Cheese again

[Rigsby]

I was thinking about this idea that notes can be cheesy yesterday, and thought that while i can understand this concept in terms of sounds, i'm not sure i do with notes. Surely 'cheese' in terms of notes just means traditionally melodic, things that we've all heard many times before, traditionally used note sequences, that sort of thing. My friend said that traditionally melodic seemed like a PC term for cheese, but i think it's more than that. 'Cheese' has such a negative connetation to it, something that should be avoided, and i don't think that traditionally melodic sequencies should be, in context they can really add something to a piece, especially if you're off elsewhere after that.

Anyone have any thoughts?

[Devlars]

Well I've just got in and I've not really thought too long and hard about this but I think you said it right there Rigsby, it's all about the context of the music.

Right now I'm listening to my friends tribute album, The Midwest, made for their bandmates brother. It's very bluesy and sometimes "cheesey" but purposefully tongue in cheek. If this were presented in any other context than for a laugh and to put some songs together that have specific meaning to a specific person then it would quickly be straight "cheese". However due to the context it's hilarious and very cool. So those "cheese" notes sequences are about context really. Listen to The Flaming Lips 'Soft Bulletin' some of that music is definitely cheesey like Spark That Bled. It opens with a string section sounding like something from a Disney cartoon but then that weird guitar and synth line come in to destroy that image real fast.

[gog]

i agree, context and relativity have to be taken into consideration. interesting topic... has my head reeling around all kinds of perceived objectivity in regards to music and why something sounds "cool" and something sounds "cheesy".
when you interject a pedestrian "cheesy" phrase into an "odd" somewhat dissonant piece, it cn make the more traditional stuff sound odd, or sometimes release the tension a bit. seems like it's got to be mostly conditioning... ya know 4/4 major chord stuff the majority of americans see as "regular", but other cultures grow up with different "norms".
sorry, i've taken this and run with it a bit, but it's something that's always intrigued me... i also used to smoke a lot of pot as a kid.

[Slider]

I have a technique where if someone comes up with a cool part that sounds almost too obvious, I find that messing up the sound by reamping it with a freaky echo, or putting it through a leslie, or distorting it ect. will mask the cheesyness of it.
Sometimes it will become everyones favorite part.

That way the part doesn't get thrown away. Somehow messing up a somewhat cheesy part or melody can makes it work.
I always keep this in mind when someone says "erase that, it's too cheesy".

Now if the whole song is based on cheese then that's a different story.

[MichaelAlan]

Cheese = Donny:

[@?,*???&?]

Study Schoenberg and get back to me in the morning. Western music as we know it stems from a 12-tone chromatic scale. What have you been raised with?

There's a book called "The acoustical foundations of music" that has an excellant chapter on Interval, Scales, Tuning and Temperament" that you should read..

Short of re-designing most instruments as we know them, what other option is there? Choose your dissonance.

[Rigsby]

I'm still not convinced that when it comes to note selection, it's possible to call the selection cheesy, unless everything comes under that bracket. Sometimes i think obvious is good, it's another tool in the box. I don't want to listen to anything for ever, whatever style it may be in terms of notes/scales/modes, everything becomes obvious after a while, and once it does you're never that far from boredom. So i guess where i'm at with this is that as everything becomes obvious, the only way to avoid becoming stale is to mix those notes, paying less mind to what style you're playing in, concentrating on feeling first.

This is one of the problems i have with every percieved genre of music (not all music, but the genres we contain them in), that it becomes stale as soon as the format or style are set, you could accuse all music of being cheesy as much as you could call traditionally melodic material. Remember i'm talking about notes, not sounds. For me it's definately about context as to whether something works or not as i think we've all agreed, it's about light and shade and everything in between, too much of either is dull, becomes stale.

[Slider]

I'm referring to when a melody is very commercial sounding.
As I usually work for bands, they will almost always veto anything that sounds overtly commercial or to them "cheesy".

When I started making records I discovered that a really obvious sounding part would suddenly be accepted by everyone when it was messed with sonically.
Just an observation.

I agree it's hard to classify anything as cheesy because of it's melodic content. It all depends on the opinion of the listener.
Maybe it's all too existential to really answer.

I think it's impossible to seperate the sound and how a melody is perceived.
The same melody may be heard as cheesy in one context and simple and beautiful in another.

[gog]

true objectivity is impossible when it comes to music (or any art). it's hard to say whether we have some innate sense of what's "good" or whether it's a product of what is ingrained in us to consider "proper". some hear beauty in thelonius monk, while others hear "wrong" notes in his melodies. if something works, whether it's an overused sequence that is deemed pedestrian or "cheesy", or something more adventurous, i guess we have to just try to serve the piece with what serves it best. there is no definitive answer on this, except that "cheese" is in the ear of the beholder.

[antonlamont45]

I'm referring to when a melody is very commercial sounding.
As I usually work for bands, they will almost always veto anything that sounds overtly commercial or to them "cheesy".

While I assume you mean "commercial" in a pop charts sense, that reminded me of a thought I often have; music sounds cheesy when it sounds like a tv or radio commercial. All commercials sound either happy and optimistic (saccharine) or sentimental (sappy), in a very simplistic (dumb) way. It's very easy, when you are trying to simplify a melody or song, to fall into this kind of "commercial" sound.

Sometimes when I listen to (good) classical music for an extended period of time, and then switch to modern music it all sounds cheesy to me because I imagine those modern songs played by a classical orchestra. What saves modern music, in my opinion, are distortion effects.