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Hey OP, I've written a very comparable paper during my years so I am happy to write a bit about it here. I play improvised music that is often times very harsh and has been called Avant Garde by both myself (although I don't really say it anymore) and critics when reviewing some of the music I've put out. I wouldn't personally call my music "experimental" per say but I do understand what people mean when they use the term.

First off I think using a generic reference point such as Pop, Jazz, Classical, or anything is really in reference to the product, and terms like this are used by marketing companies to signify a shared sound that they can sell you. For example what I mean is Black Sabbath didn't really call themselves a "Heavy Metal" band until a press personal called them that and they adopted the label, but other bands of the same ilk were also described as heavy metal afterwards in direct reference to Black Sabbath because the thought was, if you like them, you might like this new band too. I think the label Avant Garde can by applied in the same way and isn't really used to describe a sound of the product but that it falls outside of normal parameters at the time it was made, not in relation necessarily to the impact that it had to the art produced after it was made.

Something I think of as I am writing this is Ornette Coleman's The Shape of Jazz to Come-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=71iR0kECPMU&list=PLF592AEB662C84871
which came out in 1959, the same as the famous album Kind of Blue by Miles Davis -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zfF3_VlZ2Fg
In retrospect its pretty easy to look at The Shape of Jazz to Come as one of the most game changing albums in the history of Jazz that would go on to be described as Avant Garde. The idea of the phrase "avant garde" would be used to describe secondary characteristics of the music and not it's inherent impact on art down the road. The Ornette album is huge and if you talk to any hardcore Jazz fan, they will have it. If you check out a little bit more of an obscure cut called The Painter from a really underrated and unsung saxophonist Julius Hemphill -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mC0X0V1KI38
It doesn't make the music any less impactful because less people are listening to it and it arguably had less impact on art down the road than Ornette's album, but it still challenges musical norms of the time and so that secondary characteristic of an Avant Garde approach is still there. I guess the way I see it the Advanced Guard can only attempt to advance the present, not be measured by its contribution in the future.

To me the big distinction between Avande Garde and Experimental would be Experimental is an attempt to describe the process of making the music and not the product. If you as musician experiment, its solely based off of what you know already, that is obviously informed by what you've listened to and learned but as a process of making music its relatively meaningless. It doesn't attempt to describe the product at all, which is cool because "experimental music" as a whole is trans-idiomatic and has no sound, only a clear process. My dislike of the term comes from the improvising guitarist Joe Morris (here is a fucking nutty set with Nate Wooley)-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqukROECrQo
who said once when he plays he might experiment to the same degree any other musician does but he consistently knows what he wants something to sound like even when he is improvising.

If you want any further reading I can throw some stuff down here-

https://www.amazon.com/Perpetual-Frontier-Properties-Free-Music/dp/0985981008/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1543301973&sr=8-2&keywords=joe+morris+improvisation

http://www.tzadik.com/index.php?catalog=B008 (click Arcana 1 on the side)

Anthony Braxton's Tri Axium Writings (although they are super expensive)

https://www.amazon.com/Music-Creative-Spirit-Innovators-Improvisation/dp/0810852845/ref=sr_1_6?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1543302170&sr=1-6&keywords=avant+garde+music+books

https://www.amazon.com/Improvisation-Its-Nature-Practice-Music/dp/0306805286/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1543302221&sr=1-1&keywords=derek+bailey+improvisation

Anyways, I don't think my opinion is worth more than anyone else's, I know this is a decisive topic and I'm not even trying to change anyone mind, just throw in my two cents since I've spent tons of time thing about this. It's just sound anyways so its all good. Sorry for the rambling its 2am.

> I don't see how established genres can be experimental?

> more signed artists should be posted

Those two statements conflict almost 100%. The only artists who are signed to even indie record labels, are ones on whom the record label can make money, which means established genres.

Not all self-posts are non-experimental, but you do need to have open ears.

I'd strongly suggest reading Nyman's Experimental Music: Cage and Beyond. It's a very short academic book with short, digestible chapters. It's 40 years old at this point, but still absolutely relevant, and I am pretty sure you would like it. It would help you clarify the core of the point you were trying to make in this comment.

Oh, and also Listening Through the Noise by Demers. It totally explains your point about genres not being experimental. One of the best books I've ever read on electronic music.

Yeah, that's the part that is both interesting and ultimately unsatisfying - that his theory is based on the assumption that conventional music is inappropriate for the modern era, which of course is not true at all. But in terms of his evident sensitivity for, and appreciation of, all sorts of different non-musical noises, he's definitely very important and interesting even now, even if the theories that I think are intellectually stronger are the ones (like Henry Cowell's) that argue that "noise" is already inherent in "music", just heretofore unrecognized, and that it would be a logical progression to increase the emphasis on it. Basically (and this is kind of what John Cage and Edgard Varèse say as well) it's about not limiting oneself to "music" or "noise", but about organizing sound as one sees fit.

Yeah, I'm super obsessed with this book right now. Lots and lots to think about...

I made a sort of generative music system in Max/MSP while in college about 3 years ago. It was very simple. If I remember correctly, it was about 8 oscillators producing sine tones, playing notes at random intervals. The notes were set before hand by me. They were all going through a reverb I think. And I also gave the user control over how loud each oscillator could be, so they sort of controlled the soundscape.

Max is similar to PD, but is a bit more user friendly I think. It's a lot more appealing to look at too in my opinion, but costs a subscription.

https://www.amazon.com/Designing-Sound-Press-Andy-Farnell/dp/0262014416 this book is the shit for all of this. Pretty sure all of his Pure Data files from the book are online somewhere too

Dlacho - Looking Back [Metal/Electronic]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fnPzitqfF90

It's all made by one guy (me). Btw. I'm not good in singing so pls don't judge me too much :P All other criticisms are welcome.
You can support me on:
iTunes
https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/looking-back-single/1352734989?app=itunes&ign-mpt=uo%3D4

Amazon
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07B2C4ZXX

Google play
https://play.google.com/store/music/album/Dlacho_Looking_Back?id=B2w5aygqgiy67acddrkuyib6yaq

Enjoy! :)

He's featured in a book called The Best Music You've Never Heard.

Tracks that the book recommends:

• Invocation from The Viking of Sixth Avenue
  
  
• Paris from Sax Pax for a Sax
  
  
• Lament 1: Bird's Lament from Moondog (1969)
  
  
• Stamping Ground from Moondog (1969)
  
  
• All Is Loneliness from Moondog (1969)
  

Korg Monotron Delay costs $50. It's an analog synth that fits in the palm of your hand. It has a really lo-fi fuzzy delay effect. If you turn it all the way up it feeds back on itself and makes crazy drone noises. You can plug a guitar or other instrument into it to use it as a delay effect.
Its sibling synths, the Monotron & Monotron Duo are also great fun.

Electro-Faustus Drum Thing Mini is $60. It's a kind of weird metallic sounding percussion instrument, basically a contact mic in a tin can. Great when fed into a few effects pedals.

Also, go to Etsy and search for "circuit bent" and you'll find a while load of handmade, unique and downright weird instruments and effects.

Here are few I've read and would recommend:

• Noise/Music: A History
  
• Ocean of Sound
  
• The Rest Is Noise: Listening to the Twentieth Century
  
• Talking Music: Conversations with John Cage, Philip Glass, Lauria Anderson, and Five Generations of American Experimental Composers
  
• Contemporary Composers on Contemporary Music
  
• Four Musical Minimalists: La Monte Young, Terry Riley, Steve Reich, Philip Glass
  
• Experimental Music: Cage and Beyond
  
• Electronic and Experimental Music: A History of a New Sound

I was always very happy with the Boss DD-6 digital delay - it can do adjustable delay, up to 6 second loops, and some other effects.

Wreckers of civilization - a very in depth book about Throbbing Gristle and COUM Transmissions (Up until their first breakup, if I'm not mistaken)


RE/Search #4/5: W.S. Burroughs, Brion Gysin, Throbbing Gristle - should still be in print


RE/Search #6/7: Industrial Culture Handbook - Eternal classic that some important musicians used as a starting point. Mostly very rare and out of print, but RE/Search had it in some bundle for around $100 recently..

Theres that one about Aphex's SAW and The Industrial Culture Handbook was kind of my bible for a time...

You might check out the soundtrack to Pi. It has a bunch of various artist. https://www.amazon.com/Pi-Orbital/dp/B000009MZW/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1522021114&sr=8-1&keywords=pi+soundtrack

Solvent's New Ways: https://www.discogs.com/Solvent-New-Ways-Remixed/master/751100

Stranger Things soundtrack.

Massive Attack's Mezzaine: https://www.discogs.com/Massive-Attack-Mezzanine/release/6373144