Re: quintuple CD

["Michael P. Hughes, Ph.D." <pycraft@elec.gla.ac.uk>]

>>One other thing: If we want this to be a commercial success, how about
>>asking somebody famous (like Torn) to contribute a short clip. (cries of
>>disgust) Ok, ok, this is a stupid marketing trick, and of course we *are*
>>all fine enough musicians and our music can stand for itself ... it was
>>just an idea. What do you think? (I'm sure Torn would contribute one of 
>his
>>cool loops which are only available on expensive CDROMs.)

If music could stand for itself, I can think of any number of musicians who
deserve as much success as the Spice Girls.  Let's face it, we need all the
help we can get!  I think it's a great idea.  Besides, I like the prospect
of getting another Torn track!  :)

>That might be fun if Mr Torn or some of the other more successful folks
>around were interested in joining in. He does lurk around here sometimes, 
>so
>he sort of qualifies. I see a couple of problems with that, though. One is
>that the more famous person might overshadow the others sharing the disc, 
>so
>that the average folk's work doesn't get so much an opportunity to stand 
>on
>its own.

Well, that will happen anyway, albeit to a lesser degree.  People like Jon,
Warren or Andre f.e. are way up the Looping Tree compared to, say, little
ole me.  If CD gets snapped by a bunch of Torn fans, they are probably
going to enjoy it since they've got to be pretty damned open minded to
begin with!

>And second, while Mr. Torn manages to be quite diverse himself, he
>still only represents a limited spectrum of the styles that might be on 
>the
>same disc. His audience would likely dominate the sales of the cd, and 
>they
>might not be so appreciative of other musicians employing loops to create
>radically different styles, which might not be so fair to those folks. 
>Just
>some thoughts, any others? 

that's going to be a problem regardless - if the content is too diverse,
people will find tracks they dislike (A friend of mine borrowed Eric
Johnson's Ah Via Musicom and thought it was OK - would have been great if
not for that _country_ track!).  And if you look down the list of
influences on the LD website, Torn must figure in about 50% of them - so at
least the CD should sound cohesive. 

Michael