The Visibility Of Music

We are all witnessing a process where music and its visual manifestations are quickly de-materializing. Music has been digitized, playlisted and cover art has been reduced to thumbnails. More and more DJs, who are traditionally a strong pro-vinyl fraction, are discovering the amenities of tools like Serato or Final Scratch.

In this context it is interesting to see that there have been a couple of recent projects to portray DJs and producers in their creative workspaces. The picture above shows Hamburg based DJ Koze’s studio as photgraphed by Ragnar Schmuck. Ragnar shot this photo as part of a series called “Musikzimmer/Music Rooms” for German Groove - a magazine for electronic music and club culture. The series gives you a peep into different ways of DJs/Producer’s living, working, putting things in order (or not).

“Bedroom Rockers, Where DJs Call Home” is a book documenting bedrooms of 97 DJs from all over the US. “Behind The Beat” looks at the creative spaces of some of the most influential Hip Hop DJ’s and producers in the UK and US such as J Dilla, Madlib and DJ Shadow.

The photos from these projects show the treasures of DJs and producers nowadays: huge record collections. But, music is loosing its spatial and visual presence. Also, the way we memorize music is changing from visual to semantic. We are more likely to browse through endless archives and playlists or even random play than flipping through our CDs or LPs.

What does this mean for creativity in music production and consumption? What does it mean on a cultural level? How do our patterns of memorizing, selecting and listening to music change when the shelves that used to be filled with records have been completely replaced by digital playlists? How is creativity being influenced “behind the beat”? Without trying to be too retro, we’re just wondering if there’s a bigger change going on in terms of creation and perception of music than we might imagine.