Snares

I also cannot understand this man's music. It's terrorizing, dark, and unrelenting, reaching fast tempos and including earsplitting barages of beats. One asks: Is it music? Yes, anything is music. It is this man's interpretation of something in life. Is it music you'd want to listen to? I'd check out some of his work, just to get a feel of how mortals can incorporate hell into music, but most people with a musical ear will be turned off by this abstract artist. You can enjoy it now and then, and when you're young, but once you get older, you can't really handle these loud volumes and fast tempos, and it's soulless, dark and empty.

I used to be into dark and unstoppable music like this, but as my taste matured, I realized that it's just pointless to live your life listening to soulless music just because its transcendental, tough, and powerful. My advice for new listeners: take a peek, but go find some jazz cds for the best long term listening pleasure.

Well my life and perspective on Electronic music definitely changed when i listened to Mr. Aaron Funk. I first came across his music, after hearing his track "Felbomlasztott Mentökocsi" (which is my favourite representation of disturbed minds of someone who is mentally troubled.) on the British TV programme Top Gear. I loved this song, but to me with just hearing this song i thought he was more of a classical musician. I then decided to download his album "Rossz Csillag Alatt Született", which i promptly put on my ipod and walked to my local town centre too...my god i was shocked in two ways. Shocked that this was classed as music, and shocked that it wasn't classical music at all - it was techno?
(Im not a major fan of techno, im more of a Rock sort of guy, although i will listen to anything.)

Its been about 4 months since i first downloaded the album, and listened to it once... i deleted it - i didnt want to listen to that. But i slowly found myself wanting it back, missing those crazy, quick, insane, nightmare like shots VSnares would shoot at your eardrums. So here i am listening to "Huge Chrome Cylinder Box Unfolding". And i fucking love it. Of course, its hard to get my metalhead guy mates and my top 40 fan girl mates to listen or even appriciate this type of music. But im telling you know, if you havent listened to this, pull up your spotify and listen to one album...any album...and just close your eyes - turn up your speakers...and let your imagination create images from these sounds. I get images of dreams, to me this is what dreams sound like if they were created in sound form. I also think this is what it sounds like in a city, if our ears could pick up electromagnetic waves produced by the technological world we live in. Trying to explain the sound to people is near impossible, it sounds like every video game pre 1995 mashed up to create some crazy ugly beast of a game. This man is a god at what he does, and yes we all hate to love his music - but if you want to let your mind go for one crazy fucking walk, without drugs...this music is for you.

Venetian Snares never ceases to surprise. There is the overall skill of his albums, combined with the overall speed at which he releases them. There is his unique capability to jump from the discordant noisy groove of "Making Orange Things" to the upbeat glitch, ambient and drone of "Songs About My Cats" to the straightforward, downright horror of "Doll Doll Doll" in roughly 4 months. There is the sheer number of influences that he draws from. There is the unlikelihood of, and the fact he pulled off, his co-productions and splits. And there is the realization that yes, all these recordings were done, in part or in whole, by the same person. I'm not suggesting you go out and collect all his albums, I'm just telling you, this is a man worth listening to.

I fell in love with this guy's stuff over the past year (I'd heard him before, but never gotten into him, ya know?), and I just haven't been able to turn around if I just want some of the best damn programming on the planet. The number of tracks he mixes together in each song, and the subtle variations he'll make from measure to measure are just amazing, let alone his manipulation of time signatures. From the subtle abrasions of albums like "Huge Chrome Cylinder Box Unfolding;" to the brutality of releases such as "Making Orange Things," "Doll Doll Doll," and "Greg Hates Car Culture;" to the ethereal beauty of the orchestrations on "Rossz Csillag Alatt Született;" and into the playful absurdity of albums like "The Chocolate Wheelchair Album" and "Songs about My Cats," Aaron Funk's style is able to span a gamut while maintaining basic thematic elements linking his works as distinctively his own.

And if people have a hard time believing the amount of time he puts into everything he releases just because of the insane pace at which he releases material, one should but remember the Beatles, who are well documented as to how much work they put into every album, and how often they released these albums.

As an electronic musician myself, I'd like to comment on his work. Aaron Funk may put out CD's damn fast, but that certainly doesn't mean he doesn't spend time on his work. Sequencing music like he does is not something you can just do. Sure, some people won't understand it, but not everybody gets rap or country music either. And furthermore, the notion that he is putting out music fast simply to make music is certainly not justified. The amount of money that break artists make does not even begin to compare to that of mainstream bands in other genres. Funk has a strong following in a very small crowd of people (as compared to other genres or music). That being said, we realize that many people won't understand or like it, but we love it and that's all we care about.

I hate to be a sourpuss, but I think it must be known that while many do like Aaron Funk's "music" there are many of us who are profoundly confused and irritated by it. I, for one, really don't get what all the hype is about. His music is absurdly one-dimensional and devoid of any true emotion or musicianship. It's like when he makes songs he thinks "let's make this as fast and intense as humanly possible" but he doesn't give much thought to anything else. The product is a song that is fast, sure, but that's about all it has going for it.

You have to wonder why he's able to release so many albums so quickly. Is it because he does nothing but make music every waking hour of his life, or is it because he's just half-assing the job and trying to make as much money as he can? I'm sure it's a median between the two, but I'll take an album that took a few years to make over one that took a few months to make any day of the week.

This is all, of course, my opinion. He obviously has a huge following, but if you ask me, there are many musicians out there who are far worthier of your time and money.

Aaron Funk has provided me with some of the most memorable sonic moments of the last 4 years (including the final live peformance on monday morning 4:00am at the Autechre curated All Tomorrow's Parties).
My Venetian Snares baptism began with Songs About My Cats and I've never looked back.
His output ranges from the harsh/mentalectronica/technoid punishment of 7 Sevens Med or Salt through to his more infamous breakcore/sickness-sampling/cut-up style on the Hymen label, whilst his two 7"s on Addict appear to be a homage to the intricacies of jazz.
But it is with Mike Paradinas' Planet Mu that I think Snares comes into his own. With his Mu releases he seems to have been allowed complete and utter freedom to express himself, venturing into more personal and experimental/non-predictable territories. From the manic, noise driven (and humourous) Making Orange Things to the electro-mechanical and bittersweet snatches of melody contained in Winter In The Belly Of A Snake, Funk manages to encompass a spectrum of sound that surpasses what most modern electronic artists are capable of today.
Venetian Snares is a credit to electronic music, and should be recognised and lauded in the same way that Mike Paradinas and Richard D. James are for their contributions to create beautiful, challenging and abstract music.

Venetian Snares music is very interesting and unique. You can hear it's quality and you got to have mad skills to do it, but most of his albums are 2 fucked up for me to listen to. 2-advanced-or-no-melody-at-all-worst-drill'n'bass-gabber-heavy-noise-ever-heard.
Though (!), there is one album that I really love, a 5/5 stars and for me, a classic; Huge Chrome Cylinder Box Unfolding.
Would also like to recommend his new album; Rossz Csillag Allat Szuletett.

Snares is one of the most original (and prolific) artists to come out of the breakcore/IDM scene in years. With fierce programming skills, a ton of personality and a serious disregard for traditional time-signatures, Aaron Funk injects fat doses of both beauty and brutality in his music. It's artists like this who keep things fresh in a scene that can often become stangnant...

ya sure, it's violent at times, insane at times, and loud at times, but taken as a whole this guy releases some of the most beautiful music out there. think of everything you are scared of, then make hauntingly scorching music from it...