I headed out to the Gallery at Potential Life Studios (34 Elton St.) to check out The No-Tone Party. I got there a little early and got to chat with the folks from the studio — Jeremy and Colleen, I think. They run a nice space for music, art, and performance.
Anyway, the show was primarily organized by Ian Downey and Nuuj. The idea was for musicians to record pop songs that had no appreciable notes. For the most part, the songs pit the two concepts against one another, as if "pop song" and "melody" were opposites. As such, most of the songs were either not very catchy or they included some melodic element. I decided that the closest approximation to the no-tone pop song would be the rhythm of a train: a recognizable and appealing "music". Before I became overwhelmed with tiredness (as I've been going to bed rather early lately) I did hear one song that captured that kind of element.
We'll have to see where this all goes … if it's not a genre unto itself, some version of it will probably start appearing in alternative-rock within a couple years.