[MrTechno]

Originally Posted by robkramble

I started coming here because I hoped to find a place where people who shared my passion for music could talk to each other and help each other blossom into creative, happy artists. The more I come here, the more I see this place as a graveyard for creativity and joy.

The homogenization of thought and the impulsive nature that permeate this forum have created a legion of teenage "producers" fixated with analog synthesizers, multiband compressors, or any other tool they believe will help them to achieve hollow fame by creating "of-the-moment" trendy tunes with no soul or personality whatsoever. Artistry, personality and the guiding principles behind their work take a backseat to big talk and "number games" of frequencies and compression ratios.

Listening to artists I love and admire for their ingenuity, it seems they always have such simple, almost naive explanations for how they approach their craft and why they do what they do. They live in wonderment and let music flow from their soul, that crucial instrument to which the brain is a mere servant.

Reading Rainer Maria Rilke's "Letters to a Young Poet," I stumbled upon one of the most important lessons I think I'll learn as an artist, and one that hopefully hasn't hit me too late.

"You ask whether your verses are any good. You ask me. You have asked others before this. You send them to magazines. You compare them with other poems, and you are upset when certain editors reject your work. Now (since you have said you want my advice) I beg you to stop doing that sort of thing. You are looking outside, and that is what you should most avoid right now.

No one can advise or help you--no one. There is only one thing you should do. Go into yourself. Find out the reason that commands you to write; see whether it has spread its roots into the very depths of your heart; confess to yourself whether you would have to die if you were forbidden to write. This most of all: ask yourself in the most silent hour of your night: must I write? Dig into yourself for a deep answer. And if this answer rings out in assent, if you meet this question with a strong, simple 'I must,' then build your life in accordance with this necessity..."

This website has filled my head with nonsense and noise, and I honestly hope there will come a day when I can approach music in a less by-the-numbers and dreadfully soulless way than has been imparted on me from countless visits to this forum.

I hope the same day can come for you when you can create without a mind tethered to the negative impulses the age of the internet has placed in your brain and let out through your hands when you work.