Off The Beaten Track: An introduction to the weird world of library music
In second-hand record stores across the world, next to the stacks of Beatles reissues and deluge of 1980s pop, there is usually a dusty bin of vinyl titled ‘library’. For casual music listeners, library music is fairly unnoteworthy, and yet the unique genre of music has had an incredible effect on the world of hip-hop, experimental music and a plethora of audio-visual media throughout the years. Library music, or stock music, are records produced by music libraries, which can easily be licensed out for use on television, film, radio or, as is often the case, sampling.
The first instances of library music came about during the late 1920s when De Wolfe Music began producing records to be licensed for use in silent films. The benefits of using pre-recorded library music are clear, as it is a lot quicker, easier, and cheaper than commissioning tailor-made music for film and media. Given that most library composers were work-for-hire session musicians, often working under pseudonyms, it was a lot more cost-effective for media companies to licence library music than mainstream records. For quite a while, that’s all library music was: a way for production companies to save some money on soundtracking their work.
As the field developed, different types of library music rose to the forefront. Much of the music was made up of poor approximations of whatever the current pop music sounded like, however there were some elements of library music that were distinctly more interesting. The instrumental, mood-setting manifesto of the records endeared itself pretty flawlessly to the world of jazz. As such, countless library records were produced featuring unique and endlessly cool jazz soundscapes.
On the more experimental side of the library world, companies began recruiting avant-garde composers to create bizarre soundscapes. Presumably, the thinking was that these strange sounds could be utilised for horror film soundtracks or sci-fi B-movies, recruiting now-iconic composers like Delia Derbyshire to produce these library LPs. Although nothing much was expected from these albums at the time, the styles of ambient, noise and musique concrète that they pioneered went on to be hugely influential on the world of alternative and experimental music.
It is not surprising, therefore, that library music spent years being largely ignored by the record-buying public. After all, why would the general public be interested in a plethora of largely instrumental mood-setting albums made by unknown session musicians? Most people were probably unaware of the existence of library music for the most part, despite encountering it on a daily basis through television, film, and radio. If music history has taught us anything, though, it is that vinyl junkies will stop at nothing to seek out and celebrate the obscure and ignored records of the world.
With the advent of hip-hop and dance music during the 1980s, musicmakers began to reassess the ignored records sitting in that dusty bin in the corner of the record store. While the cheap and accessible soul records of the 1960s provided the foundations for a lot of hip-hop and dance sampling, the instrumental and unique stylings of many library records proved to be a natural fit for samplers. Over the years, everybody from The Prodigy to Tyler, The Creator, have called upon library music to add fresh new layers to their own music.
During the early days of library music, nobody could have predicted the incredible effects it would later have, both on hip-hop sampling and the development of fringe genres like experimental, noise rock and ambient music. Due to their somewhat disposable nature, many early library records have since become highly sought-after collector’s items among vinyl fans, yet there is still a plethora of incredible sounds just waiting to be discovered in the bargain bins of record stores across the globe.
