Mashup's

So a couple technical comments before I start my blog today. First off, I should have some sort of music listening mechanism (a radio of some sorts) in place later today. I'll try my best to get it done before the end of the Israeli working day, if not, it really should be up by tomorrow. It's really technical and I'm not so smart, so it'll probably take me longer than it should to set it up. But I'm going to do my best. My bathroom exploded yesterday so I've got to hangout till 3 to wait for the plumber. So that gives me time to work on it. The second technical comment is I don't get this whole a-z meme tagging thing. And I'm sorry to disappoint people, but I'm not playing.

So on to the music. I'm going to respond to what Debbie Wiseman posted about yesterday on my comments page. She gave a link to an album full of what’s called 'mashup' songs. A mashup is a song that combines multiple songs into one. For example if you take just the music of Wanted Dead of Alive by Bon Jovi and edit into it just the lyrics of Madonna's Like A Virgin. I know it sounds cool, but it’s pretty kitschy. And like most art forms, anything kitschy is just that.

Just to give a brief history of how mashup’s came to be, like most new musical styles, technology played a major part in its creation. In 2001 Sonic Foundry (later bought out by Sony) came out with a program called Acid Pro, which for the first time allowed people a cheap way to edit songs on their personal computers. As a promotion for this product, in 2003 Jay-Z released a free vocal-only version (a cappella form) of his new album The Black Album for people to remix.

An underground NYC DJ named DJ Danger Mouse took these raw tracks and sampled them with the Beatles White Album creating what he then released as The Grey Album. This Grey Album became one of the most critically acclaimed albums of 2004 appearing on numerous Best Of lists and was featured in publications like The New Yorker, Entertainment Weekly and the Village Voice. The album also led to the creation of The Purple Album (The Black Album remixed with Prince's Purple Rain), The Black and White Stripes Album, and the Double Black Album (combining Jay-Z's and Metallica's Black Album's) among others. The Grey Album was eventually banned and DJ Danger Mouse was then sued by EMI who holds the licensing rights to the Beatles catalogue. All of this notoriety, though, helped to launch this genre and in 2005 a plethora of mashup albums and compilations came out, and then were taken off the market because of various lawsuits. MTV even launched a video mashup show where they sliced together videos based on the mashup songs that DJ's created.

Probably too quickly, because of the over saturation of the market, the kitsch appeal of the genre, and the lack of quality in most of the music being produced, mashup songs lost their flavor with the music buying public and quickly became a thing of the past.

Adam Freeland, founder of a type of techno music called Breakbeats and one of the most groundbreaking DJ's to ever remix a song called mashup songs amateurish. Take a listen to Freeland's remixes of 'Fever', 'Hello, I Love You', 'Seven Nation Army', and 'Smells Like Teen Spirit' (when I get the radio thing working) and see what you think.

Despite all of this, aside from their legacy, mashup music has made a vital contribution in today's musical landscape. Because of the lawsuits that followed the music, the issue of the legality of music sampling has been brought back to the forefront of music law. Various non-profit groups have taken up the cause and are committed to freeing music so that sampling, in all of its forms, will be allowed. The most active of these groups is Banned Music (http://bannedmusic.org/) where you also can download DJ Danger Mouse's The Grey Album.

If you want to check out more mashup music, follow Debbie's link (http://www.bootiesf.com/bestofbootie_2005/) and see it for yourself.

I had planned to talk about the godliness of Brian Wilson today, but I guess I'll have to save that for tomorrow.