"VARIATIONS #6. The Library", a podcast series by Jon Leidecker on the history of appropiative collage

Link: http://rwm.macba.cat/en/curatorial?id_capsula=810

In the sixth episode of this series of podcasts, we encounter the
establishment of sound libraries, collections explicitly curated for
further use: sound objects presented as authorless, unfinished
ingredients. Though some libraries contain newly commissioned generic
sounds, specifically designed for maximum flexibility, the most widely
used sounds are often sourced from commercial recordings, freed from
their original context to propagate across dozens to hundreds of songs.
From presets for digital samplers to data CD ROMs to hip-hop battle
records, sounds increasingly detach from their sources, used less as
references to any original moment, and more as objects in a continuous
public domain.

 As hip-hop undergoes a conservative retrenchment in the wake of the
early 90's sampling lawsuits, a widening variety of composers and
groups expand the practice of appropriative audio collage as a formal
discipline. The aesthetic of the sound libraries gives rise to
recombinant genres like drum and bass, the use of sampling as
romanticized representation leads to the first quadruple platinum World
Music collage, and we encounter a novelty single that quietly heralds a
musical form that would soon become known as the Mash-up.

Link: http://rwm.macba.cat/en/curatorial?id_capsula=810
MP3: http://rwm.macba.cat/uploads/variations/06_Variations.mp3
Related info: http://rwm.macba.cat/uploads/20110304/06Variations_eng_PDF.pdf


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