Standard Clichés

[seanocean]

Sorry i been off board for a while. -been doing other stuff.

I've been thinking about techno clichés recently. I think if you examine and identify cliches and find workarounds from dismissing them, your music can be a bit more creative. For example, you all know the old ride cymbal that was ubiquitous in late 90s techno and is no longer to be found anywhere.. and the millennium noise that was impossible to get rid of? I'm just wondering if the good people of Subsekt had their favorite sounds they'd love to do without.

btw it can also be personal for you as well.. a friend of mine, he hates with a passion, the use of chords in techno.. something about the harmonics or the buzzing between the harmonies pisses him off and as a result a lot of the techno he likes is on the raw and grinding side.. but i can relate since chords without some real purpose seem to water down things or do nothing for the track or start pushing things to a progressive angle.

[terryfalafel]

I loved 909 rides in the 90s and I love them now. They're still a great way to elevate the energy in a section of a track. No need to make them too forward in the mix; they can sit quite far back and still work well.

[dubdub]

I wish there was some kind of replacement for the 909 ride but there's nothing that I think matches that kind of energy and momentum that that sound brings. Noise rides can work but at this point they're also cliché, so might aswell choose the classic I use the 707 ride sometimes which isn't being used that often and sounds slightly different.

Hating chords seems weird, they're like the fundamental melodic structure of western music... Kind of in the opposite direction - I really hate most techno that's just noise. Give me some interesting harmonics, people. It doesn't have to be "melodic", a lot of old Mills is really sparse melodically but the patterns and harmonics are still really interesting. Just noise can be made to work, like on some old Downwards or E-Com records but if I hear a new track that's just noise, it'll be almost guaranteed to be piss boring.

I don't always hate the reverb-rumble-bass (although it's incredibly overdone) but I always just roll my eyes when it's super-overdone, how much more cliché can you get?

Another big turnoff in the low end department and are clicky plastic kicks and these lame sinewave-bassline you hear in Ibiza-bigroom Techno all the time.

I also kinda hate tracks with 909-tom based bass, it works on some 90s tracks but doing it today just sounds super dated and tacky to my ears (most of the time). Speaking of the 909, I used to not mind before I started producing but I now I get a bit turned off by just how many tracks are still using an almost completly unprocessed 909. If you are using one in 2016, at least give it your own spin or make it unrecognizable, imo. That said, I won't skip a good record just because it useses a raw 909.

I'm also really over these "dark", washy Sandwell/Prologue-esque reverb pads. Most of the time they're massive in the mix and just seem to be made to fill the whole in the producer's creativity. A lot of these type of records have aged quite badly and at least they were decently original at the time. Most of that stuff being made today is going to land in the 3-5 euro bin a couple years down.

There's much more i'm forgetting right now. Yes, i'm a DJ with specific taste - on the plus sides it makes going through records much easier

[buffered]

the two quick reverbed claps Faki uses heavily just before a sucessive 16, 32 bar section begins. kind of like the noise riser technique.
not that i dislike it, just avoid doing anything similar in my work.

[seanocean]

One more.. I think that when things are excessively dark for no reason that's kind of a turn off. I've heard techno in major and it's pretty ok.

Also dirge techno that's just borderline powernoise. >:| that to me just sounds uncreative and bores the hell out of me.

[Alume]

kicks are so cliche

[Hepta]

kicks are so cliche

Haha, yeah. Being a producer in 2016 is the most cliche of them all though. Why even bother making music.

[TimBuys]

Some producers motto seem to be "as loud and intense as possible" which is definitely not my thing while it definitely seems to be quite popular atm. A good track is a good track though. I actually quite like chords, especially in dub techno

[remykruyer]

The sequenced 'jeff mills' space bleep

fucking annoying

[Críoch]

Anonymity
Mysticism

[Mono-xID]

Anonymity
Mysticism

Yep. I'm so sick of this "known producer in disguise" thing.

[Críoch]

Referring to music label owners as 'head honcho*'

*Honcho appears to be derived from Japanese / WW2 POW camp experiences with camp guards.

[Críoch]

Analog Techno

Referring to the techno making machines as if they are ALIVE in some way

[Barfunkel]

What's the difference between a cliche and a classic?

[Críoch]

Marathon DJ sets

Car-touching-competition.jpg (47.77 KiB) Viewed 5143 times

[Críoch]

What's the difference between a cliche and a classic?

Sometimes very little

[samnatur]

Techno is cliché

[Barfunkel]

Strange to hate chords though. I think that if I had to put together a list of my 50 favorite techno tracks of all time, at least 40 of them would have chords in them.

[Mono-xID]

- Moving to Berlin and desperately suck promoters/residents/club owners cock to get a gig while sharing a 1 room flat with 3 spanish mates.
- setting up a label night of your 1456347228000000 digital label with one (crappy) release.
- black and white pressphoto with your serious fuck face
- hand stamped vinyls
- muscle shirts and sunglasses
- wearing band shirts you don't have a fuckin' clue of
- calling Jerkhain "the church"

list could go on and on....i just realized how much i hate this techno crap more and more each day...dunno why i'm even here anymore...

thanks to this thread....a real eye opener....

goodbye you cunts.

[snitch]

allright guys her comes a big one. Its THE Techno Cliché of 2016.
Ready? Here it comes:

EXØR
Mørklys
Dan Høyer
MØDE
Mørd
H ø R D
MINDS øN EDGE