Haunted Weather: Music, Silence, and Memory (Paperback)

~ (Author) "Not strictly awake, though far enough from dreamless sleep, I am lying on this bed up here in the clouds..." (more)
Key Phrases: soundscape composition, haunted weather, generative music, John Cage, John Stevens, Heights Gallery (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review

"'Haunted Weather is not just a deeply thoughtful and richly populated survey of modern experimental music, it's a meditation on hearing itself' Guardian '[Toop] has somehow managed to make the world of experimental music not just understandable but alluring for even the most virginal listener... this book is almost perfect' Independent on Sunday 'One of Britain's most celebrated writers on music' New Statesman 'A joy to read, whatever your musical taste' Buzz 'With Toop's enthusiasm and accessible style, the world of the avant-garde needn't seem like a closed club: Haunted Weather offers the perfect port of entry for the uninitiated' Record Collector (Four-star review)" --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Product Description

Is it possible to grow electronic sounds, as if they were plants in a garden? Why are childhood memories of sound and silence so important to our emotional development? Is it valid to classify audio recordings of wind or electrical hum as musical compositions? Why have the sounds of our environment become so important to sound artists and why is atmosphere so important in music? In Haunted Weather, David Toop asks these questions and gauges the impact of new technology on contemporary music's sound.

David Toop is a highly regarded author, music critic and musician. Since 1995, he has released three solo albums, curated five compilation albums (including the soundtrack to Ocean of Sound). His books include Rap Attack 3, Ocean of Sound and Exotica.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: Serpent's Tail (July 1, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1852428120
• ISBN-13: 978-1852428129
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.3 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,215,824 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Fresh, thoughtful and stimulating, March 31, 2005

By	D. Borrie "music thinker" (Wellington, New Zealand) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Rather than argue a thesis, Toop's style is the chase down a thread of meaning via the points at which various thoughts and anecdotes cross over. This perfectly suits the nature of his subject matter- the vast, largely uncharted terrain of non-genre-based music, for which a dominant narrative and vocabulary do not yet exist as with, say, rock 'n roll or classical.

The book meditates on, among other things, the boundary between performer and audience, environmental sound and music, improviser and composer, and the role of digital technology in mediating or enhancing these distinctions.

As a journeyman music writer, critic and musician, Toop has spent a lot of his time travelling. This seems to inform his writing style as he is constantly in motion, moving quickly between personal recollections, excerpts from correspondence with diverse musicians, and lengthy quotes from various topically obscure yet philosophically related texts.

These (non-)random stop-overs make the book a slow read, as the reader is left to do a lot of the piecing together. Yet this is part of the pleasure to be found in Toop's writing- like a brilliant but challenging piece of music, the book offers an experience in which the mind of the reader is engaged as more than just a passive receptor of received ideas and emotion.

9 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars big ideas spoken in a quiet voice, September 30, 2004

By	Mr. G. I. Keene "Gary" (London) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Beautiful, challenging and nourishing.

I read this upon its UK release in July and still find myself dwelling upon some of the ideas raised. Reading it challenged me to use my ears afresh, and to think about what music can be.

2 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Haunted by Pomo Posturing, November 11, 2008

By	Matthew Spencer (Portland, OR) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Haunted Weather: Music, Silence and Memory (Five Star Fiction S.) (Paperback)

This book was intended as an open-ended exploration of how technology is changing music, but hidden in Toop's meandering style are ridged modernist constructs. Like any book covering experimental music, Haunted Weather makes copious mention of John Cage. Toop gives no convincing reason why contemporary sound art is a step forward. He often mentions the ability of technology to take away intentionality in music making, claiming composers can grow music like watering and feeding plants. Too bad so much of the music produced this way is either artificial enough to render organic metaphors absurd or so indistinguishable from background noise as to not merit attention at all. "The humanistic approach to music is dead" is his reoccurring claim, but having listened to a few of the artists Toop covered, I recommend a bit more humanity their music.

Another claim that doesn't pass muster is that there is an entire world of sound artists that don't fit into standard narratives of genre or history. Toop knows too much about 20th century music to make this statement an honest mistake. He pretends that field recordings and "sound ecology" represent an artistic breakthrough, ignoring the fact the musque concrete artists made compositions of non-musical, pre-recorded sounds decades earlier. In claiming that he has tapped into a brand new type of music, Toop continues the old modernist habit of hiding your influences behind a curtain of originality.

To be fair, Toop's enthusiasm for potential of sound art is real and infectious, but it limits the scope of the book to his own narrow view of how music can change. Technology does have vast potential to aid musical expression, but not within the shackles of academic theory. Computers have revolutionized the recording process, not just for sound art but any number of genres, from classical to rock. Digital editing and auto tuners have brought up real concerns about musicianship and creativity. Sampling, synthesis and sequencing software have fired breakthroughs in ambient, techno, dub and other genres. Haunted Weather could have covered any one of those topics, but Toop choose to use technology to legitimize shop-worn claims of the avant-garde. In putting the cart of ideology in front of the music, he has missed much of what is interesting about digital music.