Samantha Bennett
Samantha Bennett is Professor of Music and Associate Dean Higher Degree Research at the Australian National University, and Chair of the International Association for the Study of Popular Music (IASPM). Her research interests bridge music and science and technology studies, focusing on sound recording, music production, music technology, and the manifestation of technology and process in recorded popular music. Her co-authored book with Associate Professor Eliot Bates (CUNY), Gear: Cultures of Audio and Music Technologies, is forthcoming from The MIT Press (2024), and a short-form monograph, Secrets and Revelatory Discourse in Music and Audio Technology Culture, is forthcoming from Cambridge University Press (2024). She is the author of two further monographs, Modern Records, Maverick Methods: Technology and Process in Popular Music Record Production 1978-2000 (Bloomsbury Academic) and Peepshow, a 33 1/3 series edition on the album by Siouxsie and the Banshees (Bloomsbury Academic). She is also a co-editor of Critical Approaches to the Production of Music and Sound (Bloomsbury Academic) and Popular Music, Stars and Stardom (ANU Press). Samantha’s journal articles are published in Popular Music, Popular Music and Society, The Journal of Popular Music Studies, and IASPM@journal and her technical papers are published in the Journal of the Audio Engineering Society. In 2014, Samantha gave the biannual American Musicological Society Lecture at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum Library and Archives where she also held a research fellowship in 2015. She is on the editorial board of the Cambridge Elements in Popular Music (CUP) series, and an advisory board member and editor of Bloomsbury Academic’s 33 1/3 series. Prior to her work in academia, Samantha worked extensively as an audio engineer in multiple London recording studios and is a former Director of the UK's Music Producer's Guild. She is an active member of the Audio Engineering Society, the Society for Music Production Research, and a number of Working Class Academic and Leadership networks.
As an educator, Samantha has eighteen years curriculum design, authorship and quality management experience across FE/TAFE, teaching intensive, and research intensiveUniversities. She has held numerous external consultant and examiner positions at overseas Universities and is the recipient of multiple teaching awards, notably, an Australian Award for University Teaching (2020), the Vice Chancellor's Award for Education Excellence and a Vice Chancellor's Award for Teaching Excellence at the Australian National University (2019) and a Vice Chancellor’s Teaching Fellowship at the University of Westminster (2012). She is a Principal Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. Since arriving at the Australian National University in 2013, she has authored a broad music technology and popular music curriculum and, after securing a $250,000 major equipment grant, led the refurbishment of the School of Music's recording studio facilities to include the installation of a 48-channel Neve Genesys console and a blend of vintage and contemporary microphones and processors.
Supervisors: Prof. Allan F. Moore - PhD Supervisor
As an educator, Samantha has eighteen years curriculum design, authorship and quality management experience across FE/TAFE, teaching intensive, and research intensiveUniversities. She has held numerous external consultant and examiner positions at overseas Universities and is the recipient of multiple teaching awards, notably, an Australian Award for University Teaching (2020), the Vice Chancellor's Award for Education Excellence and a Vice Chancellor's Award for Teaching Excellence at the Australian National University (2019) and a Vice Chancellor’s Teaching Fellowship at the University of Westminster (2012). She is a Principal Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. Since arriving at the Australian National University in 2013, she has authored a broad music technology and popular music curriculum and, after securing a $250,000 major equipment grant, led the refurbishment of the School of Music's recording studio facilities to include the installation of a 48-channel Neve Genesys console and a blend of vintage and contemporary microphones and processors.
Supervisors: Prof. Allan F. Moore - PhD Supervisor
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Books by Samantha Bennett
Drawing on a discography of more than 300 recordings across pop, rock, hip hop, dance and alternative musics from artists such as the Beastie Boys, Madonna, U2 and Fatboy Slim, and extensive and exclusive ethnographic work with many world-renowned recordists, Modern Records presents a fresh and insightful new perspective on one of the most significant eras in commercial music record production.
The book traces the development of significant music technologies through the 1980s and 1990s, revealing how changing attitudes and innovative techniques of recording personnel reimagined recording processes and, finally, exemplifies the impact of these technologies and techniques via six comprehensive tech-processual analyses. This meticulously researched and timely book reveals the complexity of recordists' responses to a technological landscape in flux.
“Modern Records begins with a simple question: “How are recordings made and why do they sound the way they do?” The answers to that question take Bennett deep into the processes of recording and are as fascinating and diverse, profound and fun as the music itself. Process, technology, sound and music are at the heart of this study and the strength of Bennett's approach is how she links them together – an illuminating read for musicians, fans and scholars alike.” – Paul Théberge, Canada Research Professor in Music and Interdisciplinary Studies, Carleton University, Canada, and co-editor of Living Stereo: Histories and Cultures of Multichannel Sound (Bloomsbury, 2015)
“In Modern Records, Maverick Methods, Sam Bennett not only provides a hugely detailed study of the linking technologies and methods that characterise the two decades between the 'golden age' of rock recording in the 1960s/70s and the current world of the DAW, she also provides a fascinating analysis of the tortured and complex process through which attitudes to recording technologies both developed and changed. This is an important and welcome addition to the literature.” – Simon Zagorski-Thomas, Professor of Music, London College of Music, UK, and author of The Musicology of Record Production (2014)
“In this deeply researched study of commercial popular music production in the 1980s and '90s, Samantha Bennett turns the digital vs. analog debate on its head, revealing the hybrid “maverick methods” recordists developed as they blended technologies and practices from both analog and digital domains in a rapidly changing studio environment. Rich in technical detail and musical analysis, the book nevertheless underscores the human element of record-making as recordists' choices and attitudes influenced the sound of the “modern records” they produced.” – Susan Schmidt Horning, Associate Professor of History, St. John's University, USA, and author of Chasing Sound: Technology, Culture, and the Art of Studio Recording from Edison to the LP (2013).
Samantha Bennett looks at how Siouxsie and the Banshees' Peepshow is better understood in the context of film and film music (as opposed to popular music studies or, indeed, the works of other rock n' roll bands). Drawing upon more than one hundred films and film scores, this book focuses on Peepshow's deeply embedded historical and aesthetic (para)cinematic influences: How is each track a reflection of genre film? Who are the various featured protagonists? And how does Peepshow's diverse orchestration, complex musical forms, atypical narratives and evocative soundscapes reveal an inherently cinematic record? Ultimately, Peepshow can be read as a soundtrack to all the films Siouxsie and the Banshees ever saw. Or perhaps it was the soundtrack to the greatest film they never made.
Table of contents
List of Figures
List of Tables
List of Contributors
Chapter 1: The Production of Music and Sound: A Multidisciplinary Critique
Eliot Bates and Samantha Bennett
Section 1: Situating Production: Place, Space and Gender
Chapter 2: Field Recording and the Production of Place
Tom Western (University of Edinburgh, Scotland)
Chapter 3: The Poietics of Space: The Role and Co-performance of the Spatial Environment in Popular Music Production
Damon Minchella (University of Birmingham, England)
Chapter 4: “An Indestructible Sound”: Locating Gender in Genres Using Different Music Production Approaches
Paula Wolfe (Sib Records, England)
Section 2: Beyond Representation
Chapter 5: Producing TV Series Music in Istanbul
Eliot Bates (City University of New York, USA)
Chapter 6: Reclamation and Celebration: Kodangu, a Torres Strait Islander Album of Ancestral and Contemporary Australian Indigenous Music
Karl Neuenfeldt (Queensland Conservatorium, Griffith University, Australia)
Section 3: Electronic Music
Chapter 7: “All Sounds Are Created Equal”: Mediating Democracy in Acousmatic Education
Patrick Valiquet (University of Edinburgh, UK)
Chapter 8: Technologies of Play in Hip-Hop and Electronic Dance Music Production and Performance
Mike D'Errico (UCLA, USA)
Section 4: Technology and Technique
Chapter 9: Weapons of Mass Deception: The Invention and Re-invention of Recording Studio Mythology
Alan Williams (UMASS, Lowell, USA)
Chapter 10: Auto-Tune In Situ: Digital Vocal Correction And Conversational Repair
Owen Marshall (Cornell University, USA)
Section 5: Mediating Sound and Silence
Chapter 11: Listening To or Through Technology: Opaque and Transparent Mediation
Ragnhild Brøvig-Hanssen (University of Oslo, Norway)
Chapter 12: Six Types of Silence
Richard Osborne (Middlesex University, England)
Section 6: Virtuality and Online Production
Chapter 13: Intermixtuality: Case Studies in Online Music [Re]Production
Samantha Bennett (Australian National University, Australia)
Chapter 14: Crowdfunding and Alternative Modes of Production
Mark Thorley (Coventry University, England)
Index
Edited Editions by Samantha Bennett
recording session procedures, the production of sonic trends, as well as the aesthetics, value and iconicity of recording technologies. Such narratives affect how songwriting and sound recording are understood and influence the processes and techniques employed by musicians. They are also used as powerful drivers of new products: plug-ins, amps, consoles and outboard equipment, which purport to bring the listener closer to that elusive sound. We are particularly interested in contributions that focus on the relationship between sound recording and popular music that include, but not are limited to, the following themes:
⎯ Musical aesthetics, song structures, and song forms.
⎯ Philosophical approaches to songwriting and studio production.
⎯ The construction of fantastical narratives surrounding specific recording sessions, production processes or a recordist’s “sound”.
⎯ The relationship between analogue and digital recording technologies in musical practices.
⎯ The emulation and commodification of analogue production processes, signal chains, equipment or instruments via plugins and other digital products.
⎯ Discourses of fidelity and loudness relating to media such as radio and networked mobile audio.
⎯ Working practices and decision processes within the recording studio.
Contributions that emphasize other philosophical, mythological, or ideological interrelationships between popular music and sound recording will also be considered.
Contributors are encouraged to submit a 300-word proposal plus references by Friday the 11th of December 2015, to:
Dr Samantha Bennett (Australian National University, Australia)
[email protected]
Dr Eve Klein (University of Queensland, Australia)
[email protected]
The submission deadline for articles is the 31st of March 2016. Publication is scheduled for late 2016. Please register as an Author and submit online, ensuring you are a current member of IASPM (instructions can be found below).
Journal of the International Association for the Study of Popular Music
www.iaspmjournal.net
Published Articles & Book Chapters by Samantha Bennett
Through its duration of more than 6 minutes, “Cirice” (Old English: “church”) traverses a number of sonic environments befitting its overarching themes and lyrical content. From a listener perspective, “Cirice” features multiple examples of what Moylan has termed ‘host environments’ within its ‘overall environment’ (Moylan 2020, 292). Drawing on aforementioned phonomusicological studies, as well as works by Hall (1966) and Moore (2012) that consider proxemics, this chapter will apply a tech-processual analytical mode to the track in order to reveal the sonic construction and perception of 4 distinct environmental and emotional situ as sonically discernible in “Cirice.” This chapter also recognizes influences and sonic tropes drawn from both metal and Western Art Music as present in “Cirice.”
Applications of dynamics and time-based signal processing, spatial positioning and the proximity of instruments to each other and to the foreground and background of the mix situate the listener (as well as track protagonists) in a range of different spaces. Firstly, the foregrounding of an organ and voice with significant applied time-based signal processing in a lengthy, reverberant space clearly fabricates the inside of a church. Secondly, lyrical references to thunder, in both its literal sense as heard outside in a storm and metaphorically as internalized emotion, are reinforced with a timpani leitmotif, which varies in proximity to both listener and protagonists throughout the track. Thirdly, temporal and spatial manipulation at times abandons the listener and protagonists in desolate spaces, indicating isolation and defection. Lastly, and by contrast, similar temporal manipulations are reversed, thus indicating connection and allegiance.
With particular focus on its tech-processual content, the track in its lossless, stereo digital file format will be iteratively analyzed in an acoustically treated listening room at the Australian National University. Technological and processual matters will be documented through the listening process and along the timeline of the track duration.
Accounts of intertextual practices often focus on sampling (Goodwin, 1990; Beadle, 1993) or, more recently, on sample-based composition such as mash up (Navas, 2010; Sinnreich, 2010; Sheiga, 2007). Online intertextual practice has only recently been acknowledged as a site of scholarly enquiry (Jarvenpaa & Lang, 2011; Michielse, 2013; Bennett, 2015). Earlier in this emergent discourse, both Lacasse (2000) and Taylor (2001) identified the implications of interactive remixing from authorship and reception perspectives. This chapter moves the discourse forward, addressing the emergence of 3 clear online remix sites, those being: creative commons remixing; remixing event host sites; and, direct artist-to fan community remix competitions and events. 4 case studies are used to elucidate artists’ engagement of fans in music production processes. US EDM producer Deadmau5’s 2010 collaboration with BeatPort and Acapellas4All with the stem release of ‘SOFI Needs a Ladder’ is an example of creative commons remixing in a competition context. In 2012, US Indie
artist Bon Iver released mix stems from the entire Bon Iver album in a competition context with Indaba Music and Spotify. Via Beatport PLAY, Big Beat Records and OWSLA, UK EDM producer Skrillex and Jamaican Reggaestep artist Damian Marley released stems to their 2012 single ‘Make it Bun Dem’ in 3 concurrent online competitions. In 2011, US rock group REM released 126 separate stem files to their fan community via their REMHQ website. These case studies illustrate the various modes of engagement used by contemporary artists to engage their fan bases in
production processes. Building on research published in the Oxford Handbook of Music & Virtuality (featuring case studies focused on Kanye West, William Orbit, Radiohead and Nine Inch Nails), the following questions are addressed:
- how, and to what extent, do artists engage fans via the music production
process?
- what is revealed by analyzing the stem components of a multitrack recording, otherwise concealed as part of a ‘whole’ track?
- how do online remixers interact with mix stems, form communities and
disseminate their mixes online?
- what are the implications with regards the ‘democratisation’ of recording &
production skill sets?
Drawing on a discography of more than 300 recordings across pop, rock, hip hop, dance and alternative musics from artists such as the Beastie Boys, Madonna, U2 and Fatboy Slim, and extensive and exclusive ethnographic work with many world-renowned recordists, Modern Records presents a fresh and insightful new perspective on one of the most significant eras in commercial music record production.
The book traces the development of significant music technologies through the 1980s and 1990s, revealing how changing attitudes and innovative techniques of recording personnel reimagined recording processes and, finally, exemplifies the impact of these technologies and techniques via six comprehensive tech-processual analyses. This meticulously researched and timely book reveals the complexity of recordists' responses to a technological landscape in flux.
“Modern Records begins with a simple question: “How are recordings made and why do they sound the way they do?” The answers to that question take Bennett deep into the processes of recording and are as fascinating and diverse, profound and fun as the music itself. Process, technology, sound and music are at the heart of this study and the strength of Bennett's approach is how she links them together – an illuminating read for musicians, fans and scholars alike.” – Paul Théberge, Canada Research Professor in Music and Interdisciplinary Studies, Carleton University, Canada, and co-editor of Living Stereo: Histories and Cultures of Multichannel Sound (Bloomsbury, 2015)
“In Modern Records, Maverick Methods, Sam Bennett not only provides a hugely detailed study of the linking technologies and methods that characterise the two decades between the 'golden age' of rock recording in the 1960s/70s and the current world of the DAW, she also provides a fascinating analysis of the tortured and complex process through which attitudes to recording technologies both developed and changed. This is an important and welcome addition to the literature.” – Simon Zagorski-Thomas, Professor of Music, London College of Music, UK, and author of The Musicology of Record Production (2014)
“In this deeply researched study of commercial popular music production in the 1980s and '90s, Samantha Bennett turns the digital vs. analog debate on its head, revealing the hybrid “maverick methods” recordists developed as they blended technologies and practices from both analog and digital domains in a rapidly changing studio environment. Rich in technical detail and musical analysis, the book nevertheless underscores the human element of record-making as recordists' choices and attitudes influenced the sound of the “modern records” they produced.” – Susan Schmidt Horning, Associate Professor of History, St. John's University, USA, and author of Chasing Sound: Technology, Culture, and the Art of Studio Recording from Edison to the LP (2013).
Samantha Bennett looks at how Siouxsie and the Banshees' Peepshow is better understood in the context of film and film music (as opposed to popular music studies or, indeed, the works of other rock n' roll bands). Drawing upon more than one hundred films and film scores, this book focuses on Peepshow's deeply embedded historical and aesthetic (para)cinematic influences: How is each track a reflection of genre film? Who are the various featured protagonists? And how does Peepshow's diverse orchestration, complex musical forms, atypical narratives and evocative soundscapes reveal an inherently cinematic record? Ultimately, Peepshow can be read as a soundtrack to all the films Siouxsie and the Banshees ever saw. Or perhaps it was the soundtrack to the greatest film they never made.
Table of contents
List of Figures
List of Tables
List of Contributors
Chapter 1: The Production of Music and Sound: A Multidisciplinary Critique
Eliot Bates and Samantha Bennett
Section 1: Situating Production: Place, Space and Gender
Chapter 2: Field Recording and the Production of Place
Tom Western (University of Edinburgh, Scotland)
Chapter 3: The Poietics of Space: The Role and Co-performance of the Spatial Environment in Popular Music Production
Damon Minchella (University of Birmingham, England)
Chapter 4: “An Indestructible Sound”: Locating Gender in Genres Using Different Music Production Approaches
Paula Wolfe (Sib Records, England)
Section 2: Beyond Representation
Chapter 5: Producing TV Series Music in Istanbul
Eliot Bates (City University of New York, USA)
Chapter 6: Reclamation and Celebration: Kodangu, a Torres Strait Islander Album of Ancestral and Contemporary Australian Indigenous Music
Karl Neuenfeldt (Queensland Conservatorium, Griffith University, Australia)
Section 3: Electronic Music
Chapter 7: “All Sounds Are Created Equal”: Mediating Democracy in Acousmatic Education
Patrick Valiquet (University of Edinburgh, UK)
Chapter 8: Technologies of Play in Hip-Hop and Electronic Dance Music Production and Performance
Mike D'Errico (UCLA, USA)
Section 4: Technology and Technique
Chapter 9: Weapons of Mass Deception: The Invention and Re-invention of Recording Studio Mythology
Alan Williams (UMASS, Lowell, USA)
Chapter 10: Auto-Tune In Situ: Digital Vocal Correction And Conversational Repair
Owen Marshall (Cornell University, USA)
Section 5: Mediating Sound and Silence
Chapter 11: Listening To or Through Technology: Opaque and Transparent Mediation
Ragnhild Brøvig-Hanssen (University of Oslo, Norway)
Chapter 12: Six Types of Silence
Richard Osborne (Middlesex University, England)
Section 6: Virtuality and Online Production
Chapter 13: Intermixtuality: Case Studies in Online Music [Re]Production
Samantha Bennett (Australian National University, Australia)
Chapter 14: Crowdfunding and Alternative Modes of Production
Mark Thorley (Coventry University, England)
Index
recording session procedures, the production of sonic trends, as well as the aesthetics, value and iconicity of recording technologies. Such narratives affect how songwriting and sound recording are understood and influence the processes and techniques employed by musicians. They are also used as powerful drivers of new products: plug-ins, amps, consoles and outboard equipment, which purport to bring the listener closer to that elusive sound. We are particularly interested in contributions that focus on the relationship between sound recording and popular music that include, but not are limited to, the following themes:
⎯ Musical aesthetics, song structures, and song forms.
⎯ Philosophical approaches to songwriting and studio production.
⎯ The construction of fantastical narratives surrounding specific recording sessions, production processes or a recordist’s “sound”.
⎯ The relationship between analogue and digital recording technologies in musical practices.
⎯ The emulation and commodification of analogue production processes, signal chains, equipment or instruments via plugins and other digital products.
⎯ Discourses of fidelity and loudness relating to media such as radio and networked mobile audio.
⎯ Working practices and decision processes within the recording studio.
Contributions that emphasize other philosophical, mythological, or ideological interrelationships between popular music and sound recording will also be considered.
Contributors are encouraged to submit a 300-word proposal plus references by Friday the 11th of December 2015, to:
Dr Samantha Bennett (Australian National University, Australia)
[email protected]
Dr Eve Klein (University of Queensland, Australia)
[email protected]
The submission deadline for articles is the 31st of March 2016. Publication is scheduled for late 2016. Please register as an Author and submit online, ensuring you are a current member of IASPM (instructions can be found below).
Journal of the International Association for the Study of Popular Music
www.iaspmjournal.net
Through its duration of more than 6 minutes, “Cirice” (Old English: “church”) traverses a number of sonic environments befitting its overarching themes and lyrical content. From a listener perspective, “Cirice” features multiple examples of what Moylan has termed ‘host environments’ within its ‘overall environment’ (Moylan 2020, 292). Drawing on aforementioned phonomusicological studies, as well as works by Hall (1966) and Moore (2012) that consider proxemics, this chapter will apply a tech-processual analytical mode to the track in order to reveal the sonic construction and perception of 4 distinct environmental and emotional situ as sonically discernible in “Cirice.” This chapter also recognizes influences and sonic tropes drawn from both metal and Western Art Music as present in “Cirice.”
Applications of dynamics and time-based signal processing, spatial positioning and the proximity of instruments to each other and to the foreground and background of the mix situate the listener (as well as track protagonists) in a range of different spaces. Firstly, the foregrounding of an organ and voice with significant applied time-based signal processing in a lengthy, reverberant space clearly fabricates the inside of a church. Secondly, lyrical references to thunder, in both its literal sense as heard outside in a storm and metaphorically as internalized emotion, are reinforced with a timpani leitmotif, which varies in proximity to both listener and protagonists throughout the track. Thirdly, temporal and spatial manipulation at times abandons the listener and protagonists in desolate spaces, indicating isolation and defection. Lastly, and by contrast, similar temporal manipulations are reversed, thus indicating connection and allegiance.
With particular focus on its tech-processual content, the track in its lossless, stereo digital file format will be iteratively analyzed in an acoustically treated listening room at the Australian National University. Technological and processual matters will be documented through the listening process and along the timeline of the track duration.
Accounts of intertextual practices often focus on sampling (Goodwin, 1990; Beadle, 1993) or, more recently, on sample-based composition such as mash up (Navas, 2010; Sinnreich, 2010; Sheiga, 2007). Online intertextual practice has only recently been acknowledged as a site of scholarly enquiry (Jarvenpaa & Lang, 2011; Michielse, 2013; Bennett, 2015). Earlier in this emergent discourse, both Lacasse (2000) and Taylor (2001) identified the implications of interactive remixing from authorship and reception perspectives. This chapter moves the discourse forward, addressing the emergence of 3 clear online remix sites, those being: creative commons remixing; remixing event host sites; and, direct artist-to fan community remix competitions and events. 4 case studies are used to elucidate artists’ engagement of fans in music production processes. US EDM producer Deadmau5’s 2010 collaboration with BeatPort and Acapellas4All with the stem release of ‘SOFI Needs a Ladder’ is an example of creative commons remixing in a competition context. In 2012, US Indie
artist Bon Iver released mix stems from the entire Bon Iver album in a competition context with Indaba Music and Spotify. Via Beatport PLAY, Big Beat Records and OWSLA, UK EDM producer Skrillex and Jamaican Reggaestep artist Damian Marley released stems to their 2012 single ‘Make it Bun Dem’ in 3 concurrent online competitions. In 2011, US rock group REM released 126 separate stem files to their fan community via their REMHQ website. These case studies illustrate the various modes of engagement used by contemporary artists to engage their fan bases in
production processes. Building on research published in the Oxford Handbook of Music & Virtuality (featuring case studies focused on Kanye West, William Orbit, Radiohead and Nine Inch Nails), the following questions are addressed:
- how, and to what extent, do artists engage fans via the music production
process?
- what is revealed by analyzing the stem components of a multitrack recording, otherwise concealed as part of a ‘whole’ track?
- how do online remixers interact with mix stems, form communities and
disseminate their mixes online?
- what are the implications with regards the ‘democratisation’ of recording &
production skill sets?
In Noise – The Political Economy of Music, Jacques Attali described recording practice as ‘…a means of social control, a stake in politics…’3 In the late 1970s, John Loder, founding recordist, studio and label owner at Southern Studios, Wood Green, claimed his stake in the anarchist punk and post-punk musical underworld. For more than 2 decades, Loder pioneered an oft-imitated, subversive recording aesthetics befitting of the anarcho-punk, noisecore and proto-grunge acts he affiliated with. His predominantly live recordings were assembled and released quickly, featured minimal technological intervention at source, yet were routinely [under] mixed as raw and unprocessed, sometimes vocally indecipherable, and often with foregrounded distortion. Southern Studios’ discography reads as a ‘who’s who’ of independent UK and US punk, yet the studios, Loder and his sonically discernible [anti] production style remain absent in independent rock historiography. This paper seeks to address this omission by dealing with the establishment and characteristics of Southern Studios, with special focus on John Loder’s working practice as Southern’s main
recordist.
Via recordings such as CRASS’ The Feeding of the 5000 (1977) and Penis Envy (1981), The Jesus and Mary Chain’s Psychocandy, (1985), Big Black’s Songs About Fucking (1987), Babes in Toyland’s To Mother (1990) among many others, John Loder’s distinctive [anti] production style is considered as sonic catalyst; The Feeding of the 5000 (1977) as a significant aural turning point signposting a [no] future trajectory for independent and underground punk. The sonic continuum of Loder’s working practices are further traced through later recordings, including Pixies’ Surfer Rosa (1988), recorded by Steve Albini, and Therapy?’s Nurse (1992), recorded by
Loder’s assistant recordist Harvey Birrell.
Blending ethnographic and analytical findings, this paper addresses the place of Southern Studios in alternative music history, as well as its unique environment, technologies and operations before analysing a number of Loder’s recordings to elucidate his construction of a distinctive, enduring and fundamentally subversive sonic signature.
XX Biennial IASPM Conference
School of Music, The Australian National University
Canberra, Australia, 24–28 June 2019
Call for Presentations
Following the request of the Local Organizing Committee the deadline for abstract submissions to the XX IASPM Biennial conference, to be held in Canberra, Australia, 24–28 June 2019, has been extended for a fortnight, that is until 15th August. You can find the CfP including the new deadline below. Please notice that letters of acceptance will be sent by 15th October 2018 instead of 30th September.
As certain songsters and songstresses have noted, seasons turn, turn, turn, even if you are talking about a revolution. While global warming alters seasonal cycles with the aid of neoliberal and (pseudo)socialist forms of capitalism, and waves of societal turmoil follow each other with varying degrees of authoritarianism in different parts of the world, popular music studies remains committed to critical enquiry of music of the masses, the everyday, a variety of subcultures, the megastars, all with their revolutionary potential. Faced with the increasing worldwide austerity in the humanities and social sciences, caused by short-sighted research funding policies that purportedly aim at revolutionary technological and business innovations, popular music studies also struggles with its future directions. Whither popular music studies and where to turn?
Popular music studies in its institutional form is approaching the end of its youthful years, and IASPM will celebrate its twentieth biennial conference in Canberra. This provides also an opportunity to turn to the past and reconsider what may be learned from the twists and shouts of the previous decades. How have recent affective, neomaterialist, performative, post-humanist, spatial, transnational and visual turns, among others, affected popular music studies, and what might the emergent or future disciplinary turns be? Or to what extent do the turns and revolutions within popular music studies signal an excessive neoliberal belief in constant innovation that implies a lack of thorough investigation of the field’s intellectual history? How are the politics of higher education changing the field’s history of critical research and challenging its civic agenda?
To address these issues, as well as any other questions and topics related to the past, present and future turns and revolutions of popular music studies, the International Association for the Study of Popular Music invites proposals for the twentieth biennial conference, to be held at the School of Music at the Australian National University in Canberra 24–28 June 2019. The general theme of the conference is divided into six interrelated streams:
a) Temporal turns and revolutions. In recent years there has been a pronounced interest in popular music as cultural heritage. Alongside issues of heritagisation, this stream accommodates topics relating to nostalgia, history, historiography and futurology alike, and any other aspect involving temporal relations within popular music studies.
b) Spatial turns and revolutions. As popular music studies is a global field of enquiry, debates emerge concerning the key geographical loci of its knowledge production. This stream welcomes discussion on the centrality of Western conceptualisations of popular music and their challenges, including the variety of centre–periphery relations, “locals” versus “newcomers”, migration and displacement. Furthermore, how are issues of space and place dealt with in the field, including such liminal circumstances as festivals?
c) Technological turns and revolutions. Media studies approaches constitute a dominant strand of popular music studies, and in addition to issues of media, mediation, mediatisation, et cetera, this stream invites topics that address all dimensions of popular music and technology, whether conceived as practical technical solutions or more abstract logic behind the use of various tools and techniques. A particularly relevant theme in this stream is the presence of technological elements in all stages of the music industry, from production to consumption, and how they blur the lines between live, recorded and streamed music experiences. Additionally, how is technology inspiring aesthetic choices, also in terms of post-digital backlash?
d) Political turns and revolutions. Popular music studies, however defined, is intimately associated with questions of power relations and hence with politics. In an age of global migration, extremist populism, global warming and #metoo, the politics of popular music are implicated in issues of racism, ecological activism and gender and sexual discrimination in particular. Presentations focussing on identity, intersectionality, and more generally, inclusivity are especially welcome, as well as those that address the socio-historical shifts in protest music, however conceived.
e) Theoretical turns and revolutions. How has the inherent interdisciplinary nature of the field evolved during the last decades? How have “popular” and “music” been – and continue to be – understood in the field, and how is their “study” or “analysis” conceived? Furthermore, how are the theoretical and methodological choices that popular music scholars make today likely to affect the field’s “health and wellbeing” in the future? Of particular relevance here are topics that deal with conceptual curves and conflicts within popular music studies, whether stemming from feminism, Marxism, postcolonialism, semiotics, music analysis, or any strand of music theory in its broadest sense.
f) Affective turns and revolutions. Issues of feeling, emotion and pleasure have been central in the study of popular music, in part because of the importance granted to forms of stardom and fandom. Alongside such questions, this stream tackles additional aspects of affective attunements and alliances within popular music and its scholarly investigation.
Academic Committee
Pablo Alabarces, Emilia Barna, Sam de Boise, Giacomo Bottà, Diego García Peinazo, Elsa Grassy, Florian Heesch, Sarah Hill, Fabian Holt, Nadine Hubbs, Laura Jordán González, Akitsugu Kawamoto, Pil Ho Kim, Serge Lacasse, Kristin McGee, Isabella Pek, Rosa Reitsamer (co-chair), Geoff Stahl (co-chair).
Local Organising Committee
Samantha Bennett (chair), Catherine Hoad, Di Hughes, Stephen Loy, Bonnie McConnell, Pat O’Grady, Georgia Pike, Julie Rickwood, Geoff Stahl, Catherine Strong, Aleisha Ward, Samuel Whiting, Kirsten Zemke.
Abstracts
There will be four options: panels (of 3 or 4 presenters), individual papers, film/video presentations, or poster sessions. Panels and individual papers may also be delivered as practice-based presentations, featuring performance-based, composition-based, recording-based or multimedia-based research. In case of practice-based presentations, please make sure to include a description of room and/or technical requirements. In addition, online presentations may be considered for inclusion in the programme, yet priority is given to on-site participation.
Panels
Proposals of organized panels are strongly recommended (two-hour long sessions with four papers, or three papers and a discussant). Each session should leave at least 30 minutes for discussion or for comments by a discussant immediately following the presentations. The panel organizer should submit the panel abstract and all individual abstracts (200 words each) in one document, with a full list of participant names and email addresses. Where an independently submitted abstract appears to fit a panel, the Academic Committee may suggest the addition of a panellist.
Papers
We invite abstracts of no longer than 200 words, including five keywords for programming purposes and an optional list of references (max 10). Individual paper presentations are 20 minutes long to be followed by 10 minutes of discussion.
Film/video session
Recently completed films introduced by their author and discussed by conference participants may be proposed. Submit a 200-word abstract including titles, subjects, and formats, and indicate the duration of the proposed films/videos and introduction/discussion.
Poster session
A space where presenters can exhibit posters will be provided. A 200-word abstract by the poster’s author, including five keywords for programming purposes, must be submitted.
Submission
Please email your abstract no later than 15 August 2018, as a doc/odt/rtf attachment to [email protected]. Please name the file with your surname (eg. Ciccone.docx). The following format should be used:
• Name, affiliation and contact email address
• Type of presentation (select one from: panel, individual paper, film/video, poster)
• Stream (select preferably one but not more than two from: Temporal/Spatial/Technological/Political/Theoretical/Affective Turns and Revolutions)
• Title of presentation
• Abstract (200 words maximum; in the case of panels, include a general abstract followed by individual abstracts, in total 1000 words maximum)
• Five keywords
• Bio (80 words maximum; in case of panels, bios of all participants)
Abstracts will be accepted in English, IASPM’s official language. Papers in all other languages are allowed, if accompanied by a visual presentation in English. Letters of acceptance will be sent by 30 September 2018.
Each participant must be a member of IASPM: www.iaspm.net/how-to-join. Each participant may present only one paper at the Conference, but may also preside over a panel or serve as a discussant.
The conference organisers look forward to receiving your submissions!
With kindest regards
IASPM Executive Committee:
Julio Mendivil, Chair
Jacopo Conti
Marta García Quiñones
Antti-Ville Kärjä
Kimi Kärki
Sílvia Martínez
Ann Werner
School of Music, The Australian National University, Canberra, ACT, December 4th – 6th 2015
‘Stars’ manifest in popular music literally, conceptually and metaphorically through song lyrics, artist ‘stage names’ and in discourses of economic and/ or mainstream success (Hamlen Jnr., 1991; Holmes, 2004). Stars can be conceptualised as ‘mythic constructs’ (Shuker, 2005) ‘other worldly’ (McLeod, 2003) or associated with fantasy and escapism. As performers, ‘stars’ have been considered as ‘manufactured’ (Franck and Nüesch, 2007) and/ or ‘authentic’ (Zuberi, 2001); as groups of individual artists, such as ‘Superstar DJs’ (Phillips, 2009), or the individual persona, such as ‘Ziggy Stardust’ (Grant, 2000). In recent years, popular music stardom is closely associated to reality television (Frith, 2007), a site of tension between influences of traditional auteur and public ‘star maker’ roles. The portrayal of popular music ‘stars’ on film varies between those in the foreground (Rock Star, 2001), in the background (20 Feet from Stardom, 2013) and those in supporting or ‘behind the scenes’ roles (Muscle Shoals, 2013).
In a literal sense, astronomy research suggests a ‘musical galaxy’; a black hole is heard ‘singing’ a B♭, at 57 octaves lower than middle C, ‘the lowest note in the universe’ (Overbye, 2013). The universe may have its own ‘soundtrack’, a ‘sonic composition that records some of the most dramatic events in outer space’ (Levin, 2013).
If we consider popular music as a metaphorical universe, who or what are the planets, stars and constellations? In what ways do they align, traverse and orbit? We invite papers that consider the theme of popular music, stars and stardom from one or more of the following angles:
Stars: musical, cultural, political biography
Stardom: discourses of mainstream success, fandom, reception, memory
The universe: popular music production, management, distribution
Constellations: genre, tradition, locality, subculture, collaboration
Galaxies: ‘other worlds’, spirituality, fantasy, iconicity
Waiting for a Star to Fall: songs, lyrics and ‘star’ references
Stellar performances: liveness, audiences, performance on film and television
Selling stars: business models, economics, revenue streams
Fading stars: success, career trajectories, ageing, posthumous canonisation
Black holes: noise/ silence, the ‘visible’ and the ‘concealed’
Papers that address the overall theme beyond these angles will also be considered.
Abstracts: Please upload abstracts of 300 words in .docx or .pdf file format (with SURNAME_ANZ2015 as the file name) via the web form at the conference website: music.anu.edu.au/iaspm-anz-2015
Deadline: Sunday May 31st 2015
Notification of acceptances: Friday July 17th 2015
Conference website: music.anu.edu.au/iaspm-anz-2015
Conference email address: [email protected]
Registration: Early bird registration applies between August 3rd – October 5th. Further information will be released on the IASPM ANZ 2015 Conference website in May.
Transport: Qantas, Jetstar and Virgin operate regular flights to Canberra from most domestic Australian airports, including Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide. Canberra is a 3-hour coach ride from Sydney, with Murray’s and Greyhound services every hour to and from Canberra’s central ‘Jolimont’ bus station.
Accommodation: a variety of accommodation options to suit all budgets are available, including University House Further information, including location and maps will be available on the conference website
Conference activities: lunch and morning/ afternoon tea is provided. A first-day evening reception is planned at Canberra Museum & Gallery. Canberra is home to Australia’s National Gallery, National Museum, National Portrait Gallery and Questacon Science Museum. Opportunities to visit the public gallery in Parliament can also be arranged.
Conference dinner: to be held on Saturday December 5th at Mount Stromlo Observatory with an evening of music and stargazing.
Publication: following the conference, the organising committee plan an edited collection with ANU Press. Further details TBA.
Local Organising Committee: Dr Julie Rickwood, Dr Samantha Bennett, Dr Stephen Loy, H.C. Coombs Fellow Andrew Farriss.
'On their anthemic single Skylarks, shoegaze six piece Sheen marry the propulsive, honeyed-fuzz indie-rock sound with Karen O-style banshee theatrics. It's an intoxicating mix.' - Q Magazine
'Highly anticipated... the release of one of the most glorified debut albums in a long time. A perfect psychedelic album.' - Independent Music News
'A darkness, a heaviness which seems to borrow from goth's make up bag. Beautifully accomplished.' - Clash Magazine
'Even by their high standard of brooding melancholy and taut melody, this is pretty special.' - THE LINE OF BEST FIT
'Enticing, ethereal and enveloping' - Freedom Spark
Course content includes: essential theoretical concepts including the fundamentals of sound and recording; venues, acoustics and the practicalities of recording workplace[s]; recording and production equipment, to include hardware and software; microphone types, polar patterns and placement; mixing consoles; dynamics and time-based effects processing; audio recording, editing and mixing in Pro Tools; and, critical listening seminars. Additionally, students will discuss and debate current issues affecting music and recording, to include: listening levels, hearing and health; 'loudness' and dynamic range; and technology and use value.
Topics for study include: a short history of music and digitisation; massively-collaborative online music production and distribution; case study analyses of music for gaming, crowdfunding and digital audiovisual curation techniques; as well as the integration of music in social networks, media players and blogs.
You will work towards researching an individually negotiated topic relating to the course themes, as well as creating a music current affairs podcast for online distribution.
This course will introduce students to sound archiving, and explore the historical, philosophical and ethical implications of audio archiving, as well as preservation needs assessment and planning. Students will tour the NFSA , and the School of Music's tape collection, and have the opportunity to gain hands-on, practical experience of equipment and processes such as analogue tape recorders and magnetic tape; tape machine technology and operation; the handling of tape, tape deterioration, maintenance and restoration techniques; the practicalities of digitisation: preparation, recording, software, editing, file creation, and metadata management and storage.
The Summer School “Mappin' Your Own Underground!” seeks to grant students with valuable feedback on their research projects, as well as share knowledge on how to achieve successful professional carreers, through practical know-how and scientific expertise.
A Summer School “Mappin' Your Own Underground!” tem como objetivo fornecer aos estudantes interessados um relevante feedback sobre os seus projetos de investigação e oferecer-lhes conhecimentos e competências práticas para construírem trajetórias profissionais e académicas bem sucedidas.