Ms. Wench: Your post, and tafka's sig, reminds me of the story behind Dead Can Dance's band name:
"In most musical instruments the resonator is made of wood while the actual sound generator is of animal origin. (the gut of stringed instruments, the hides of drum heads, etc.) In cultures where music is still used as a magical force, the making of an instrument always involves the sacrifice of a living being. That being's soul then becomes part of the instrument and in the tones that come forth, the 'singing dead,' who are ever present with us, make themselves heard." -- from the liner notes of
Spiritchaser
"The mask, though once a living part of a tree is dead; nevertheless it has, through the artistry of its maker, been imbued with a life force of its own. To understand why we chose the name, think of the transformation of inanimacy to animacy. Think of the processes concerning life from death and death into life. So many people missed the inherent symbolism, and assumed that we must be "morbid gothic types," a mistake we deplored and deplore..." -- from an interview with Lisa Gerrard
Consider the Tuvans, (between Mongolia and Siberia) famous for "throat singing" which imitates wind, water, animals etc, and their instruments of horse skin and bone, bowed with horse hair bows and strung with horse gut, upon which they traditionally compose songs about... horses.
and... lol@LV15...
"Music is a safe kind of high."
-- Jimi Hendrix.
... Unlike a fifth of tequila, 28 lines of coke and a handful of quaaludes, huh?
Mike: Go download Myrrhman, Taphead, or After the Flood from the CD Laughing Stock by Talk Talk, or the whole damned CD for that matter, and maybe get a different perspective about why Hollis (vocalist) said the above. After the Flood, particularly, climaxes in the most amazingly expressive minute-and-a-half one note electric guitar solo in the history of recorded music, IMHO. Of course, really, what Hollis said is probably more of a justification for the way the band does things than it is a practical and intentional work ethic. It isn't important at all that the guitar solo is one note (in fact it sounds like more than one note to most people, with its distorted flickering overtones) what's important is the economy of this band, and the way they approach suspense, which is one essential element of music, and one I'm fascinated by because I'm so incredibly pretentious.
"Music is the architecture of silence"
-- Robert Fripp
"Jazz isn't dead. It just smells funny."
-- Frank Zappa
and todays favorite:
"In opera, there is always too much singing."
-- Claude Debussy
