Experimental rock or avant-garde rock is a type of music based on rock which experiments with the basic elements of the genre, or which pushes the boundaries of common composition and performance technique.
Performers may also attempt to individualize their music with unconventional time signatures, instrumental tunings, unusual harmony and key signatures, compositional styles, lyrical techniques, elements of other musical genres, singing styles, instrumental effects or custom-made experimental musical instruments.
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The mid- to late 60s was an era of explosive growth and experimentation in rock music. Bands drew influences from free jazz artists such as John Coltrane and Sun Ra and avant-garde composers like John Cage and Karlheinz Stockhausen. The Velvet Underground, which at one point counted Lou Reed, John Cale, and Angus Maclise among its members and was associated with Andy Warhol and LaMonte Young, fused elements of minimalism and avant-garde music with standard rock song structures. The sounds of Indian and Arabic music were also widely admired and adapted. Even such popularly successful bands as The Beatles, The Beach Boys and The Rolling Stones were able to incorporate outside and foreign influences into their songs without sacrificing their broad fanbase.
In the television program Howard Goodall's 20th-Century Greats, Goodall says that in mixing pop and classical techniques, and cross-fertilising them with Indian and electronic music, The Beatles refreshed and revitalised western harmony. They also transformed the recording studio from a dull box where you recaptured your live sound, into a musical laboratory, of exciting and completely new sounds.[1]
Other important experimental bands in this period include The Monks, The Fugs, The Godz, Red Crayola, Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band and The Mothers of Invention. These bands were also the inspiration for Plastic People of the Universe, which emerged in the 1970s behind the Iron Curtain.
Influenced by the experiments of these groups came another wave of experimental rock bands in the early 1970s. There was, for instance, the so-called Krautrock scene in Germany, which included psychedelic bands like Amon Düül II and Popol Vuh, sound-collage artists like Faust, and the extremely improvisational and almost unclassifiable Can. Brian Eno was another important figure, especially after his departure from Roxy Music in order to pursue his own ideas (which ultimately led to his invention of the term "ambient music"). Some other artists in this period, such as David Bowie and Scott Walker, also departing from more pop-oriented styles in order to experiment with songwriting and production. Some of Miles Davis' early-70s work such as On the Corner or A Tribute to Jack Johnson straddles or even defies the line between jazz fusion, funk and rock. At the same time, there was the experimental wing of the already somewhat experimental progressive rock scene, including a number of bands who were influenced by contemporary classical music -- Magma, Zao, Henry Cow, Samla Mammas Manna, Area, Univers Zero, Frank Zappa, and so on. In the late 70s, punk rock developed a number of experimental offshoots, most notably post-punk. This genre includes everything from arty punk rockers like Pere Ubu, The Electric Eels and Suicide to the dub-influenced Public Image Ltd. Other punk offshoots included industrial music (bands such as Cabaret Voltaire, Einstürzende Neubauten and Throbbing Gristle) and No Wave (bands such as James Chance and the Contortions and DNA).
Experimentalism was a large part of the college rock and underground music scene in the 1980s. Influenced by their punk and post-punk predecessors, bands like Sonic Youth, Band of Susans, and Live Skull who all originated in New York's No Wave scene, The Scene Is Now, Negativland, Butthole Surfers, Swans, Beme Seed and Dinosaur Jr. further expanded the boundaries of rock by introducing influences from minimalism and conceptualism, as well as pop art, situationism and fluxus and influences from the new media culture of the 1980s. The late 80s underground scene saw the rise of a number of bands influenced by the Velvet Underground and 1960s psychedelia, including Agitpop, Opal, Pixies, Treatment, Yo La Tengo, and Big Black. Hardcore punk, with its DIY ethic, was also a big influence on many of the experimental rock bands of the day. Toward the end of the 1980s rap emerged into a mature, experimental phase exploring the possibilities of sampling and dealing with social and racial issues. Sampling technology had been present within pop music for a large portion of the decade, however, artists such as Kate Bush, Brian Eno and so forth innovated an experimental pop music take on the use of sampling technology. The influences of this form of sampling also aided as an influence on modern electronica. Rap's impact on experimental rock was huge, as many rock bands were impressed by the power and innovation of rap artists such as Public Enemy, Dream Warriors and Digital Underground and sought to incorporate aspects of rap and hip hop into their music, with Sonic Youth's 1990 "Kool Thing" featuring an appearance by Chuck D. of Public Enemy. Beginning in 1988 Oxbow's music has blended elements including noise rock, avant-garde jazz, musique concrète, blues, non-Western music and contemporary classical music, among others.
The commercialization of underground music in the first part of the 1990s led to the rise of a representative "Alternative" style which featured multiple, layered distorted guitars and overwrought male vocals. The experimentalism that had characterized the 1980s declined as grunge took hold as the dominant style in rock music. Originated in the Pacific Northwest in the 1980s by metal, psychedelia and punk influenced bands such as Mudhoney, and Mother Love Bone, Nirvana was the genre's breakout artist. Soon follow up bands like Pearl Jam, Stone Temple Pilots, Soundgarden were dominating the charts while hewing close to the accepted list of influences on their genre and even adding elements of arena rock such as extended guitar solos and intricate time signatures to what had been a stripped-down, nonvirtuosic style. Bands such as the Butthole Surfers and Sonic Youth discarded many unconventional and abrasive elements and began working within traditional structures. Artists such as Ween and Redd Kross continued their predecessors inventiveness with less impact, as did some bands referring to 1970s funk such as Praxis. North California's Mr. Bungle combined the skillful musicianship of progressive rock with a confrontational, absurdist approach more often associated with No Wave, by switching genres in between whole songs, and getting rid of traditional song structures.
Half way through the nineties the lo-fi movement became a prominent factor in exploring new recording techniques at home with direct plugged in guitars as well as heavily pre amps channels for acoustic instruments raising the noise in the music. Experimental lo-fi rock bands are Sebadoh, Guided by Voices, Half Japanese, Slicing Grandpa, and Eric's Trip.
In the later 1990s, many indie rock bands diverged into a style called post-rock, which has been described as "using rock instrumentation to make non-rock music." Although post-rock can often be traced back to the late-80s/early-90s works of Slint (influenced by hardcore punk) and late-era Talk Talk (influenced by Miles Davis and ambient music), the term did not become prevalent until the late-90s/early-00s to describe the mostly-instrumental music of bands such as Mogwai, Tortoise and Godspeed You! Black Emperor. By now "post-rock" can refer to almost any complex instrumental rock coming out of the indie scene, from the delicate, classical-influenced chamber rock of Rachel's to the massive, forbidding sonic landscapes of Godspeed You! Black Emperor. Other experimental rock styles of this period are math rock and post-hardcore, with bands like Shellac, Fugazi, Les Savy Fav. Noise rock took a more radical course and speedy with bands like Melt-Banana and Lightning Bolt. At the end of the nineties some indie rock bands like The Notwist and Enon went into a more electronic way of music making to explore new textures.
In the latin american music, one rock band that was pioneering of the experimentation was Soda Stereo, leaving sample particularly in his albums Dynamo of 1992 and Sueño Stereo of 1995. This set a precedent for the Latin American music.
As the 1990s passed, non-instrumental forms of indie rock also became increasingly experimental. Later experimental indie bands include Circus Devils, Deerhoof, Deerhunter, The Fiery Furnaces, Kling Klang, Liars, Man Man, and Xiu Xiu.[2] British band Radiohead, who became popular in the 1990s playing alternative rock, began experimenting with different musical styles at the turn of the millennium, with the album Kid A, and then in 2001 with Amnesiac. These albums took influence from electronica and Krautrock, as well as jazz and classical music, creating a radical shift in direction for the group, polarizing critics and fans.
Experimental luthier Yuri Landman created several experimental musical instruments for notable experimental rock acts like Enon, Jad Fair, Liars, Lou Barlow, Mauro Pawlowski and Sonic Youth. The band Neptune also built several similar electric instruments. With multi-layered sound over sound delay tracks Liam Finn incorporated noise rock sound structures in his singer songwriter songs.
The New Weird America movement with bands like Animal Collective emerged as a distinct presence. Bands like Chicks on Speed draw on the No Wave sounds of the early 1980s. Other experimental rock acts founded after 2000 are Kellermensch, Ponytail, Pre and The Luyas.
Some of the more common techniques include:
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