Reactions to Analog Fetishism in Sound-Recording Cultures

Stuhl, Andy Kelleher

doi:10.7560/vlt7405

Cited by 10 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 19 publications

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“…As such, they overlook and obscure the significant technological advancements in audio quality that have occurred since this time (Moorefield, 2005) Nonetheless, images within these texts include the expensive hardware technology such as mixing consoles, speakers, signal processors, microphones, recording and mixing spaces, the sum of which often involves purchase costs into the millions of dollars. They also fit in with a trend towards 'analog fetishism' in music production (Stuhl, 2014). Yet they are closely linked to the lossy compression debate.…”

Section: Large-scale Production and Economic Capitalsupporting

confidence: 57%

Rethinking criticism about lossy compression: Sound fidelity, large-scale production and audio capital in pop music

O’Grady

2020

Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Med

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Although digital music streaming and downloading practices highlight a preference for portability over fidelity among pop music consumers, for some ‘high fidelity’ continues to be a crucial component of their pop music engagement. This article examines the political dimensions of audio preferences. It considers comments by Neil Young and those within The Distortion of Sound who claim that the lossy compression encoding process – used in digital downloading and streaming – significantly degrades the quality of recorded sound and compromises valuable pop music characteristics. In 2015, these claims were followed by the development of the ‘hi-res’ music player device and digital download store ‘Pono’. This article argues that some criticism of lossy compression can be understood as ‘audio capital’. Rather than merely exchanging aesthetic preferences, or a reliable metric of the audibility of high fidelity, audio capital describes the reconversion of celebrity status and economic capital into a class divide structured by an appreciation for large-scale music production.

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Section: Large-scale Production and Economic Capitalsupporting

confidence: 57%

Rethinking criticism about lossy compression: Sound fidelity, large-scale production and audio capital in pop music

O’Grady

2020

Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Med

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“…Several theoretical concepts can be unknotted from the ‘Austin sound’. For instance, this ‘sound’ privileges what Stuhl labels technical fidelity , which aims to faithfully ‘capture the sound of live musicians performing simultaneously in the studio’ (2013, p. 19). This notion is connected to Paul Sanden's concept of liveness of fidelity , where ‘the further a recording or performance deviates from “true” (acoustic) performed sounds, the less live it is’ (2013, p. 35).…”

Section: Aesthetic Conventions Of Record Productionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Unknown Pleasure: interpretations of the mystery hiss in Feist's 2017 album

Coughlan-Allen

2023

Pop. Mus.

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This article examines the critical reception of Feist's 2017 album Pleasure, and interpretations by reviewers of the mysterious hiss that permeates most of the album's tracks. I firstly contextualise Pleasure in relation to the aesthetics of record production. I then examine interviews with Feist and her collaborators to identify the source of the hiss, and explain its presence on Pleasure. Lastly, I examine a corpus of 20 reviews, showcasing how critics (mis)identified and (mis)interpreted the sound, as well as the effect of this on their overall understanding of the album. To explain the relationship between the hiss and accompanying music, I assume a semiotic perspective. Following Poyatos, I regard these two kinds of sound as part of distinct yet related cosystems of signs, loosely analogous to the relationship between verbal utterances and nonverbal behaviours in face-to-face communication. Through this lens, I analyse how Pleasure's hiss was heard to modify, support, emphasise and undermine the meaning of the music by reviewers.

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“…We are starting to see this, with the reemergence of electronic music being made outside the DAW, as can be seen in analog synthesis, modular synthesis and drum machines in electronic music recording and performance. This can be for a number of reasons-Stuhl writes that digital tools are still widely seen as unsatisfactory emulations of their more "authentic" analog counterparts, (Stuhl 2014) while practitioners such as Richard Devine have said that the DAW encouraged neurotic and un-productive overediting, that the relative confines of modular synthesis didn't enable. Future Music 2013Perhaps, then, these trends and viewpoints are setting the stage for the emergence of a post-DAW music-a music that derives new outputs from the DAW's virtual proper being.…”

Section: Post-daw Music Post-daw Interfacesmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Fractured Earth - Sonification and Spatialisation of Seismic Data With Max:msp and Speaker Motion

Dunham¹,

Johnson²

2020

Preprint

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This paper provides an overview of a Max/MSP patch that sonifies seismic data and the use of spatialisation to explore the resulting soundscape. The background to the development of the patch and spatialisation techniques are discussed and a brief overview of the implementation of the patch is provided with contexts for its use. Spatialisation is explored with the use of a new mechatronic speaker system and its use in a live performance. Finally, the paper considers future development of the system.

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Reactions to Analog Fetishism in Sound-Recording Cultures

Cited by 10 publications

References 19 publications

Rethinking criticism about lossy compression: Sound fidelity, large-scale production and audio capital in pop music

Rethinking criticism about lossy compression: Sound fidelity, large-scale production and audio capital in pop music

Unknown Pleasure: interpretations of the mystery hiss in Feist's 2017 album

A Fractured Earth - Sonification and Spatialisation of Seismic Data With Max:msp and Speaker Motion

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