in my mind. Now it feels rather cheap and under-produced to me (the last third of the track while the first two thirds are stunning). Surripere used to be my untouchable, perfect monolith in the music world. Now it is a remarkable waste of potential. :catsuicide:

 

Totally subjective, I know. But I feel as if part of my world just collapsed... lol

Edited by Jev
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Also... recently, there are at least as many times listening to Autechre where I'm like "these guys are such sloppy bitches" as when I'm like "holy fuck how was this even made by human beings". And I wonder if the former is just a result of paying such close attention to their music (which is in turn because they pay such close attention it... the right kind of attention). Anyway, I find myself appreciating both equally. Sometimes the lazy thing or even the "wrong" thing is the right thing to do.


Not disappointment so much as hmm, I can't process this, there is something going on here that is just so wrong and I don't get it. Better listen another 100 times... Or come back to it in 6 months... or both.

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I'm not sure if I've ever noticed that. Didn't ae say in the AAA thread that surripere was originally two different tracks that just happened to be the same tempo so they smashed them together?

 

edit: nope, listening now and I don't think I get it, it sounds as fkn amazing as it always has

Edited by modey
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I think also that Draft in particular is a really odd one out of their catalog. Most of what they've done seems more jammy, muscular, improvised, off-the-cuff to some degree. I'm sure there is some of that in Draft but I've always understood it to be mostly composed in the Digital Performer timeline. While surely a lot of editing goes into each of their releases, this one in particular has this kind of concrete, desolate feeling to it that I think is a result of that. So I think where in other releases their fingers sort of did a lot of the thinking, with Draft the process driving the decisions seems to have been a lot more cerebral at all levels/scales.

 

There's lots of conclusions to be drawn from that, some of them obvious, most of them subjective, so I'll leave that up to you. I will say that it's probably down there with Oversteps as my least favorite Autechre releases, but I still enjoy both from time to time.

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Oh and just to contradict myself and be super subjective, my favorite time to listen to Draft is driving along the stretch of Highway 2 between Davenport and Wilbur on an overcast Spring day with very sparse traffic.

 

Something about the sparse, rugged beauty/ugliness of the Palouse, the pines ringing the barren sagebrush-speckled pseudo-desert, vague mountains on the horizon. Run-down public works projects and tiny remote communities, not seeing any humans for miles. Maybe a travel mug of gas station coffee. Goes nicely with the brittle, meticulous field recording rhythms, the hazy, paranoid swells of reverb and the muffled bass lozenges.

 

It's gloomy but it doesn't ruminate. It's like a weather pattern that I appreciate while it's there and it's kind of nice when it passes too.

Edited by sweepstakes
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Oh and just to contradict myself and be super subjective, my favorite time to listen to Draft is driving along the stretch of Highway 2 between Davenport and Wilbur on an overcast Spring day with very sparse traffic.

 

Something about the sparse, rugged beauty/ugliness of the Palouse, the pines ringing the barren sagebrush-speckled pseudo-desert, vague mountains on the horizon. Run-down public works projects and tiny remote communities, not seeing any humans for miles. Maybe a travel mug of gas station coffee. Goes nicely with the brittle, meticulous field recording rhythms, the hazy, paranoid swells of reverb and the muffled bass lozenges.

 

It's gloomy but it doesn't ruminate. It's like a weather pattern that I appreciate while it's there and it's kind of nice when it passes too.

Isn't that rest area in the middle of nowhere right in between? Or maybe it's between Davenport and Reardan...can't remember.

 

I actually started a track six years ago that was specifically about Highway 2 going thru Leahy at night, but never got around to finishing it...

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Oh and just to contradict myself and be super subjective, my favorite time to listen to Draft is driving along the stretch of Highway 2 between Davenport and Wilbur on an overcast Spring day with very sparse traffic.

 

While looking at the highway in street view, I can totally relate to this.

 

Listened to the part from 8:08 to 8:11 in Surripere and it sounds pretty amazing to me, but then again, what do I understand about composing?

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I think also that Draft in particular is a really odd one out of their catalog. Most of what they've done seems more jammy, muscular, improvised, off-the-cuff to some degree. I'm sure there is some of that in Draft but I've always understood it to be mostly composed in the Digital Performer timeline. While surely a lot of editing goes into each of their releases, this one in particular has this kind of concrete, desolate feeling to it that I think is a result of that. So I think where in other releases their fingers sort of did a lot of the thinking, with Draft the process driving the decisions seems to have been a lot more cerebral at all levels/scales.

 

There's lots of conclusions to be drawn from that, some of them obvious, most of them subjective, so I'll leave that up to you. I will say that it's probably down there with Oversteps as my least favorite Autechre releases, but I still enjoy both from time to time.

 

I remember seeing somewhere on xlt that the name of the album was that it was the 30th draft they've tweaked until they thought it was done. very deliberate and thought out. It's still one of my favorite ae albums, very woody sounding.

Edited by azatoth
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I love Draft. Very cohesive, amazing sound design and with right amount of sharp transients and dynamics. One of my favourite albums.

 

Just to clarify the compositional problem I have with Surripere.

 

I wouldn't mind the defined part if it happened just once in the track. What I really dislike is that it keeps repeating that pattern over and over again until the end of the track. Starts around 7:20, then continues to happen around: 7:28, 7:37, 7:43, 7:52, 7:59 etc. till the end of the track.

 

Listen for the hi-hat. It does this "melody" that is so prominent and conflicting with the flow in my mind. The hi-hat also sounds as a single sample again and again with no variation which I don't enjoy in this context. I would be more capable to describe it in person than in text.

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Isn't that rest area in the middle of nowhere right in between? Or maybe it's between Davenport and Reardan...can't remember.

Yeah, exactly, that would be the "run-down public works" I was referring to ;) Ideally the suncomes out just for 6Ie.CR, the clouds thin out and there are no cars on the road during Tapr, there's some rain & stormclouds during Surripere, and you go past that pretty little pond where the road curves near the tall Tom's sign outside with day-glo green letters outside Wilbur during VL AL 5 - really makes those shimmering chords pop.

 

I remember seeing somewhere on xlt that the name of the album was that it was the 30th draft they've tweaked until they thought it was done. very deliberate and thought out. It's still one of my favorite ae albums, very woody sounding.

That makes a lot of sense. Also listening to this album now it occurs to me that its weird cabin fever energy reminds me a lot of the prog rock compositions I've heard, where it seems to me they were trying to sort of emulate the complexity of jazz without actually improvising. Progressive musique concrete.

 

Woody is an excellent word for the sound design - there's also this glassy/watery (but not fluid) quality to a lot of the processing. Wood, water, and sky.

 

I love Draft. Very cohesive, amazing sound design and with right amount of sharp transients and dynamics. One of my favourite albums.

Yeah, it is nice, really. I ought to listen to it more often, I just tend to quickly associate moods or places with albums and after that it's kind of hard to untether them - I could tell you at least one for every Autechre release. I do appreciate the sound design sort of separate from that.

 

But the melodies and chords are so barren on this one, and my favorite parts of Autechre tend to be the composition and design they do around some really juicy chords & basslines (Cipater, Altibzz, Dilankex, etc.) and that was sorely missed on this release. It feels like they spent a little too much time on it and the ideas got a little worn and threadbare. I think after this release they started to restrain themselves from doing this, consciously or not. I'm glad they went through the journey, though - it seems like they learned a lot and Quaristice probably owes as much to this as it does to Untilted.

 

Speaking of highway 2, there is this hand-rolled, homemade, ad hoc kind of flavor to the sound design that I like a lot. Like the equipment of a seasoned fisherman. I think they compensated for the lack of improvisation by exposing the seams and imperfections of the sound design process a lot more, and I enjoy the textures and slightly cheeky vibe that creates. There was some of this in Confield too but they seemed more shy about it, where here they exposed it more but obscured it instead by putting it in a weird context.

 

The drums in the beginning of P.:NTIL are a good example. You can really hear the crappy room reverb from the field recordings in that little "fill" at 0:20.

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Interesting.

 

I enjoy many melodies (or rather tonality changes) throughout Draft. I love how obscure many melodies and chords are on the album. 6IE.CR (drum tonalities create melodies) and Tapr (amazing, blury harmonies) are so excellently composed. And those beats (apart from that Surripere finale...).

 

On the other hand, I enjoy the explicit Oversteps approach too.

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Oh and I would consider Untilted to be worse album compared to Draft. I really don't think Draft was rushed. I think it is a truly excellent record with not really dull moments.

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I think also that Draft in particular is a really odd one out of their catalog. Most of what they've done seems more jammy, muscular, improvised, off-the-cuff to some degree. I'm sure there is some of that in Draft but I've always understood it to be mostly composed in the Digital Performer timeline. While surely a lot of editing goes into each of their releases, this one in particular has this kind of concrete, desolate feeling to it that I think is a result of that. So I think where in other releases their fingers sort of did a lot of the thinking, with Draft the process driving the decisions seems to have been a lot more cerebral at all levels/scales.

 

There's lots of conclusions to be drawn from that, some of them obvious, most of them subjective, so I'll leave that up to you. I will say that it's probably down there with Oversteps as my least favorite Autechre releases, but I still enjoy both from time to time.

I remember seeing somewhere on xlt that the name of the album was that it was the 30th draft they've tweaked until they thought it was done. very deliberate and thought out. It's still one of my favorite ae albums, very woody sounding.

Yeah, if I remember correctly. The album certainly flows well, so it was worth it.

 

 

sent from a tippytappy flatpad

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This is one of their albums that I never ended up caring for as a full album but 4-5 of the tracks are definite standouts. I have been trying with it lately after listening to the live sets since each new AE release seems to make their past albums gel a bit more for me but I've basically come away with the same feeling although the tracks I like I now like more. I generally find I have a harder time getting anything out of the more solidly percussive tracks with less in the way of washes and tones padding them out.

 

Reinform Puls sounds like the soundtrack to an avant garde spy film. V-Proc is still all time top ten.

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I dunno guys but to me Draft is basically flawless if I ignore my specific Surripere's problem...

Yeah, to be honest that IS a very specific problem! I wouldn't say it's a problem for me, but it's interesting to hear it is for you.

 

Would you say you would find most problems or annoyances in very specific instances rather than a general viewpoint? Not a criticism, just curious <:

 

 

Basically, only an absolute minority of producers is capable of making mostly flawless and interesting music (the "flaws" are of subjective nature of course). AE are, imo, one of them. So I have only minimal problems with AE, and a couple of other bands/producers.

 

Majority of the music is, to me, flawed and majority of the majority is completely disposable. But it's not my general viewpoint. It's just that a majority of music truly sucks to my ears. That is why I care more about individual tracks rather than whole albums. It is a miracle when an album is completely flawless (AE does not have a single flawless album imo - draft was the last hope - but there is so little flaws and so many interesting moments in their discography that in the end the whole package is still absolutely brilliant).

 

My point of view is also heavily influenced by my interest in music composition and music production. Naturally, the more one learn the more demanding one is. And I am my own worst critique too (8th year of making music and never releasing anything to public because so far my music was disposable).

 

So yeah...

Edited by Jev
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