The use of lofi techniques leads listeners back to gestures, objects, causes of why what is heard has that nature, that timbral colour.
In this external-internal link, in addition to reproducing human space and gesture, in the sound object realised with lofi techniques there is also the gesture of the machine, of the device that is producing it. The tool actively participates in the creation of the sound material and thus becomes part of it. An old loudspeaker that reproduces a certain sound but at the same time also electrical noise at 50/60 Hz can be recorded with an external microphone, creating a layering between the hum and the sound, the sum of which will constitute a new timbre. The final result will also include the machine, the loudspeaker, whose gesture, action, participation in the creative act we will hear. Because the “bodies” participating in the game are not only human.
Through this participation, lofi production techniques generate sound artefacts and audio effects that are considered affordances in this research.
The concept of affordances was introduced by James Gibson in the theory set out in Ecological Approach to Visual Perception. According to Gibson, “the affordances of the environment are what it offers the animal, what it provides or gives, good or bad” (1999). Affordances are “functional meanings” (Windsor 2004, 179-198) that “are primarily understood as the consequences in terms of action of encountering perceptual information in the world” (Clarke 2005, 38).
The concept of affordances was later introduced in music studies. This concept is understood here as not being restricted to movement, but also extended to the other senses. Although acousmatic music is at least apparently a monosensory experience, as Denis Smalley well describes: “This does not mean that the other senses lie dormant; in fact they spill over into sonic experience” (Smalley 2007, 39).
According to Eric Clarke: “In the specific contexts of musical hermeneutics, musical material can be conceived as offering (affording) certain kinds of interpretation and not others [...]. Interpretation is also action - the speaking, the writing, the gestures and facial expressions through which interpretation manifests itself [...]. The recapitulation of the first movement of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony offers (affords) the possibility of writing (or speaking) about it in terms of homicidal sexual rage, or burning paradises. Interpretive writing and speaking are forms of action [...]” (Clarke 2005, 204).
In order to better specify the juxtaposition of audio characteristics determined by lofi production techniques with affordances, it is necessary to recall that affordances are very strongly socially determined, however, “for different organisms, affordances will be different [...]. Furthermore, affordances are fluid with respect to individual perceptual development” (Windsor 2000, 7-35), i.e. they are dynamic both phylogenetically and ontogenetically.
The affordances that a sound object realised with lofi audio production techniques offers to a listener can be conceived as extended meanings contained in structures outside the human brain. They embody facilitated interactions, such as precise synchronisation, and guide attention and awareness of musical events to higher levels of meaning formation. Interaction in music not only involves movement; it can also involve the reading and interpretation of signs such as the physical properties of sound, such as spectral density and amplitude, giving rise to impressions of visual and tactile space, such as weight, smoothness, roughness and so on. In this way, the listening experience is embodied and the abductions the body makes generate senses, meanings and synaesthesia representing old and new patterns internalised in our bodies. The subjects and environments (in this case musical) dialogue through codes that generate a closed-circuit experience, a loop, the body-consciousness-knowledge of Gino Stefani and Stefania Guerra Lisi (2010), which from the sound/musical environment moves on to the body (the central element linking these worlds) and then to its representation and so on, each time changing all the elements of this path and creating new languages.
These methods are used by many musicians, producers and sound designers from various musical genres. The lofi techniques are considered to be strongly linked to what is most material in sound, in its creation. Methods and methodologies that even when they deviate from the material use expedients to recall it. An obvious example is in the previously mentioned “in the box” audio production.
1. Layering (and Sound Collage) Conceiving of these sound objects as small pieces of music, small landscapes, with timbre as the main parameter, means that special space is dedicated to the layering technique (and sound collage), a technique that brings to the fore precisely the timbral aspect of the sound being produced. The layers, which are superimposed and mixed, can come from samples, recordings or be created from scratch. One of the possibilities offered by lofi techniques is to be able to layering on analogue media such as multitrack cassette recorders. By executing this action, we can also voluntarily incorporate into the creation any transduction noise that may be generated by the device involved. Sound objects created by layering invite repeated listening, as they are richly complex sound objects that can reveal themselves differently each time they are listened to. They can be read at the same time, i.e. two or more timbres or sound objects participate in the creation of a single, more complex timbre or sound object. Sound collage creates new realities. ‘By “gluing” together sound elements from various sources, hyper-real sound objects are created. An artist frequently referenced in this context is Noah Creshevsky, who employs the term “hyperrealism“ to denote an electroacoustic musical language constructed from sounds that are found in our shared environment (“realism”), handled in ways that are exaggerated or excessive (“hyper”). In this experiment, sounds were collected from a variety of contexts, with the objective of achieving maximum breadth (Windleburn 2021).
2. Vinyl Crackles, Dust, Transduction Noise & co. (real and fake) With the advent of personal computers and the considerable noise reduction that resulted especially with the rise of the digital recording standard, the relevance of the lofi aesthetic could only increase. Lofi is indeed related to the aesthetics of imperfection and malfunctioning common in some electronic and experimental music scenes. However, the pursuit of manifest imperfection, of the deliberate flaw/defect, is a treacherous path that can slide towards the paradox of the cleverly ill realised. But these characteristics are peculiar to lofi philosophy and can be created/recreated and highlighted in many ways. After all, even “imperfections” themselves can be sound objects. A vinyl crackle, whether genuine or artfully fabricated, is a micro sound object. Many crackles form an atmosphere. But these elements are not just an atmosphere, a binder; they are also active participants in the creation of timbre. Two examples of application: realising the sound object directly in an analogue environment that possesses the noise we are interested in, using layering to mix the two elements together.
3. Filter Techniques and Tape Manipulation Everything is a filter! That is to say, from the human perceptual system to objects specifically deputed to the function of audio filters, everything (a room, a loudspeaker and so on) can enhance or attenuate specific audio frequencies. The tape is itself a filter as well as a medium on which to record. Tape manipulation techniques, such as tape delays and tape saturation, add warmth and distinguishable character to audio productions and to sound objects. Each sound object can be conceived as a micro musical piece, existing independently of the context in which it is placed. Therefore, giving it a narrative development can help it to be conceived as an element in its own right. Audio filtering, with the application of effects such as reverb, delay, distortion, saturation and so on, creates a micro narrative, a micro unfolding, during which one can speak of amplitude envelope but also of narrative envelope and timbral envelope. The evolution of the sound object can be realised in the lofi regime thanks to objects such as old mixers, through which we can filter the created sound objects to shape and colour these sounds.
4. Sampling Sampling plays a crucial role in the production process. Producers can sample from a wide range of sources, ranging from old jazz records to obscure audio clips. These samples form the basis of a song and can be sound objects. Sampling can be done with many instruments but in the lofi philosophy I prefer old samplers like the Akai S950 or old walkmans and recorders that could record directly onto tape.
5. Field Recordings A field recording is a capture of the world around us. The field recording marks a specific moment in time. Field recordings traverse the trajectories of multiple genres of music and sound. In research, field recordings have been used, and in some cases have been fundamental, in various disciplines including folklore, ethnomusicology, cultural geography, anthropology, biology and others. In the domain of art music, field recordings have served as a prolific source of compositional material, spanning the 20th century and continuing into the 21st. The advent of microphones and tape machines has not only facilitated the capture of sound but has also transformed these instruments into creative entities, enabling the generation and preservation of auditory phenomena (Western 2018).
A sound object can also be captured by recording and then modelled with various audio treatments or left as is and inserted into the piece of music for which it was intended. Recording can be done in many ways but, to respect the lofi aesthetic, one of the possibilities can be, as mentioned in point 4, an old sampler or a portable cassette recorder.