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Post by dspencer124 on Nov 16, 2016 22:23:03 GMT
i've said for a long time that A&B cannot be called DJs in the traditional sense because they play largely pre-planned sets, which 'proper' DJs wouldn't do - they'd read the crowd and adapt their set accordingly. A&B are more like a traditional band (a la Coldplay, etc.) where you buy a ticket to see them play a set list, which you know is going to be fairly predictable but you accept that's how it is.
I guess this coincides with their move away from the trancier end of the spectrum to more accessible club music - nights need to be the same by and large to ensure that everyone who attends feels like they've seen 'the real A&B', but actually many of the longer term or more die-hard fans would rather a greater variety to make each show unique. Speaking to people who have been to more than one show in quick succession, they might as well have not bothered paying for the 2nd night's ticket as the show was basically the same as the previous night, which rather defeated the point in going for them!
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Post by anthropology on Nov 16, 2016 22:36:12 GMT
recent A&B sets have seemed to only propagate the idea that anjuna is less about the creating club-friendly dance music with an emotional twist and more about the marketing machine & $$$$ these days, because it is filled with nothing but anjuna from the last ~1.5 years or so. they only want to push what's new and current so that their business model can succeed, which is why artists like jason ross and ilan bluestone have been rammed down our throats. that's business for you though, so i can't say i fault them, it's just unfortunate to see more emphasis placed on $ than the music. I assume that most people on the forum are at their core intelligent, understanding, and rational individuals - however, my argument against the quoted point is that it is a one-dimensional retrospective reduction of A&B's career, unless you're one of the three, you don't really have any insider knowledge on how they are conducting the balance of their art and business, so I feel that claiming things like they are only doing things for the money these days is not fair. For their part, and in my opinion, they do an unbelievable job retaining a consistent level of quality, artistry, and imagery without sacrificing too much of the aforementioned qualities in order to stay in a good place business-wise <- which is a necessity if us lucky consumers wish to continue having a focused outlet for consistent, quality music. It does not make sense when you're at their level in terms of scale, reach, and brand recognition (as both a label and a band) to play primarily non-anjuna content when you're only playing 1 - 2 hour sets anymore for obvious reasons, and again, in their defense, I do think they do a decent job at throwing in one or two oldie surprises in their current sets (albeit they're never really that old and/or they're usually A&B tracks); let's be honest though, compared to the majority of big names and heavily branded go-to-market "djs," Above & Beyond is one of very, very few main stage acts that does not ever play typical main stage diarrhea, and we should be thankful for that, no matter how predictable or static their sets can sometimes feel.
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Post by svenmo on Nov 17, 2016 0:36:10 GMT
I'm going to agree with Anthropology on this. While I do wish that A&B would play a more diverse set, at the end of the day, they are, in their own words, a band. On top of that, they run a record label, and I understand their decision to promote newer tracks and artists that they've obviously invested a lot of time and money in. Certainly Jono was very over the top in responding to his criticism (especially the "all uplifting is boring" bit) but a lot of the criticism hurled at a&b and anjuna was over the top as well. Obviously, it's also harder to play older tracks in a festival environment/2 hour club slots, because there's so little time and seeing how the modern anjuna style is so different from a lot of classics, it would be hard to have a set that builds emotionally and has smooth transitions.
I will agree that the criticism was handled poorly though. The forum was and is made up of the most devoted fans and long term fans. Even if it isn't fair, artists should understand there will be some blowback when you change up your style, especially when it comes at a time when your umbrella genre of music is starting to explode.
I'm of the opinion that anjunabeats never really got stale. I've liked the majority of their releases from the start of the label, through the volatile beginnings of 2.0 up to the present. The problem was more with a&b. Their releases were head and shoulders above most other releases on the label until 2010ish, group therapy was above average, and then WAAWN consisted of some of the worst tracks on the label imo, although part of that blame goes to horrible choices in remixers.
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Flexo24
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Post by Flexo24 on Nov 17, 2016 17:22:39 GMT
house and (real) prog and techno gigs are the way to go for me these days. these genres actually leave room for djs to have great creativity and broad range of track selection in sets, whereas trance sort of keeps you pigeonholed. trance has become mostly a home listening genre for me (that is unless gabriel and dresden pop into town and decide to play a 6 hour classics set <3) I agree. Techno was my first love back in the day, then trance slowly crept in. I went to see Adam Beyer the other night in Bristol, 2 hour 45min set, mind blowing! It's after sets like that that make you realise what a real technically gifted DJ can do, both musically and the way he manipulates and moves the crowd. He wasn't just beat matching one tune into the other, he was taking layers and elements from many songs at once and then creating loops and troughs and then building them back up to incredible builds. The whole time keeping the crowd on a point of about to burst. I took my american friend who is trance trance trance through and through. She has never known any other music apart from trance. It's in her blood. Only recently has she discovered Drumcode, Adam and Ida Engberg and the whole world of techno. That night changed her life, she said she'd never heard music like that or presented like that, broken down into parts. Now trance (especially A&B) has taken a back seat Then I look at A&B DJing at say ABGT200, beat matching one song into the next, yet still trying to look busy and like they're doing something
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Post by theboz on Nov 17, 2016 18:07:04 GMT
house and (real) prog and techno gigs are the way to go for me these days. these genres actually leave room for djs to have great creativity and broad range of track selection in sets, whereas trance sort of keeps you pigeonholed. trance has become mostly a home listening genre for me (that is unless gabriel and dresden pop into town and decide to play a 6 hour classics set <3) I agree. Techno was my first love back in the day, then trance slowly crept in. I went to see Adam Beyer the other night in Bristol, 2 hour 45min set, mind blowing! It's after sets like that that make you realise what a real technically gifted DJ can do, both musically and the way he manipulates and moves the crowd. He wasn't just beat matching one tune into the other, he was taking layers and elements from many songs at once and then creating loops and troughs and then building them back up to incredible builds. The whole time keeping the crowd on a point of about to burst. I took my american friend who is trance trance trance through and through. She has never known any other music apart from trance. It's in her blood. Only recently has she discovered Drumcode, Adam and Ida Engberg and the whole world of techno. That night changed her life, she said she'd never heard music like that or presented like that, broken down into parts. Now trance (especially A&B) has taken a back seat Yes defo. Techno is something that definitely needs to be experienced live to fully appreciate it. I mean I still love it for home listening, but when you're not in a big dark room with the masterful DJing of a good DJ, it feels like it's missing something.
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Flexo24
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Post by Flexo24 on Nov 17, 2016 21:45:35 GMT
^ Yes. But I also feel the same about trance. It's all very well listening to trance at home, but nothing beats being on the dancefloor with lasers pulsating around you, hands in the air with trance stabs going off Anway... Think we've got off topic
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Post by maxirobriguez on Nov 18, 2016 23:49:59 GMT
To me there's a big difference between 'not playing the old Anjuna sound' and releasing crap like WAAWN.
Let's just accept it for what it was, WAAWN is a blight on A&B discography. The production both before and after it are much better and you don't have to go trawling through the Anjuna archives that hard to find good material.
I dunno, I felt really let down by WAAWN, was slightly nervous going to ABGT200, was desperately hoping to avoid the majority of it and I'm glad in a 2hr slot they only found time to play around 17 minutes of their most recent album.
*Shrug* move on, Tri-State and Group Therapy are still as relevant as ever, they're forgiven.
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Post by philipandtigger on Nov 23, 2016 20:41:45 GMT
It's a bit harsh referring to WAAWN as 'crap', to be fair. In my view it's a decent album, just not in the same league as Tri-State, SOTS or Group Therapy.
For me it's suffered a bit with age, when it was fresh it sounded a lot better, it had a certain vibrancy and accessibility, but as time has passed I can't see myself going back to it very often (not like the other three albums). If I'm objective, I think it maybe sounds rushed out and released it too quickly - I think it would've benefitted and maybe sounded more cohesive if it had been refined in the studio for a further year or so - I think it needed much more critical appraisal, editing, polishing lyrically and the addition of more musical depth. Melodically, I think there was probably another Above & Beyond masterpiece in there (especially melodically) but they didn't quite do enough to pluck it out of the ether and translate it into physical form...
That being said, I don't think it's a bad album at all - just not a timeless classic their others. It's tough really, when you're trying to evolve your sound and production approach stylistically, for your album to sound different to your previous ones while retaining the same level of brilliance - I appreciate the effort involved, but I have to say they just missed the mark (in comparison to their previous work).
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Post by dspencer124 on Nov 23, 2016 21:43:29 GMT
Have to agree with you Tim, WAAWN isn;t in the same league as the others (though, for me SOTS is so far above the others so perhaps I'm biased in some ways)...tbh i'd actually forgotten WAAWN was an A&B album, i had to go and look it up (which shames me to some degree). Looking back across the tracklist now there are very few tunes that standout to me; Little Something, Fly to New York, Sink The Lighthouse, and Treasure, the rest I've already forgotten...it's not like Ashes, where i still catch myself singing the lyrics, or Alone Tonight/Home which are the songs i go to whenever I need a soul-lift.
WAAWN would have been a decent album by any other group, but was mediocre by A&B standards.
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Flexo24
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Post by Flexo24 on Nov 23, 2016 21:48:34 GMT
It's a bit harsh referring to WAAWN as 'crap', to be fair. In my view it's a decent album, just not in the same league as Tri-State, SOTS or Group Therapy. For me it's suffered a bit with age, when it was fresh it sounded a lot better, it had a certain vibrancy and accessibility, but as time has passed I can't see myself going back to it very often (not like the other three albums). If I'm objective, I think it maybe sounds rushed out and released it too quickly - I think it would've benefitted and maybe sounded more cohesive if it had been refined in the studio for a further year or so - I think it needed much more critical appraisal, editing, polishing lyrically and the addition of more musical depth. Melodically, I think there was probably another Above & Beyond masterpiece in there (especially melodically) but they didn't quite do enough to pluck it out of the ether and translate it into physical form... That being said, I don't think it's a bad album at all - just not a timeless classic their others. It's tough really, when you're trying to evolve your sound and production approach stylistically, for your album to sound different to your previous ones while retaining the same level of brilliance - I appreciate the effort involved, but I have to say they just missed the mark (in comparison to their previous work). I agree with this. But in the old classic internet forum line of 'just my opinion guv!' I still think it's crap. In all honesty I haven't listened to it once since it came out. I found there were far too many ballads and just general slow songs, insipid, tired and lazy lyrics (Sticky Fingers for one... I just cringe everytime that's said. Elegant dinosaur limbs?!). Hello miiiiiiight get an airing ever now and then, but Tri-State and GT have had more airplay since But yes, the mark was way off. I think they wanted to avoid 'EDM', but in the process went the other end of the spectrum. Maybe they tried so hard 'not' to be something it came off as false and not really them
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mrman
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Post by mrman on Nov 24, 2016 0:42:18 GMT
I agree with this. But in the old classic internet forum line of 'just my opinion guv!' I still think it's crap. In all honesty I haven't listened to it once since it came out. I found there were far too many ballads and just general slow songs, insipid, tired and lazy lyrics (Sticky Fingers for one... I just cringe everytime that's said. Elegant dinosaur limbs?!). Hello miiiiiiight get an airing ever now and then, but Tri-State and GT have had more airplay since But yes, the mark was way off. I think they wanted to avoid 'EDM', but in the process went the other end of the spectrum. Maybe they tried so hard 'not' to be something it came off as false and not really them I agree with you. I saw the acoustic 2 show live, and up until then I'd only heard Save Me once (my initial playthrough of the album). Some of the other tracks on the album, I can honestly say I can't even remember what they sound like. The album is mediocre. There are no truly memorable tracks, although the S8&T remix of Little Something was quite nice. Although I understand that the recent A&B productions have tended to rely on lyrics to portray the emotions of the track, I feel like WAAWN almost lost sight of this, or maybe wasn't critical enough of itself as someone else already pointed out.
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