{"id":2352,"date":"2009-09-09T11:46:10","date_gmt":"2009-09-09T16:46:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wayneandwax.com\/?p=2352"},"modified":"2015-01-07T13:57:47","modified_gmt":"2015-01-07T17:57:47","slug":"bass-is-a-feeling","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wayneandwax.com\/?p=2352","title":{"rendered":"Bass Is a Feeling"},"content":{"rendered":"

I’ve really been enjoying all the feedback I got on my “treble culture<\/a>” post. One idea that’s been especially interesting is the seemingly common notion — repeated & affirmed by many commenters — that we tend to imagine\/assume bass even when we don’t hear it. <\/p>\n

I suspect that this phenomenon may be at work more frequently than we think. Indeed, I suspect that even when we’re in the presence of a good enough system to “hear” bass, it’s hardly bass at all if we’re not feeling<\/em> it. Comments from Nina<\/a> and Beni<\/a> emphasized this point, but nothing brought it home quite like last night’s Mos Def & Talib Kweli concert at the House of Blues.<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

As you can see in that picture above, the speaker stacks at the HoB are pretty damn serious (see the arcing array rising from the stage). Corporate sheen aside, I can’t remember being in a club with a system that pumped like that. The highs and mids could have used some teasing out — 30 years in & soundmen still haven’t figured out how to mix hip-hop unmuddily? — but the “lows” were perfect. It feels a little odd to call them “lows” actually, since rather than hearing the bass frequencies I felt like I was being inhabited by them, body cavities vibrating in sympathy. There’s no way I could translate this physicality for you — YOU HAVE TO BE THERE, simple as that — but this little video<\/a>, and the crushing distortion produced by the bass therein, gives some sense — if a kind of bizarro, fractured representation — of what it was like.<\/p>\n

I’d love to hear more thoughts on this, if anyone has any.<\/p>\n

I’ll leave you with an apropos photo c\/o Botswana brethren<\/a>, Ruff Riddims. Seeking to push their sound out, they’ve been building their own speaker boxes, which are as beautiful (and, I’m told, as awesome) as the studio they built<\/a> last year. Moemedi, aka Red Pepper, says they’re going to build four more like these, for the other side of the flatbed!
\n
\n<\/a><\/p>\n

& if you think that’s impressive, here’s what Mr. Ruff himself told me yesterday: <\/p>\n

\nRuff<\/strong>: today I started molding bricks for the new night club that I dream of building
\nme<\/strong>: bredrin, you’re an impresario!
\nRuff<\/strong>: we have 200 bricks so far
\nme<\/strong>: 200 bricks so far!
\nRuff<\/strong>: yes and 4000 is where we must reach
\nme<\/strong>: brick by brick! that’s some real industry right there
\nRuff<\/strong>: I told the guys helping me that, a journey of a thousand miles begins with one step and they where very motivated and laughed too.
\nme<\/strong>: i’m sure they can see by the studio and soundsystem that you mean business
\nRuff<\/strong>: the thing is the building where the club is now is sold and so we need a place to party so I will build one
\nme<\/strong>: necessity is the mother of invention<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

What I’d give to feel some Botswana bass bouncing off 4000 bricks!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’ve really been enjoying all the feedback I got on my “treble culture” post. One idea that’s been especially interesting is the seemingly common notion — repeated & affirmed by many commenters — that we tend to imagine\/assume bass even when we don’t hear it. I suspect that this phenomenon may be at work more […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[413,288,133,404,289,290],"class_list":["post-2352","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-africa","tag-bass","tag-boston","tag-hip-hop","tag-phenomenology","tag-treble"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wayneandwax.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2352","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wayneandwax.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wayneandwax.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wayneandwax.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wayneandwax.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2352"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/wayneandwax.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2352\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2380,"href":"https:\/\/wayneandwax.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2352\/revisions\/2380"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wayneandwax.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2352"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wayneandwax.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2352"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wayneandwax.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2352"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}