BeatGen Series: First Principles

19 11 2009

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The fundamental first principle of BeatGen is the beat. Defining the beat however, things become more complex. Music theory tells us that *a* beat is one pulse of time. *The* beat is the interval patterns between pulses. More colloquially, meaning has expanded to represent a core pattern of a song as the beat (this notably predates the hip-hop reference to the beat). In hip-hop, producers make beats which MC’s rap over to become songs. The beat in BeatGen is most closely tied to the latter two definitions but perhaps a bit broader.

A beat is a repeatable sonic motif. It can be a simple drum pattern or the complex layering of samples. It contains a rhythmic mode, whether implied or direct, as there need not be rhythmic instruments used to create a beat. In digital production a beat is a close synonym to a sequence – an arrangement of sonic elements into a repeatable pattern. The beat is the counterpoint of BeatGen, the cantus firmus of which can come from various influences (e.g. a sample), but is then built upon for definition as a beat. Like counterpoint, the beat can stand on its own as a compositional work, but it can also be expanded upon to become full orchestras.

The reason why the beat is fundamental for BeatGen, is closely tied with the demographic. With the bulk of BeatGen being born in the mid to late 1980’s, by the time they were actively tuning into the radio, hip-hop and the beat were commanding the airwaves. This is markedly different from the radio of previous generations, where genre’s may vary from jazz to rock to salsa, but what dominated the radio were melodies, rhythms and harmonies. With the influence of hip-hop, all of these elements merged into one fundamental as the beat.

The second principle of BeatGen is technology, which is also linked to the age of the generation. As they were coming into disposable income, music technology was bursting into the consumer market. The rise of low cost DSP allowed for the technology previously reserved for serious audio professionals to become more populus. Studios were being put into personal computers, while keyboard and drum machine prices were being slashed. There was a boom in music technology publications on the consumer and hobbyist levels. Specifically in hip-hop, the media played a huge role in the promotion of the trade, from producer spotlights, to beat competitions, to magazines like Remix or Scratch which were dedicated to the culture of music production. Suddenly the technology and the techniques, that were once guarded secrets, were becoming common knowledge, priming the stage for BeatGen to take those foundations and expand upon them.

With neither of the first two principles, however, do we get an idea of what the sound of the BeatGen actually is. Well to be clear, BeatGen is not wonky. More precisely, wonky is an element of BeatGen but it isn’t required. A distinction is made because despite how it is commonly used, wonky is not a genre. Even Martin Clark who coined the term¹ recognized this:

“As summer 2008 approaches, a theme– not a genre– has emerged across many existing styles of music: the mid-range is being hijacked by off-kilter, unstable synths. Crossing hip-hop, hyphy, grime, chip tunes, dubstep, crunk, and electro, one flavor unites a network of exciting sounds. What do you call it? Wonky.”

My first time hearing the word was as a descriptor for instrumental hip-hop. I cringed at the thought of it, despite loving the music it described. To my ears the word is an anamanapia for a very prevalent sound in some of the music Clark associates it with. It’s a modulated pitch in the ‘mid-range’ which literally sounds like ‘wonk,’ the opening of your mouth with the double-u emulating the opening of the modulation. This combines with hyper-compressed drums and bass tweaked on the low end to create a sonic motion that mimicks the word – “wonk wonk wonk.”

Over-simplified definition, perhaps, or maybe primal. That was my gut reaction to it and what it described. The thought of a genre based around that sound screamed of early over-saturation. Then I found Clark’s piece and noted he had anointed it as a non-genre. In fact amongst its hardcore proponents the non-genre aspect of wonky is an essential²:

“Wonky is not so much a genre unto itself. Instead it operates as a kind of trans-generic mutational agent, spreading seamlessly between bpm species, liquidating textures, distending rhythmical consistency like so much manipulable sonic sticky toffee: All that is solid melts into a new electronic psychedelia, as fluid and mellifluous as the globalised capitalism which spreads it….”

Over-glorified definition, or perhaps indicative. Wonky as it reads is not a genre but a philosophy alluding to the style of technique of modifying an existing form into a new shape that resembles something slightly (or exaggeratedly) off-kilter. It is from this that the term is able to leap beyond genre’s and out of the world of music to become useful when describing something like architecture³:

“The buildings literally look wonky. They bend, they twist, they appear to collapse or leap, their masses shift and cantilever – put simply their forms appear ‘out of place, out of key and misshapen’⁴”

But of course we’re more interested in how it affects music not just philosophically but also practically:

“Sometimes it indicates de-quantised drums (as in Flying Lotus⁵, Lukid⁶, and other post Dilla beat-artisans) sometimes pitch-bent synth and bass work (Joker⁷, Starkey⁸, Rustie⁹), sometimes a maddening rush of 8 Bit arpeggios (Zomby¹⁰, Ikonika¹¹, Rustie again)… Wonky in the sense of off-key, out of place, misshapen, breaking through an electronic music environment increasingly characterised by myopic microgenre developments and parodic stylistic affectations, as a set of strategies to be applied to a pre-existing template.”

The danger in wonky as defining anything more than a set of techniques, is that as soon as it becomes attached to an artist it either limits the them or expands the breath of the genre too broad. Case and point would be Flying Lotus, appropriate as much of the early applications of the name¹²were being applied to his debut Warp LP Los Angeles¹³. While he does implore the wonk techniques on a number of the songs, they are not exclusive, and in many regards it’s the other techniques that he incorporates that really pull it together as a package.

Nevertheless the wonky name was assigned and those individual techniques, plus numerous others, have been inappropriately incorporated under the label. But each of those techniques have their own history. The de-quantized drums pre-date Dilla¹⁴ and he cannonized them before wonky was conceived. Pitch bent synths in electronic music goes back to at least Detroit Techno. 8-Bit arpeggios are as old as 8-bit synths. Over-compression on drums has long been a hip-hop technique to produce the pumping effect. DJ’s have been manipulating filters since the knob was first created. Sample chopping dates back to Paul C¹⁵. Etc. There are almost an infinite number of techniques at the artists disposal. Combining them together they can produce the wonk, but they can also produce a ballad or even classic boom-bap. The potential combinations are endless and where form is modular as well, the spectrum of possibilities wide.

“What is most interesting about Wonky thus far is its trans-generic nature, its relative looseness and inclusiveness to a proper diversity of disparate aesthetics: stretching between Rave, Dubstep, G-Funk, Instrumental Hip Hop, Crunk, Pop, UK Garage, IDM/Electronica, Techno… etc. Moreover it operates in a number of different tempos, (chiefly dubstep’s 138 bpm and hip hop’s slower 90-110bpm) with producers scattered between different continents, and different regimes of consumption (club and home listening).“

Interestingly enough, despite the multitude of genre’s it crosses into, the main time I hear the label used is in reference to hip-hop. It is used to denote anything that strays too far left of the traditional boom-bap, out of the realm of production for an MC. But again, not all of this instrumental hip-hop is wonky. As a parallel, much of what is being called instrumental hip-hop, and indeed some of the work spotlighting MC’s, can fit under the BeatGen umbrella. The beat as a fundamental, is here contrasted with the decades of history in hip-hop with the MC as the fundamental. In practice, hip-hop is only just coming around to the idea of hip-hop music without an MC as the focal point.

I do believe the above quotes are appropriate in philosophizing the new sound emerging, it is only the label of wonky that is limiting. The sound itself is in a constant state of evolution, preventing it from being definitive. What the author catches in articulating the ability of it to transcend genre’s, can be taken a step further to acknowledge that the genre’s themselves are converging within the artists, birthing new forms. Burial¹⁶ is considered a dubstep artist, but is he producing dubstep, and does what he produce sound wonky? The answer to both is, not really. But there is something that connects him to a Flying Lotus or an Onra¹⁷ despite sounding quite different from the both of them, and it can be understood through the principles laid out here. If we reverse those principles an open formula arises: the techniques are fused using the technology to produce the beats. The beat then is the starting point and common thread, but where it goes from there is what makes the present and future exciting.

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Audio

• Exile “Population Control” from the album Radio

• Rustie “Tar” from the Bad Science EP

• Flying Lotus “Melt!” from the album Los Angeles

• Burial “Endorphin” from the album Untrue

References

¹Martin Clark, “Grime/Dubstep” Pitchfork, 30 April 2008 <http://pitchfork.com/features/grime-dubstep/6840-grime-dubstep/>

² “Wonky as Transversal Rave” Splintering Bone Ashes, 18 February 2009 <http://splinteringboneashes.blogspot.com/2009/02/wonky-as-transversal-rave.html>

³“Wonkitecture” There Was Always Doubt, 14 July 2009 <http://therewasalwaysdoubt.blogspot.com/2009/06/wonkitecture.html>

⁴“Wonky as Transversal Rave, ” Splintering Bone Ashes, 18 February 2009 <http://splinteringboneashes.blogspot.com/2009/02/wonky-as-transversal-rave.html>

⁵“Flying Lotus” MusicBrainz <http://musicbrainz.org/show/artist/?artistid=375648>