The Art of the Loop.

I recently listened to an extremely interesting programme entitled: “The Art of the Loop” on BBC Radio 4. The presenter of the programme; Matthew Herbert, has first hand knowledge of the art of ‘looping’ which is fundamental in a large proportion of music, popular and underground.

A ‘loop’ is a way of repeating a recording, usually a very short ‘sample’ that is repeated in order to create a beat. Hip-Hop music is famous for this, and the debate then rises that:

“Is it the producer who compiled the samples, placed them in an order and then a beat was made, or was it the individuals, who made the songs from which the samples and loops were taken that should be praised for the song in hand?”

I personally side with the fact that sampling and looping are actually creating new music and enable producers and disc-jockeys alike, to create something that is their own. However, there are cases in which this is flawed, for example Immortal Technique created this instrumental‘Dance with the Devil’, but in actual fact all they have done is taken Henry Mancini’s classical song ‘Love Story’ and placed a heavy drum track over the top. Is this creating music?

On the other hand The Avalanches created this masterful track ‘Frontier Psychiatrist’ which uses nothing but samples and loops, but to me seems even more original that that of Immortal Technique’s ‘Dance with the Devil’ instrumental.