seriouss recently wrote in another thread: “What i miss at wikiloops is a bit more room for the newcomers. People always seem to stay with what they already know. After a warm welcome newbies are normally ignored.”
As this resonated/contrasted with some thoughts I had after the Barnadise meeting, I thought I`d comment as even after 2 years on Wikiloops I still regard myself as a newcomer.
When you look at Wikiloops the two most prominent buzzwords are “Jamming” and “Backing tracks” and I suppose most members were attracted by one or the other.
Personally I was only searching for backing tracks to learn and practice bass guitar. I had no intention of jamming or uploading anything. To be honest, in the beginning I didn`t pay too much attention to the tracks that were uploaded, sometimes only listening to bass parts to try to learn something new and to broaden my horizons.
What I did do was to read comments on tracks to understand how Wikiloops worked. Not in a technical or functional sense but in the sense of user behaviour and group dynamics. Maybe I was just lucky to come across some comments that made me think that some outside comments and advice might help me in my development, especially as I was moving beyond just learning bass and re-discovering keys and musical creativity (which to me is totally different to learning to play an instrument. It`s a different journey with a different mindset).
So I just went for it, fully aware that my first couple of uploads (in fact 95% of all my uploads) were and mostly still are of sub-standard. As someone who stopped playing in bands and performing solo more than 30 years ago, everything I do musically is one big chaotic construction site.
Learning to record and working the DAW – 30 years ago I had an engineer do that for me,
Playing bass – don`t yet have the real feeling for the thing, but ask me again in 10 years time,
Keys – hell, midi was just an underground topic in the 80s and don`t even get me started on synths. The stuff available today would have seemed like something from outer space 30 years ago.
The thing is that starting on Wikiloops despite all these deficits, the members have given me the room to slowly progress to a point where my personal cringe level is noticeably reducing and I`m getting even more and better constructive feedback.
And I think that that`s down to three factors.
One, well-meaning and helpful comments and messages either about the playing itself, the recording, the sound…. And I got that right from day one.
Two, the high level of tolerance on Wikiloops. I confess to having this weird inability to really listen critically to my output until I`ve uploaded it. So I`m basically misusing Wikiloops as my personal sounding board – hence the apologies I often add in my comments. (Luckily there`s a learning curve and I am learning to listen for “mistakes” prior to uploading.)
The third factor is something I began to suspect a couple of months ago and which I think I found confirmed at the Barnadise meeting and that is the personal level of interaction, which might sound funny considering this is an online platform. But I think the charm (and the challenge) of Wikiloops really comes into play when you not only add to a track because you like it but when you also consider who else is performing on it and you try to acknowledge and fit into their styles (either by buying in or by consciously creating a contrast and surprising everyone). I really believe that many people take notice when they feel that the uploader has tried to understand and become involved with the intention of the template rather than just piling up the adds. (That`s a real lesson-learned from the master of plastering his keys across every available audio space!!!!).
So, room for newbies? I don`t think there`s a limit to what you can do on Wikiloops, regardless of newbie/old hand status or of what you want to achieve for yourself. But as with every community it takes time to get to know people (at least their Wikiloops personas) and to develop musical relationships.
They only things that really do NOT seem to work on Wikiloops are
- inflating your ego by trying to get as many thumps-ups as possible,
- being unkind to the folks manning the trolley,
- proposing marriage to Shi
- composing long, rambling texts
(I`ll crawl back into my hole now)
As this resonated/contrasted with some thoughts I had after the Barnadise meeting, I thought I`d comment as even after 2 years on Wikiloops I still regard myself as a newcomer.
When you look at Wikiloops the two most prominent buzzwords are “Jamming” and “Backing tracks” and I suppose most members were attracted by one or the other.
Personally I was only searching for backing tracks to learn and practice bass guitar. I had no intention of jamming or uploading anything. To be honest, in the beginning I didn`t pay too much attention to the tracks that were uploaded, sometimes only listening to bass parts to try to learn something new and to broaden my horizons.
What I did do was to read comments on tracks to understand how Wikiloops worked. Not in a technical or functional sense but in the sense of user behaviour and group dynamics. Maybe I was just lucky to come across some comments that made me think that some outside comments and advice might help me in my development, especially as I was moving beyond just learning bass and re-discovering keys and musical creativity (which to me is totally different to learning to play an instrument. It`s a different journey with a different mindset).
So I just went for it, fully aware that my first couple of uploads (in fact 95% of all my uploads) were and mostly still are of sub-standard. As someone who stopped playing in bands and performing solo more than 30 years ago, everything I do musically is one big chaotic construction site.
Learning to record and working the DAW – 30 years ago I had an engineer do that for me,
Playing bass – don`t yet have the real feeling for the thing, but ask me again in 10 years time,
Keys – hell, midi was just an underground topic in the 80s and don`t even get me started on synths. The stuff available today would have seemed like something from outer space 30 years ago.
The thing is that starting on Wikiloops despite all these deficits, the members have given me the room to slowly progress to a point where my personal cringe level is noticeably reducing and I`m getting even more and better constructive feedback.
And I think that that`s down to three factors.
One, well-meaning and helpful comments and messages either about the playing itself, the recording, the sound…. And I got that right from day one.
Two, the high level of tolerance on Wikiloops. I confess to having this weird inability to really listen critically to my output until I`ve uploaded it. So I`m basically misusing Wikiloops as my personal sounding board – hence the apologies I often add in my comments. (Luckily there`s a learning curve and I am learning to listen for “mistakes” prior to uploading.)
The third factor is something I began to suspect a couple of months ago and which I think I found confirmed at the Barnadise meeting and that is the personal level of interaction, which might sound funny considering this is an online platform. But I think the charm (and the challenge) of Wikiloops really comes into play when you not only add to a track because you like it but when you also consider who else is performing on it and you try to acknowledge and fit into their styles (either by buying in or by consciously creating a contrast and surprising everyone). I really believe that many people take notice when they feel that the uploader has tried to understand and become involved with the intention of the template rather than just piling up the adds. (That`s a real lesson-learned from the master of plastering his keys across every available audio space!!!!).
So, room for newbies? I don`t think there`s a limit to what you can do on Wikiloops, regardless of newbie/old hand status or of what you want to achieve for yourself. But as with every community it takes time to get to know people (at least their Wikiloops personas) and to develop musical relationships.
They only things that really do NOT seem to work on Wikiloops are
- inflating your ego by trying to get as many thumps-ups as possible,
- being unkind to the folks manning the trolley,
- proposing marriage to Shi
- composing long, rambling texts
(I`ll crawl back into my hole now)
+8
