I know it was a long boring night but do you remember Dave Grohl’s statement during his Grammys Awards speech? Some rant dissing out electronic dance music, and attesting the superiority of the all-analog recording for his last album:
‘This is a great honor, because this record was a special record for our band. Rather than go to the best studio in the world down the street in Hollywood and rather than use all of the fanciest computers that money can buy, we made this one in my garage with some microphones and a tape machine…
To me this award means a lot because it shows that the human element of music is what's important. Singing into a microphone and learning toplay an instrument and learning to do your craft, that's the most important thing for people to do.
It's not about being perfect, it's not about sounding absolutely correct, it's not about what goes on in a computer. It's about what goes on in here [your heart] and what goes on in here [your head].’
He got a second thought following all the bad press he received, and released a statement on Friday to ‘clarify’ his comments declaring:
‘Oh, what a night we had last Sunday at the 54th Annual Grammy Awards. The glitz! The Glamour! SEACREST! Where do I begin?? Chillin' with Lil' Wayne…meeting Cyndi Lauper's adorable mother…the complimentary blinking Coldplay bracelet…..much too much to recap. It's really is still a bit of a blur. But, if there's one thing that Iremember VERY clearly, it was accepting the Grammy for Best Rock Performance…and then saying this:
[He quotes the speech above verbatim.]
Not the Gettysburg Address, but hey……I'm a drummer, remember?
Well, me and my big mouth. Never has a 33 second acceptance rant evoked such caps-lock postboard rage as my lil' ode to analog recording has. OK….maybe Kanye has me on this one, but….Imma let you finish….just wanted to clarify something…
I love music. I love ALL kinds of music. From Kyuss to Kraftwerk, Pinetop Perkins to Prodigy, Dead Kennedys to Deadmau5…..I love music. Electronic or acoustic,it doesn't matter to me. The simple act of creating music is a beautiful gift that ALL human beings are blessed with. And the diversity of one musician's personality to the next is what makes music so exciting and…..human.
That's exactly what I was referring to. The "human element". That thing that happens when a song speeds up slightly, or a vocal goes a little sharp. That thing that makes people sound like PEOPLE. Somewhere along the line those things became "bad" things, and with the great advances in digital recording technology over the years they became easily "fixed". The end result? In my humble opinion…..a lot of music that sounds perfect, but lacks personality. The one thing that makes music so exciting in the first place.
And, unfortunately, some of these great advances have taken the focus off of the actual craft of performance. Look, I am not Yngwie Malmsteen. I am not John Bonham. Hell…I'm not even Josh Groban, for that matter. But I try really… hard so that I don't have to rely on anything but my hands and my heart toplay a song. I do the best that I possibly can within my limitations, and accept that it sounds like me. Because that's what I think is most important.It should be real, right? Everybody wants something real.
I don't know how to do what Skrillex does (though I … love it) but I do know that the reason he is so loved is because he sounds like Skrillex, and that's badass. We have a different process and a different set of tools, but the "craft" is equally as important, I'm sure. I mean…..if it were that easy, anyone could do it, right? (See what I did there?)
So, don't give me two Crown Royals and then ask me to make a speech at your wedding, because I might just bust into the advantages of recording to 2 inch tape.
Now, I think I have to go scream at some kids to get off my lawn.
Stay frosty.
Davemau5’
What is this crap? What was this ‘it's not about what goes on in a computer’ thing a few days ago, and now this love declaration for ‘ALL kinds of music’ including computer music? It is a 180 degrees change of mind and direction.
He tries really hard to make us believe he really likes all kinds of music, but trips over his own train of thoughts with sentences like ‘That thing that makes people sound like PEOPLE’,… hey Dave not all music manages to do this! Some music doesn’t sound human at all to me, and the soul, what he calls this ‘human element’, was actually absent from a lot of things I saw at the Grammys.
In his first statement, Grohl sounds like an old rock’ n’ roll guy who does not seem to understand today’s music, in his last statement, he sounds like someonewho wants to kiss everyone’s ass (come on! Seacrest? Coldplay?), but cowardly does not admit who he does not like. How can he says he loves ‘All kinds ofmusic’ when there is ‘a lot of music that sounds perfect, but lacks personality’?