SXSWorld

All mixed up: Tomorrow’s
interactive music is here today
By Peter Kirn
Jacinta
It’s unsettling when predictions
come true.
Seven years ago, remixers speaking
at South by Southwest had some
surprising ones: Mash-ups of different
songs would remake music.
Laptops would bring production out
of the studio and into the bedroom.
Remixing songs would become so
commonplace that microlabels would
spread as fast as artists once did. Music
would be as much about the remix as
the mix.
“When we first covered this topic
at SXSW back in 2000, the panel’s
assessment was eerily prescient,” quips
panel leader and remixer Francis
Preve, author of The Remixer’s Bible.
“With this year’s team, it’s almost certain
that we’ll be able to make some
very educated projections for 2012.”
Once a tiny niche, remixing has been
interwoven with music making at
every level. Software tools like Ableton
Live have mashed-up traditional
recording with remixing and DJing
techniques, transforming music creation.
Online tools such as JamGlue
have community members remixing
in their browser instead of just
listening, and then joining in onlinebased
choruses of tunes for Valentine’s
Day. As with digital music creation in
general, though, democratization of
production is nothing without more
access to distribution, and microlabels
are giving artists not only new opportunities
to distribute their music, but
also greater control over how they
sound and appear.
At the March 13 “Music From the
Masses” panel at SXSW Interactive,
an impressive selection of digital
music experts will gather to talk about
the parallel trends of the growth of
remixes in creation and the expanding
universe of online listeners and participants.
Keyboard magazine’s Preve
is moderating, having worked both
on the software side (programming
sounds for Ableton and Korg), and
the DJ/Remix side with #1 Billboard
Dance remixes. Acclaimed DJ,
producer, remix artist and MixMan
founder Josh Gabriel
joins dance artist, keyboardist
and producer
Jacinta to share the
perspective of artists.
Matt Rubens will talk
about JamGlue.com,
and Jonas Tempel
of Beatport will talk
about his company’s
portal to remix labels,
both micro and major.
Francis Preve
Gabriel represents just
how fast the music world can change.
Co-founding music tech vendor
Mixman in the 1990s, he presaged the
mass-market computer music creation
and popular remixing trends to come.
He also worked with the more experimental
side of music performance that
is now spreading through DIY circles,
and in a Dutch club installation he
co-designed, he could control beats by
interrupting beams of light with his
hands. Since then, as half of Gabriel
& Dresden, he has become one of the
best-known names in electronica, with
countless remix hits.
Jacinta illustrates that these trends
really can empower the people making
the music. “As a dance music artist
and songwriter, today’s new technologies
are enabling me to get my songs
out there, especially when dance
music radio has sadly dwindled so
much,” says Jacinta. “It’s brilliant that
DJs and producers can recreate and
remix my songs in their own style that
works for them and their audiences.
Indie labels like my own (Chunky
Music) are relying on these outflows
significantly now.”
“New trends suggest the relationship
of producer and listener can
be inverted. Is it interactive, or is
it music?”
But how does this lead to online choruses
on Valentine’s Day? That’s the
participatory leap sites like JamGlue
hope their listeners will take online.
Whereas the conventional online
community might have members post
their own songs or pick their favorite
artists, online remix culture takes
music one step further. A listener logs
onto the site, records an ode (of either
love or hate) to Valentine’s Day, and
soon is part of an electronic chorus of
singers from around the world.
Looking at the rise of Walkmans and
iPods, it is easy to say digital music
has made listeners more passive. But
new trends suggest the relationship of
producer and listener can be inverted.
Is it interactive, or is it music? n
NOELLE REIFEL
Music From the Masses:
The Remix Revolution
Tuesday, March 13
2:00-3:00pm
Room 12AB
SXSWorld Review / March 2007 21