[Artist/Group/Scene/Movement] - Eclectic Music or Cultural Imperialism

[Mr. Tea]

So you have to be a culture-studies student who goes over everything they read/watch/listen to with a microscope to scour it for tell-tale signs of RACISM and IMPERIALISM and other ISMs to be an 'intellectual', do you? Is that the official definition now?

I'm all for thinking about things and talking about things but when you have people huffing and puffing about how 'racist' it is that Hadouken! take inspiration from grime - I mean, who exaclty is being racist in this situation? The band? The people who buy the music and go to the shows? The record company that sells it to them? Yet it's already been mentioned in this thread that hip-hop is pretty much based on recycling other people's music to make new sounds, and no-one seems to have a problem with that.

Christ, I've seen people complain that the character of Apu in The Simpsons is 'racist'. What, because he runs a shop? Is hard-working and honest? Fuck, someone'd better call the CRE...

 

[Mr. Tea]

Tainted Love by Softcell was itself ripped off from a black soul artist, whose name escapes me, as someone said upthread.

It's nominally a cover of a Gloria Jones song, but Soft Cell pretty much made it their own.

 

[IdleRich]

"Tainted Love by Softcell was itself ripped off from a black soul artist, whose name escapes me, as someone said upthread."

But written by a white producer (Ed Cobb).

"We don't need to start another "anti-intellectuals versus theory readers" debate about the validity of taking a critical stance toward popular culture. Do we?"

Just because you are not into theory does not mean you are anti-intellectual.

 

[nomadologist]

Of course not, IdleRich. But we've all seen Mr. Tea take a well-meant thread discussion of a certain topic and turn it into an argument about whether being critical and using critical theory to talk about pop culture is "valid" or "invalid" or "pomo", etc.

 

[nomadologist]

Also: "imperialist" and "racist" are NOT necessarily the same thing.

sorry that must have read weird

 

[nomadologist]

Christ, I've seen people complain that the character of Apu in The Simpsons is 'racist'. What, because he runs a shop? Is hard-working and honest? Fuck, someone'd better call the CRE...

I think people would call Apu racists because it's a pretty vicious stereotype in the U.S. that Indian/Pakistani people are good for nothing but overcharing people with 300% mark-ups at convenience stores.

 

[IdleRich]

"Of course not, IdleRich"

Fair enough.
Guess the Tainted Love example is quite a good one in the way it's changed hands so many times (didn't Marilyn Manson do a version as well and there is another northern soul version - Ruth Swan maybe?) and most people don't really know how far back it goes. Probably turn out that he ripped it off someone else anyway.

 

[Leo]

a little off topic but somewhat related: i find the whole Subliminal Frequencies thing (label run by sun city girl's alan bishop) a lot more dodgy in a realistic sense. at least appropriated music is used to (hopefully) create something new, whereas SF just takes the ACTUAL music, puts it into cd compilation form and sells it with no credits/royalities.

 

[nomadologist]

as i said i was talking about the synths, which are totally the same in Soft Cells -Tainted Love and Rihanna's SOS. The lyrics of "tainted love" are nowhere to be heard in in SOS.

So Rihanna did rip off Soft Cell, and im glad she did.

Never much liked Rihanna's "cover" of Tainted Love, personally. This could have something to do with how played out it became, but at the time I thought it was because it was too repetitive and wasn't really a "cover" in terms of lyrics. Which are the good part of the original, imo.

 

[nomadologist]

a little off topic but somewhat related: i find the whole Subliminal Frequencies thing (label run by sun city girl's alan bishop) a lot more dodgy in a realistic sense. at least appropriated music is used to (hopefully) create something new, whereas SF just takes the ACTUAL music, puts it into cd compilation form and sells it with no credits/royalities.

I always wondered about this--they really don't give money to the artists at SF?

 

[Leo]

I always wondered about this--they really don't give money to the artists at SF?

my understanding is it's been a very gray area. ths new thai pop cd apparently includes credits but a lot of the other stuff is just swiped from radio broadcasts.

 

[nomadologist]

that seems blatantly wrong to me

 

[Leo]

that seems blatantly wrong to me

yeah, but it's an unfortunate tradition in the music biz. there are tons of 60s garage band/rockabilly comps where no one got a penny. also wonder how this compares to alan lomax and harry smith? do the families of all those appalachian folk singers still receive royalities?

 

[Leo]

correction: label name is sublime frequencies...

 

[Mr. Tea]

I think people would call Apu racists because it's a pretty vicious stereotype in the U.S. that Indian/Pakistani people are good for nothing but overcharing people with 300% mark-ups at convenience stores.

I've never seen Apu portrayed as grasping, if anything he's honest to a fault.
Plus Kwik-E-Mart is a franchise so I can only assume Apu has no say over the pricing.

Edit: 'appropriation' is always going to be a grey area but it sounds like this SF label specialises more in out-and-out theft. Does this happen a lot, then? (Q. for people who know a bit about the record industry)

 

[Leo]

Edit: 'appropriation' is always going to be a grey area but it sounds like this SF label specialises more in out-and-out theft. Does this happen a lot, then? (Q. for people who know a bit about the record industry)

it's not done by the major record labels (although they probably would if their legal departments thought they'd get away with it), but it's not uncommon for small "collector's" labels to boot rare, out-of-print music. there are plenty of specialty record shops in nyc that carry dubious compilations of old blues, r&b, garage bands, rockabilly and punk (ie, "killed by death" comps).

 

[mixed_biscuits]

So you have to be a culture-studies student who goes over everything they read/watch/listen to with a microscope to scour it for tell-tale signs of RACISM and IMPERIALISM...

The rampantly 'analytical' indeed find it very hard to turn off their keenly critical brains, making every interaction torturous in their self-regarding struggle to show off their smarts. Word to the would-be wise: you are wasting your time.

 

[nomadologist]

The rampantly 'analytical' indeed find it very hard to turn off their keenly critical brains, making every interaction torturous in their self-regarding struggle to show off their smarts. Word to the would-be wise: you are wasting your time.

Thanks, Biscuit. That really cleared everything up for everyone.

 

[mixed_biscuits]

Thanks, Biscuit. That really cleared everything up for everyone.

Any time!

 

[Mr. Tea]

it's not done by the major record labels (although they probably would if their legal departments thought they'd get away with it), but it's not uncommon for small "collector's" labels to boot rare, out-of-print music. there are plenty of specialty record shops in nyc that carry dubious compilations of old blues, r&b, garage bands, rockabilly and punk (ie, "killed by death" comps).

Well for music that's 40+ years old, maybe labels that do reissues and compilations work on the (no doubt often correct) assumption that the people who created the music are likely to be dead. (is that what you mean by "killed by death", or is that a specific series of compilations?)