Is the scene still under the ground?
category: general [glöplog]
@la_mettrie: imho, the "underground" concept is just as phoney and shallow when it comes to music. but it seems you are not interested in solid historical arguments anyway.
Well, it's possible to take the discussion to the higher level and question the more general usage of "underground" (it would have been better to do this explicitly and not as a post-hoc justification)
Again, I think it's important for everyone in this thread to first agree that there is no clear definition of "underground" when it comes to a community like ours.
dipswitch: Sorry, you are wrong. Yes, when it comes to music, the subject is extremely relevant. For centuries it was normal and OK to "remix", aka to take someone else's song, melody and lyrics, and it's just within the last 50 years that this idea was completely killed by the copyright mafia. We had this in this thread before, the Hip Hop community which clearly once was really "underground" (non-commercial, developed in the streets by the non-privileged) and lost - at least to me - most of that appeal once outside world rules got applied to them.
The law in Germany now is that you may not sample other peoples songs at all for your tracks, and are only allowed to use 15 seconds of other peoples music in another context. You can get sued for singing children's songs and having that on YouTube.
So not being underground MAY bring quite a lot of limitations.
If an evil copyright holder would scan scene.org once, there would be plenty of grounds to sue all of us into the grounds. Why doesn't this happen? Because we are under the radar.
You can clearly see however with Twitch and YouTube that as soon as you are no longer underground, meaning in this context that you are using the outside world's platforms, suddenly the outside world's rules fully apply to all you do.
You may argue if all of this is a good or a bad thing, but to reject that it's there and that there are disadvantages of doing things in public.
I do believe that in general the scene has always been far more progressive than the outside world, especially if you look at it at the global scale. For a hell lot of what we did and do, the question "is this legal in every single country where sceners are active in?" would need to be answered "no" in a hell lot of cases. If you just take the aspect of Nudity inside scene art, there are plenty of countries where sceners are active where this stuff could get you seriously into trouble.
I reject the notion that any of this is about "oh, the good old times", it has practical implications on what we can do TODAY, and what we'll be able to do TOMORROW.
It's worth taking those concerns seriously.
dipswitch: Sorry, you are wrong. Yes, when it comes to music, the subject is extremely relevant. For centuries it was normal and OK to "remix", aka to take someone else's song, melody and lyrics, and it's just within the last 50 years that this idea was completely killed by the copyright mafia. We had this in this thread before, the Hip Hop community which clearly once was really "underground" (non-commercial, developed in the streets by the non-privileged) and lost - at least to me - most of that appeal once outside world rules got applied to them.
The law in Germany now is that you may not sample other peoples songs at all for your tracks, and are only allowed to use 15 seconds of other peoples music in another context. You can get sued for singing children's songs and having that on YouTube.
So not being underground MAY bring quite a lot of limitations.
If an evil copyright holder would scan scene.org once, there would be plenty of grounds to sue all of us into the grounds. Why doesn't this happen? Because we are under the radar.
You can clearly see however with Twitch and YouTube that as soon as you are no longer underground, meaning in this context that you are using the outside world's platforms, suddenly the outside world's rules fully apply to all you do.
You may argue if all of this is a good or a bad thing, but to reject that it's there and that there are disadvantages of doing things in public.
I do believe that in general the scene has always been far more progressive than the outside world, especially if you look at it at the global scale. For a hell lot of what we did and do, the question "is this legal in every single country where sceners are active in?" would need to be answered "no" in a hell lot of cases. If you just take the aspect of Nudity inside scene art, there are plenty of countries where sceners are active where this stuff could get you seriously into trouble.
I reject the notion that any of this is about "oh, the good old times", it has practical implications on what we can do TODAY, and what we'll be able to do TOMORROW.
It's worth taking those concerns seriously.
"but to reject [...] is closing your eyes in front of reality"
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I don't understand the "underground -> creative/edgy" line of thought. There's lot of non-underground communities, companies etc making super edgy stuff. Music videos, VPRO, super weird Roblox games, the occasional Netflix show even.
In my opinion, a fundamental part of art is exploring and pushing boundaries, both legal and illegal ones. Which is much easier if you are 'underground' and under the radar, not bound by the established rules, or at least to a lesser degree. Usually these underground scenes are also less bound by financial interests, which gives additional freedom. A lot of innovations are created this way, which might become completely mainstream later on. Many things we now take for granted were made in some guys garage, unbeknownst to pretty much the entire world. And of course there is no hard boundary between the underground and the mainstream, they both need each other.
An example that comes to mind is gentrification. Where artists move into a neglected neighbourhood and dress up the place. This attracts trendy shops which in turn attracts people with money. After this the neighbourhood becomes too expensive and too mainstream. At this point the artists will leave and move onto something else, taking the creativity with them.
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Also lets not kid ourselves, the average demo looks more like a Eurovision performance backdrop than something super artsy / edgy. That's fine! But it doesn't seem very underground-y to me.
Of course, but this is true for anything. In any field, 80% is borderline incompetent, 19% is mediocre to good and 1% is exceptionnal. And probably of that 1% only a small percentage is absolutely world class. That said, the world class stuff can't exist without the other 99% to compare it to. So whenever I have a garbage entry, I just tell myself I'm contributing to greatness.
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Well, it's possible to take the discussion to the higher level and question the more general usage of "underground" (it would have been better to do this explicitly and not as a post-hoc justification)
FYI - I'm not aware of the context/post that inspired your initial post. Can you provide that?
Reading your opening post, I had the impression you were concerned about something. And I wonder if this thread as an subjective attempt of defining the arbitrary term "Underground" cuts it - does it?
If it does, here's the most underground answer I can potentially think of:
Who cares? :)
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We had this in this thread before, the Hip Hop community which clearly once was really "underground" (non-commercial, developed in the streets by the non-privileged) and lost - at least to me - most of that appeal once outside world rules got applied to them.
Dude, have you heard the new Griselda stuff? They don't even put beats over the samples anymore, they just rap over the loops, it's awesome.
prrrrrrrrrrrrr westside gunnnn
tbf, Roc Marciano brought that style back recently, but Griselda is outdoing themselves with it.
to rp:
While the introduction may suggest this could be a fork of another discussion I actually had been thinking about this for a longer time - it was maybe Gargaj who wrote on the IRC like ~two years ago that the demoscene hasn't been underground for a long time and I felt it needs some further discussion.
My main interest is a rather theoretical, to understand the concepts of art culture and how the demoscene is related to them. This may be uninteresting for many but so are many other threads.
Also thread's topic is related to certain tensions within the demoscene itself which surely adds to the relevance of this topic but I didn't have any particular issue in my mind.
While the introduction may suggest this could be a fork of another discussion I actually had been thinking about this for a longer time - it was maybe Gargaj who wrote on the IRC like ~two years ago that the demoscene hasn't been underground for a long time and I felt it needs some further discussion.
My main interest is a rather theoretical, to understand the concepts of art culture and how the demoscene is related to them. This may be uninteresting for many but so are many other threads.
Also thread's topic is related to certain tensions within the demoscene itself which surely adds to the relevance of this topic but I didn't have any particular issue in my mind.
The loop at 1:14 in this The YOD Fahim track gives me goosebumps every time.
And this YOD track with Heems samples a dutch flute player, who was a guy living on the street in Utrecht and made one record on a dutch labels ONCE, i don't know HOW they got it, but goddamn does this track slap!
This is my last post about the beatless wave, you can all go back to nitpicking about underground now!
This is my last post about the beatless wave, you can all go back to nitpicking about underground now!
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here's the most underground answer I can potentially think of:
Who cares? :)
That. <3 Thread can be closed now
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For centuries it was normal and OK to "remix", aka to take someone else's song, melody and lyrics, and it's just within the last 50 years that this idea was completely killed by the copyright mafia. We had this in this thread before, the Hip Hop community which clearly once was really "underground" (non-commercial, developed in the streets by the non-privileged) and lost - at least to me - most of that appeal once outside world rules got applied to them.
1) Sampling and using loops the oldschool way is still quite present in the hip hop music of today. You just dont hear it, because you are not following the stuff outside the mainstream, which is mostly lost to the autotune/trap beat bolloks :)
2) The Demoscene already bows down to the "copyright mafia" the very same way. For example, many parties require me to sign that i own all rights to whatever i enter in a compo. Technically i cant rip someones tune and use that in my demo anymore - something that was super common years ago. And infact, this is why those parties lose the appeal for me the same way mainstram hip hop does for you, i guess :) (yes i know, i should come to UC)
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Technically i cant rip someones tune and use that in my demo anymore - something that was super common years ago.
While that's true, I think the argument there was more because it was both an unfair advantage when it comes to the competition aspect, and "just nicking stuff from somewhere else" goes somewhat against the creative nature of the scene.
What Groepaz said nails it. I usually find this at german parties infested with Partymeister (or how it's called) - I found that I usually need to venture outside germany to find proper parties. I understand that big parties feel the need to cover their asses with regard to botched german laws. More smaller parties with a proper "who gives at rat's ass" attitude could fix that.
groepaz: Yes, come to UC.
bifet: In this regard, UC is the most Non-German party in Germany that you can find. Come to UC.
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bifet: In this regard, UC is the most Non-German party in Germany that you can find. Come to UC.
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goes somewhat against the creative nature of the scene
But when you take a look back to the demos/intros and musicdiscs on c64/amiga etc a lot of graphics and music got "ripped" and repixeled or even full sample-loops got used. But that changed with the time in the scene. But i guess it's more because the copyright infringements are quick found and punished faster today than back in the days. You can quickly find the content and those responsible on the internets.
Basically most stuff Ravebusters had released had been copyright infringement. And I am still listening today, and in a lot of cases I like those tracks far more than the "original".
Would I be allowed to hand in a Happy Hardcore version of a commercial track at a major demo party today? Probably not. (Yes, I am aware that my music would probably get -1 votes, but it was fun when it was still possible for me to at least try.)
Would I be allowed to hand in a Happy Hardcore version of a commercial track at a major demo party today? Probably not. (Yes, I am aware that my music would probably get -1 votes, but it was fun when it was still possible for me to at least try.)
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Basically most stuff Ravebusters had released had been copyright infringement.
True. And we loved it to "remake" this songs in a small mod. :) I miss those days with my mates sitting the night smoking cigarettes, drinking cola and beer and just making music possible on the amiga. We paid homage to the originals and we learned that way, how to transpose melodies.
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While that's true, I think the argument there was more because it was both an unfair advantage when it comes to the competition aspect, and "just nicking stuff from somewhere else" goes somewhat against the creative nature of the scene.
No. The whole argument is about copyright, and to make it fully technically legal for the organizers to redistribute all competition entries. There never has been an unfair advantange for anyone using ripped tunes - sceners are not stupid and usually recognize them immediatly. Great demos with great original tunes were always regarded higher than great demos with ripped tunes.
And i actually find it limits my creativity when i cant just use a tune that i really like - which is why i will just do it if i feel like it (although i also prefer to use original tunes most of the times - but thats not the point).
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More smaller parties with a proper "who gives at rat's ass" attitude could fix that.
They totally do it for me :)
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sceners are not stupid and usually recognize them immediatly.
forgot: and usually they are also properly credited. We are not talking about ripping something and passing it off as your own here.
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My main interest is a rather theoretical, to understand the concepts of art culture and how the demoscene is related to them.
What are "the concepts of art culture"?
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The whole argument is about copyright, and to make it fully technically legal for the organizers to redistribute all competition entries.
Honestly, when I organize compos they're mostly at smaller parties way under the radar, and the rule is there solely because of the creativity aspect, the same reason we have the "no previously released entries" rule.
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the rule is there solely because of the creativity aspect, the same reason we have the "no previously released entries" rule.
makes no sense to me in that context, see above
Re: the fear of UNESCO recognition changing the scene.
In Ireland the sport of Hurling (no not projectile vomiting, kind of like lacrosse meets field hockey meets a bar room brawl) got intangible cultural recognition a few years ago, and there were similar fears about how this would change things. Hurling is an ancient sport, with a very Irish political history, that means a great deal to who we are. Some of the traditionalists worried about having to tone down the madness of the sport, or make it more acceptable or commercial, but none of that has happened as quite frankly UNESCO don't give a shit once you're in.
The main benefit has been something which hopefully will apply to us, when people wish to set up hurling or camogie (the female version of the sport, which is essentially the same thing) clubs in places with no history of playing it, they can point at the UN website for why it should be allowed. Iirc, there are now leagues in south east asia, with almost no irish players, who keep to the tradition of the sport being amateur and batshit insane, because they have this ability to get permission to rent playing fields etc. If UNESCO can help defend whacking opposition players on the forearm with a heavy stick to put then off bouncing a sliotar (just google it) like its 500ad, I feel confident we'll be able to use it to rent a hall to put spinning cubes with bill gates face on them on a big screen while people pants off and scream amiga in the audience.
In Ireland the sport of Hurling (no not projectile vomiting, kind of like lacrosse meets field hockey meets a bar room brawl) got intangible cultural recognition a few years ago, and there were similar fears about how this would change things. Hurling is an ancient sport, with a very Irish political history, that means a great deal to who we are. Some of the traditionalists worried about having to tone down the madness of the sport, or make it more acceptable or commercial, but none of that has happened as quite frankly UNESCO don't give a shit once you're in.
The main benefit has been something which hopefully will apply to us, when people wish to set up hurling or camogie (the female version of the sport, which is essentially the same thing) clubs in places with no history of playing it, they can point at the UN website for why it should be allowed. Iirc, there are now leagues in south east asia, with almost no irish players, who keep to the tradition of the sport being amateur and batshit insane, because they have this ability to get permission to rent playing fields etc. If UNESCO can help defend whacking opposition players on the forearm with a heavy stick to put then off bouncing a sliotar (just google it) like its 500ad, I feel confident we'll be able to use it to rent a hall to put spinning cubes with bill gates face on them on a big screen while people pants off and scream amiga in the audience.
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the sport of Hurling (no not projectile vomiting, kind of like lacrosse meets field hockey meets a bar room brawl)
I prefer 'really aggressive egg and spoon race'