Electric Picnic 2017 **Discussion Only // No Ticket Sales**

MJohnston

georgiecasey wrote: »

that album literally hit Spotify 18 minutes ago!

Yep, there were 4 'tracks' from it on Spotify for a few days now too.

yeah but isn't mano a DJ set? he won't be playing his own stuff so what's the point of listenting to his stuff, which i like, but i hate DJ sets and think they're the stupidest thing ever

Not entirely sure, I saw him do a live set back in a place called Rogue (which no longer exists) over 10 years ago, but he might not be doing that anymore?

BananaR

TimeToShine wrote: »

If you want electronic music FF is the place to be, knocked it out of the park this time round.

As an electric picnic goer of many years and FF of a few. I agree. FF line-up is A-game this year.

PabloAndRoy

MaroonAndGreen wrote: »

I'm one of the young brigade who (as is the dominant kind of music at the moment) is interested more in the electronic acts and djs rather than bands, though of course there are some bands I'd enjoy!

There are 6-7 acts there to cater for the likes of myself and none of them inspire. We've gone from Huxley, The Magician, Adam Beyer, Chemical Brothers last year (which was quite decent) to BBC radio DJs, and a poor Icelandic techno dj amongst others. It's quite a drop in standard. I view EP as a multi-genre festival, a festival that has something for everyone, I've seen people on this thread say DJs or techno have no place at EP, and the Bacardi stage is a nuisance etc, if you think that there is plenty of other things to occupy you at the festival!!!

Back to main point anyway, so far that line-up is not good enough for any electronic music head IMO. Not sure about the other genres, but that's my take there.

Who is this Icelandic DJ you speak of?

Tago Mago

Initial thoughts on the line-up is there seems to be a concerted effort to go back to its boutique roots rather than the commercial route many had feared.

They should be applauded for this although would have thought at least one of the headliners ought to have been sub-headliners - surely Pete Tong & Chaka Khan won't end up as the sub-headliners or am I missing something?

Overall very happy with the opening announcement especially with plenty of EP attainable acts crucially touring in the vicinity still to come you'd imagine.

Still can understand the people who were expecting a Stone Roses/Radiohead type announcement too.

Rfrip

The comments on twitter... I genuinely want to punch some of them in the face!

"Carlow rag week has a better line up than electric picnic"

Paleblood

georgiecasey wrote: »

i hate DJ sets and think they're the stupidest thing ever

I can see you've put a lot of thought into it.

Paleblood

MJohnston wrote: »

Would disagree completely with the two bolded statements. But I'll try and actually get you to enjoy the electronic acts that are there:

As others have pointed out, Soulwax are electronic to the core - they have rock elements in there, but their new 'From Deewee' album is a modern-day krautrock reinvention that couldn't get more electronica-minded. They're similar to the Chemical Brothers in the sense that they're album-oriented, lyrically involved stuff, with the odd full on dancefloor killer in there too.

Check out:
+ Nite Versions Live version of 'E Talking'
+ Transient Program for Drums and Machinery
+ Turn Off The Lights (from their 'Belgica' soundtrack).

Kiasmos are an experimental, techno duo from Iceland (one half, Ólafur Arnalds an award-winning composer with some beautiful minimalist techno and ambient pieces) who generally perform a semi-live show (no less or more live than Chemical Brothers for example). Their music is techno at heart, but is surrounded by layers of absolutely stunning piano/string ambience. I saw them at Body and Soul in '15, with only a little knowledge of Olafur, and they blew me away - trust me if you're looking for music to completely disappear into and just dance, they're it.

Check out:
+ Looped
+ Drawn
+ Bent

Floating Points was at the forefront of a kind of fusion of old-school math-based electronica (like Aphex) with more funky, house-y styles. His music is really varied, so it's hard to pin his style down exactly, but it's noodly, deep, and so interesting. His most recent album 'Elaenia' was an experimental series of almost improvised pieces of electronic-jazz and ambience.

Check out:
+ ARP3
+ Marylin
+ Danger

Mano Le Tough is a local lad who moved to Berlin and got a bunch of music signed to big labels, and then got around to releasing a couple of albums. I guess I'd describe him as more straight up deep-house with some stuff verging on techno.

Check out:
+ I See Myself In You
+ Tempus
+ The Sea Inside

There may be other electronic artists on the lineup already, but I don't know them if they are. However, there will undoubtedly be plenty more added closer to the date, as well as the usual Bacardi/Heineken stage DJs.

In fairness, the OP did say DJs and 'electronic acts', but the only act he mentioned was The Chemical Brothers. It doesn't sound like he'd be too interested in Floating Points' electronic noodling. He cleary wants big name, accessible dance music.

There's clearly been a concerted effort in recent years to more fully integrate electronic music rather than having it cordoned off on its own somewhere. There's also been more of an emphasis on live acts versus DJs, which is understandable given how prominent digital instrumentation has become amongst full on bands. All of that is commendable.

I just hope they'll continue to have a strong, straight up DJ scene. Some people don't get it and that's fine. But it's been a massive part of the festival from the very start.

MyPeopleDrankTheSoup

Paleblood wrote: »

I can see you've put a lot of thought into it.

Opinions are like arseholes, everyone has one!

I like an artist's songs like Mano le tough or bicep, i wanna hear his songs in a shared communal experience, not random songs he likes.

Paleblood

georgiecasey wrote: »

Opinions are like arseholes, everyone has one!

I like an artist's songs like Mano le tough or bicep, i wanna hear his songs in a shared communal experience, not random songs he likes.

What has 'shared communal experience' got to do with it? People dancing and singing together is a shared communal experience. What they're dancing or singing to is irrelevant.

Ferris_Bueller

Brilliant post my MJohnston, basically what I came on here to say. Some cracking electronic acts announced already. For the type of music MaroonAndGreen is looking for he will probably have to wait until the Casa Bacardi line up comes out, which is always really good for that style of music. We will probably get a few other DJs too over the next few announcements - someone like Bicep would be great.

There are certain types of DJs that EP never seem to book, and I can understand that as a fan of that music it can be frustrating - but festivals like Life and Forbidden Fruit have them in abundance.

Paleblood

georgiecasey wrote: »

Opinions are like arseholes, everyone has one!

I like an artist's songs like Mano le tough or bicep, i wanna hear his songs in a shared communal experience, not random songs he likes.

One final point. What exactly do you think Mano does when he's performing 'live'? We all know what a rock band does and what it looks like. But what does an electronic live act look like? What does Mano do in a live set that fundamentally distinguishes it from his DJing?

Some acts have very complex set ups, while others have laptops and midi controllers. Both are 'live' but clearly there's differing levels of performance involved. Then there's individuals like Surgeon who blend their DJing and live performance work together so you can't tell where one ends and the other begins.

Where do Mano and Bicep come in all of this? Have they banks of synthesisers and hardware sequencers, or are they triggering audio samples and pre-automated MIDI clips in Ableton? If it's the latter then I can assure you there's less 'live' effort and craft in it than there is in their DJ sets.

I can understand people not wanting to stand in front of a DJ because they like the spectacle and performance of a band firing on all cylinders, or just the joy of seeing a musician bringing music into existence right in front of you. But this distinction between live sets and DJ sets is becoming increasingly muddled as new technologies are developed, especially with solo acts like Mano, who one way or another is only going to be triggering some sort of pre-recorded/produced material.

drunkmonkey

Think some of the posters here are too young to remember how big a DJ Pete Tong was back in the day. If you can't get a rave on at his picnic gig you may give it up.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ziXJT2nx9I0

MyPeopleDrankTheSoup

When a DJ performance is 'live' it just seems to mean he's playing his own songs which is what i want. I like bicep songs on Spotify, i want to hear them same bicep songs when they're billed at a festival.

I do not care how they're playing those songs, it can be some mad ableton **** or it can be them going to their Spotify page and clicking play! I don't care either way, I'm there for the shared communal experience.

When it's a 'dj set' it's just some random songs the artist has picked out. Anyone can play them. Why can't they grab some random lad from portloaise, give him the bicep DJ set track list to play and call it a 'bicep DJ set'.

Then you'd say why can't that portloaise lad play the actual bicep tracks and call it 'live'! And you'd be right, I'd go see that lol

Would you happy if you went to see a band you like and they played just all random covers of other songs u don't know?

Paleblood

georgiecasey wrote: »

When a DJ performance is 'live' it just seems to mean he's playing his own songs which is what i want. I like bicep songs on Spotify, i want to hear them same bicep songs when they're billed at a festival.

I do not care how they're playing those songs, it can be some mad ableton **** or it can be them going to their Spotify page and clicking play! I don't care either way, I'm there for the shared communal experience.

When it's a 'dj set' it's just some random songs the artist has picked out. Anyone can play them. Why can't they grab some random lad from portloaise, give him the bicep DJ set track list to play and call it a 'bicep DJ set'.

Then you'd say why can't that portloaise lad play the actual bicep tracks and call it 'live'! And you'd be right, I'd go see that lol

Would you happy if you went to see a band you like and they played just all random covers of other songs u don't know?

Honest question.

Would you prefer to see Mano press play on an album and dance around on stage or watch him use a set of turntables to share a selection of his favourite pieces of music?

ghostdancer

georgiecasey wrote: »

When it's a 'dj set' it's just some random songs the artist has picked out. Anyone can play them. Why can't they grab some random lad from portloaise, give him the bicep DJ set track list to play and call it a 'bicep DJ set'.

the random lad from Portaloise likely doesn't have the knowledge or selection of tracks available to electronic producers/DJs who do it full time for a living.
I'd expect Mano to have loads of stuff I've never heard that he's found or been given access to pre-release, same with Bicep as their blog used to showcase.

I'd expect the lad from Portlaoise (and lots of the more well-known Irish DJs) to be playing those tracks 6 months later when they're released or listened to them online and maybe ID'd them (or more likely never found them).
It's amusing when you listen to the likes of Ben UFO or Joy Orbison DJing, and people ID obscure tracks or forthcoming releases, and then a year later you hear people like Kelly-Anne Byrne or DJ Deece rinsing the track at every festival over the summer. tracks or acts or labels that may have stayed completely obscure without those producers doing DJ sets and bringing them to a wider audience.

If you like an act for their music, I don't know why you wouldn't want to listen to the music they like and influences them.

team_actimel

georgiecasey wrote: »

When a DJ performance is 'live' it just seems to mean he's playing his own songs which is what i want. I like bicep songs on Spotify, i want to hear them same bicep songs when they're billed at a festival.

I do not care how they're playing those songs, it can be some mad ableton **** or it can be them going to their Spotify page and clicking play! I don't care either way, I'm there for the shared communal experience.

When it's a 'dj set' it's just some random songs the artist has picked out. Anyone can play them. Why can't they grab some random lad from portloaise, give him the bicep DJ set track list to play and call it a 'bicep DJ set'.

Then you'd say why can't that portloaise lad play the actual bicep tracks and call it 'live'! And you'd be right, I'd go see that lol

Would you happy if you went to see a band you like and they played just all random covers of other songs u don't know?

I agree with you. Frustrating when you go to see a DJ you like and they don't play any of their own songs, they just make mixes of other artists' tracks.

Paleblood

team_actimel wrote: »

I agree with you. Frustrating when you go to see a DJ you like and they don't play any of their own songs, they just make mixes of other artists' tracks.

Unless the DJ has produced a couple of identifiable 'anthems' he's unlikely to play too much of his own music. In fact it's kinda frowned upon for one reason or another. The exception is festival sets where DJs like Daniel Avery, or older DJs like Laurent Garnier, will be expected to play their big hits. But you won't get a pro DJ playing his own music in clubs 2 or 3 times a week.

Slobberdawn

Interesting discussion on the "live" performance of electronic music.

I have very little interest in the genre but I'm intrigued by people's attitude to the live performance of it.

If I come across an electronic artist's album that I like I wouldn't go to see it performed live as it's just a guy standing behind some equipment that I don't understand. I appreciate that the artist may be performing some serious **** that I know nothing about, but when I go to see a performance I like to see/know what's going on. I want a beat to be made from something being hit, a sound being made by something being plucked/strummed/hit/plucked and a voice to come from a person's mouth.

For others that understand what's going on, I acknowledge your ability to appreciate something more than I can.

The bit I don't get, at all, is a few of the views above; being happy for a DJ to play his own songs regardless of how he plays them, i.e. if he just presses play.

GidCudi

Delved into the lower tier of the line up...Kiasmos are going to steal the weekend for me I think.

Great shout from a few posters in this thread

MJohnston

georgiecasey wrote: »

When a DJ performance is 'live' it just seems to mean he's playing his own songs which is what i want. I like bicep songs on Spotify, i want to hear them same bicep songs when they're billed at a festival.

I do not care how they're playing those songs, it can be some mad ableton **** or it can be them going to their Spotify page and clicking play! I don't care either way, I'm there for the shared communal experience.

When it's a 'dj set' it's just some random songs the artist has picked out. Anyone can play them. Why can't they grab some random lad from portloaise, give him the bicep DJ set track list to play and call it a 'bicep DJ set'.

Then you'd say why can't that portloaise lad play the actual bicep tracks and call it 'live'! And you'd be right, I'd go see that lol

Would you happy if you went to see a band you like and they played just all random covers of other songs u don't know?

Question - is it DJ sets in general that you dislike, or just DJ sets from producers who could easily have done a live set?

If it's the latter, I'd agree a bit. Kaytranada was booked a few years ago and he's one of my favourite producers, but it's pointless to hear him just spin a few records in comparison to hearing his music in a more live performance.

That said, he was a good DJ, and did play a lot of his own stuff, but you see those names on the lineup with a small (DJ set) hidden beside it, and it feels a good bit misleading.

jobless

glencurtis252 wrote: »

Had a bit of a listen to a few I didn't no today.. Michael kiwanuka I will definitely be heading along to see sounds very good!!

saw him in the academy few months ago..... brilliant

showpony1

for the folks looking for something commercial/chart,
that act Krept & Konan sing the song "Freak of the Week" that was in the charts.

PabloAndRoy

GidCudi wrote: »

Delved into the lower tier of the line up...Kiasmos are going to steal the weekend for me I think.

Great shout from a few posters in this thread

Somebody decided to loop Looped by Kiasmos for 2.5 hours ...

The first time I heard this tune, I was all "play it again" then "play it again". So I get where he is coming from.

MJohnston

Slobberdawn wrote: »

Interesting discussion on the "live" performance of electronic music.

I have very little interest in the genre but I'm intrigued by people's attitude to the live performance of it.

If I come across an electronic artist's album that I like I wouldn't go to see it performed live as it's just a guy standing behind some equipment that I don't understand. I appreciate that the artist may be performing some serious **** that I know nothing about, but when I go to see a performance I like to see/know what's going on. I want a beat to be made from something being hit, a sound being made by something being plucked/strummed/hit/plucked and a voice to come from a person's mouth.

For others that understand what's going on, I acknowledge your ability to appreciate something more than I can.

The bit I don't get, at all, is a few of the views above; being happy for a DJ to play his own songs regardless of how he plays them, i.e. if he just presses play.

In terms of what a live electronic music performance consists of, it's generally a producer using Ableton with a preconfigured arrangement of their songs. That arrangement can either be a simple mix, or something more complex and mashed up (e.g. Daft Punks Alive 07 sets)

If they're a little bit adventurous, they'll bring a controller which allows them to tweak aspects of the mix of the song live, so you might get a bit more reverb or delay or other FX.

A little bit more adventurous and the controller will adjust segments of the arrangement, so that you get something akin to an improvisation on the original version which emphasises different parts from what you're used to on the studio versions.

More still and the controller will include keys and/or drum triggers, and it becomes more of a true improvisation where melodies or drum sequences are legitimately completely different to those you hear on the studio versions. In his case, most of the time the pre-sequenced stuff will still play if the performer isn't taking control. Lindstrom and Floating Points are like this from memory. I think Olafur plays the Kiasmos piano parts live too, using a synth piano.

And then more still would be adding additional "band" members, and assigning different parts of an arrangement to their control. Kraftwerk are very much like this, they're playing off a pre arranged sequence, but their controllers let them improvise whatever bit they have control over (drums, individual synths, other percussive elements, other melodic elements).

Then the final step I guess would be giving those band members full control over an unsequenced song, with every member using a controller to generate the electronic elements. Hot Chip would be a good analogue here, although I'm sure even they have some pre-sequenced parts in there. But at this point the material truly feels live.

The reason why most electronic music producers stick with the less adventurous levels is because essentially to step it up at all requires huge investments of time and money, and if you're just starting out that's pretty difficult.

Korvanica

Slobberdawn wrote: »

Interesting discussion on the "live" performance of electronic music.

I have very little interest in the genre but I'm intrigued by people's attitude to the live performance of it.

If I come across an electronic artist's album that I like I wouldn't go to see it performed live as it's just a guy standing behind some equipment that I don't understand. I appreciate that the artist may be performing some serious **** that I know nothing about, but when I go to see a performance I like to see/know what's going on. I want a beat to be made from something being hit, a sound being made by something being plucked/strummed/hit/plucked and a voice to come from a person's mouth.

For others that understand what's going on, I acknowledge your ability to appreciate something more than I can.

The bit I don't get, at all, is a few of the views above; being happy for a DJ to play his own songs regardless of how he plays them, i.e. if he just presses play.

I highly recommend you check out Disclosure and Infected Mushrooms Live Sets.

Paleblood

MJohnston wrote: »

In terms of what a live electronic music performance consists of, it's generally a producer using Ableton with a preconfigured arrangement of their songs. That arrangement can either be a simple mix, or something more complex and mashed up (e.g. Daft Punks Alive 07 sets)

If they're a little bit adventurous, they'll bring a controller which allows them to tweak aspects of the mix of the song live, so you might get a bit more reverb or delay or other FX.

A little bit more adventurous and the controller will adjust segments of the arrangement, so that you get something akin to an improvisation on the original version which emphasises different parts from what you're used to on the studio versions.

More still and the controller will include keys and/or drum triggers, and it becomes more of a true improvisation where melodies or drum sequences are legitimately completely different to those you hear on the studio versions. In his case, most of the time the pre-sequenced stuff will still play if the performer isn't taking control. Lindstrom and Floating Points are like this from memory. I think Olafur plays the Kiasmos piano parts live too, using a synth piano.

And then more still would be adding additional "band" members, and assigning different parts of an arrangement to their control. Kraftwerk are very much like this, they're playing off a pre arranged sequence, but their controllers let them improvise whatever bit they have control over (drums, individual synths, other percussive elements, other melodic elements).

Then the final step I guess would be giving those band members full control over an unsequenced song, with every member using a controller to generate the electronic elements. Hot Chip would be a good analogue here, although I'm sure even they have some pre-sequenced parts in there. But at this point the material truly feels live.

The reason why most electronic music producers stick with the less adventurous levels is because essentially to step it up at all requires huge investments of time and money, and if you're just starting out that's pretty difficult.

That's an excellent post.

We're lucky that our artists have such sophisticated technology these days, not to mention the fact that it's all second nature to them.

'Live sets' used to be the bane of many a dance tent/festival, especially when established DJs like Laurent Garnier wanted to stretch themselves in a different context. There simply weren't the tools for them to properly 'perform' their music, and being surrounded by musicians often exposed the brutal reality that they themselves couldn't play a note.

I remember when the CDJ-1000 first took off. For the first time DJs could make remixes and edits of their work and play them without having to press them to vinyl. So they'd take those CDRs, add in a dude on a set of congas, and you had a live set full of previously unheard versions of the music! So innocent, and yet at the time it was a major change and we were glad to experience it.

PabloAndRoy

MJohnston wrote: »

In terms of what a live electronic music performance consists of, it's generally a producer using Ableton with a preconfigured arrangement of their songs.

....

Ableton Live (thats what the software is called) is not generally used like that at all.

Ableton has a view called the "Session View" and this is why it is so popular for live performances. From the session view you can trigger individual "clips" which consist of a sequence of notes on one track (like a drum loop for example) or trigger a "scene" (a horizontal row of clips), playing a group of clips. You can trigger clips from other scenes, copy and paste new scenes together on the fly and lots more.

Throw in a midi controller (as almost everyone does) and you can tweak just about anything you want using buttons and rotary knobs, including parameters on one of the currently playing synths, or trigger a scene or a clip or change the speed, etc. This is not anything like a "preconfigured arrangement" but more like a jamming tool for mixing together bits of pre-recorded or pre-sequenced music . When you use this, it very definitely feels like live mixing of your own music and as such the results are different every time. A bit like playing a guitar, no matter how hard you try, its never exactly the same twice.

Do a search on youtube for Ableton session view and you will see how this works.

Slobberdawn

MJohnston, thanks for the reply. Somewhat enlightening although I think I'll always struggle with the "guy behind some equipment" problem regardless of what he's doing.

Korvanica, why are you recommending these in particular in response to my last post?

Do any of you know where Jon Hopkins would fit in in MJohnston's various categories above?

MJohnston

PabloAndRoy wrote: »

Ableton Live (thats what the software is called) is not generally used like that at all.

Ableton has a view called the "Session View" and this is why it is so popular for live performances. From the session view you can trigger individual "clips" which consist of a sequence of notes on one track (like a drum loop for example) or trigger a "scene" (a horizontal row of clips), playing a group of clips. You can trigger clips from other scenes, copy and paste new scenes together on the fly and lots more.

Throw in a midi controller (as almost everyone does) and you can tweak just about anything you want using buttons and rotary knobs, including parameters on one of the currently playing synths, or trigger a scene or a clip or change the speed, etc. This is not anything like a "preconfigured arrangement" but more like a jamming tool for mixing together bits of pre-recorded or pre-sequenced music . When you use this, it very definitely feels like live mixing of your own music and as such the results are different every time. A bit like playing a guitar, no matter how hard you try, its never exactly the same twice.

Do a search on youtube for Ableton session view and you will see how this works.

Hi, you're being a little bit condescending here, but I'll forgive you I've actually used Ableton a lot myself and while there is indeed the possibility to use it for what you say, it definitely has an Arrangement View that allows you to presequence everything.

Im not sure you really read my post though, because I explained that plenty of artists will use the Session View style of performance.

ghostdancer

Hopkins would probably be around the 3rd scenario, he generally kicks off the bones of the track using samples which mostly play untouched throughout the track, but with him adding some effects on the fly, and then improvises/creates other parts himself on top of those and manipulates them with Kaoss pads.

Karenn's live setup would be a good example of pretty much everything being done live and no pre-sequencing: