Treating music-making as personal meditation produces a consistent artistic identity distinct from market-driven production

When a producer’s primary relationship with music is intrinsic — the act of making is the reward, not the audience response or revenue — it produces a different kind of output than market-oriented production. The slogan ‘meditate on bassweight’ on DMZ flyers described the actual practice: making bass music as a means of focusing attention, managing stress, and exploring inner states. This intrinsic orientation has a practical consequence: the producer does not need external validation at each step, so they can take longer, make stranger decisions, and refuse compromises. The trade-off is economic precariousness; the benefit is that the work is genuinely personal.

Examples

Mala worked multiple day jobs (youth worker, debt recovery, Vodafone) to fund his music practice before it became self-sustaining. The DMZ flyer carried ‘meditate on bassweight’ — not a genre name, not a booking list, but a practice instruction.

Assessment

Describe your actual motivation for making music. Which recent decisions were driven by intrinsic interest and which by anticipated audience response? Identify one decision you made for external reasons that you would reverse if you only had to satisfy yourself.