By The Landlord
"There is geometry in the humming of the strings, there is music in the spacing of the spheres." – Pythagoras
"Music has charms to soothe a savage breast, to soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak." – William Congreve
"Music is the mediator between the spiritual and the sensual life.” – Ludwig van Beethoven
"Music is the best means we have of digesting time." – W. H. Auden
“It’s a liminal thing, humming, And I'm always interested in liminal things.” – Max Richter
"Music should be able to accommodate many levels of listening attention without enforcing one in particular; it must be as ignorable as it is interesting ... my idea was to make music that was more like painting." – Brian Eno
Hello. And so it continues. And continues. The soft hum of fridge to the loud, distant rumble of train or traffic, the constant trickle of ice melting, of water rushing, of rocks cracking, of wind blowing, it's the rush of thought, of blood coursing, of brains whirring. And in music itself, the chant of monks or Mongolian to Bulgarian voices to shrill blow of bagpipe pibroch, or the growl of didgeridoo, the turn of the hurdy-gurdy, the low rumbling sustained pedal of church organ to the non-stop thrum of bass or guitar or twang of the banjo's fifth string, of Slovenian drone zither or Welsh crwth, the puffing of a shruti box, the ping of Indian tanpura, Japanese gagaku, the ottu, the ektar, dotara, the surpeti, the swarmandal and shankh, all the way to sine waves and strange sounds of analogue or digital electronica.
Drone music is as old as the hills, but as modern as this very moment, transcending time, passing from ancient Indian classic to western bedroom composer, from Byzantine chants to 20th-century avant garde, from classical to krautrock, new age and ambient, shoegaze and indie, metal, experimental and film music, from the meditative and calm, to the clashing and nightmarish.
But given that it spans throughout music's history, where are its parameters and definitions for the benefit of this topic? Drone is any music, or songs dominated by sustained sounds, very long notes, either in instrument or voice, often occurring continuously throughout a song or piece, or at least recurring regularly. They can be as single notes or chords or other clusters, and their effect is often strange and mesmeric, the drone sound something around which other notes can play, moving in and out of harmony with it, creating dissonance, but somehow that central stem of sound is the foundation, the mothership, the place where it must always return. Its effect is often, but not always minimalism.
In Origins of the Popular Style: The Antecedents of Twentieth-Century Popular Music (1989), Peter van der Merwe writes that “of all harmonic devices a drone is not only the simplest, but probably also the most fertile."
In the 20th century one of the key figures in drone music is La Monte Young, the American composer born in 1935, who said he was fascinated from a young age by droning noises, such as "the sound of the wind blowing", and the "60-cycle-per-second drone [of] step-down transformers on telephone poles". Immersing himself in Indian classical music, which is the true origin of drone music, and something that readers may also wish to explore, in 1962 Young founded an experimental group, The Theatre of Eternal Music, involving a variety of talents from different backgrounds, from other classical composers to poets and jazz musicians, painters and mathematicians, including Marian Zazeela, Tony Conrad, Angus MacLise, Terry Jennings, John Cale, Billy Name, Jon Hassell, and Alex Dea. The music was invariable long and experimental, but one overriding theme is that did away with any notion of the 3-minute song and looked for a more expansive perception of time, again a whole philosophy taken from Indian traditions.
La Monte Young
So among these there are lengthy, slower, contemplative and very expansive indeed, allowing, as La Monte Young put it "stasis - the concept of form which is not directional in time, not so much climactic form, but rather form which allows time to stand still".
This extreme form helps create an effect on the mind, taking you to another place, altering perception of time, almost to a vanishing point. And on this note, journalist Mark Richardson defined it as: "The vanishing-point music created by Phill Niblock and, especially, La Monte Young is what happens when a fixation on held tones reaches a tipping point. Timbre is reduced to either a single clear instrument or a sine wave, silence disappears completely, and the base-level interaction between small clusters of 'pure' tone becomes the music's content. This kind of work takes what typically helps us to distinguish 'music' from 'sound', discards nearly all of it, and then starts over again from scratch."
Other pieces by The Theatre of Eternal Music still heavily contain the drone element but also have flighty, faster elements playing around them. In this piece you can hear John Cale's early work that became key to some of that that later appeared with The Velvet Underground.
So while there is beauty and meditation to drone music, it also requires a recalibration of patience and there is also an element of pain, as is necessary to break through with many forms of music genre in order to understand and appreciate them. Arguably the same goes, in very different ways, with punk, metal, ambient and classical.
On the topic of pain and drone sounds, during my early years at secondary school some of the pupils would play a cruel trick on one of our teachers, a Mr Griffin, who, to be fair, didn't really deserve this, and was good at his job, and a likeable character. The difficulty was that he suffered from a certain level of deafness, and had hearing aids in both ears. So when some of the kids were feeling particularly restless and bored, one or two the back of the class would very softly begin to hum a note, others joining in to help keep it continuous for several minutes, until the sound gradually augmented. Griffin would begin to wonder if it was his hearing aid making this sound and so adjust it with clear irritation. Then, when addressing one of the lads at the back, when answering his question, they would speak so softly that he could not hear them at all, or perhaps even they might just mouth their words. So with the humming still happening, and not being able to hear us properly, our poor teacher would turn his aid's volume right up. And you can guess what happened next. Everyone would start talking very loudly ... Bastards.
Pain and time are then as much part of the drone experience as transcendent pleasure, and with another example, here's Richard FInk IV, setting the Guinness Book of Records, longest sung note in 2 min 1.07 sec, in Las Vegas on 17 November 2019. Watch how he nearly passes out in the last few seconds.
There may be a link here, as drone vocal music drone is particularly widespread in traditional musical cultures, particularly in Europe, Polynesia, Melanesia and parts of Asia including among Pearl-divers in the Persian Gulf, where the holding of breath, or the slow breathing out certainly runs a parallel with the efforts of Richard Fink.
Pain, pleasure, time and also louder volume certainly come in droves, as well as drone elements, when it comes to attending the performance of almost any by Richard Wagner. His operas are mostly many hours long. But in the music itself, try, for example, the prelude to Das Rheingold (1854) in which low horns and bass instruments sustain an E♭ throughout the entire movement. In the classical genre, you might also enjoy time to pick out drone elements with Beethoven’s Ninth or Sixth Symphonies, Haydn’s ‘London’ symphony, as well as pieces by Bruckner, Mendelssohn, Mahler, Berlioz, Bartók and more. And in the 20th century, there are many classical movements, particularly involving chanting drone elements, by the likes Arvo Pärt, Sofia Gubaidulina, Karlheinz Stockhausen, and John Tavener.
Staying power: Richard Wagner
Shoegaze is another prominent corner of the drone genre, and among is the work of Kevin Shields and his band My Bloody Valentine. For those who have ever seen them live, You Made Me Realise, on which Shields' guitar technique was also influenced by his own peers and heroes Sonic Youth and Dinosaur Jr, there is an extended section of noise which is extremely challenging to ears, head and every part of the body, with clothes and limbs shaking with sonic vibrations. Obviously earplugs are absolutely necessary. After one of these gigs, I said to bass player Deb Googe that being there during that performance felt like I was strapped to the back of a jet engine for several minutes, and she said that's exactly what it is supposed to feel like.
Always sustained: My Bloody Valentine. It always takes time, but they are back again soon …
Whether bring transcendent pain, pleasure or both, drone music is something that needs to be carried through as an experience, fully immersed into. It's interesting that an archaic term for any part of a musical instrument that is used to produce the drone effect is burden (bourdon or burdon).
But some drone instruments are less extreme that the blast of multiple guitar pedals and amps. The shruti box, its name from traditional Hindu culture and music, is a charming instrument that creates single note and chords, being form of harmonium, squeeze-box, accordion and concertina, that needs to be pushed in and out, but also works with force of gravity too so that it can partially self-sustain. Here's a demonstration of newer models:
With squeeze-box instruments and more, drone music can be found in many parts of folk, rock, metal, electronica and beyond, ranging from Bob Dylan to Can to Captain Beefheart, Cocteau Twins to The Jesus and Mary Chain, Phill Niblock to Pink Floyd to Liars to Sunn O))) to Led Zeppelin. But whatever genre in which drone music sits, it’s all about listening for those long, continuous notes.
It’s an expansive topic by nature, and if anyone is seeking more guidance on artists who specialise in drone music, this page gives a helpful list.
We began with a quote from Pythagoras about music from the spheres. Let’s close with drone artist Klaus Wiese, who was a master of the Tibetan singing bowls, which are struck bells. He created an extensive series of album releases using them, including a contemplative planetary theme:
So then, it’s time to hand you over to this week’s doctor of drone sounds, but also one who is making their debut behind the Song Bar pumps, so let’s give a warm welcome to the marvellous MussoliniHeadkick! Place your drone songs and music in comments below, in time for last orders when the large drone bell can ring at 11pm UK time (BST) on Monday, for playlists published next week. It’s something that we can sustain and it will sustain us.
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