Wednesday, April 29, 2009

MUSIC THEORY PAPER: "Building Steam with a Grain of Salt" by DJ Shadow


Carlos Salguero
4-19-09

Theory IV—T-Mac
Final Paper

On Building Steam with a Grain of Salt


Chances are you’ve never heard of Josh Davis. Clocking in at over 60,000 pieces of vinyl, he holds the world record for the largest personal record collection. But it gets better, he also holds a Guinness World Record for the first album to be created entirely out of samples. When Endtroducing. . . was dropped in 1996 neither Sean Davis, better known around the globe by his alias/moniker DJ Shadow, nor the rest of the world could have fully predicted the impact the album would have on the current musical world( “DJ Shadow”, “Endtroducing”).
Armed with nothing but his Akai MPC60, ProTools, and all the records he’d found from thrift-store bargain bins to the dusty basements of his favorite vinyl haunts, Shadow spent 2 years recording the album and the result was a sonic masterwork that has yet to be topped by anyone even Shadow himself. Drawing from snippets and scraps from long forgotten soul singles to old TV show broadcasts he manages to channel every genre from jazz, classical, break-beat, jungle, and more and weaves and stitches them together to create a new aural landscape. Yet, despite the fact that these beats and noises have been built on clips that have been “processed, looped and re-arranged far beyond recognition”, at the core, these “funky rhythms . . . never sound like they've been cut and pasted together”(Fine, Jason).
Thus what Shadow has created with Endtroducing is a new form musical expression. Some have called this new genre trip-hop but I like to think of it as the art of making sound landscapes, or soundscapes and “When Shadow brings sound together, it does not become music or a song, but rather a sonic painting that depicts the world. . . [and] provides a gripping ambiance that overtakes the listener”(Transmute).
Perhaps the most accessible and clear example of this is the LP’s first track “Building Steam with a Grain of Salt” which I will attempt to analyze here. You can listen to the entire song here:

DJ Shadow- "Building Steam with a Grain of Salt"


Approach:
Since this piece is made entirely of samples, there is no real published score per-se; instead what I have done is made a map of the entire piece indicating at which point in time which samples come in, how much time/how many measures said sample is looped, and what is playing concurrently with it. Also, when possible I’ve tried to identify where the and link/upload the original sample material and I believe I have all of it. The resulting score that I have created is a visual representation of how the different samples interplay and interact with each other to become one evolving and ultimately circular soundscape.
After importing the song into Logic I figured out that the tempo of the song is roughly at 85.5 BPM, but wavers a little bit. Also by playing along with my guitar I was able to figure out the melodies for some of the sampled bits, as well as the fact that overall the piece is in C minor. Here is the score that I wrote out in Sibelius:

(Click on the images to make them clearere and then use the zoom feature on your mac. Sorry this was the best I could do. Let me know if you you want me to send the sibelius file. "

Analysis:
The song starts out with voice clip saying “Producing” at time 00:00 (time used here is in min:sec format). This clip comes from a 1974 interview with jazz drummer and percussionist George Marsh, of which the whole clip can be found as an mp3 here:
Interview with George Marsh MP3

Different clips from this interview are used later throughout the piece.
Now comes in the sample that is the backbone that connects and holds everything together in this piece. It is a 2 bar loop from a song by Jeremy Storch called “I Feel a New Shadow”, that features two pianos. I found the original sample and you can listen to it here:
Jeremy Storch- "I a New Shadow"

The first piano is playing rapid arpeggiated/broken C minor chords while a second piano plays the following melody in a higher register:This continues until the fifth measure when another George Marsh interview sample beings at 00:12 where he says:

“From listening to records I just knew what to do
I mainly taught myself. And, you know, I did pretty well
Except there were a few mistakes, but um, that I made, uh
That I've just recently cleared up”

This entire sample lasts for the next four measures. At measure nine we hear a piano hit a forte low C that resonates and will be a feature throughout the piece and gives it an ominous sound. This C is hit on the first beat of every 2-bar piano loop for the next 8 measures. On the second beat of mm. 11 (00:30) we get another George Marsh clip that lasts until the end of bar 16 (00:47); what we hear now is:

“And I’d like to just continue to be able to express myself
As best as I can with this instrument
And I feel like I have a lot of work to do
Still, I'm a student-- of the drums
And I'm also a teacher of the drums too”

On cue, starting at mm.17 (00:47) as soon as the vocal sample is done, Shadow drops the drum beat which is also based on a 2-bar programmed groove seen here which features predominantly syncopated bass drum beats over a steady snare hitting on the 2 and 4 of the bar. The drum samples, bass and snare and cymbals come from an old soul song by Frankie Seay and the Soul Riders called “Soul Food”, which can be listened to here:

Frankie Seay and the Soul Riders- "Soul Food"
*Clicking this will take you away from this page, may want to right-click and open in new tab.

The drums and pianos play on for the next 8 measures.
At mm.25 (1:11) a new sample comes in. It comes from the same Jeremy Storch song as the pianos and features a choir that has been processed and affected to sound ghostly and eerie. The choir sings the same 2-bar piano melody that the original higher piano has been playing and that I have notated above. The piano playing the melody is put down in the mix a little but the piano arpeggios remain and drums remain at the same level. The choir loops for the next 16 measures, mm.25-mm.40 (1:11-1:57). When the choir comes in we also get a bass coming in playing a simple line but it is not that prominent, we first truly hear it in mm.32, which is at the end of the first 8 bars after the choir has come in, where is has a 2 beat fill starting on beat 3 of mm. 32 (1:33). This same fill returns at the end of the next 8 measures, on beat 2 of mm.40 (1:56). Starting at measure 33 (1:34) we also get a return of the low C piano hits every two bars until mm.41.
Starting at mm.41 our ghost choir drops out, leaving the rhythm section and pianos. We hear turntable scratching, seemingly preparing us for a new change, which we receive starting at mm.42. This is where a new sample, this time another vocal/spoken-word comes in and plays out through the end of mm.48 (2:21). The sample comes from a piece written by the electronic musician Mort Garson called “Planetary Motivations (Cancer)”. This piece is from a suite called “The Zodiac : Cosmic Sounds - Celestial Counterpoint with Words and Music,” in which he wrote a piece for each sign of the 12 signs of the Zodiac (“Mort Garson”). The sample used from Planetary Motivations features the following lyrics spoken by a female starting at 2:00 :

“What makes cancer tenacious?
The moon rules the fluids
Including the inner juices of human beings
That which assimilates and feeds the body
So the crab feeds his astral plane
Assimilating and distributing all he receives
Slowly, until it becomes a part of you”

Mort Garson- "Planetary Motivations(Zodiac)"
We hear the last few words, “a part of you”, effected with and delay and echo. Then when mm. 49 starts our ghost choir loop returns for the next 8 bars until 2:44. On the eighth bar of this section, mm.56 (2:41) we get 1 measure drum and bass fill that preps us for a new section.
What we from mm.57 (2:44) to mm.64 (3:07) get now is and 8-bar solo section where Shadow gets to show off his skills at drum programming. Using his MPC sampler he starts syncopating beats and progressively starts chopping and screwing them until they no longer play in time and no longer sound like a human playing them. Still if you keep the established beat in your head and tap it out you will find that the solo still ends perfectly in time at the end of the mm.64. Thus, aurally, Shadow plays with the beat we’ve heard and been stuck in our head so far and then turns it upside down so we are shaken from it and unsure of what comes next or how long it will go on. Yet, in actuality he has carefully and consciously measured out how long to make it and still keep a total, metrical flow of the work.
With the first beat of mm.65 (3:07) our anxiety brought on by the drum solo is relieved when we get a strong hit of the piano playing a low C, demarcating a new section. No piano and drums are present but a new sample is thrown into the mix. It is a funky, 1-bar guitar loop that has a wah effect on it. It comes from a funk song called “I Need You” by HP Riot and which you can find the original sample here:

HP Riot- "I Need You"

This guitar plays along with the bassline that also returns and leads us away from the previous motif into a new, refreshing direction. This group/groove plays on for three measure when in mm.68 (3:16) we get a 1 measure drum fill signaling the return of that instrument.
Measure 69 (3:19) starts with another low C piano hit and the drum groove drops back in and this group plays out for 8 measures, through mm.76 (3:42).
Mm. 77 (3:42) brings a new layer to our groove, a dreamy synth line that floats above the rest of the groove and giving the melody energy. The synth line comes from an old soul classic by the group Lexia called “I Worship You”.

Lexia- "I Worship You"

And though you wouldn’t know this without knowing and listening to the original samples, another sample from this song will soon be used, so in a way the use of this subtle sample foreshadows that it will come back in a more prominent way in the need future. This group plays out for another 8 bar section, through mm.84 (4:02) where a one bar drum fill signals an impending change.
The change that we get starting in mm.85 (4:05) is a progressive peeling back of textures from this new soundscape that happens over the course of the 8 measures. Measure 85 finds the wah-guitar dropping out. This leaves us with just the synth playing over bass and drums. This, however, only lasts for 3 measures, because starting in mm.88 (4:14) the synth is faded over the next 2 measure until it has disappeared by the end of mm.89 (4:20). This leaves us with just drums and bass in mm.90 (4:20), and once the synth has left our drums take up the lead with a mini-solo that lasts for the last three measures of this section building up a cacophony until 4:29.
Out of the mini-climax that ends mm.92, mm.93 (4:29) stops everything and out of the past comes our 2-bar piano loop by itself. It plays twice (4 measures) and mm. 97 we get a low-C piano hit. Starting in mm.98 (4:43) we get another sample, which is from the “I Worship You” featuring the female vocalist singing the line “I fly to the strangest lands” over the next 4 measures, through mm.100 (4:52).
The word “lands” echoes and prompts the drums and our ghost choir from earlier to come back in at mm.101 for the next 8 bars.
At bar 109 (5:16) our wah-guitar also gets added back to the mix so what we are getting is the return of all our samples playing in unison for the next 8 measures. Measure 113 (5:27) adds one more sample, a deep resonating bass synth that one feels more than hears if listening to the piece non-analytically. This gives us a new powerful push and helps distinguish this as a sort of finale of the song. All these instruments and play for four measures until mm.117.
Measure 117 (5:39) marks what I would call the “coda” of the piece. Here everything but the pianos and choir drops out. The choir now is heard naked, effect-less, like it sounds in the original sample. A low C hits in mm.119 then again in mm.121. In mm.121 finds the choir fading out from 5:50-5:53, leaving just the pianos. On beat 3 of mm.122 (5:54) we get our last sample, and the last words we hear come from George Marsh who brought us into the piece. He says:

“And I would like to able to continue
To let what is inside of me
Which is, which comes from all the music that I hear,
I would like for that to come out
And it's like, it's not really me that's coming
The music's coming through me”

Which takes until 6:08 to complete. Measure 123 has our last low C hit and on the third beat of this measure (6:09) the last line of this last George Marshall sample, “The music’s coming through me” repeats with heavy delays and echoes added as a final reminder to the listener through 6:14. We are left with the pianos tinkling and fading out for 6 more measures until by 6:31 everything is gone.

Conclusion:
Despite being a piece of electronic music, when looking back at the overall layout and format of the work is very structured and thought out. Because we are dealing with hip-hop, the core of the piece will always be rhythm, ie. drums and bass. All our musical samples fit into 1, 2, or four bars. Sections are comprised almost always of 8 bars, with 2-bar loops often used as the bass sample. Often within these 8-bar sections are subdivided into 2 four-bar phrases.
Looking at it from an larger formal perspective, I think this piece could be considered to be in sonata or rounded-binary ( ||A||BA’|| ) form. Our first section, of the “exposition” would comprise mm.0 till mm. 56 and our main theme could be considered our 2-bar piano loop. While there is no modulation, I think we could consider the shift of the melody from the piano to choir as the modulation to the dominant that we would often see in a sonata.
The drum solo serves as a modulation of sorts in the piece that can be considered the beginning of the “development”, as it breaks from what has been going on in the “exposition” and clears space by dropping pianos and choir. This modulation allows for the opening into new sonic landscapes that is brought about the wah-guitar. We get new feelings and textures shift as we add layers of synths with new melodies. This entire section I would consider to be comprised from mm.57 till mm.92.
But we don’t stay here for long, as our drums give us a modulation back into the “recapitulation” which starts off just like the beginning of the piece. We then continue but add everything back in, so that all the instruments from both the “exposition” and “development” play together and crest into a coda that brings us straight back into a final, harking sample and pianos just like our intro and the whole piece ends as it begins; circularity is achieved.










Works Cited
Dahlen, Chris. “DJ Shadow: Endtroducing . . . [Delux Edition]”. Pitchfork Media. Online Review. June 9, 2005.

D.J. Shadow. “Building Steam with a Grain of Salt”. Endtroducing
Mo’ Wax: 19 Nov., 1996.

"DJ Shadow." Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. 20 Apr 2009, 09:18 UTC. 29 Apr 2009 .

"Endtroducing......" Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. 23 Apr 2009, 09:39 UTC. 29 Apr 2009 .

Fine, Jason. “DJ Shadow, Endtroducing”. Rolling Stone. Music Review. Jan 23, 1997.

"Mort Garson." Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. 8 Apr 2009, 13:41UTC. 29 Apr 2009
.

NPR News. “NPR 100: Master List of top 300 Songs”. Website. 2009
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Sullivan, James. “Endtroducing. DJ Shadow aka Josh Davis”. Review. BAM Magazine, April 4, 1997.

Transmute. “Building Steam with A Grain of Salt”. Online. Blog. April 16, 2006.





2 comments:

  1. This is an amazing post. Excellent use of musical science interpritation!

    ReplyDelete
  2. I'm amazed at the level of analysis here. The links don't seem to work anymore but I still learned so much about probably my favourite piece of music. Top 3 at least!

    ReplyDelete