Pop and Noise
 

I don't think I can differentiate the two. Every time I listen to Sy I can see their pop melodies, especially their 90's output. This is also with other noise artist or those along the same lines. Magik Markers, Bardo Pond, Arab on Radar etc.

Every time I listen to pop albums, be Madonna or Britney Spears I find it that they could be the most noise artist than any one that claims to be a noise artist. I also think that pop and noise can be intertwined, as it has been with the Raveonettes, Jesus and Mary Chain, Late SY.

Are any of you in the same situation?

none of those bands you mentioned are pure noise, arab on radar is noise rock/punk, magik markers noise rock, bardo pond is psych rock with feedback and distortion but in no way "noise".

merzbow, violent onsen geisha, masonna, aube, aaron dilloway, daniel menche, panicsville, incapacitiants, and a shit load of others have nothing to do with noise.


i do love though when artists can make pop songs using elements of noise like sonic youth, deerhoof, early flaming lips, thinking fellers union local 282, butthole surfers, shit like that.

I've never heard anything more abrasive than Masonna. If you would please enlighten me on how Masonna is not noise, I'd really appreciate it.

Madonna is noisy 'cause her music is unlistenable.

Surely this thread is a joke.

I'm not sure of what you mean.

Is it the fact that, say, Madonna or Britney might tackle subjects on their songs that you then find on the music of your Jesus and Mary Chain etc but without the pop glee that you're after?

Perhaps he's implying that Spears' music is so horrible that it sounds like noise, whereas SY are considered noise buy sound lovely.

I like Britney Spears, the last album being her ultimate triumph. She's pop not noise.

No. This just sounds like an expanded version of that classic Merzbow quote. Of the bands you mentioned, Magik Markers don't know what a melody or a hook or even structure is, usually ("Boss" barely counts because it has a bit of structure on a few songs and Body Rot has an awesome riff -- played by Lee, of course). So, I don't know how you can hear hooks or melodies in their music. The other bands you mentioned at least have constant riffs and stuff.

I don't really understand this thread.

Anyway, the best mix of noise and pop is probably Swirlies "Blonder Tongue Audio Baton".

*belch*

i fucked up, i meant to say have nothing to do with pop*

Are you aware of what you've written, EH? You do know that now it's too late and you don't stand a chance anymore, EH? You should be ashamed of yourself, seriously.

Noise as a genre, no.

Noise as an adjective, yes. One definition of noise (the definition pursued/ developed by your Cages and your concréte types who laid the foundations for your Merzbows, Reeds, Whitehouses etc) suggests that 'noise' is anything which falls outside of 'conventional' notation. Most percussion is, on some level, noise. The hyper-production on pop records (following the tradition set by Sgt Peppers/ Pet Sounds) uses a lot of 'noises'. They're not often at the forefront of the mix, but they're definitely there. Incidentally to this post, I'd like to mention here that while I can't stand the Beatles as songwriters, their records do make fascinating studies for their production (the later stuff at least).

There's quite a common technique in 'sexy pop', commonly used by Prince/ Madonna/ Britney (but found all over 'popular' music in the 20th Century), whereby the vocals are either miked very close or without one of those vocal baffle things, whereby you get the sound of the closing of salivaed lips, or the rushed intake of breath. This is a noise. The plectrum attack on garage records, and the pop equivalent in the Kinks/ the Who, which is often cleaned out in 70s pop - that's a noise. Pick slides - noise. Feedback - noise.

'Noises' are all over popular music, but they're not often emphasised - except, perhaps, in early hip-hop.

Is that what you mean?

Sorry if I didn't worded correctly. What porky, and glice said.

dude, chill, i wrote that before i went to bed so i didnt have a chance to correct myself, obviously i know that masonna and merzbow have no relation to pop whatsoever.

noise has a lack of polyphonic melody.

So does the majority of pop. Let's find a point, ja?

but it's the melody and hooks of pop music that make people like it. all pop songs are polyphonic.

hes right

polyphony-a musical texture involving two or more simultaneously sounding lines; the lines are often often independent and and create counterpoint.


sounds like most pop to me.

Wrong on many accounts.


I was succesfully teasing you earlier on in this thread.

It's all pop to me!


(The new face of noise music)

haha

everyone needs to get teased sometime, but that definition is straight outta my classical music text book.

Sure, it's just that you are applying it - forcingly, if you allow me to say that - to the context of pop music in a vague way, which ultimately doesn't do anything or anyone any good.

well, pop aint homphonic, and it sure as fuck aint monophonic, so i guess it should be polyphonic, i dont really care about things like that thugh, type of texture used, color, etc.. i just care if it sounds cool to me.

I don't want to come across as a prick - literally speaking, you're right (poly = many; phonic = sounds [loosely]) - but the above is my understanding of polyphony, which doesn't occur in the majority of pop, which is more often than not homophonic.

Contrapuntal pop music is often mooted, but I've heard very little.

Surely pop music, in it's most polished and generic form, at it's heart are songs with a structure and pattern that draws you in, verse chorus verse essentially...- you are compelled to listen to it, becuase after the first 30 seconds you can fairly accurately assume what patterns the song will follow. Pop fans engage with the music because of it's predicatability.

Like many sonic gossipers I was born wrong and somehow find formless and structureless music, a.k.a noise, as engaging if not moreso than 'pop'. Because I have no time for pop songs unless they have an interesting and unique take no pop structures (see SY) when someone turns on Radio 1 at college, pop music completely drifts over me, completely failing to grab my attention, much as a pop fan might react to noise. So, this said, the pop I hear on the radio, completely failing to engage with me, is essentially noise. I get the that same dead-inside bored feeling from pop as many do from noise. Is this what this poster is getting at, they're not saying they're the same thing, but rather they listen to pop in the same way as others do noise? If so, I agree.

Well, that was a load of pious twaddle. Pop and noise are not opposed. It is possible to like both. Preferable, even.

No you misinterpreted what I said. However, that was my fault I did not word it correctly. I think pop and noise can fuse into one. Both are equally enjoyable. However, I feel that many here at least can't accept that most pop music is actually great.

I think polyphony is present in songs like God only knows or Good vibrations for instance, songs that are rather very harmonically complex (in pop standards at least).

You forgot to mention 'except Glice', but otherwise you're spot on.

the best noise rock pop is POLVO's MY KIMONO

it's not noisey though.

salsa is poly phonic

pop rock is most definitely NOT

as "noise rock pop"

not noisey

everything polvo does is off tune and not proper "tones" so why is that not noise? does it have to be made without a guitar? does it have to be purely discordant feedback skronk to be noise?

I can tap on a hood of a car with a hammer and make a song and that shit is NOISE

You LIE everything!

Yeah, feedback skronk is kinda the definition of "noise". Haha.

In all seriousness, my kimono is beautiful and doesn't have a hint of noise in it, its just some beautiful melodies. I don't consider that noise, even if the tuning is different. On the same hand, I wouldn't consider Jandek or -- again! -- Beefheart noise even if they sound kinda "out of tune" at times.

Also, I wouldn't say everything Polvo does is out of tune sounding. "Shapes" is pretty straightforward rocking and even references Hendrix on one song. "Exploding Drawing" as well.

I don't think some notes on a guitar could qualify as noise, it's not even really distorted, just badly-recorded.

"Noise pop" to me is early Pavement, some early Thinking Fellers, early Swirlies (especially "Pancake")..

Also, I wouldn't call tapping on the hood of a car noise unless it was really arhythmic and random. Even then it may not sound like noise. Noise has a clearly defined and, um, "unmusical" sound to it.

that's true. but music genre terms get so damn insular and refined after a while

joy division was grouped as goth music once, but why not the Misfits? and if a jopy division like band were to start today not a single goth would think "thios is goth music" you know?

when Confusion is Sex came out, that was as pure noise as many people had ever heard. but it was not the same noise as yoko put out or metal machine music, or silver sessions ssutff, you know?