All Mashed Up

Hard drive full of music -- and nothing to do but LISTEN to it? More people are going interactive, mashing together different songs to create original collages of sound. Even business magazine Forbes has caught wind of this trend.

In the July 21 issue of Forbes, known most for its libertarian, uber-business attitude than its party 'tude, Aliya Sternstein prescribes mashups for music collectors who are tiring of passive listening. Mashing means taking two (or more!) different songs and playing them on top of one another, intermixing them in just the right way. (For example: Madonna's "Ray of Light" combines with the Sex Pistols' "God Save the Queen.")

The craze for mashups, also known as bootlegs and bastard pop, is peaking in Belgium and Mexico City, and has been exploding in the US. Another recent trend is video mashups, with the same principle being applied to films and music videos.

Sternstein points out that people already have the raw materials -- songs on CDs or MP3 files. All they need are some mashing tools, such as Traktor DJ, Acid Pro, or Cakewalk.

Is mashing legal? It depends on where the materials come from , and what is done with the result. Songs that are legally obtained, are okay. Illegal downloads are illegal raw materials. If the resulting mashups are used for private enjoyment and non-commercial activity, the law seems to say everything's cool. Public performance is a problem. And mass distribution of a mashup is a big problem, although a quick search of the web reveals that it's happening, despite threatened fines of thousands (or many thousands) of dollars.

Some music companies are even promoting mashing as a way to engage audiences. The Lollapalooza Mashup Contest (entries closed August 14) is being sponsored by software makers Cakewalk and Microsoft, who have made available some music loops (raw material) from several artists on the Lollapalooza tour (Jane's Addiction, The Donnas, and Jurassic 5). Cakewalk even threw in 60-day trial copies of its software and some bonus loops.

Need something simpler to play with? Mac users might like Doggiebox, an inexpensive new "electronic beat box" program. Create and edit drum tracks as simply as a Word processing program. MacWorld (August 2003) gives it "4 mice" rating.

Read more about Mashups in Salon, the online magazine: "The Mashup Revolution," by Roberta Cruger (Aug. 2003) [introduction free; full article requires registration] or the older "Bootleg Culture," by Pete Rojas (Aug, 2002) [full text is free]

Read the Mashups article in Forbes magazine [free, one-time registration required]

Read about the Lollapalooza Mashup contest and hear the entries

See more examples of mashups by scanning the song list of these CD releases [of uncertain legality]

Learn more about mashing software, such as Traktor DJ or Sonic Foundry's Acid Pro

See examples of mashups of videos

Find out more about the DoggieBox beat box program [specs, demos, downloads]