On Nov 24, 2005, at 9:57 AM, Greg Earle wrote:
If you're referring to me, I am not in SF, I am in LA. I am not a
promoter. I have nothing to do with the Kontrol promoters. It
appears from other peoples' e-mails that there may be a "Greg"
involved with Kontrol, but that is not me.
Fair enough. You are however, the same Greg who decided to interpret
my own take on the Tejada show and draw a limited conclusion from it,
totally ignoring a key point, that he played a a set that I didn't
overall enjoy ASIDE FROM A FEW EMOTIVE MOMENTS. From what you've
written, apparently Mr. Tejada chose to ignore that point as well,
choosing instead to personally attack me (and you chose to forward that
attack to the list), instead of seeing the fact that yes, it is
possible that there might be fans out there who do not equally enjoy
all of his work. If my attitude towards his promoters came across as
negative, then it probably was due to the fact that someone who
apparently went to the show as well has posted to the list, saying that
given how great this particular show was in their eyes, "...what more
could we hope for?"
What more could we hope for?!?!? In a city that claims to be one of
the most progressive in every sense in the world, we have an electronic
music nightlife scene that plays host to either trance or bland house
in most clubs, or, as I see it, productions that FOR THE MOST PART (and
this is key here) book currently popular artists (For more on that,
please see my response to Dave Cronin that I posted yesterday).
ONCE AGAIN, I think that jumping to conclusions based on snippets of my
message does not make it ok for a producer to call a music fan names
behind his back (and then have a list member forward that personal
email to the list in order to get at me for my critical remarks, now
that's what i call BALLS! ;) just because that music fan may not like
all of that producers work.
You're saying that me criticizing promoters' booking choices is equal
to saying that a producer sucks? In this case, I'm sure that if I were
to criticize local trance promoters Spundae who booked Hawtin in 2001
would mean that Hawtin would then contact a list member and feel hurt
b/c I DARED to criticize the ppl who book him? In this case, I'm
surprised that no one associated with M-nus or hawtin on this list
doesn't forward Hawtin's emails to the list calling all the listmembers
who dislike his current work losers, @**holes, or what have you. But
then again, I'm sure that Hawtin doesn't give two bleeps about that
fact that some Detroit music lovers may not dig his current output.
Big deal. But I guess if you're a producer who can't take criticism
then you call your critics names, since it's really impossible to argue
with anything in their well-reasoned argument.
Notice that most of the recent posts about this thread seem to focus
around everyone's defense of Tejada. Why? because someone dares to
say that they didn't care for his current music style, and wished to
hear more of his earlier style of work (which is EXACTLY what i said in
my first post)? Or that they DARE wish for more variety in bookings?
Anyone on this list who knows me (and there are many - I've been
here for over 8 years now) knows that I do not name drop to name
drop - I've known John Tejada for over 10 years now, his paramour
Lynn Hasty used to put on the best Electronic Music shows in LA and
I went to nearly all of her events and met them both very early on.
I have also known Justin Maxwell (through the SoCal-Raves mailing
list) ever since he was in his teens and used to hang out with him
a fair bit before he moved up to Oakland.
To me, your comments about the promoters only booking "trendy/popular"
producers/musicians were a back-handed insult to John & Justin as far
as I was concerned.
...And so you chose to forward Tejada's personal attack to the list.
Again, why do you think that? Read the comment about Hawtin and
Spundae above.
Given that you had already made a comment about
how they "lacked in depth and emotion" and "play[ed] to the crowd,
incorporating electro-clash guitar samples and a whole slew of quirky
and gimmicky ``glitch'' sounds", I felt compelled to come to their
defense. Maybe I overreacted, but if you knew well-known musicians
and you felt they were unfairly slagged on a public mailing list you
were on, you'd probably feel compelled to do the same.
If I knew a well known musician, say Derrick May, and someone on the
list said that he played nothing that night except boring loop-techno
tracks and only one or two of his own productions, then i'd say, ok,
that's the guy's opinion, Derrick played some looped techno, so what?
I'm not gonna protect my friend's "rep" (or, more accurately, stroke
his EGO) by writing to the list that the critical show attendee is out
of line b/c he DARED criticize the ALMIGHTY Derrick May, and then go
cry to Derrick about it and have Derrick call that someone who didn't
care for the majority of his show names, and that forward that message
to the list. That's real net etiquette for you.
And once again, you deliberately choose these two quotes OUT OF
CONTEXT. There's a key statement in between those two quotes that
explicitly states that I HOPED TO HEAR MORE EMOTIVE, melody driven
MUSIC AT THE SHOW. Criticism aside, there's nothing in that post that
"slags" Tejada, if anything, it portrays my impression of the music I
heard that night and what I perceived to be the other guy's (your
friend Justin Maxwell's) influences. The term I used in the quote
above, "quirky" does not have a negative connotation, does it? or is
gimmicky offensive or diss-like in your eyes? If, in the context of
earlier techno, I heard the hoover sound being used all over again,
would you not consider that sound to be gimmicky if someone used it at
a live show back in 94 or 95? Similarly, since it is safe to say that
quite a few producers nowadays use the chirpy, or glitchy sounds,
what's so offensive about stating that in a review if I see those
sounds to be overused in modern productions? But it looks like it's
not ok to do anymore on the list, if you're criticizing producers who
have friends on the list
(Now please respect my Reply-To: header and follow up to the list.)
Sure thing. Please DO NOT quote my posts out of context in the future,
and refrain from venting personal attacks on the list, unless of course
that is the only argument you have against a critical remark.
Happy Thanksgiving and best wishes to all
Wojtek
- Greg
