[Kreutzer]

>To dig deeper into this style of tape loop ambient music, check out William Basinski’s The Disintegration Loops. William Basinski used a similar concept to Brian Eno, only the tapes he used rapidly deteriorated upon playback, causing the musical material to degrade over the length of the recording.

I've never "bought" the story of Disintegration Loops that Basinski tells about its creation. The idea he composed it literally during the 9/11 attacks was just a silly attempt to add gravitas to abstract music. The more you think about it, the more off-putting it becomes. Reminds me of Stockhausen's stupendous remark about 9/11 being "the biggest work of art there has ever been".

In the same vein, tape doesn't normally just deteriorate before your eyes. The gradual change in sound of the loops is more likely due to the guitar pedal chain he was running his loops into (Basinski tends to omit this part of its creation).

[jdee]

I went to see William Basinski 'live' in Liverpool at Yoko Ono's Tung Auditorium. William stood in front of his MacBook, waving his arms like a conductor and drinking red wine.

Halfway through, he said he was tired with travelling and left the stage.

The audience continued to sit there for another hour, staring at the lid of the MacBook that was making the music. When it finished, we applauded the MacBook and left.

Quite surreal. Very enjoyable though.

[asdhtjkujh]

Despite being categorically "non-narrative" music, the longevity of both records is almost entirely dependent on these narratives behind them. Ambient 2-4 are musically much more interesting, but the memetic quality of its origin story has given Ambient 1 (and the Basinski record) undue attention over time. Conceptually pure, yes! Sonically compelling, maybe. At least the Eno's approach was novel.

Also, Stockhausen was not entirely wrong. It was insensitive and poorly phrased, but 9/11 is undoubtedly the defining aesthetic image of our time.

[uslic001]

One of my first ambient records I bought after I got into Music for Airports by Eno. Still one of my favorites. After those two I got into Stars for the Lid.

[pram]

That isn't true. The "loop tape" was already like 20 years old IIRC, it was already disintegrated by 9/11

[olelele]

This. He was digitizing older works on tapes where the ferrous material starts breaking away from the plastic, literally disintegrating the sound. It's what happens to old tape.