A quote from Mr. FreakAnimal in the TF/PE topic made me think about it, that I also don't quite understand, how anyone can "quit noise":
| "I always found strange someone would quit noise (and related)." |
I fully understand, when someone ceases the activities and doesn't make noise anymore, because of various and often personal reasons.
But I cannot imagine to stop listening noise or take part on even minor discussions in forums, thoughts on records and so on.
Of course, everybody's focus or whatever you call it can change everytime.
I just hope, I never lose the pleasure listening to noise (and being interested in all the related art and movies and books etc.)!
If I do someday, I'm dead! Haha
But I'm totally serious here.
What's your opinion?
In short: "You can´t kill what can´t be killed"
It´s in my blood for life, for sure, but I can understand how you could slowly "phase out" of anything... life is all about change - more for some than others.
Quote from: Krigsverk on July 07, 2025, 05:48:48 PMIn short: "You can´t kill what can´t be killed"
It´s in my blood for life, for sure, but I can understand how you could slowly "phase out" of anything... life is all about change - more for some than others.
Totally agree. It's not a quit, it's just a change. Life is always in evolution. You are not quitting, just changing.
I go through phases of listening: Classical, Jazz, etc. But Noise always puuuulls me back in.
I'm currently travelling - no CDs. But when I sit in the bathtub of my current hotel, the ceiling vacuum / fan thing makes a hell of a Noise! Vomirish!! It's fucking beautiful!
Cage said it. Noise is all around us.
I would say you can look at it in Two Different Aspects. Scene/Music/Socials and Pure Sound at it is. First is easy to Quit and to get annoyed by and the Second one is around us all anytime.
Too absolutist of a statement for me to take seriously.
I fully realize that there are very different kinds of people, with different kinds of motivations.
One quality is that people have phases in life, and they "move on" so to say.
I know a lot of people who were "punks" or "metalheads" and then grew up, so to say. They quit, totally. Just adjusted into what is generally expected from people in the society.
I have written about it, quite alot, some of it found from SI website too. Addressing question if what we are involved in is what in past was seen as "youth culture".
It is very very interesting perspective to realize how new idea is to be somehow committed to (sub)culture that is not all about minimum level of survival. That we have merely couple decades of examples of this. Formerly, it was some sort of rebellious transition moment, before there was something else and idea of grown up man committing some something besides feeding family just wasn't really option.
I was born to moment when to rebel was no longer like "summer of 68" or "summer of 77", but turned out into something else. It was no longer that brief moment, where summer or two you got adolescent idealism, what gets suppressed and you get back to line, so to say. Now what we have is life long commitments into something what in past was just anomaly before you got back in line.
I know a lot of people who are merely in search of something. They test things. A lot of trends. A lot of phases. Making couple noise releases is like fucking couple ladies. You know there are bunch of different kinds of ladies you want to try out and not settle on HNW.. so to say.
I am not here just to "try out things". Noise was never phase, not something that was "done", something I would get tired. I can understand there are people who just test things and realize there are more suitable things for them elsewhere move there. I was never like that, never quit anything, never quit liking something I liked, never felt disappointment nor regret of things I've been doing.
Right now, listening SLOGUN, just after listening DISSECTING TABLE, and drinking little whiskey with it. After day of various types of activities, I am sure there are a lot of things I should do, focus and do more, but "quitting" something ain't happening. I rather feel that what I consider to be "industrial noise", both as a sound, plus as worldview, is just so much more that just about anything there is.
I never quit listening other types of music, but indeed, I listen LESS of something. All music genres, I don't need to be listening daily, weekly, or even monthly. I like it, but I don't necessarily need to listen all types of music all the time. Noise, in other hand, since I discovered it, I was always into it. Maximum amount of not listening noise, is being in conditions where I do not have access to stereos or noise releases. That means, just days, maximum of couple weeks when simply being in conditions of not being possible to listen.
That said, even if I'd spend hours in day doing so, I get to do plenty of things BESIDES listening records, cds, and tapes.
I can't see myself "quitting noise", but if someone else does, and find something better, fine! To me, noise feels compatible to almost anything, so I am really puzzled to hear people moving away from noise for sake of "family" or "work" or whatever. As if you'd need to really make choise between those things?
As for being part of "scene" or being "visible", I dont think that matters so much.
Quote from: FreakAnimalFinland on July 07, 2025, 11:08:48 PMI fully realize that there are very different kinds of people, with different kinds of motivations.
One quality is that people have phases in life, and they "move on" so to say.
I know a lot of people who were "punks" or "metalheads" and then grew up, so to say. They quit, totally. Just adjusted into what is generally expected from people in the society.
I have written about it, quite alot, some of it found from SI website too. Addressing question if what we are involved in is what in past was seen as "youth culture".
It is very very interesting perspective to realize how new idea is to be somehow committed to (sub)culture that is not all about minimum level of survival. That we have merely couple decades of examples of this. Formerly, it was some sort of rebellious transition moment, before there was something else and idea of grown up man committing some something besides feeding family just wasn't really option.
I was born to moment when to rebel was no longer like "summer of 68" or "summer of 77", but turned out into something else. It was no longer that brief moment, where summer or two you got adolescent idealism, what gets suppressed and you get back to line, so to say. Now what we have is life long commitments into something what in past was just anomaly before you got back in line.
I know a lot of people who are merely in search of something. They test things. A lot of trends. A lot of phases. Making couple noise releases is like fucking couple ladies. You know there are bunch of different kinds of ladies you want to try out and not settle on HNW.. so to say.
I am not here just to "try out things". Noise was never phase, not something that was "done", something I would get tired. I can understand there are people who just test things and realize there are more suitable things for them elsewhere move there. I was never like that, never quit anything, never quit liking something I liked, never felt disappointment nor regret of things I've been doing.
Right now, listening SLOGUN, just after listening DISSECTING TABLE, and drinking little whiskey with it. After day of various types of activities, I am sure there are a lot of things I should do, focus and do more, but "quitting" something ain't happening. I rather feel that what I consider to be "industrial noise", both as a sound, plus as worldview, is just so much more that just about anything there is.
I never quit listening other types of music, but indeed, I listen LESS of something. All music genres, I don't need to be listening daily, weekly, or even monthly. I like it, but I don't necessarily need to listen all types of music all the time. Noise, in other hand, since I discovered it, I was always into it. Maximum amount of not listening noise, is being in conditions where I do not have access to stereos or noise releases. That means, just days, maximum of couple weeks when simply being in conditions of not being possible to listen.
That said, even if I'd spend hours in day doing so, I get to do plenty of things BESIDES listening records, cds, and tapes.
I can't see myself "quitting noise", but if someone else does, and find something better, fine! To me, noise feels compatible to almost anything, so I am really puzzled to hear people moving away from noise for sake of "family" or "work" or whatever. As if you'd need to really make choise between those things?
As for being part of "scene" or being "visible", I dont think that matters so much.
I think there is something to be said about renouncing youth in a sense and giving your life to something as an adult. Even if you got into noise as a youth, the more it begins to take a hold onto your life - the more you see different shades of it - the less it becomes innocent or wild or extreme in youth, but actually something more serious, something to devote time to.
Which goes hand in hand with just spending less time with certains genres, albums or artists but not quitting your likeness to them. Taste just gets more refined as time goes on perhaps, and maybe quitting something means your taste wasn't refined or that you feel time not devoted to something all the time means it is defacto version of quitting?
Can't speak for others but I feel like if you like something enough - like noise, lots of things can become study guides, even if you aren't doing it 100% of the time. Like Minus1 said, noise is all around us. With that mindset, quitting may be impossible, learning is always availble. Long periods where one doesn't make noise could be interchanged with lots of listening, or the inverse. But also good to mention, it isn't passive and it is a life perspective to take into account when interacting with things that aren't noise. So, for this sort of mindset, quitting noise is more than just not partaking in a musical genre, or listening to it, but changing how someone goes about their life? Not sure if that's entirelty accurate, but definitely interesting to think about. This is more adding onto what Mikko was saying, and not the notion of quitting noise to pursue a career, family or otherwise.
It's not a prison gang. In the words of Lemmy, "do what you want".
It wouldn't be strange to replace noise with styles that use a wide range of sounds like acousmatic music. Depends on what you were looking for from noise.
Quitting noise for what ? Lady Gaga ? Cant you listen to both ? - If you have lost interest in music in general OK i get it, but that's not quitting noise is quitting music. If one day you play one of your favorites and you find hey i dont like it finally, i dont like noise at all, i 'move on' , that's quitting. And probably you never really liked it for what it is.
Everything else is just phases. I dont have time, i ll manage my time to focus more into something else etc. - I do have periods that i dont listen to noise but that falls into the 'quitting life' category, meaning times when my mind is fucked and dont want to anything, no pleasure, no interest, kill me. Usually i buy more noise then !
One thing is also conditions in life, what enable things. I hear horror stories of men meeting woman who eventually concludes that your records are now going to storage, or garage or something. It will be drastic difference is your daily life happening in front of huge flat screen tv, book shelves, empty white stylish room or.. perhaps stereo system and bunch of all time favorite albums. I think there is direct correlation of where your focus will be drifting.
I think one of most curious things is projects that announce quitting. Maybe happens less now, but I remember when there was quite frequent announcements about quitting... many also returned back in action as soon as conditions in life allowed. In most cases, people wouldn't even notice. Only in very rare cases you could say it is indeed artistic creation reaching completion or that artists who work on this level of "publicity" need to announce what is current state of their project.
Quote from: FreakAnimalFinland on July 08, 2025, 01:50:24 PMOne thing is also conditions in life, what enable things. I hear horror stories of men meeting woman who eventually concludes that your records are now going to storage, or garage or something. It will be drastic difference is your daily life happening in front of huge flat screen tv, book shelves, empty white stylish room or.. perhaps stereo system and bunch of all time favorite albums. I think there is direct correlation of where your focus will be drifting.
I think one of most curious things is projects that announce quitting. Maybe happens less now, but I remember when there was quite frequent announcements about quitting... many also returned back in action as soon as conditions in life allowed. In most cases, people wouldn't even notice. Only in very rare cases you could say it is indeed artistic creation reaching completion or that artists who work on this level of "publicity" need to announce what is current state of their project.
My dad lost a majority of his vinyl collection to a flood when he had to pack up his records in the basement. I shudder at the idea of that happening to me...
Artists making "I quit" announcements is probably so infrequent nowadays because in the age of social media, it is hard to avoid something you invested so much of your online profiles to. All these pages you follow are posting noise, you have close relationships, etc. Trying to quit noise for some would basically mean they'd also have to quit going on Instagram or whatever. Easier said than done for most.
Quote from: FreakAnimalFinland on July 08, 2025, 01:50:24 PMOne thing is also conditions in life, what enable things. I hear horror stories of men meeting woman who eventually concludes that your records are now going to storage, or garage or something. It will be drastic difference is your daily life happening in front of huge flat screen tv, book shelves, empty white stylish room or.. perhaps stereo system and bunch of all time favorite albums. I think there is direct correlation of where your focus will be drifting.
There's nothing worse than seeing a man being psychologically castrated in his own home under the guise of "settling down" but it unfortunately happens all too often.
Staying on topic, despite knowing people from different walks and backgrounds of life, I've never strayed away from the music I listen to or unconventional interests/beliefs I have. I always found it strange when people do a complete 180 and never look back. Feels inauthentic and disingenuous to me.
Quote from: Wild Nature Acolyte on July 09, 2025, 03:34:32 AMQuote from: FreakAnimalFinland on July 08, 2025, 01:50:24 PMOne thing is also conditions in life, what enable things. I hear horror stories of men meeting woman who eventually concludes that your records are now going to storage, or garage or something. It will be drastic difference is your daily life happening in front of huge flat screen tv, book shelves, empty white stylish room or.. perhaps stereo system and bunch of all time favorite albums. I think there is direct correlation of where your focus will be drifting.
There's nothing worse than seeing a man being psychologically castrated in his own home under the guise of "settling down" but it unfortunately happens all too often.
Staying on topic, despite knowing people from different walks and backgrounds of life, I've never strayed away from the music I listen to or unconventional interests/beliefs I have. I always found it strange when people do a complete 180 and never look back. Feels inauthentic and disingenuous to me.
I totally agree! It's the absolute worst. I use to have some metal head friends in my 20s and all of them are gone as far as music interest is concerned, mostly the whiffle thrasher type, which was force fed popular thrash metal by MTV in the late 80s early 90s, once that shit stopped they stopped and couldn't find bands anymore... and then the "settling down" conditions hammered them down forever and once in awhile they'll have this nostalgia about something from back then that has no big impact on me anymore, but to them it's like still the greatest band or music or whatever, cause while settling down they didn't follow along, all they got is this one distant memory from a long time ago and then it becomes very hard for me to relate to these types of people, because I've invested most of my adult life into music and mostly as a listener, so I've become very alienated with those types of people, whom I originally only connected with through music. You start to almost feel like this immortal vampire after awhile, haha your interests have remained as always, may have changed or evolved in some ways, while you see people come and go for decades. The process almost seems normal to me now, cause I've seen a lot of people come and go with music interests in specific.
I've gone through many different life periods, some good, some not so good, lived in 5 different countries, tried things and yeah I admit, quit them when I discovered they weren't for me. I "discovered" noise in my early 20's, but I was already approaching middle age when I really got into it. Like I mentioned in Olli's (EoD) documentary, this one is starting to feel like a life sentence. No complaints.
People change, scenes change. I can't see myself stop listening to the music I like, but I can see my interest and thus real life engagement wane if the scene changes into something that's not for me. Through the ups and downs, it hasn't happened yet that I couldn't find anything out there to be excited about, but hypothetically it could happen and then I'd simply sit at home and listen to all that stuff I've hoarded through the years. Quitting listening to noise: never, quitting parttaking in the scene: possibly.
Sometime things come and go. PLacing an enormous amount of effort in releasing stuff, producing records, organising/attending/performing at gig, making network (taht is still the thing I enjoy the most). All this is great until you face more moundane things like family, work, health issues etc.
Sometimes I am super excited, other times, like the past two years, I focus only on my own thing and very slowly develop new projects. I listen less noise today than (UNPC) oi/hardcore at the moment, but whenever I get good stuff for friends makes me feel at home.
The excercise of making noise, choosing (and buying or assembling) new gear, new software or new know how (MAX Jitter being a fantastic ally for the past decade) is and will always be stimulating, same goes for the visual parts. Despite power electronics for me is always linked to some kind of story telling, the noise behind it is and always been the most exciting part when it comes to try to create sounds and atmospheres you would like to listen yourself.
Lost track of noise a bit between my mid 20s and mid 30s. For whatever reason I spent my late 30s getting deeply reacquainted. Now at 48 I don't think it will stop.
Noise as social organization around a genre, I have zero interest in that anymore.
Noise as a non-genre specific sphere of sonic possibilities, approaches, and frameworks for sound, I still utilize that in my music.
Interests change yadda yadda, I'm deeply entrenched in metal and sort of the same for other niche sounds like noise, hardcore punk and vaporwave (have to relax you know) and could never truly leave it. Do have to admit I feel like throwing it off when it comes to women, I don't want to them to know me as a stereotype, with ensuing rejection. But experience has learnt me that's only a lustful phase and it doesn't matter anyway, the morbid freak in me will always show its ugly head hah.
I am of the opinion that once one gets deeper in underground genres, the sounds and ideas will no doubt leave traces in ones brain. It's a matter of conditioning and in that sense, one can never truly 'leave', as it has made its mark in the psyche. I could never say I dislike noise, any explanation would be an excuse after me and my brain already decided it's good stuff. I could always see the merit in it and any further explanation for a sudden dislike would just be excuses I tell myself. Boredom of course can strike, but a change/fatigue ≠ leaving/quitting.
i'm also deep into metal, but i've found that i tend to take breaks from noise rather than quitting altogether. the culture around stuff like harsh noise is always interesting to me and eventually draws me back to the albums. i've found my musical identity and noise more or less is going to take up a quarter of it.
Quitting life is the shit.
I tend to have different phases where I listen massively to a genre to the detriment of others, but never definitely "quit" anything, besides almost stopping to listen to techno/danceable music at home, I think I used to do more often in the past for few year and I basically don't do it anymore because - besides the few artists I like - I am fucking bored from that stuff.
Now that I am father I tend to avoid blasting noise or power electronics with depraved/anti-social lyrics in front of my 2-year-old kid so far, and I use headphones in case I still want to listen to it. Still listen to a lot of extreme metal with the kid though.
This is an interesting topic and one I've actually thought about recently. A bunch of my favorite tapes/etc were made by artists who made a run at it for a few years and then either moved on to something else or disappeared completely. Conversely, I'll see people who have been around releasing noise for decades, but haven't recorded anything that has moved me in the slightest in 30+ years, who openly rant about how noise and/or power electronics owe them a paycheck.
I guess some people are just honest with themselves and know that once the inspiration is gone, it's time to pack it up. For some of those folks, the drive comes back and they have another killer run. For others, it simply never returns. I think it's probably better to just cease activity than waste plastic on uninspired shit or become the entitled veteran.
when i was teenager i listened metal. with family issues i grew up ( i'll not piss of anybody here to develop this ) i needed to go to something more mainstream ( student in computer science... really needed to see chicks and real world ).
with career issues and mid life crises i came back to extreme music... now, step by step, i notice i move from death metal to noise. fives years ago i listened metalcore, then back to extreme and now it's mainly sludge and industrial about metal).
I also notice now i appreciate a lot more some G.O album than some years ago.
I could also talk about reasons for going into noise scene older than most of people here... maybe totally different than other guys here and laughable.
Pretty normal to evolve with job, kids, family to raise.
Pretty normal to evolve into music tastes and a sign of good mental health.
Quitting noise is pretty normal. As is quitting noise whilst simultaneously ramming a Merzdisc up the ass and singing God Save The Queen and frantically jacking it.
All pretty normal and don't let them jerk it otherwise, damnit.
Quote from: englishwheel on October 19, 2025, 12:18:58 AMPretty normal to evolve with job, kids, family to raise.
Pretty normal to evolve into music tastes and a sign of good mental health.
As I tend to listen quite variety of sounds and music, I never really get tired of particular style. Just might shift with % of what to listen to in specific period. Noise related is the only thing that may take significant % of total amount, where are punk or rock albums go through phases I may listen very little. What was said in this message that is not on quote, I find myself often actually liking more albums I didn't care much in past. A lot of releases that felt ok at the time and now, returning to it 5, 10, 20, 30 years later, suddenly many of the albums were way better than impressions were back then.
I don't dismiss getting married and raising family, not at all. Done that. I just have seen that many times it goes on route where all things man has been into, goes on full stop, and 15-20 years later sort of semi bitter divorced man returns to underground, catching up, haha... While many seem to be puzzled about idea that one can (usually) do both. No reason why entire family should be listening radio or watching TV and not... industrial noise on living room. Like mentioned on previous page, I heard that man is sort of semi forced to retreat into garage or attic, with all his crap, while in the house, nothing can remind about unusual interests or involvement in culture. I can't really see why one would accept such dominance from partners, as it certainly goes way beyond any sense. I vote for approach where even the friends of wife and kids will hear the power of harsh noise so they are exposed to good things in life, and not just the illusions of generic routines.
I've been thinking about this topic for the past week or so. I had attended noise focused shows around 2012-2014 (with less attendance in 2015), created some recordings during that period up until 2016. I'm not entirely certain but it felt like the Oakland Ghost Ship fire (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghost_Ship_warehouse_fire) and the fallout from the incident had an effect on the los angeles art gallery and noise scene. I know a couple of the venues that would host noise shows either closed or stopped hosting events entirely. I had talked with a guy who was involved in one of the bigger venues here, one that still hosts shows, and they had to bring their event space up to code to prevent shutting down.
I had moved farther and farther north, away from the area that hosted most shows and my motivation for noise and experimental music in general waned. I have held onto my collection of noise tapes, CDs, and records. Once my wife found my collection of tapes, specifically the more fetish focused releases and asked me "what the fuck is this?! why do you have this??" She has known I tend to be more snobby when it comes to art, music and film in general so she wasn't very surprised when I had explained what noise is.
Life became a bit busy and I fell out of the noise scene and world. I would attribute some to the lack of major depression, loneliness and addiction problems that affected me between 2011-2017. I've seen Richard post every year about some tour that is suppose to happen and I've wanted to go see BLJ live again so hopefully the tour does materialize. The past few weeks I've gone through some instagram accounts of noise folks I was aware of and seeing some of the live footage the past few years, and reading through a mini book of an art gallery I went to a lot before they closed, really gave me a big sense of FOMO and sad nostalgia about not keeping up with things.
With Maniacsonly and stench forums ceasing to exist, I'm really glad to see this forum, special interests and freak animal still alive and well. The writes ups done involving the noise shows in Finland have been amazing and the White Centipede Noise youtube video about Oskar's recommendations and interviews has me diving back into noise. I've spent a little bit of money to get an audio recorder again, luckily I had all my gear I had used previously, and have decided to try and make some sort of "sound collective" in my area since I live near a big arts college. Even if it ends up just being me again, I'd be happy to just see what sound I go for and where it takes me. I was never big on performing live because I tend to suffer from some stage fright/performance anxiety but I think creating something and throwing it online would be fun.
Quote from: FreakAnimalFinland on July 07, 2025, 11:08:48 PMI fully realize that there are very different kinds of people, with different kinds of motivations.
One quality is that people have phases in life, and they "move on" so to say.
I know a lot of people who were "punks" or "metalheads" and then grew up, so to say. They quit, totally. Just adjusted into what is generally expected from people in the society.
I have written about it, quite alot, some of it found from SI website too. Addressing question if what we are involved in is what in past was seen as "youth culture".
It is very very interesting perspective to realize how new idea is to be somehow committed to (sub)culture that is not all about minimum level of survival. That we have merely couple decades of examples of this. Formerly, it was some sort of rebellious transition moment, before there was something else and idea of grown up man committing some something besides feeding family just wasn't really option.
I was born to moment when to rebel was no longer like "summer of 68" or "summer of 77", but turned out into something else. It was no longer that brief moment, where summer or two you got adolescent idealism, what gets suppressed and you get back to line, so to say. Now what we have is life long commitments into something what in past was just anomaly before you got back in line.
I know a lot of people who are merely in search of something. They test things. A lot of trends. A lot of phases. Making couple noise releases is like fucking couple ladies. You know there are bunch of different kinds of ladies you want to try out and not settle on HNW.. so to say.
I am not here just to "try out things". Noise was never phase, not something that was "done", something I would get tired. I can understand there are people who just test things and realize there are more suitable things for them elsewhere move there. I was never like that, never quit anything, never quit liking something I liked, never felt disappointment nor regret of things I've been doing.
Right now, listening SLOGUN, just after listening DISSECTING TABLE, and drinking little whiskey with it. After day of various types of activities, I am sure there are a lot of things I should do, focus and do more, but "quitting" something ain't happening. I rather feel that what I consider to be "industrial noise", both as a sound, plus as worldview, is just so much more that just about anything there is.
I never quit listening other types of music, but indeed, I listen LESS of something. All music genres, I don't need to be listening daily, weekly, or even monthly. I like it, but I don't necessarily need to listen all types of music all the time. Noise, in other hand, since I discovered it, I was always into it. Maximum amount of not listening noise, is being in conditions where I do not have access to stereos or noise releases. That means, just days, maximum of couple weeks when simply being in conditions of not being possible to listen.
That said, even if I'd spend hours in day doing so, I get to do plenty of things BESIDES listening records, cds, and tapes.
I can't see myself "quitting noise", but if someone else does, and find something better, fine! To me, noise feels compatible to almost anything, so I am really puzzled to hear people moving away from noise for sake of "family" or "work" or whatever. As if you'd need to really make choise between those things?
As for being part of "scene" or being "visible", I dont think that matters so much.
We have had a similar discussion on this forum I think. I made the argument that rock/punk/metal genres are inherently about youth, youthful energy, youthful rebelliousness etc. Once fans/musicians get older they either move on or display a certain amount of devotion which is about "staying true" to their roots, "rocking hard" and maintaining that youth spirit at advanced age.Rock/metal bands immediately lose fanbase if they change or experiment. Those who move on, they precisely connect it with their youth and that's why they lose interest once their youth is gone, it was just a "phase".
This is something absent from certain music style such as classical music or experimental music where the arch of evolution remains open or is even desired, supposedly.