"Doing the research" for a release

[FreakAnimalFinland]

I remember quite many discussions about non-sonic content of noise, where either question or explanation revolves around idea of doing the research on themes that a release is dealing with. I can't really remember how many times artists would have explained what exactly is the research they are doing.

I can imagine, artists like Slogun, they have mentioned in interviews being avid readers of true crime books back then. Or Taint, who would collects video documentaries, books, news articles and so on.

Question being more like:

-Is something research for a release, or more like general interest in topic. Going through all sorts of materials and some of it sort of bleeds into artists work. It can be debatable if it really was research for a release.

-I do also know guys who decide what the release is going to be and then they indeed start to read books on the matter. Watch documentaries, search for visuals and so on.

-It can be also both. You have been simply going through all sorts of stuff you tend to be interested, find a starting point that leads you to dive deeper.

-There is also question is noise ever really "well researched" or does it matter. Lets say BACILLUS, we know his deep interest in matters he does, but would it make noise less of value if he'd do it for purely aesthetic reasons?

-Is reading and watching "good enough"? Should it rather be personal experiences? Lets say like Allerseelen? He would not simply study and observe, but actively take part and put himself into situations.

-Or instead of "research", if it is simply word that is used and what actually happens is someone simply living his life and the life tends to be focused on all sorts of creative and interesting things. Not something you study, but something you live through.

[Penon]

Good one. I have few thoughts on this - example is "A Beginner's Guide to Modern Bioethics" CD of mine. The topic of morality in general and applied morality in medicine are topics I was very interested in well before I started working on the album, and I wouldn't call that prior interest "research". But as I was putting down ideas for songs I realised that some bioethics topics - like morality of euthanasia - are pretty common and I probably don't need any deeper "research" into it, while morality of cryonics, for instance, is something I only vaguely came across, and so I went into a rabbit hole for a bit reading about this narrow thing. So to me "research" is filling the gaps - both in my understanding of the subject and in my understanding of a variety of opinions about the subject that exist out there. Research is a word that I'd probably not use (too academic and formal), but "filling the gaps" is the concept it represents for me. It definitely has to be intentional act of seeking information over and above your day-to-day interest in the subject, otherwise - I agree with you - it feels incredibly strange to call it research.

[Is reading and watching "good enough"? Should it rather be personal experiences?] This is a personal pet peeve of mine, when someone demands "lived experience" or implies that "lived experience" makes art better or more authentic. Especially in music, which is the most abstract of all types of art! Music should be the last bastion of using imagination, fantasising about things you never had or never felt. Using lived exprience organically is fine of course, if that is your inspiration, but forcing yourself to use it just because someone says it makes your art authentic, or because that gives you a better marketing hook - well, I reject that entirely.

[Cranial Blast]

I think doing research for a specific topic for a release can be necessary sometimes, but not always. I think more so depending on if the album is meant to evoke certain ideas to the listeners that will give the album more of well balance, especially if artwork is to be specifically tied to the sounds/music when it comes to the overall experience. I think reading or watching documentaries can only potentially further or enhance topic ideas. It could also lead one to taking theme or topic somewhere more left field with their own personal output.

[HateSermon]

I have mixed feelings about this because I've seen artists get too wrapped up in the concept rather than the craft. Do the research, sure, but don't let it consume you so much that the quality of the noise takes a back seat. At the end of the day, if it doesn't sound great, then what was it really all for? Like a fine artist with an artist statement that includes a bunch of $20 words, but can't paint or sculpt for shit. Go to any contemporary art gallery and you'll see plenty examples of this.

[Heppakirjat]

Like a fine artist with an artist statement that includes a bunch of $20 words, but can't paint or sculpt for shit. Go to any contemporary art gallery and you'll see plenty examples of this.

I find it often that the finer the word salad you have to attach to your art, the less actual substance it has. Nothing sounds more fake or superficial than a bunch of complicated words that mean nothing strung together around a theme that is supposed to mean something to you. Even though my first language is Swedish, this is especially annoying in connection to Finnish titles or text. Finnish is a beautiful language that needs no pompous nonsense borrowed from Latin, English or other such languages. They just make you sound like a goddamn consultant.

But regarding research... I guess if an honest interest in the subject matter and the sounds comes through it's enough for me. I don't care if it's the result of research, a general interest or a full blown obsession. And of course I have to find the sounds interesting.

[BlackCavendish]

-It can be also both. You have been simply going through all sorts of stuff you tend to be interested, find a starting point that leads you to dive deeper.

I think (at least I like to think) this is the starting point.
A subject that interests you, or you may have read about, that eventually inspires you and find its way within a specific release. Exploration of the subject is a process in which your interest is also fueled by the purpose of using it for a record.
Researchig a speicific topic you never was interested in just for the sake of a release seems a bit odd (possible but odd)

-Is reading and watching "good enough"? Should it rather be personal experiences? Lets say like Allerseelen? He would not simply study and observe, but actively take part and put himself into situations.

IMHO, I don't think there's such thing as "good enough" research. Research for academic purposes is different from research done for personal knowledge, which is different from research done for artistic purposes.
It doesn't necessarily have to be comprehensive (quite hard). What matters, at least to me, is that meaningful elements, connections, or a particular vision of the artist are transferred into the work.

Golden years of neofolk come to mind: places,authors and so on would find their way into records and suggest further paths of exploration for the listener. They were just hints but they were enough for someone curious. At the same time they could make the record more interesting and layered for "those who know".

In this sense, personal experience can be great thing, but I don't think it is necessarily "better" than a good reflection developed through other ways (reading, observation, work of the mind) about a particular subject.

[FreakAnimalFinland]

Golden years of neofolk come to mind: places,authors and so on would find their way into records and suggest further paths of exploration for the listener. They were just hints but they were enough for someone curious. At the same time they could make the record more interesting and layered for "those who know".

Indeed. I recall there is somewhere discussion where I mention that moment where ex-wife of mr. Tibet mentioned that she had to leave, since in that world of Tibet, wasn't really space for anything else. Something like that. World that is expressed in his art, was bleeding all over the life in general. Books, pieces of art, whatever. Of course someone may say it doesn't sound like healthy relationship, but if that was what it took for exceptionally good C93's to exist, sounds ok to me!


I think research doesn't have to manifest itself in form of complex language or manifestos. It may be even in form that someone just didn't feel the first pic of boobies or first page google search will be the front cover of noise tape. Instead some "leg work". Going through libraries, going to make something, spending time on figuring out what and how something is done, where to go, who to ask etc. And furthermore, all this done in ways that very few actually "get it", so to say.

[Balor/SS1535]

There are many interesting aspects of these questions.  Part of the complication, for me, is that a term like "research" seems too intentional, so I guess I tend to value the last point in the original post the most.  While I understand that literal, intentional research is a real part of certain people's artistic practice, I tend to think artists that "dwell with" certain thematic materials tend to produce deeper and more interesting work as a result.

For instance, it seems to me that projects like Coil or the above-mentioned Current 93 feature members who are certainly "experts" in their respective areas of thematic interest, but I'm not sure that they ever explicitly set out to research material for a given release (I might just be missing a historical detail proving otherwise, but I think my point stands generally).  It seems to me that the material they explore in their music is something they would be spending their time with regardless of whether they were musicians.  It's just a part of their life that then bleeds over to art, and the fact that they value it personally implies that they express connection to it in a meaningful way.  (In a way, "dwelling with" rather than researching material also resolves the question of lived experience/authenticity, as it really is a lived experience in a certain sense!)

[pidgeons]

I think research in an academic sense is not really necessary. I would rather consider genuine interest in a topic and the urge to process it in an artistic way more important. After all one project may glorify Auschwitz while another will use it as a cautionary tale.
Conspiracy theories or spiritual themes do not rend themselves to an objective research by default.

Topics covered in post-industrial works have led me to further reading about the events that inspired them. See the 7" religious extremism series by GO, where I had only known about Kahane Chai and well mr Jones; but not the other three. Survival Unit's Fentanyl Martyrs surrounding the Russo-Chechen conflict and the moscow hostage crisis. Or certain Italian true crime stories I would have never heard about without listening to Italian PE projects. Some historical events covered by Geography of Hell. Hyper specific cases presented by the likes of FFH or Breathing Problem et al. the list goes on...

Do I take the topics presented at face value? Hell no. Do I appreciate an artists obsession for whatever calamity/depravity is presented and might look into the backstory? Quite often!

[Balor/SS1535]

I think research in an academic sense is not really necessary. I would rather consider genuine interest in a topic and the urge to process it in an artistic way more important. After all one project may glorify Auschwitz while another will use it as a cautionary tale.
Conspiracy theories or spiritual themes do not rend themselves to an objective research by default.

Topics covered in post-industrial works have led me to further reading about the events that inspired them. See the 7" religious extremism series by GO, where I had only known about Kahane Chai and well mr Jones; but not the other three. Survival Unit's Fentanyl Martyrs surrounding the Russo-Chechen conflict and the moscow hostage crisis. Or certain Italian true crime stories I would have never heard about without listening to Italian PE projects. Some historical events covered by Geography of Hell. Hyper specific cases presented by the likes of FFH or Breathing Problem et al. the list goes on...

Do I take the topics presented at face value? Hell no. Do I appreciate an artists obsession for whatever calamity/depravity is presented and might look into the backstory? Quite often!

This is also true for me very often---a release gets me to "research" something upon hearing it.  This reminds me of how the Industrial Culture Handbook provided a reading/film list for each of the interviews to facilitate the exchange of research information.

I think art better serves as a wellspring for possibilities than a source of researched "interpretations."

[NedOik]

i think there is something of a paradox here, these days when anyone can upload 40 minutes of noise to Bandcamp and all filters that used to exist like cost to press, artwork, distribution, network of contacts have been removed; then I (as a 'consumer') feel that context is becoming more necessary to situate it and answer the question - why should I or anyone care about this? However just because someone has supplied context or research with a release and the topic is interesting to me does not mean the music is any good - which is meant to be source of its artistic legitimacy.

[FreakAnimalFinland]

There might be other topic for it, but above mentioned thing is related to discussion I had recently with other label. I expressed my critic towards consumerism in noise. He felt we all consume and entire life is consumerism. In a way yes, but, there are many ways to see it. I don't personally think the act of actually buying something is even the most negative one. In music/sound, I rather reject the "non material consumerism", where lack of physical material and fast pace has made possible that people would routinely consume previews, soundlinks, whatever. It is no news that psychological promise that the next will bring "fulfillment" is accelerated so fast in non-physical realm that cycle of consuming is beyond any sense. Becoming kind of theoretical experiences. "Yeah I checked it out, didn't like like it", may be 10 seconds when there was no desire to commit to anything.

This related to topic of "doing the research" that even as listener, I don't feel there is any sense in just clicking through buttons, pouring in stuff (audio), unless I have done some sort of research on it. What is this, who is this, why I should be checking it out? Some dude from south american sending link to glitch beats. WTF? Instant delete. Dude sending me link "check out my bandcamp". Why? Who? What? Almost without exception, if you follow link, it has nothing to do in what I would either care for or be even remotely interested. It feels as if there is correlation. Someone who created material for a purpose, that may be mostly creation of sound, but something more, has sort of invested his persona and put purpose in it, in other ways than guys who will spam you whatever sound came out of their gadgets.

It is somehow totally different kind of scenario of being handed out noise tape at gig or something. Most likely artist has idea what he is doing. He has done legwork that is required for having this item done. He might have idea that I may be interested in it to some degree. As example, you could get handmade tape of THE DAY OF THE ANTLER. No manifesto. No lyrics. But... the whole thing radiates that it is about something. There is a drive. There is desire and purpose for it. Suddenly I got a feeling, I'd really like to know more about this. What is the hidden qualities, subtle references, the spirit of release that is not very obvious, except that obviously there.

[BlackCavendish]

I think research doesn't have to manifest itself in form of complex language or manifestos. It may be even in form that someone just didn't feel the first pic of boobies or first page google search will be the front cover of noise tape. Instead some "leg work". Going through libraries, going to make something, spending time on figuring out what and how something is done, where to go, who to ask etc. And furthermore, all this done in ways that very few actually "get it", so to say.

Another interesting point is how that knowledge actually enters the noise. Does it become a title, artwork, sample, atmosphere, lyrics? Or does it simply remain in the way the artist approaches the subject? Research can be explicit or it can simply change the way the artist looks at a particular theme.

Also, it might be interesting to consider how the actual research process itself can influence the spund. Does allowing an idea to sit in a corner while the research takes place change the final outcome? New infos and connections can slowly alter the way you approach the music itself? Maybe the artist starts with a certain idea but the research takes them somewhere else.
Like for example, discovering some unexpected nuances in the story of a serial killer does change the sound of the album, rather than just using a true crime image on the cover and turning everything up to eleven?

[post-morten]

-Is something research for a release, or more like general interest in topic. Going through all sorts of materials and some of it sort of bleeds into artists work. It can be debatable if it really was research for a release.

-I do also know guys who decide what the release is going to be and then they indeed start to read books on the matter. Watch documentaries, search for visuals and so on.

-It can be also both. You have been simply going through all sorts of stuff you tend to be interested, find a starting point that leads you to dive deeper.

Diamanda Galas took this to the next level. Back in the 90s I somehow (don't remember the actual circumstances) got in touch with a person online, that worked as her researcher. Let's say Diamanda wanted to do a thematic album on the Turkish genocide of Armenian people, or of the AIDS epidemic that took her brother's life. This guy would read up on the subject, research sources, etc then she would process the information and use in her works. Perhaps you could consider this approach lazy, but then again this was well before google, wikipedia, or chatGPT. Being in her position she could afford paying someone else to "do the legwork".

I kept in touch with this guy for a while, which led to him being kind enough to set up a "meet & greet" with Diamanda after a concert when she was in town 1998.