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Did you know that Pink Floyd used a celesta in The Wall? That’s the same instrument that looks like a toy piano that’s used in Tchaikovsky’s Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy in The Nutcracker.
Musicians have always sought to push limits, and one way they do so is by going beyond the standard bread-and-butter quartet of two guitars, a bass and a drum set. But just how far beyond that will they go?
Some, like ‘80s punk group pUbLiC NuIsAnCe, used ordinary equipment in very un-ordinary ways. I asked pUbLiC NuIsAnCe front-man JohnnyV about how he was able to get that wild, thrumming outboard motor sound in their music, which defined the early punk movement at its very origins in New York City’s Lower East Side. “Nothing exotic,” he said. “But to get my sound I never used anything besides a heavy metal box with MXR distortion pedal but also had DeMarzio pickups installed on my Ibanez PF200, which gave it a sound like a motor boat with jaws.”
Others go out of their way to find instruments that few other musicians use. Mike Oldfield, of “Tubular Bells” fame, used a bodhran in his own version of the William Tell Overture; Radiohead used a glockenspiel in “No Surprises,” and in a completely unexpected move, if you listen carefully you can hear heavy metal band AC/DC using Scottish bagpipes in “It’s a Long Way to the Top (If You Wanna Rock ‘n Roll).”
But would you know for example, that the shrill horns in the hard rock AC/DC song were actually bagpipes?
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Pushing the line between instruments and construction equipment, Natalia “Saw Lady” Paruz is best known for musical saw, and you can hear her performance as she renders a haunting melody in the movie soundtrack to “Time Out of Mind” starring Richard Gere. While other musicians boast an impressive collection of vintage guitars, Natalia has a set of 20 ordinary carpenters’ saws ranging from 12 to 33 inches in length. “I also played bottles,” she says. “I collected juice bottles, filled them with water to varying degrees and played them with a mallet.”
Still other composers take it even further, transforming everyday objects and natural sounds into musical instruments, in what is sometimes referred to as “concrete music.” Composer Anthony L. Sanchez, in his Somnium Futurum uses distorted sounds of Puerto Rican coqui frogs, street sounds, and a cooling fan, noting that “Concrete music forms the basis of most of my electronic and electroacoustic pieces. I often use natural sounds in a stereophonic soundscape. I then distort these sounds to the point where they become unrecognizable.”
How do these musicians come up with those crazy ideas? Every musician is influenced in one way or another by other musicians. Michael Pierce, founder of Equipboard, says “Music fans and professional musicians alike often gain inspiration from other compositions. A particular passage may speak to you, and may form the foundation of your own original composition.”
But would you know for example, that the shrill horns in the hard rock AC/DC song were actually bagpipes? Probably not, and despite the instrument’s characteristic resonance, most people associate bagpipes with one or two songs, most notably “Scotland the Brave.” AC/DC uses the pipes out of their traditional context, so we may not recognize it unless we know what to listen for.
“When a composer is inspired by a particular piece, they may not have any idea how that passage was created,” said Pierce. “Not every musician can just call up Mick Jagger and ask him what type of equipment he used on the Some Girls album.” Originally started as a hobby to solve that very problem, Pierce’s Equipboard is now one of the only places on the Web where musicians can learn with great detail what equipment and instrumentation went into each piece of music.
“Every musician faces the same issue. We call it the ‘equipment chase,’” said Pierce. “Musicians want to know how to create a particular sound, what type of equipment their favorite band uses, or what instrument was used for a riff they like. Equipboard is crowdsourced, and you can even create a ‘want it’ list.” Just how many musicians partake in the “equipment chase” was evident in this year’s Grammy Awards, when the incredibly talented Ed Sheeran was seen performing solo using a huge pedalboard during his powerful performance of “Shape of You.” When viewers couldn’t figure out what the massive device was, they flocked to Equipboard in such high numbers that the traffic actually brought the site down for 20 minutes.
If you’re wondering what Sheeran’s device was and where to get it, you’re out of luck, though. The pedalboard was developed by Sheeran himself to allow for four separate tracks of loops for guitar, vocals, and percussion, each of which can be treated with different effects.
Musicians have always looked to those who have gone before them for inspiration. The Beatles were influenced by the music of Chuck Berry and Elvis Presley, and if you listen carefully to the Rolling Stones, you can hear the influence of blues great Muddy Waters coming through. Madonna, one of the most influential female pop singers in history, has influenced dozens of other female performers, including Britney Spears, the Spice Girls, and Lady Gaga. Today’s Internet-based tools are forming the foundation of the next generation of what will be the greatest music yet.
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Photo Credit: Getty Images