Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-45l2p Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-30T03:45:55.969Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Laptop Composition at the Turn of the Millennium: Repetition and Noise in the Music of Oval, Merzbow, and Kid606

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 August 2011

Abstract

Laptop composition – the creation and performance of music primarily using laptop computers – emerged as an important musical activity in the last decade of the twentieth century. While much has been written about the cultural and conceptual significance of this new music, less has been published regarding the sonic structure of specific works. This article explores the musical structure and design of compositions by three laptop composers at the turn of the millennium: ‘Untitled #2’ by Oval (Markus Popp), ‘Cow Cow’ by Merzbow (Masami Akita), and ‘Powerbookfiend’ by Kid606 (Miguel De Pedro). Each piece is analysed using spectrographic images, representations of musical sound that allow for the precise measurement of frequency and intensity. Repetition and noise are revealed as musical characteristics common to all three pieces, defining both smaller-scale patterns and large-scale designs. Using the conceptual vocabulary of Paul Virilio and Gilles Deleuze, repetition and noise are framed in relation to a ‘machine aesthetic’ and ‘difference and repetition’.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Discography

Kid606. Don't Sweat the Technics. CD, Vinyl Communications 140, 1998.Google Scholar
Kid606. Down With the Scene. CD, Ipecac Recordings 7, 2000.Google Scholar
Kid606. PS I Love You. CD, Mille Plateaux 8093, 2000.Google Scholar
Kid606. Kill Sound Before Sound Kills You. CD, Ipecac Recordings 46, 2003.Google Scholar
Merzbow. Merzbox. 50 CD set, XLTD-003, 2000.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Merzbow. Amlux. CD, Important Records 2, 2002.Google Scholar
Oval. Diskont. CD, Thrill Jockey 28736, 1994.Google Scholar
Oval. Systemisch. CD, Thrill Jockey 28732, 1994.Google Scholar
Oval. Ovalprocess. CD, Thrill Jockey 81, 2000.Google Scholar
Ziegler, Thomas, and Gross, Jason. OHM: the Early Gurus of Electronic Music, 1948–1980. 3 CD set, Ellipsis Arts 3671–3673, 2000.Google Scholar

Bibliography

Backus, John. The Acoustical Foundations of Music. New York: W. W. Norton, 1977.Google Scholar
Braun, Hans-Joachim. Music and Technology in the Twentieth Century. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2002.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Broening, Benjamin. ‘Alvin Lucier's I Am Sitting in a Room’, in Analytical Methods of Electroacoustic Music, ed. Simoni. 89110.Google Scholar
Brouwer, Joke, and Mulder, Arjen, eds. Machine Times. Rotterdam: V2, 2000.Google Scholar
Butler, Mark J. ‘Hearing Kaleidoscopes: Embedded Grouping Dissonance in Electronic Dance Music’. twentieth-century music 2/2 (2006), 221243.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cascone, Kim. ‘Introduction’, in The Laptop and Electronic Music: Shapeshifting Tool or Musical Instrument?, ed. Cascone, Kim. Contemporary Music Review 22/4 (2003), 12.Google Scholar
Cascone, Kim. ‘The Aesthetics of Failure: “Post-Digital” Tendencies in Contemporary Computer Music’, in Audio Culture, ed. Cox and Warner. 392398.Google Scholar
Clarke, Michael. ‘Jonathan Harvey's Mortuos Plango, Vivos Voco’, in Analytical Methods of Electroacoustic Music, ed. Simoni. 111144.Google Scholar
Cogan, Robert. New Images of Musical Sound. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1984.Google Scholar
Cogan, Robert. Music Seen, Music Heard. Cambridge, MA: Publication Contact International, 1998.Google Scholar
Cogan, Robert. The Sounds of Song. Cambridge, MA: Publication Contact International, 1999.Google Scholar
Collins, Nick. ‘Electronica’, in The Oxford Handbook of Computer Music, ed. Dean, Roger. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009. 334353.Google Scholar
Collins, Nick, and d'Escrivan, Julio, eds. The Cambridge Companion to Electronic Music. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cox, Christoph, and Warner, Daniel, eds. Audio Culture: Readings in Modern Music. New York: Continuum, 2004.Google Scholar
Crogan, Patrick. ‘The Tendency, the Accident, and the Untimely: Paul Virilio's Engagement with the Future’, in Paul Virilio: from Modernism to Hypermodernism and Beyond, ed. Armitage, John. London: SAGE Publications, 2000. 161176.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Delaney, Martin. Laptop Music: Create, Record, Perform, or Just Listen to, Music on Your Laptop Computer. Thetford: PC Publishing, 2004.Google Scholar
Deleuze, Gilles. Difference and Repetition, trans. Paul Patton. New York: Columbia University Press, 1994.Google Scholar
DeLio, Thomas. ‘Diamorphoses by Iannis Xenakis’, in Electroacoustic Music, ed. Licata. 4158.Google Scholar
Derian, Der James, ed. The Virilio Reader. Malden, MA: Blackwell, 1998.Google Scholar
Derrida, Jacques. ‘Structure, Sign, and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences’, in Writing and Difference. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1978. 278293.Google Scholar
Derrida, Jacques. ‘Semiology and Grammatology: Interview with Julia Kristeva’, in Positions. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981. 1536.Google Scholar
DiScipio, Agostino. ‘A Story of Emergence and Dissolution: Analytical Sketches of Jean-Claude Risset's Contours’, in Electroacoustic Music, ed. Licata. 151186.Google Scholar
Fineberg, Joshua, ed. Spectral Music: History and Techniques. Contemporary Music Review 19/2 (2000).Google Scholar
Fineberg, Joshua, ed. Spectral Music: Aesthetics and Music. Contemporary Music Review 19/3 (2000).Google Scholar
Fletcher, Harvey. Speech, Hearing, and Communication. New York: Van Nostrand, 1953.Google Scholar
Hegarty, Paul. Noise/Music. New York: Continuum, 2007.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Helmuth, Mara. ‘Barry Truax's Riverrun’, in Analytical Methods of Electroacoustic Music, ed. Simoni. 187238.Google Scholar
Hensley, Chad. ‘The Beauty of Noise: an Interview with Masami Akita of Merzbow’, in Audio Culture, ed. Cox and Warner. 5961.Google Scholar
Inglis, Sam. ‘Oval, Markus Popp: Music as Software’. Sound on Sound 17/12 (2002). <http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/oct02/articles/oval.asp> (accessed 2 July 2007).Google Scholar
Kellner, Douglas. ‘Virilio, War and Technology: Some Critical Reflections’, in Paul Virilio: from Modernism to Hypermodernism and Beyond, ed. Armitage, John. London: SAGE Publications, 2000. 161176.Google Scholar
Kelly, Caleb. Cracked Media: the Sound of Malfunction. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2009.Google Scholar
Latartara, John. ‘Multidimensional Musical Space in Hildegard's “O rubor sanguinis”: Tetrachord, Language Sound, and Meaning’. Indiana Theory Review 25/1–2 (2004), 3974.Google Scholar
Latartara, John. ‘Theoretical Approaches Towards Qin Analysis: “Water and Clouds over Xiao Xiang”’. Ethnomusicology 49/2 (2005), 232265.Google Scholar
Latartara, John. ‘Machaut's Monophonic Virelai “Tuit mi penser”: Intersections of Language Sound, Pitch Space, Performance, and Meaning’. Journal of Musicological Research 27/3 (2008), 226253.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Latartara, John. ‘Pedagogic Applications of Fourier Analysis and Spectrographs in the Music Theory Classroom’. Journal of Music Theory Pedagogy 22 (2008), 6190.Google Scholar
Latartara, John, and Gardiner, Michael. ‘Analysis, Performance, and Images of Musical Sound: Surfaces, Cyclical Relationships, and the Musical Work’. Current Musicology 84 (2007), 5378.Google Scholar
Leech-Wilkinson, Daniel. ‘“Rose, lis” Revisited’, in Machaut's Music: New Interpretations, ed. Leach, Elizabeth Eva. Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 2003. 249262.Google Scholar
Licata, Thomas, ed. Electroacoustic Music: Analytical Perspectives. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2002.Google Scholar
Licata, Thomas. ‘Luigi Nono's Omaggio a Emilio Vedova’, in Electroacoustic Music, ed. Licata. 7390.Google Scholar
Lotringer, , Sylvere, , and Virilio, Paul. The Accident of Art. New York: Semiotext(e), 2005.Google Scholar
Louden, Kenneth C. Programming Languages: Principles and Practice. Pacific Grove, CA: Brooks/Cole, 2003.Google Scholar
Madden, Dave. ‘Kid606: Epic Personal Agenda’. Splendid (n.d.). <http://www.splendidmagazine.com/features/kid606/> (accessed 7 July 2007).+(accessed+7+July+2007).>Google Scholar
May, Andrew. ‘Philippe Manoury's Jupiter’, in Analytical Methods of Electroacoustic Music, ed. Simoni. 145186.Google Scholar
Neill, Ben. ‘Breakthrough Beats: Rhythm and the Aesthetics of Contemporary Electronic Music’, in Audio Culture, ed. Cox and Warner. 386391.Google Scholar
Pierce, John. ‘Introduction to Pitch Perception’, in Music, Cognition, and Computerized Sound: an Introduction to Psychoacoustics, ed. Cook, Perry. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2001. 5770.Google Scholar
Potter, Ralph. ‘Visible Patterns of Speech’. Science 102 (1945), 463467.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Potter, Ralph, Kopp, George, and Kopp, Harriet. Visible Speech. New York: Dover, 1966.Google Scholar
Pouncy, Edwin. ‘Consumed by Noise’. The Wire 198 (2000), 2633.Google Scholar
Price, Zack. The Beginner's Guide to Computer-Based Music Production. New York: Cherry Lane Music, 2007.Google Scholar
Redhead, Steve. The Paul Virilio Reader. New York: Columbia University Press, 2004.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Reynolds, Simon. Rip It Up and Start Again: Potpunk 1978–1984. New York: Penguin Group, 2006.Google Scholar
Risset, Jean-Claude, and Wessel, David L.. ‘Exploration of Timbre by Analysis and Synthesis’, in The Psychology of Music, ed. Deutsch, Diana. San Diego: Academic Press, 1999. 113169.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Russolo, Luigi. ‘The Art of Noises’, in Strunk's Source Readings in Music History, ed. Treitler, Leo. New York: W. W. Norton, 1998. 13281334.Google Scholar
Seggern, John von. Laptop Music Power! The Comprehensive Guide. Boston: Thompson Course Technology, 2005.Google Scholar
Shapiro, Peter. ‘Kid606: Beats and the Brat’. The Wire 212 (2001), 3743.Google Scholar
Simoni, Mary. ‘Paul Lansky's As If’, in Analytical Methods of Electroacoustic Music, ed. Simoni. 5388.Google Scholar
Simoni, Mary, ed. Analytical Methods of Electroacoustic Music. New York: Routledge, 2006.Google Scholar
Tanaka, Atau. ‘Speed of Sound’, in Machine Times, ed. Brouwer and Mulder. 98115.Google Scholar
Toop, David. ‘The Generation Game: Experimental Music and Digital Culture’, in Audio Culture, ed. Cox and Warner. 239247.Google Scholar
Twombly, , Kristian, . ‘Oppositional Dialectics in Joji Yuasa's The Sea Darkens’, in Electroacoustic Music, ed. Licata. 217236.Google Scholar
Virilio, Paul. The Original Accident. Cambridge: Polity Press, 2008.Google Scholar
Weidenbaum, Marc. ‘A Conversation with Markus Popp, of Oval and Microstoria’. Disquiet (1997). <http://www.disquiet.com/popp-script.html> (accessed 2 July 2007).Google Scholar
Williams, James. Gilles Deleuze's Difference and Repetition: a Critical Introduction and Guide. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2003.Google Scholar
Winckel, Fritz. Music, Sound and Sensation: a Modern Exposition. New York: Dover, 1960.Google Scholar
Young, Rob. ‘Worship the Glitch’, in Undercurrents: the Hidden Wiring of Modern Music, ed. Young, Rob. London: Continuum, 2002. 4555.Google Scholar
Zahora, George. ‘Oval Processed’. Splendid (2002). <http://www.splendidezine.com/features/oval/> (accessed 2 July 2007).Google Scholar