Culture As Advertising.

[sadmanbarty]

Barty is not making the argument that we should accept capitalist realism. To he contrary he is bewailing the cooption of uk drill to the marketplace, the corruption of a former purity, and his underground heroes selling out. No one here is making that argument in simple good faith. Worth remembering.

yeah sorry about that. i got carried away with a rhetorical flourish; habitually turning things into polemics. shifted the conversation in the wrong direction

 

[luka]

But my position is as far away from vigilant citizen.

My position is that the curator connoisseur elite was a victim of its own success.. It actually killed pop music as something that could have outside possibilities folded into it. Being into New Order in the 80s or the sex pistols in the 70s (for they were ultimately pop music and were intended to be so) meant something. Being into Migos in 2019 means absolutely nothing. the right wing deconstructionists have achieved a pyrrhic victory. everything is relative now. you can read anything into anything and extract from its condensation within a very specific set of time sequences (hence mind control and illuminati to conspiratorially frame what happens in literally every single industry.) It is essentialy the murder of the dead of dead crystalised historical labour. It isn't really capitalist realism, there are certainly alternatives that can be read through music, but it is literally capitalism sonified. revolution itself has even been rendered as an integral part of capitals stabilisation.

So actually I'd be more tempted to agree with Luke on the predatory nature of it.

Look at the pitchfork and RA writers trying desperately to big up their experimental club mates like Holly Herndon and her man matt dryhurst's rant about how algorithms are killing everything, all to cover for the fact that without these personalities in the industry noone's gonna pay their rent as the logical place for experimental music today is tiny mix tapes, itself targeted for a very specific audience.

This I am struggling with a great deal. When you talk about the curator conneseiur elite, who are we talking about exactly? I've talked about NTS and fellow travellers in this way but I sense you are talking about a larger and more powerful bloc? When would you say pop music was neutered? At which point in the timeline?

Who are the right wing deconstructionists? Are they related to the curator conneseiur elite? Do they operate in the same way? Is this related to poptimism as an argument an ethos or is it something separate?

What does extract from its condensation a very specific set of time sequences mean? What exactly is the murder of dead crystallised historical labour? How can you murder something which is dead? Is it possible to clarify this for me?

Music is literally capitalism sonified makes sense to me. Music obviously predates capitalism and also exists outside it so this requires making a case for, but within certain parameters would make a good argument.

 

[luka]

One of the interesting things here is that capitalism clearly predates pop by hundreds of years but we all seem to want to talk about developments that are very very recent.

 

[thirdform]

yeah sorry about that. i got carried away with a rhetorical flourish; habitually turning things into polemics. shifted the conversation in the wrong direction

nah it's cool. I do have some sympathy for the let's all become the man ethos, i just think its not really possible, because there isn't a man as such anymore.

 

[luka]

I am actually a hyper-modernist, I just like to engage modernism in relation to its others. However I utterly reject traditionalism as the very category of traditional is a modernist construct, just like anti-enlightenment is a modernist construct. I'm not anti-traditionalist, I think it's a non problem because it doesn't exist.

People in the 17th century wouldn't have thought of their music as *traditional*, yes, they would have thought of it having a genealogical tradition, but so do poptimists.

This I think needs to be put on a firm footing. In the obvious sense of course it's completely untrue, tradition is in no way a modernist construct, even in a specifically cultural, non religious way I think you would struggle to make a case for it. Do you mean the notion of sealing a practice in aspic, in removing it from the time-stream entirely, so it no longer participates in history? There's something in that, certainly, and it would relate to some naive world music rhetoric... Albeit not nearly so prevalent as it was in the 80s and 90s

 

[vimothy]

was (pop) music ever a revolutionary possibility?

 

[thirdform]

This I am struggling with a great deal. When you talk about the curator conneseiur elite, who are we talking about exactly? I've talked about NTS and fellow travellers in this way but I sense you are talking about a larger and more powerful bloc? When would you say pop music was neutered? At which point in the timeline?

I'm talking about the genrifiers. Yes, we've had this debate before, about the its all music maaaan discourse being odious, but at the same time there is the counter tendancy that once a genre has one or two crystalised names it will be forced to obey an inevitable logic. it's better when a genre has 3-5 names.

 

[luka]

Not to steal from Third's bit BUT I think the nature of how K-Pop has to be consumed on the multitude of levels (which doesn't exist in Western Pop anymore) makes it some of the most unintentionally class-conscious music out there.

What does this mean? I can't make sense of it. What are the multitude of levels? How does consuming something on the multitude of levels make something unintentionally class conscious? Please elaborate so I can respond.

 

[thirdform]

This I think needs to be put on a firm footing. In the obvious sense of course it's completely untrue, tradition is in no way a modernist construct, even in a specifically cultural, non religious way I think you would struggle to make a case for it. Do you mean the notion of sealing a practice in aspic, in removing it from the time-stream entirely, so it no longer participates in history? There's something in that, certainly, and it would relate to some naive world music rhetoric... Albeit not nearly so prevalent as it was in the 80s and 90s

The whole point of that post was to make a differentiation between an *tradition* be that religious, musicological or political, and *traditionalism* which as a specific ideology is modernist to the core, or should I say an anxious response to modernity that superficially seems to react against it but is firmly sequestered in the parameters of the modern.

 

[luka]

Ultimately the 'idol' version of pop is vastly superior to the post-Beatles notion of pop where the notion of the song is the paramount because it instead centers it around the performer's body. Granted the vocal is there but now the performer must dance, sing/rap and ultimately Be the star and as such pressure is exuded onto the subject not only from the inhumane conditions of their various employers and benefactors AND the Korean Military (who forcibly drafts so many of the stars inevitably thus securely putting a murmur in their career's heartbeat to potentially end it in SPITE of all their diligent work) but the ravenous consumption of the audience(s) and the societal expectations/obligations.

It's easily the most exploitative music in any possible realm.

This I also need help with. As I understand it the Beatles were idols. Possibly the first global idols, Elvis notwithstanding. Bigger than Jesus. Girls screaming and fainting. Granted you say post-Beatles....

But if we accept, for the sake of argument, that western pop is centred around the song rather than the performers body, does it follow that Korean pop is vastly superior? It seems to me that several steps are missing from this argument and I would like to see them filled in. I'm not hostile to it, I just don't get it.

 

[thirdform]

was (pop) music ever a revolutionary possibility?

Probably not, but was Schoenberg?

 

[luka]

The whole point of that post was to make a differentiation between an *tradition* be that religious, musicological or political, and *traditionalism* which as a specific ideology is modernist to the core, or should I say an anxious response to modernity that superficially seems to react against it but is firmly sequestered in the parameters of the modern.

Ok, this is much clearer, thank you. I'm fairly sure I follow but just to double check, What would an example of traditionalism be?

 

[luka]

actually harder than i thought that. i thought it'd be obvious and there'd be loads. maybe that's not the case.

The title of this thread was hastily chosen. I have no idea what I meant by it. I don't think that is helping much.

 

[sadmanbarty]

Ok, this is much clearer, thank you. I'm fairly sure I follow but just to double check, What would an example of traditionalism be?

is "tradition" meaning lineage; you'd acknowledge the history of something new. it's inputs.?

"traditionalism" on the other hand is striving to stick to the old or deny the newness of the new. pastiche, revival, etc.?


that right third?

 

[sadmanbarty]

The title of this thread was hastily chosen. I have no idea what I meant by it. I don't think that is helping much.

that's the key to good threads. conducive to generating new ideas. doesn't let everyone just regurgitate their schtick.

 

[thirdform]

When would you say pop music was neutered? At which point in the timeline?

After The Police were no longer relevant.

But yeah, the codification of post-punk. 90s rnb was not really (formally) innovative (yes yes excluding Timbaland etc...) a lot of it actually was similar to garage house, using electronic technology to replicate 70s sophisticate soul, not that this is a value judgment on the music because I love it... whereas he early-mid 80s was an equation of machines with funkyness.

 

[luka]

Psychedelic materialism is,imo, the unofficial religion of the ruling elites. Crowley plus prosperity theology. Magic is transforming the world in accordance to the will. When this is directed not at self transformation and self transcendence and self mastery but instead towards material success, wealth and power you get psychedelic materialism

I was talking to Barty the other day about how the Americans in particular treat capitalists as culture heroes, in the same way people deify pop stars. Biopics about Steve Jobs. The Conflation of Elon Musk with Tony Starks. Ed Dorn's Gunslinger deals with this on its treatment of Howard Hughes. These become magical figures with the ability to materialise their desires, to make money grow on trees.

 

[sadmanbarty]

this is what i’ve picked up so far:


bottom-up culture is able to produce innovation, is able to express a broad gamut of emotions and able to reflect lived experience. so even when kartel literally does a song advertising his products, the bottom-up nature of it means that it’s still human and relatable.

top-down culture is incapable of producing innovation, of reflecting lived and experience and due to it’s promotional nature limited emotionally (it can’t be convoluted, ambiguous, highly aggressive, etc.). this can have it’s benefits. there’s an aesthetic potency in the stepford wives element of it; something haunting and creepy about it for example aaliyah. likewise there’s the whole animistic component of trying to imbue inanimate objects with cultural and emotional resonance, what i call “psychedelic materialism”.


so luke, what else do we need to add to this picture or unpick? what's missing?

 

[thirdform]

is "tradition" meaning lineage; you'd acknowledge the history of something new. it's inputs.?

"traditionalism" on the other hand is striving to stick to the old or deny the newness of the new. pastiche, revival, etc.?


that right third?

nearly. traditionalism would also saying the *new* is degrading or not valid. I would call jungle revivalism pastiche, but not necessarily traditionalist, as those guys are as much influenced by footwork and halftime.

 

[luka]

After The Police were no longer relevant.

But yeah, the codification of post-punk. 90s rnb was not really (formally) innovative (yes yes excluding Timbaland etc...) a lot of it actually was similar to garage house, using electronic technology to replicate 70s sophisticate soul, not that this is a value judgment on the music because I love it... whereas he early-mid 80s was an equation of machines with funkyness.

It's very very difficult to exclude timblaland from a discussion of r&b although granted the bulk of his output comes from the 00s. The 90swas more the decade of new jack swing and later, hip-hop soul. What's quite interesting is that r&b doesn't become global pop music until timblaland and missy arrive. Here it is the most innovative form of the genre that finds mass success. I don't know what that means. I don't know how to fit it into whatever argument might be taking shape here.