Tape Op Conference 2003

Given the habits of musicians who digitally record, and how these behaviors are developing, do you see anything promising and/or troublesome about the future of music recording, and of course, the results?

For example: is it necessarily a good thing that one can add as many tracks or instruments as possible? Should we worry about the growing number of artists who don't know how to "play" an instrument?

(Admittedly, still very subjective questions... )

did we ever? possibly the only difference is that it isn't just the 'driven' ones that will commit their ideas to media..

I think this could happen with a cassette 4 track as much as a DAW. Having trouble finishing things or being happy with results is one of the great side effects of recording one's own music, at least to my experience. A band or musician that uses an outside engineer can always fall back upon, "the engineer didn't get it right...mix sux...etc."

I'd like to have an analog setup, at least for tracking, but considering the headaches involved of only option being used gear and obtaining the skill/knowledge to keep it running.

"Should we worry about the growing number of artists who don't know how to "play" an instrument?"

Knowing how to use synths, software or manipulate samples is a skill, much different perhaps from playing a Les Paul or a trombone, but it still takes work to make it musical. The hardest part about playing a traditional instrument is building up the muscle memory, timing and touch as that cannot be faked and takes time.

It makes technical competance less of an issue, and therefore (hopefully) will erradicate the willful incompetance of so-called punk. (Though I doubt it - "punk" (lack of) musicianship will probably only increase in order to show that the players involved are human and the music in some bizarre luddite display of conspicuous consumption) I wonder if there will be the musical equivalent of the Arts and Crafts movement - a return to hand-crafted music as act of defiance? Or has this already happened - punk/indie being the result?

The ability to infinitely multi-track may or may not be a bad thing. It truly depends on the talents of the artist. Sometimes the important thing in composing a piece of music is know what *not* to record. Things like 4-tracks force people to make choices - and therefore creativity is required to get around the limitations.

One would hope that not having limitations would free the creativity to concentrate on other things - but unfortunately this is often not the case. An Artist + a 4-piece band and a £5000 recording budget = a genius record but An Artist + an 8-piece band + an orchestra + an unlimited recording budget = unlistenable WANK in many cases.

So the answer is, it will change things, but not as much as you would think. And whether the changes are good or bad depend, as always, on the creativity of the artist.

What a non-answer.