Good vs Bad Ambient

If you enjoy it, it's good. If you don't enjoy it, it's bad.

>>72485154
i think theres two kinds of ambient. ones not necessarily good or better than the other.

>backpambient
chill, slow moving, pretty, and/or relaxing music. stuff for indie rock and pop music fans to chill out to and not seriously engage with in an intellectual or spiritual capacity.

>ambient
music that examines the effects of drones and repeting tones on the human psyche. traditional drone musics have historically induced trance or connect with god or higher powers in serious ways.

>>72485302
This is a pretty good start. I would add that "good ambient" is written and recorded so that it can be just as engaging as it is ignorable, like Brian Eno once said. So the good stuff I find is just as layered and well-composed as any other genre of music. The "bad" ambient I've heard is simply ignorable and not engaging--for instance, it is more concerned with slow loops and reverb than finding interesting timbres, building on repetitions, and using effective drones.

Nigga get yourself the NASA Voyager recordings 1-5

>>72485302
So ambient is either background noise, or a spiritual experience with no in-between?

I might be paraphrasing your point but I feel like a lot of ambient music switches around which of those it presents itself as. Take Rain Temple by 2814 as an example: I've put it on while I was doing work or playing games and enjoyed the mood it immersed me in even if I wasn't being completely wrapped up in all of the things going on in the music.

However there was a time it was early in the morning and I was coming down from an acid trip and I put my headphones on, laid down in the dark, and put the album on. It was one of the most profound listening experiences I've had simply because my focus kept ebbing and flowing with the music. I would get lost in my thoughts and then the music would shift and bring my focus back to the post-humanity internet dystopia I was hearing.

>>72485411
Could you give me examples of some albums that use effective drones, build on repetitions, etc?

I started this thread because I'm interested in producing ambient tracks of my own and I want to study what makes others so highly regarded.

>>72485302
How do you find more of the second kind? When I try to find more of that I just get backpamient recs or ambient techno. I've tried using rym but that's just mainly ambient techno again

>>72485154
Ambient is just slow music lol
It's either good or bad: it's based on your own taste

>>72485302
>music that examines the effects of drones and repeting tones on the human psyche
literally pretentious gibberish aimed to "indie rock & pop music"
We're in the 2010's, we can have engaging emotional/intellectual/spiritual experiences with any vapid, chill, stupid music (eg. ambient alums releases by James Ferraro, vaporware stuff).

>>72485459
>effective drones
I would first look at the artists who influenced ambient music through their use of drones. La Monte Young, Fripp/Eno for starters. Later drone ambient artists that I think are really good: Stars of the Lid, Windy & Carl, and Basinski.

>build on repetitions
Minimalism is a good example of music which is concerned with lengthy repetitions slowly changing. Steve Reich, Eno again, Jon Hassell, and Laraaji have all blended ambient music with minimalist structures. As for non-minimalists who are great at building and modifying repetitions, Aphex Twin is a good start I suppose.

I'd also like to point out the atmosphere you build is an important element. Albums like Biosphere's Substrata or Eno's Apollo: Atmospheres & Soundtracks are celebrated because of how their unique and immersive soundscapes are. Using field recordings and samples to sculpt a specific "sound environment" is more interesting than somebody who expects their synths and fx to conjure an implied location for them.

I think there's a distinction between ambient music that seeks to supplement what's already there, like Music for Airports, and ambient that is engaging enough to create an atmosphere for an imagined place, like On Land.

Also, if you want to listen to drone-based ambient, check out stuff from the isolationist movement in the 90'.

>>72485693
>literally pretentious gibberish aimed to "indie rock & pop music"
>We're in the 2010's, we can have engaging emotional/intellectual/spiritual experiences with any vapid, chill, stupid music (eg. ambient alums releases by James Ferraro, vaporware stuff).
Uh... not true. Early drone artists (and the Indian traditional music they were inspired by) literally sought to evoke divinity through long-sustained notes. A modern ambient artist might be able to achieve the same effect with great care, but the average soundcloud ambient project probably isn't going to reach the same level of "trance" in their music. You've created a false equivalency.

A question to get the thread rolling a bit more:

Do we think "Power Ambient" should be a legitimate genre to label certain artists, albums, and tracks?

For example, I'd cite Tim Hecker's later work (Rave, Virgins, Love Streams) as falling under this category - it seems far too dense, encompassing, and unignorable to fall under the traditional ambient category. While at the same time, being too clean and focused to be considered noise in the traditional sense of the term.

Examples:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QUpA8R01d50

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rIraStrVIGA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNLWBKRfgwY

(Maybe the last track is a stretch)

Ambient seems to be far too broad to be appropriately defining.