Simplicity and purity of idea maybe? I make Drum and Bass, and it seems that the whole genre has gone through a period in the last seven years whereby the opportunities afforded by sequencers and plugins have led to music which was often technically proficient, but uninspired, and more importantly, uninspiring.
Now, there's a resurgence of minimalism which I'm absolutely loving. When there aren't a thousand things going on in a tune, the choices you've made are laid bare for all to see. We had to go through some pretty ridiculous stuff to finally get here, though.
I completely agree with the analogy between 8 (and to some extent 16) bit video games, and the current generation. Limiting your scope makes it much easier to flesh out your ideas... it forces you to go for depth, because your breadth is more or less predetermined. Some of the best music humankind has ever seen was written for one person sitting at one musical instrument, capable of making a fixed range of sounds.
As a fan, I prefer a good layered number of tracks that drop down to simple and ramp back up to complex melodies/harmonics.
It's hard to find the perfect song, but I've listened to thousands of near misses ;)
Glad to hear things are leaning out, hope that doesn't always mean less tracks.
Now, there's a resurgence of minimalism which I'm absolutely loving. When there aren't a thousand things going on in a tune, the choices you've made are laid bare for all to see. We had to go through some pretty ridiculous stuff to finally get here, though.
I completely agree with the analogy between 8 (and to some extent 16) bit video games, and the current generation. Limiting your scope makes it much easier to flesh out your ideas... it forces you to go for depth, because your breadth is more or less predetermined. Some of the best music humankind has ever seen was written for one person sitting at one musical instrument, capable of making a fixed range of sounds.