Post by onetwo12 on Nov 30, 2011 20:53:15 GMT -5
Review of Pretty Lights’ album, Filling Up The City Skies
Derek Vincent Smith, otherwise known as Pretty Lights, is an up and coming American electronic music producer based out of Denver, Colorado. Pretty Lights’ music is self-described as “"glitchy hip-hop beats, buzzing synth lines, and vintage funk and soul samples, sometimes grime.” His eclectic music has a modern feel, but is undoubtedly rooted with old-school flavor. In 2008, Pretty Lights released Filling Up The City Skies, a double-disc album that doesn’t disappoint. True to his style and music philosophy, this sophomore album features sampled vocals that blend smoothly with catchy beats. It’s a cd filled with tracks you can imagine dancing to, driving to, studying to, or just simply relaxing with. And the best part about it: it’s completely free.
Like many modern producers, Pretty Lights is notorious for his usage of digital sampling. His uniqueness stems from pairing the samples with organic beats that he creates with the Novation X-Station, monome and the Akai MPD32—digital controllers. The Novation X-Station may be described as a “virtual analog synthesizer, audio interface and MIDI controller.” MIDI, or Musical Instrument Digital Interface, is the commercial standard (introduced in 1984) for developing electronic music and helps transduce signals into music. Monome is a button-grid controller used throughout the electroacoustic music industry. Other electronic artists like deadmau5, Nine Inch Nails, and Imogen Heap are known to utilize a monome to provide sample sequencing, amongst other capabilities (like sending MIDI messages to other synthesizers).
Smith’s music style is reminiscent of early electroacoustic pioneers in many ways. His utilization of synthesizers echoes Robert Moog’s first experimentation with the Moog synthesizer. The characteristic analog driving rhythm of synthesizers is evident in multiple songs, like “Hot like Sauce.” Max Matthew’s early computer music introduced the utilization of a computer generated voice; a similar style of vocal is utilized in “Who Loves Me.” Eric Satie’s looping effect is utilized in many tracks to create a pulsating beat that is both captivating and infectious. A blend of the musique concrète and electronische musik, Pretty Lights utilizes both synthetic and natural sounds to great effect.
Like Pierre Schaeffer, Pierre Henry, and Bell Labs (early electroacoustic pioneers), Pretty Lights offers all of his music for free. Acknowledging the heavily-sampled nature of his music, Pretty Lights opts for an open-source philosophy towards music production—a sentiment that proceeds to gather momentum as his music spreads across blogosphere, electronic music festivals, and word of mouth. In today’s corporate music environment, this cavalier attitude towards music is undoubtedly refreshing. Pretty Lights does accept donations that go a long way in helping him keep his music free for all to enjoy; he exudes humbleness and a genuine love for music that is incredibly endearing to his growing mass of supporters. This album is available for free download on the artist’s website (http://www.prettylightsmusic.com/#/downloads) and through Amazon/iTunes for purchase.
From classical jazz to hip-hop, Pretty Lights’ samples anything and everything from Otis Redding to 50 Cent (“Change is Gonna Come” and “How We Do”) to provide the audience with a provocative listening experience. For example, Pretty Lights’ most popular song, “Finally Moving” features samples from Etta James’ “Something’s Got a Hold on Me,” a guitar sample of “Private Number” by Judy Clay and Willliam Bell, and a sample by rapper 4Tay from his single, “Playa’s Club.” Like true electronic music, Pretty Lights’ music “does not breathe; it is not affected by the limitations of human performance…electronic music springs from the imagination” (Holmes, 11). The casual listener can enjoy “vibing” to electric dance beats, energetic dub influences, and sensual jazz elements throughout this excellent collection. His technical repertoire includes granular synthesis, sampling, pitch shifting, record scratching, looping, and generating echoes to name a few—created a rich timbre. His music conveys a variety of emotions (listen to “Something’s Wrong”) that stimulate a variety of senses; the listener can even imagine many of these songs in pivotal movie scenes. Whether or not you are a connoisseur of electronic music or not, Pretty Lights’ Filling Up The City Skies is, plain and simple, good music for everyone to enjoy. The beauty of this album is how many genres it transcends—a result of Smith’s clever sampling choices that provide a soul-satisfying listen.
After listening to this album, a quick Google search helped stumbles upon Pretty Lights’ latest single (not on the album), “I Know the Truth.” This track was an opportunity for Smith to experiment with new sounds—his fans are glad he did. In his own words, “I wanted to try to fuse the emotion of dark 60’s soul music with the energy of raw bass heavy dubstep. All the instruments were recorded to tape and then pressed to vinyl and then sampled for the sole purpose of attaining a warm organic timbre, and all the bass and synth sounds were reprocessed through analog synth modules to get a dirtier and at the same time warmer tone. It’s my first attempt at producing in a new style I like to call analog electronica. It’s modern electronic music production created with an approach based on techniques from 40-50 years ago.” Through his record company, Pretty Lights Music, he continues to inspire and collaborate with other hip-hop/electronic music producers like Gramatik, Michal Menert, Paper Diamond and Break Science (whose songs are also available for download). A modern technosonic pioneer in his own right, Pretty Lights continues to impress. His unique and versatile sound is both soothing and energizing, organic and synthetic, innovative and provocative, and most importantly, completely laced with soul—a sentiment appreciated by any music lover.
Derek Vincent Smith, otherwise known as Pretty Lights, is an up and coming American electronic music producer based out of Denver, Colorado. Pretty Lights’ music is self-described as “"glitchy hip-hop beats, buzzing synth lines, and vintage funk and soul samples, sometimes grime.” His eclectic music has a modern feel, but is undoubtedly rooted with old-school flavor. In 2008, Pretty Lights released Filling Up The City Skies, a double-disc album that doesn’t disappoint. True to his style and music philosophy, this sophomore album features sampled vocals that blend smoothly with catchy beats. It’s a cd filled with tracks you can imagine dancing to, driving to, studying to, or just simply relaxing with. And the best part about it: it’s completely free.
Like many modern producers, Pretty Lights is notorious for his usage of digital sampling. His uniqueness stems from pairing the samples with organic beats that he creates with the Novation X-Station, monome and the Akai MPD32—digital controllers. The Novation X-Station may be described as a “virtual analog synthesizer, audio interface and MIDI controller.” MIDI, or Musical Instrument Digital Interface, is the commercial standard (introduced in 1984) for developing electronic music and helps transduce signals into music. Monome is a button-grid controller used throughout the electroacoustic music industry. Other electronic artists like deadmau5, Nine Inch Nails, and Imogen Heap are known to utilize a monome to provide sample sequencing, amongst other capabilities (like sending MIDI messages to other synthesizers).
Smith’s music style is reminiscent of early electroacoustic pioneers in many ways. His utilization of synthesizers echoes Robert Moog’s first experimentation with the Moog synthesizer. The characteristic analog driving rhythm of synthesizers is evident in multiple songs, like “Hot like Sauce.” Max Matthew’s early computer music introduced the utilization of a computer generated voice; a similar style of vocal is utilized in “Who Loves Me.” Eric Satie’s looping effect is utilized in many tracks to create a pulsating beat that is both captivating and infectious. A blend of the musique concrète and electronische musik, Pretty Lights utilizes both synthetic and natural sounds to great effect.
Like Pierre Schaeffer, Pierre Henry, and Bell Labs (early electroacoustic pioneers), Pretty Lights offers all of his music for free. Acknowledging the heavily-sampled nature of his music, Pretty Lights opts for an open-source philosophy towards music production—a sentiment that proceeds to gather momentum as his music spreads across blogosphere, electronic music festivals, and word of mouth. In today’s corporate music environment, this cavalier attitude towards music is undoubtedly refreshing. Pretty Lights does accept donations that go a long way in helping him keep his music free for all to enjoy; he exudes humbleness and a genuine love for music that is incredibly endearing to his growing mass of supporters. This album is available for free download on the artist’s website (http://www.prettylightsmusic.com/#/downloads) and through Amazon/iTunes for purchase.
From classical jazz to hip-hop, Pretty Lights’ samples anything and everything from Otis Redding to 50 Cent (“Change is Gonna Come” and “How We Do”) to provide the audience with a provocative listening experience. For example, Pretty Lights’ most popular song, “Finally Moving” features samples from Etta James’ “Something’s Got a Hold on Me,” a guitar sample of “Private Number” by Judy Clay and Willliam Bell, and a sample by rapper 4Tay from his single, “Playa’s Club.” Like true electronic music, Pretty Lights’ music “does not breathe; it is not affected by the limitations of human performance…electronic music springs from the imagination” (Holmes, 11). The casual listener can enjoy “vibing” to electric dance beats, energetic dub influences, and sensual jazz elements throughout this excellent collection. His technical repertoire includes granular synthesis, sampling, pitch shifting, record scratching, looping, and generating echoes to name a few—created a rich timbre. His music conveys a variety of emotions (listen to “Something’s Wrong”) that stimulate a variety of senses; the listener can even imagine many of these songs in pivotal movie scenes. Whether or not you are a connoisseur of electronic music or not, Pretty Lights’ Filling Up The City Skies is, plain and simple, good music for everyone to enjoy. The beauty of this album is how many genres it transcends—a result of Smith’s clever sampling choices that provide a soul-satisfying listen.
After listening to this album, a quick Google search helped stumbles upon Pretty Lights’ latest single (not on the album), “I Know the Truth.” This track was an opportunity for Smith to experiment with new sounds—his fans are glad he did. In his own words, “I wanted to try to fuse the emotion of dark 60’s soul music with the energy of raw bass heavy dubstep. All the instruments were recorded to tape and then pressed to vinyl and then sampled for the sole purpose of attaining a warm organic timbre, and all the bass and synth sounds were reprocessed through analog synth modules to get a dirtier and at the same time warmer tone. It’s my first attempt at producing in a new style I like to call analog electronica. It’s modern electronic music production created with an approach based on techniques from 40-50 years ago.” Through his record company, Pretty Lights Music, he continues to inspire and collaborate with other hip-hop/electronic music producers like Gramatik, Michal Menert, Paper Diamond and Break Science (whose songs are also available for download). A modern technosonic pioneer in his own right, Pretty Lights continues to impress. His unique and versatile sound is both soothing and energizing, organic and synthetic, innovative and provocative, and most importantly, completely laced with soul—a sentiment appreciated by any music lover.
You still beautiful.
