production does not exist

[Jeff Dalton <jeff%aiva.edinburgh.ac.uk@Cs.Ucl.AC.UK>]

IED:
> OK, then, Average Guy, you're so sure that Kate's music is
> "over-produced", IED dares you to point out even one
> sound in The Dreaming that's unnecessary. JUST ONE.

But the whole record is unnecessary.  It sounds like IED is going
to insist that everything in TD must be exactly what it is, or else.
But or else what?  Or else it would be a different record, that's all.
Some people might like one of those other records better.  All this
talk of over-production is just an attempt to explain what some of 
the other records might be like.  And the attack on over-production
as a concept is, or should be, an explanation of why these other
records wouldn't be better after all -- if, that is, the discussion
is to be of music rather than of how we talk about it.

Bill Hsu:
> This sounds like the old debate about style vs. content again, tho
> the parameters for music are probably different.

And there follows a discussion of "meat" vs vs "production" with the
aim of showing that the "meat" might include everything, production
and all.  Then, if everything is content, everything is also style. 
As IED says as Doug has said, the production IS the music!  (although
production isn't all there is to style)

But just as the line between content and style can be moved, it can also
be fixed if it's useful to do so.  For example, someone, or Kate herself,
might do a cover version of TD or some part of it.  And we would be able
to say that it was a cover of that and not of something else.  So, if we're
trying to say whether two pieces of music are different versions of the
same thing or not, we can usually find a notion of what's essential
that we can use.  Of course, it's not a perfect notion -- sometimes it
might be hard to tell -- but that doesn't mean it's meaningless.
The real question is whether a particular distinction is useful for
a particular purpose.

> You can also argue that the apparent lack of production of some bands is
> really a type of production in itself. Even the simplest, unarranged music
> has been filtered through the musicians' meddlings (however minimal) in the
> studio. Production that emphasizes the rough edges is still production.

Yeah, but is it over-production?

>Let's all reread Susan Sontag's brilliant and readable essay "On Style"
>before resuming this debate. 

OK, so long as we read "Against Interpretation" too.

-- Jeff