This Life Is Just A State Of Mind (featuring STONERJAZZ)
Notes On "This Life Is Just A State Of Mind (featuring STONERJAZZ)"
TRACK DATA
Composition tool: MuseScore, Studio One 5 Professional
Recording tool (DAW): Studio One 5 Professional
Number of tracks: 65 (1st), 30 (2nd)
Sound source: Guitar and Vocal by STONERJAZZ, Presence XT, Impact XT, Mojito, Mai-Tai (All built-in sound sources of Studio One)
Composition and Recording period: May 5 2022 - Jun 11 2022
Concept: Minimal on Basso Continuo
(TM writes:)
This track is based on the concept of “minimal on basso continuo*.” Minimal music tends to have a middle- or high-ranged tones as the repeating phrase. What if minimal music is made with low-tone minimal phrases? That was the starting point of this track as well as the whole series.
(*TI talks about basso continuo below.)
In fact, the very first track under such a concept is "North At Defining Moments" (released in July 2022, later than this one). We found it very interesting and are trying to develop another album, even though it's not going to include "North At Defining Moments", which we intend to put in "The Anomalous Folk" series instead.
This track will be a part of "Auditory Art For Visual Arts", which is a spin-off from that track. To me, at least, this series seems to stimulate artistic images, hopefully for various visual artists**.
Also, I imagined the concept was suitable for collaboration with not only them but also music artists. After having made a couple of tracks (also to be released later) for the series of minimal on basso continuo (MBC), we planned to create an MBC platform so that it could be easy for other artists to collaborate with us.
The guest here is STONERJAZZ. In my opinion one of his strengths is the ability to make the music his own world and "What will happen if STONERJAZZ plays on an MBC platform?" I wondered. The tracks he added were splendid, even more so than I had expected.
One thing that this track makes me think about is that electronic music does not have to sound "electronic", even though electronic music tends to be very "electronic." One of the things we are creating is a style of sounds where digital music -- rather than electronic -- can head. This is nothing but digital music, but is not necessarily based only upon the existing digital or electronic music.
** If you are one of those interested in using our music in any way, it would be our honour that you could contact us via Facebook Messenger, X direct message or here (at "post your comment" below).
(TI writes:)
This track is tagged dub and reggae, but we didn't put this on it. It was automatically added by Soundcloud. I did think I felt elements of dub and reggae while mixing it myself, but I think this is only because the phrases 'sound repetitive' and the sound quality/acoustic treatment is similar to dub.
I am interested in dub, not only in this track, but also in the influences in sound creation, but I am interested in the method and the sound, not in dub itself. The same goes for hip-hop. I'm also interested in the way hip hop combines different kinds of music to create something unique.
This is an idea shared by The Anomalous Folk series, which we started releasing earlier, and is part of FMT's approach to music.
It's a bit emotional, but for better or worse, the Japanese have a tendency to "indulge in it and want to be it" and "stay true to the original and at the same time not accept anything that is not in the same technique or expression as the original".
For example, to play hip-hop, people wear baseball caps backwards and bulky trousers; to aspire to be a reggae musician, they grow their hair long and puff on ganja (and of course get arrested and make the news); to be a rock musician, they "buy leather swing tops" (It's obviously unhealthy to dress like that in summer in Japan).
Perhaps those who started hip-hop "didn't start hip-hop by wearing a baseball cap backwards", and perhaps Bob Marley probably didn't create reggae by learning Rastafi.
Of course, I think that this "coming from the style" and "weird elaborateness" is part of the reason why Japan has developed in a strange way in various cultures and industries, including music, and this is the driving force behind the creation of unique and interesting things, but I dislike such things (perhaps TM hates that kind of thing too). (TM: Yes, so do I.)
There is a difference between indulging in a culture or its history and 'wanting to be it' and respecting it.
Basso Continuo
(TI writes:)
As TM also notes, the bass-like sounds and lead-like phrases that sound in this piece were not intended to be so from the start, and apart from the rhythm instruments, there is very little use of overtly 'sounds that are inspired by some specific instrument or tone'.
'Basso continuo' is a Baroque musical term that is a simplified version of harmonic notation in the lower registers, indicating the presence of multiple notes on top of a single melody, even if written in a monophonic form.
The term is often misused, but it does not refer to the 'low frequency part that continues to sound throughout the piece'. In a sense, it is like the 'auto-accompaniment function in DAW plug-in software or multifunctional keyboards that automatically plays that chord when you play a bass line'.
In this track, the parts in the lower register (many of which are lower in MuseScore) are also not monophonic, but have multiple notes listed in the mass, and the timbre itself is the same timbre.
For example, the sound that sounds like a bass line in the lower register, or the sound that sounds like a metallic obbligato, are both what he calls 'basso continuo' parts, and are one part. But because of their wide range of sound, they can be individually effected and mixed to make them sound more meaningful to the listener.
Also, the process of making a 'basso continuo' in baroque music and our 'basso continuo' is reversed.
As mentioned above, the basso continuo is a harmonisation of the low register written in monophonic form in the score, whereas we break down the multi-tone low register into monophonic form and apply the roles and timbres of each note in the process of creation.
I digress, but this may be my own unique way of thinking, but it seems to me that the reason why the idea of 'basso continuo' has fallen into disuse is related to the development of instruments (basses) that specialise in playing bass notes.
It seems to me that the era in which instruments such as the cello and double bass, which specialise in low frequencies, appeared, coincides with the era in which Baroque music fell into disuse (both around the 18th century).
In the Baroque period, there were no specialised instruments that could produce a strong low-frequency range (perhaps there were no players specialising in the low register), so I wonder if they were thinking of something like playing the low register with multiple notes (harmony) to give it thickness. I imagine so.
In fact, even today, when Original plays pop, jazz and other multi-instrumental pieces as a solo piano player, there are many arrangements in which the bass line is reconstructed into harmony.
Composition: Atonality and Instability
(TM writes:)
For the MBC concept I frequently use very low tones and low chords (or dyads, more specifically). We humans recognise the very low tones just ambiguously. When the bass part plays very low tones, it sometimes sounds like a kick drum. In fact, TI often reinforces the kick drums with a very low sine wave. Early in this track, for example, the bass part (which is the ninth line in the notation above) begins with A-flat but just after that it plays G and then A. It can be said that it's atonal, of course; yes, it is atonal but not only that, there appears a sort of instability.
In addition to that, if that bass consists of short notes our recognition becomes even more ambiguous. Even though the recognition is ambiguous, repetition makes us comfortable or familiar with the phrases. That is a very interesting point for me and why "minimal on basso continuo" attracts me as well as why this is an endeavour that we call an auditory art.
Most people say they like a particular song simply because, in my opinion, they have listened to it many times and got familiar with it. That is why a huge amount of music today has (excessively) simple phrases and is consumed everyday, so that people can memorise them easily and eventually come to feel "familiar" and consume them. Then, what if a phrase that is hard to memorise and get familiar with repeats?
Thus, the platform was a product of my "designed instability" and I wondered what STONERJAZZ put onto our tracks; I just did not have any idea. Just amazing. It's his own world even on the instability. He added the tracks of the vocal, guitar and rhythm machine and I was surprised especially with the rhythm machine. He said it was just a preset pattern but I had no viewpoint like that. I took it up by re-arranging it only slightly, which the electronic drums play within the track. I also re-allocated his vocal and guitar along the structure. I designed the platform much shorter than I usually do, for a little more than three minutes, just because I thought it would fit him better.
As a result of the bass playing the role of the kick drum to some extent, that of the kick drum changes, like some other tracks in the series together with the track called "North At Defining Moments." Most of today's music tend to lack anything different on the kick drum; it's almost always ordinary. But in this case it's very free, which is enabled to give the groove accents quite differently.
Using dyads on the bass makes it unclear whether it is the bass or something else, especailly when its tone is set as a sine wave or something not typical for it, like this track.
One thing I should add is that there is no change in the tempo at 96 beats per minute (BPM). Yet, I feel as if there were some naturally, and, therefore, I did not feel needs to change it.
(TI writes:)
For this piece, I didn't add any elements, I just took the MuseScore score created by TM, took it apart and reconstructed it to fit the phrase and its register.
The MuseScore score created by TM contains a very wide range of notes in each part, so if you play it in the same tone as it is, the bandwidth is too wide, or the many notes make it difficult to hear each phrase, so the parts are broken down into single notes, and then combined again into multiple parts (usually around three parts, sometimes as many as seven). The parts are broken down into single notes and reassembled into multiple parts (usually around three parts, but sometimes as many as seven).
This is when interesting hidden phrases are discovered and new meanings are created.
It is a very enjoyable process, like looking at the many stars scattered across the night sky and connecting them together to form 'constellations'.
Mixing
The Mix was done in two stages.
In the first stage, as mentioned earlier, each part was broken down according to bandwidth and phrase, and equalised for each part. This resulted in 65 parts, instead of the 13 parts in MuseScore.
These were then mixed down into 13 parts (same number of parts as in MuseScore but very different combinations) as stem files according to bandwidth, timbre and sound quality, and then mixed again into a 2-Mix.
In this second file for the mix, the final balancing and various special effects were added.
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