Timing then and timing today

Anon La Ply

Diamond Member
A couple of interesting threads going from Caz and Earthrocker about timing within a band.

WhoIsTony said:

on most of the greatest records ever recorded the players are pushing and pulling all over the place....the key is that they moved together so the average ear never hears it

watch most of the best rock and jazz groups ever.....they pull each other around ...it's [fornicating] beautiful

being stubborn and feeling that your time is the only time is probably hurting the music way more than helping it

learn to flex with the emotion of the room

if these cats are doing a lot more than being emotionally elastic then I suggest you find some better people to play with

Seems to me that in the old days - with so much less rhythmic accountability - there was a lot more tolerance for timing imperfection than today.

If rhythm was painting, you'd say there was a boom in impressionism and expressionism in the 60s and 70s that's been supplanted by photo realism. We now have tools that produce perfect time and, presumably, audience ears are increasingly being conditioned to enjoy perfect time and to interpret music with push and pull as messy and unappealing. I remember finding the sound of old 78s "yukky" in my teens, which I guess is a similar response to some young people's response to The Stones, The Who etc.

Given that society is using digital tech pretty well everywhere, you'd expect this to be more of a long term trend than a cyclic one. No doubt there will be retro revivals but in 20 years a retro revival will include today's popular sequenced acts.

I wonder if the days of push and pull are numbered or if there is something intrinsic and basic in organic sounds (and images and smells for that matter) that will always draw us, no matter how digital the rest of our lives become? The trend toward glitch beats is interesting in this context ...

That's this week's thought bubble done. Any thoughts?
 
If rhythm was painting...

In these days of "perfection" surrounding the music industry, I still like to approach music like a painting... your analogy here is spot on, at the end of the day it's the result that counts, it has to be alive, with feel and emotions, we're humans not machines, we're not perfect... but today the average musicians timing is much better than 30-40 years ago, heck, my own timing is better than years ago, but if my parts and/or the whole band is not absolutely "perfect" who cares, as long as the band is together, like the saying "the time's in the room", providing that the time fluctuate all together as a unity, you're there as far as I'm concerned.

Most of the problem lies with the production of today's recording where less and less drummers are playing on albums, it's almost all machines and programming... thanks God that some artists still want a real drummer.

Now were's my paint brushes...
 
Love your analogies Anon. Photo Realism. That's pretty good. Jazz seems to have not succumbed to this timing quandary.
 
They say the rawness and looseness (of grunge for example) in the 90s was a reaction to the tight bummed perfect timing of the 80s, so maybe being loose will be back in fashion soon.
 
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hmmm, good one, Grea.

I think it is an evolution curve relationship of music with technology. You play with it and push it till it starts to sound lifeless and sterile and then you roll it back and try and bring humanity back to it, and then start to mess with it some more.. in a different direction this time...

And humanity is basically another word for error.

You go for something and techincally its not quite right, but the feeling transmits to the listener in a way that perfection couldn't have.

Perfection is lifeless. I like women with flaws. It adds to their individuality that makes them more attractive than lets say a photoshopped creature on the cover of vogue, everything in balance, eyebrows et al.

The digital age will have to deal with this. It might work when you're crunching numbers for wall street analysts but when everything lines up perfectly in art or music…it makes people yawn.

Why does this post remind me of Tomas Lang..?
 
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They say the rawness and looseness (of grunge for example) in the 90s was a reaction to the tight bummed perfect timing of the 80s, so maybe being loose will be back in fashion soon.

I think it was more a reaction to the tight bummed spandex and hairspray of the 80s

:)
 
I think it is an evolution curve relationship of music with technology.
& saving time / money. Programmed "drums" are a much faster foundation fix in a commercial music generating environment. We drummers, & other instrument musicians too, still struggle with the fact that commercial music is all about the vocal, melody, lyric, & hook. What backs that up is way down the pecking order to most commercial music consumers. As musicians, we think we've moved beyond being in a backing band, but in reality, we haven't.

Thank goodness not all music is commercial. It's just a pity the non commercial stuff is nothing more than a significant minority interest - & then there's jazz ;)

They say the rawness and looseness (of grunge for example) in the 90s was a reaction to the tight bummed perfect timing of the 80s, so maybe being loose will be back in fashion soon.
Grunge may well have been a reaction to the scramble for production that was 80's music, or simply a search for definition. Each generation's music is, at least in part, a reaction to the music of the previous generation.

I remember working in the industry (at a bottom feeder level) in the early 80's. Believe it or not, the huge reduction in drummer's available work was more to do with electronic percussion being regarded as fresh & exciting/relevant, than it was to do with ease of manipulation/convenience.
 
There is certainly a huge difference.

I recall when I was first old enough to get into clubs and going to see bands, there were a lot of bands going around town with poor drummers. The drummers with good time and a solid playing really stood out. And it made sense as the guys who were my age and just older than me were growing up on classic rock of the 60's and 70's. Drum machines were limited to a handful of new wave bands and bubble gum pop. Yes, rap was in existence, but it was still a bit of a fringe thing to the rock world. On the pro scene, sure drummers were using clicks in the studio, but not on every song of every record, and certainly not live.

These days, when I can make it out to a club, all the younger drummers in the young bands, even if they have suspect technique, they all have solid time. They all grew up in era where everything is played to a click. They have grown up in era where music played to machines is very common place. Rap/hip hop, electronica, and other machine based music is common place and ingrained in our modern culture. The thought that it wasn't always this way is not part of their life experience. And on the pro scene, in nearly every interview, and from every conversation I've had with working pros, working with a click is a job requirement of nearly every tour. So many bands use backing tracks or sequencers, or just want consistency from night to night that

I read lots of comments from musicians saying it shouldn't be this way, and we need to get away from clicks, etc, but who's really going to do that, and will it sell? Musicians may want a return to imperfect time, but does the public?

Korn apparently tried on Korn III and it was their wost selling album. I know Dave Ghrol has done some albums old school, but he's got a metronome in his head.

On the flip side, the fact that 60's and 70's rock remains so popular even with today's youth, does suggest the public might not be so tied to perfect machine time. I did see a band called The Joy Formidable, and their live show is glorious utter chaos, and the closest thing to way the way old live clips of The Who used to be.
 
I mean, creative music is still played without a rigorous adherence to metronomically perfect time. Maybe in the pop world, it's all quantized for public consumption. But at the high end of the spectrum of the musical art form, people are not freaking out about slight push/pull in tempos. You just have to skip Top-20 radio and check out some other stuff to hear evidence of this.

And I don't expect that to ever go away. Bringing human emotion and imperfection into music will always have a place. Grunge was definitely a reaction to the overproduced hair metal that it followed, and I desperately needed that change back then. I felt the same way about the White Stripes. Raw and gritty, not being concerned about leaving in the imperfections if the right sound and feel was captured.

Metronomic time can be hypnotic in certain kinds of music. I think it fits a lot of electronic music (although electronic and acoustic can make for an interesting mix, too). But in jazz, blues, garage rock... it sounds ridiculous to me.
 
They say the rawness and looseness (of grunge for example) in the 90s was a reaction to the tight bummed perfect timing of the 80s, so maybe being loose will be back in fashion soon.

I don't think so. Even in the 80's click were prevelent, but not on every last song of every album.

I think it was more a reaction to the tight bummed spandex and hairspray of the 80s

:)
^ This

. Grunge was definitely a reaction to the overproduced hair metal that it followed..
And this.^

Grunge was certainly a reaction to the image and production, but I don't think "timing" was a factor.

If you watch the special that was made about the making of "Nevermind" a few of those songs were assembled from various takes, and they used a click her and there. Which is not much different than most 80's albums.
 
I for one,refuse to use a click live,and have little use for it in a studio also.I think modern technology,has given us the ability to massively over complicate the most basic of human endeavors,and then ,make us feel like we can't get by without it.

If we lost access to every cell tower on the planet tomorrow,I'd be a happy man.The same with drum machines and click tracks,especially live.

Did our time wander a bit before clicks.....thank god....yes it did.We used to be able to play an organic, human performance,with no apologies for pushing or falling back on the tempo.

Relying on the click especially live,to me is a sad state of affairs.Todays pop music is manufactured,according to a rigid formula,more so that any time in history.The human factor is being completely taken out of the equasion.

There's nothing organic and fresh about it,recored or live.There's very little of yourself that you can add to this endless persuit of the "perfect time" situation.

Some are happy to accept that situation....not me.Do I have perfect time...no,but it's still pretty good.And good enough for a human performance.

Steve B
 
I mean, creative music is still played without a rigorous adherence to metronomically perfect time. Maybe in the pop world, it's all quantized for public consumption. But at the high end of the spectrum of the musical art form, people are not freaking out about slight push/pull in tempos. You just have to skip Top-20 radio and check out some other stuff to hear evidence of this.

That's a way over simplification. I haven't paid attention to new music on the radio in over a decade, and I've never paid attention to top 20.

Jazz and classical, ok, you're correct. But there is a ton of underground and niche music is based on perfect time and/or machines. Or making people sound like machines.
 
I remember in the late 80s they were bringing out drum machines with "Human feel", I suspect to get away from that machine gun sound on fills and the unreal metronome tempo.

A magazine, recently, In a piece about improving your recording, was recommending adding a couple of BPM to the click, when recording chorus or solos, to make the songs sound better, ie more human.

Its human to move a little faster when the emotion and adrenalin kicks in when you are dancing to music or at a gig. Most live albums I have heard the songs are usually faster than the original recorded version, unless of course they are using a click.

Push and pull is the heart of music, even pro orchestras do it. Conductors whip them up and they are ,allegedly, the most highly trained and technical musicians available.
 
That's a way over simplification. I haven't paid attention to new music on the radio in over a decade, and I've never paid attention to top 20.

Jazz and classical, ok, you're correct. But there is a ton of underground and niche music is based on perfect time and/or machines. Or making people sound like machines.

Oversimplification of what? I said there is still good music being made that isn't concerned with robot-like tempos. Yes, there's lots of music that is concerned with those things, but I never said there wasn't.
 
Screw metronomes for recording and live work. I firmly believe they really should only have a place in the practice room, and should be used liberally in that space. There's a big reason why I prefer to listen to live versions of songs nowadays... Album producers are literally obsessed with perfection and clarity. I've seen it personally where they freak out if there isn't a grid they can snap things to or perfect separation between each kit piece so they can change, move, add and delete with ease, usually without consulting the drummer.

To me, it really takes the life out of great music. The impact is reduced and even though it sounds "perfect" to our standards today, it doesn't have the same effect to my "soul"; whatever that means. Old recordings of orchestral and classical music often seemed to have the most color and feel to my ear... Probably because it was dozens of great musicians, each working from one another and the conductor, not a machine.
 
Usable mobile BPM takes some skill on the part of the players...and can have a great textural role...just as metronomically consistant BPM can.

I think there are fewer recordings of people that have been working together much longer than the recording sessions...so the default becomes "unvarying time" as it is easer for the various players as a whole.

Why fewer recordings of long term projects?....an attempt to reduce the cost of the artist by those funding the recording....so the artists are moved through like cattle...and the sound matches.

<<insert goose step recording with interspersed moo-ing>>

Not every case, of course....but majority that my ear hears in popular media.

...and so goes the reduced income in general...right along wih the average quality and the dissatisfied consumer....all lost in wistful memory of yester-years projects allowed to ferment and grow...all to the obfuscating whiny lamentious tune of "copyright infringement".
 
This topic fits well with an ongoing discussion I've been having with friends on the relative merits of "feeling" vs "precision" in playing music.

As a group we're divided on the issue. We keep returning to two points: 1) to that it depends on the circumstances and "goal" (for lack of a better word) of the song, and 2) that it's also a matter of personal taste.

Next time we chat, I'm going to bring your discussion of timing into the mix and see where we get with that. I have a feeling we'll be similarly divided on this as well, but it will make for a great conversation.
 
Pushes and pulls give music character and life, yes. And the more extraordinary the musicians and musicianship on a record, the less I think we drummer tend to scrutinizes over minor timing errors. However, the best drummers of any era had excellent excellent time. Just like today, every band wanted the best time they could on their albums. Producers hired the guys with great time, and the bands that made quality records had drummers with great time. While I'd prefer to record everything I do live, with excellent musicians, and no click track, many times that not possible. Using a click track and being able to over dubb stuff has a lot of utility.

What I guess I'm trying to get at is, there is no excuse for not having the best time can or not striving for perfect time every time you sit down to play. I suppose that's kind of obvious, but for instance, if my bass player told me our time fluctuates a certain spots in a song, I'd go home a work on it (as should any drummer imo), NOT reply with: Good, because I like my music with life in it.
 
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Haven't read all responses yet - as interesting as I'd hoped - but I'd like to sort this out before I forget:

... at the high end of the spectrum of the musical art form, people are not freaking out about slight push/pull in tempos. You just have to skip Top-20 radio and check out some other stuff to hear evidence of this.

I think we can skip the high end art music for two reasons ...

1. In serious art music in all eras everyone will already be a great player with spot on time.

2. Art music is such a tiny proportion of the overall.

Popular music makes up a large piece of our sonic environment whether we're fans or not ... stadiums, bars, clubs, eateries, TV, radio, online, retailers, gyms, buskers, music coming out of homes and car windows ...

BTW, the painting analogy occurred to me a while ago, and I was reminded me of it during one of those chats about how close covers should be to the original. Someone said that people don't pay to hear a band give a rough idea of popular tunes, that they want to hear it like the original.

Then I thought of how I played - I can't play many covers note for note because I don't have the chops (for photo realistic reproduction of "detailed scenes"). Instead I (and many others here from what I've read) approach covers like an impressionist - you catch the main kicks and simplify the detailed bits.

It's true, too - people don't usually pay to see me play lol
 
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