those hairshirt -wearin' Dissensians
- Thread starter blissblogger
- Start date
k-punk said:
what initially attracts me to a music scene -- and i've really only been attracted to one, namely, early 90s rave/house scene -- is the element of excess -- new and exciting sounds (in 1990) but also the style and make-up of the people who hangout at a particular place, and the vibe -- the sense of liberation that comes from being united with people of different backgrounds, etc, united by music -- the sense that some kind of social experiment is going on -- or at least that my horizons are being broadened
but since that initial encounter with house/rave, i really must say that what i've sought is more of the same, REPETITION of the initial romance -- and once i find a club or bar or party scene that offers the kind of experience i'm looking for, i tend to go there repeatedly -- it becomes my hangout -- and then it all becomes very repetitive, about being down with the program, which at times can get rather boring, and yet it also offers a connection to music and through music to other people that i otherwise wouldn't have
every now and then there's a great night, but for the most part it's kinda like a regimen -- putting in your time -- and you kinda become enslaved to the night
and yet if i didn't have this aspect to my life, i'd feel pretty impoverished, there'd be a missing dimension
and though i get bored with the same damn scene, i can't say that i envy the trend-hoppers or the people who live like tourists in their own city, going from one bar to the next, one club to the next, etc
in any case, what's all this talk of "emancipation" got to do with being involved with music or music scenes?
i.e., "emancipation" doesn't really chime with my own experience or what i imagine the experience of others to be
the term "emancipation" makes sense to me only insofar as i've always sought membership in music scenes that were "open" to all kinds of people, i.e., all kinds in terms of their background -- i.e., it's not where you're from, it's where you're at = an allusion to blissblogger's blog a week or so ago -- and have avoided overly "masculine" hip hop or hardcore punk scenes, or overly "white and middle class" rock scenes, or overly "studenty" experimental scenes, etc
but of course i can see tim f replying that i was simply "interpellated" in the dance scene --
so what to make of this term "emancipation" in relation to music???
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in other words, going out at night is my heroin
i go to the same old place and get my dose of pleasure = see the same faces, hear music that i more or less like, perhaps buy some drugs, and certainly have a few drinks
and i get out of this an something that seems to "transcend" daily life
and yet i doubt it has anything to do with emancipation or liberation
quite the contrary
it's a very repetitive, addictive lifestyle
and it is, for the most part, how i engage with music
at home my experience of music usually consists of me trying to put certain records into a certain order -- i.e., getting my set together -- and then imagining the effect of those records on a crowd of people at a bar or party
at shops my experience of music consists of rifling through records trying to find one that fits my "sound"
and only rarely do i listen to music on the internet
and though my cd collection is far less oriented to dance music than my record collection (spanning everything from classical and jazz through 80s/90s rock and odds and ends), i haven't really listened to cds lately
ANYWAY -- i think that for people like me who primarily engage with music by going out at night, it's got very little to do with "emancipation"
so what exactly do other people mean when they speak of "emancipation" in connection with music???
i go to the same old place and get my dose of pleasure = see the same faces, hear music that i more or less like, perhaps buy some drugs, and certainly have a few drinks
and i get out of this an something that seems to "transcend" daily life
and yet i doubt it has anything to do with emancipation or liberation
quite the contrary
it's a very repetitive, addictive lifestyle
and it is, for the most part, how i engage with music
at home my experience of music usually consists of me trying to put certain records into a certain order -- i.e., getting my set together -- and then imagining the effect of those records on a crowd of people at a bar or party
at shops my experience of music consists of rifling through records trying to find one that fits my "sound"
and only rarely do i listen to music on the internet
and though my cd collection is far less oriented to dance music than my record collection (spanning everything from classical and jazz through 80s/90s rock and odds and ends), i haven't really listened to cds lately
ANYWAY -- i think that for people like me who primarily engage with music by going out at night, it's got very little to do with "emancipation"
so what exactly do other people mean when they speak of "emancipation" in connection with music???
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Back To Nature
We came bk from Europe Tour a couple days before this thread started and have been reading it ,
enjoying it in parts , finally checked Mark's links to the ILM thread and decided to say something .
One thing pops out at me when reading the points made (and how they are taken sometimes by some)
was a point /observation made early on along the lines of ' if you are making the music , you probably do not have time to write on it extensively ' and so on .
The fact that on Dis there are music writers doing what they do , theorists doing their thing ,
there is obviously room for music makers doing what they do to write as well .
I enjoy reading about the latest subdividing of music sub subcultures as much as the next ,
but it's another thing to live it , face it and hear it on the street (haven't had to actually FIGHT it out , but close ) .
Those frissons', sparks on the street or in the club were interesting . leave one defensive , angry , more intense.
So I slyly thank the members of Konk who derided the Ike Yard boys for being oh my , -'electronic' ,
the Lee's of Sonic Youth who couldn't forgive me over my doing a Club record' ,
but I can guess they were a kind of peer group censorship , throwing up a border they thought they could impose - pre Discussion Boards 'I said it so I am / so it stands'.
Doing it only online is well short of walking and talking it in the RW, you can't see the committment ,
only sometimes the 'stance' well , and the wyrds of course .
So no 'hair shirts' here but decidedly Dissensessian , 'Salad bars' nah
busy threading between techno and hiphop clothes , moving from hop to bk to tech .
Looked at ILM a couple times but never any impulse , good reason to stay there , the very name makes me think 'WTF do you really ...'
And not much denying of fun stuff on purpose, 'principal' or as a lifestyle choice or even thinking about that (grab it when you can)
Decidedly 'Plus and minus' - for example : on tour minute details for or against do influence where you decide to stay , what you eat and where you can safely let it out the other end .
If something doesn't add up to 'plus' then as said before - life is short ' it can be left , maybe someone else can use it .
Dealing with labels major and indie is very much a Plus and Minus game , you have to weight it each time because they are so inconsistent or the radar moves off the label that was a moment ago 'cool' , meaning your release may not sell for *hit.
Hearing fellow musicmakers discuss the very labels you are involved with - from a pointedly less charitable POV - 'Plus , but ...'
A For or Against / On off / B/W dynamic has too many recent echoes of our poor rich President to be neutral, twilights and dawns too good (tried to catch Crepescular examples of both while in Belgium , but other stuff (clouds) got in the way) , all in fun
Lots of enjoyment on the Euro Trip (it was to support the ol' '03 Gomma Album produced for The Rammellzee),
Lots of music , lots of water in Venice , Berlin was fun (tad overrated by the 'raters ?) ,
Bit of smoke @ Bulldogs in Amsterdam,
Night cruising through the lit up Grand Palais while a very 'Bladerunner' sdtk played on the 5.1 multi Quad system,
Afternoon at Modenatie, finding "Wirtz Gardens" then Mick Rock's "Moonage Daydream" ,
cheap good VietNamese noodles in Brussels off the Old Town Square , emailing about KW Jeter -
we did it up and got a lot out of it .
Sometimes it was just too good to sit back on an Intercity train , pop in a CD of tape (not moved by MP3) of a piece you knew you would enjoy and just do nothing dissolve in the tunes .
Ramm would sometimes look up from his headphones with a 'where Am I Stuart ?' look and say loudly 'Im listen'en to Metal'
So 'scuse my elbows , a musicmaker is coming back to the table
Now Listening : Magazine Rays & Hail 1978 -1981
Cheers all
We came bk from Europe Tour a couple days before this thread started and have been reading it ,
enjoying it in parts , finally checked Mark's links to the ILM thread and decided to say something .
One thing pops out at me when reading the points made (and how they are taken sometimes by some)
was a point /observation made early on along the lines of ' if you are making the music , you probably do not have time to write on it extensively ' and so on .
The fact that on Dis there are music writers doing what they do , theorists doing their thing ,
there is obviously room for music makers doing what they do to write as well .
I enjoy reading about the latest subdividing of music sub subcultures as much as the next ,
but it's another thing to live it , face it and hear it on the street (haven't had to actually FIGHT it out , but close ) .
Those frissons', sparks on the street or in the club were interesting . leave one defensive , angry , more intense.
So I slyly thank the members of Konk who derided the Ike Yard boys for being oh my , -'electronic' ,
the Lee's of Sonic Youth who couldn't forgive me over my doing a Club record' ,
but I can guess they were a kind of peer group censorship , throwing up a border they thought they could impose - pre Discussion Boards 'I said it so I am / so it stands'.
Doing it only online is well short of walking and talking it in the RW, you can't see the committment ,
only sometimes the 'stance' well , and the wyrds of course .
So no 'hair shirts' here but decidedly Dissensessian , 'Salad bars' nah
busy threading between techno and hiphop clothes , moving from hop to bk to tech .
Looked at ILM a couple times but never any impulse , good reason to stay there , the very name makes me think 'WTF do you really ...'
And not much denying of fun stuff on purpose, 'principal' or as a lifestyle choice or even thinking about that (grab it when you can)
Decidedly 'Plus and minus' - for example : on tour minute details for or against do influence where you decide to stay , what you eat and where you can safely let it out the other end .
If something doesn't add up to 'plus' then as said before - life is short ' it can be left , maybe someone else can use it .
Dealing with labels major and indie is very much a Plus and Minus game , you have to weight it each time because they are so inconsistent or the radar moves off the label that was a moment ago 'cool' , meaning your release may not sell for *hit.
Hearing fellow musicmakers discuss the very labels you are involved with - from a pointedly less charitable POV - 'Plus , but ...'
A For or Against / On off / B/W dynamic has too many recent echoes of our poor rich President to be neutral, twilights and dawns too good (tried to catch Crepescular examples of both while in Belgium , but other stuff (clouds) got in the way) , all in fun
Lots of enjoyment on the Euro Trip (it was to support the ol' '03 Gomma Album produced for The Rammellzee),
Lots of music , lots of water in Venice , Berlin was fun (tad overrated by the 'raters ?) ,
Bit of smoke @ Bulldogs in Amsterdam,
Night cruising through the lit up Grand Palais while a very 'Bladerunner' sdtk played on the 5.1 multi Quad system,
Afternoon at Modenatie, finding "Wirtz Gardens" then Mick Rock's "Moonage Daydream" ,
cheap good VietNamese noodles in Brussels off the Old Town Square , emailing about KW Jeter -
we did it up and got a lot out of it .
Sometimes it was just too good to sit back on an Intercity train , pop in a CD of tape (not moved by MP3) of a piece you knew you would enjoy and just do nothing dissolve in the tunes .
Ramm would sometimes look up from his headphones with a 'where Am I Stuart ?' look and say loudly 'Im listen'en to Metal'
So 'scuse my elbows , a musicmaker is coming back to the table
Now Listening : Magazine Rays & Hail 1978 -1981
Cheers all
"in any case, what's all this talk of "emancipation" got to do with being involved with music or music scenes?"
I'm very suspicious of it myself Dominic, hence me pushing Mark for a definition of what he means when he tries to distinguish between emancipatory and non-emancipatory experiences.
When I have talked about "interpellation" it has been to try to redefine what others have characterised as emancipatory transformations arising from listening to certain music (but, esp., involvement in a scene). But I don't think interpellation is a bad thing in this context! The alternative would be not feeling any special attachment to any particular music or scene at all.
I just think the allegedly objective "my music taste is better than yours because my music is emancipatory and you just enjoy surface level distractions" position is incredibly tenuous.
I'm very suspicious of it myself Dominic, hence me pushing Mark for a definition of what he means when he tries to distinguish between emancipatory and non-emancipatory experiences.
When I have talked about "interpellation" it has been to try to redefine what others have characterised as emancipatory transformations arising from listening to certain music (but, esp., involvement in a scene). But I don't think interpellation is a bad thing in this context! The alternative would be not feeling any special attachment to any particular music or scene at all.
I just think the allegedly objective "my music taste is better than yours because my music is emancipatory and you just enjoy surface level distractions" position is incredibly tenuous.
Tim F said:
blissblogger was the first person on this thread to use the term "emancipation," albeit via k-punk and zizek
see as follows =
blissblogger said:
now i more or less "get" what blissblogger means when he talks about X-factors and Xcess
what i don't get is this whole notion of emancipation
or is it emancipation from the "state" as socio-cultural stasis???
if so, then this still flies in the face of how most people get involved with music = the musician who plays the SAME damn gig night in and night out, the scenester who hangs out at the SAME damn scene year after year (reconfigured when the scene shifts to a new location w/ new faces, but still the same damn thing)
and it's this commitment/enslavement to the same damn thing that gives the music and scene much of its power
so please clarify this term emancipation!!!
He means empacipation from a dull suburban life into a dull 'scene' life, where your life expentancy is probably diminshed by 20 years from too much partying.
Sure HE might feel 'emancipated' abnd is probably talented and ELITIST enough to lead a lifestyle where he can follow those desires AND make a living from it. But thousands of people can't coz it's a myth. True equality in the 'pleasure' game just doesn't exist. That's why it's all frucken wanky theories of the highest mot pretentious order. I mean who did Huggy Bear, Sonic Youth and Pansy Division ever emancipate besides a angst-ridden suburbanites, compared to say the MASSIVE emancipation dance culture brought, and then died with a massive drug come-down. There's a massive amaount of denial involved as DRUGS are a major factor in propping up the 'emanciaptory' nature of certain sounds/scene.
The real test comes when the drugs where off, and the killer hooks, beats, passages of sound remain. Hence why music like Velvet Underground, Motown Soul, old school hip hop, Kraftwerk, Dylan, even the better Detroit techno can still 'emancipate' or whatever frilly pronoun you wanna use.
Personally I just like what I like, I don't give a shit if they're gay or black or Indian or paedophiles or whatever, sometimes that can make stuff more INTERESTING or COMPELLING, I mean Bronski Beat's early grooves were way better than say anything REM did after GREEN. Though personally I do feel icky listening to Cat Stevens or Gary Glitter, so bite me, I AM repressed, closeted, fundamentalist, anti-rocknrollist, but I like to have boudaries, at least in quality and taste!
Sure HE might feel 'emancipated' abnd is probably talented and ELITIST enough to lead a lifestyle where he can follow those desires AND make a living from it. But thousands of people can't coz it's a myth. True equality in the 'pleasure' game just doesn't exist. That's why it's all frucken wanky theories of the highest mot pretentious order. I mean who did Huggy Bear, Sonic Youth and Pansy Division ever emancipate besides a angst-ridden suburbanites, compared to say the MASSIVE emancipation dance culture brought, and then died with a massive drug come-down. There's a massive amaount of denial involved as DRUGS are a major factor in propping up the 'emanciaptory' nature of certain sounds/scene.
The real test comes when the drugs where off, and the killer hooks, beats, passages of sound remain. Hence why music like Velvet Underground, Motown Soul, old school hip hop, Kraftwerk, Dylan, even the better Detroit techno can still 'emancipate' or whatever frilly pronoun you wanna use.
Personally I just like what I like, I don't give a shit if they're gay or black or Indian or paedophiles or whatever, sometimes that can make stuff more INTERESTING or COMPELLING, I mean Bronski Beat's early grooves were way better than say anything REM did after GREEN. Though personally I do feel icky listening to Cat Stevens or Gary Glitter, so bite me, I AM repressed, closeted, fundamentalist, anti-rocknrollist, but I like to have boudaries, at least in quality and taste!
k-punk
Spectres of Mark
There are no consumers
Of course it is, which is why nobody except Ben Watson holds it.
The issue is not about the content of the music, or, worse, about the 'experience' that the music produces, nor about some 'objective criteria' for assessing music. To be lured into that aestheticist trap is to have conceded everything.
I take the Popist position to be something like this: 'This is ALL just surface level distraction, come on, admit it'. Whereas the anti-Popist position is to say, 'no, there is no such thing as surface level distraction, everything has an effect beyond its merely aesthetic or 'experiental' dimension'. There are no consumers (just as the Pop Group once sang, 'there are no spectators'), in the sense that opting out of political commitments is not an option. Consuming is always more than consuming.
Trying to find emancipatory content in aesthetic objects or experiences is misconceived. But that's because there are no emancipatory experiences AT ALL, there are only emancipatory events and projects. (I have no attachment to the term 'emancipatory' btw, in fact I find it - like much of the Left lexicon ('progressive', 'radical', 'revolutionary') - rather unhelpful.) There are certain potentials, certain resistances, within particular pop products that predispose them to be taken up by certain projects, I suppose, but what makes them emancipatory or not is the way in which they are seized by particular populations. (This returns us to the Leni Riefenstahl or Skrewdriver problems: the point being that someone who watches or listens to these artifacts to interrogate why they are enjoyable is very different from someone who consumes them 'straight'. I think this is worth another thread).
So the issue is not the aesthete's question: is my taste better than yours? but: how is this music functioning as part of my life? What is it doing, what can I make it do? The criteria are always extrinsic (rather than 'objective').
But x-trinsic is not really extrinsic, since there is no experience without it. (It's a transcendental condition for any possible experience lol.) The consumer as seemingly imagined by Popists is not someone you actually recognize very easily: i.e. they are neither fans (because fans pre-judge their aesthetic experiences according to pre-given commitments) nor fantastists (because to fantasize is to go beyond what is 'actually there') but someone open to the purely aesthetic qualities of the Experience, an unprejudiced Lockean blank slate without memory or commitments. But fantasy is what gives consistency to reality: take away fantasy and there is no experience, no object. We love things not for what is in them - a list of the positive, empirical (i.e. experiencable) features of a love object will never locate the 'It' that we love - but for what is 'in them more than themselves'.
Tim F said:
Of course it is, which is why nobody except Ben Watson holds it.
The issue is not about the content of the music, or, worse, about the 'experience' that the music produces, nor about some 'objective criteria' for assessing music. To be lured into that aestheticist trap is to have conceded everything.
I take the Popist position to be something like this: 'This is ALL just surface level distraction, come on, admit it'. Whereas the anti-Popist position is to say, 'no, there is no such thing as surface level distraction, everything has an effect beyond its merely aesthetic or 'experiental' dimension'. There are no consumers (just as the Pop Group once sang, 'there are no spectators'), in the sense that opting out of political commitments is not an option. Consuming is always more than consuming.
Trying to find emancipatory content in aesthetic objects or experiences is misconceived. But that's because there are no emancipatory experiences AT ALL, there are only emancipatory events and projects. (I have no attachment to the term 'emancipatory' btw, in fact I find it - like much of the Left lexicon ('progressive', 'radical', 'revolutionary') - rather unhelpful.) There are certain potentials, certain resistances, within particular pop products that predispose them to be taken up by certain projects, I suppose, but what makes them emancipatory or not is the way in which they are seized by particular populations. (This returns us to the Leni Riefenstahl or Skrewdriver problems: the point being that someone who watches or listens to these artifacts to interrogate why they are enjoyable is very different from someone who consumes them 'straight'. I think this is worth another thread).
So the issue is not the aesthete's question: is my taste better than yours? but: how is this music functioning as part of my life? What is it doing, what can I make it do? The criteria are always extrinsic (rather than 'objective').
But x-trinsic is not really extrinsic, since there is no experience without it. (It's a transcendental condition for any possible experience lol.) The consumer as seemingly imagined by Popists is not someone you actually recognize very easily: i.e. they are neither fans (because fans pre-judge their aesthetic experiences according to pre-given commitments) nor fantastists (because to fantasize is to go beyond what is 'actually there') but someone open to the purely aesthetic qualities of the Experience, an unprejudiced Lockean blank slate without memory or commitments. But fantasy is what gives consistency to reality: take away fantasy and there is no experience, no object. We love things not for what is in them - a list of the positive, empirical (i.e. experiencable) features of a love object will never locate the 'It' that we love - but for what is 'in them more than themselves'.
Agree with most of what's in yr second-to-last post Mark.
"So the issue is not the aesthete's question: is my taste better than yours? but: how is this music functioning as part of my life? What is it doing, what can I make it do? The criteria are always extrinsic (rather than 'objective')."
"But x-trinsic is not really extrinsic, since there is no experience without it. (It's a transcendental condition for any possible experience lol.) "
Yeah I think we came to this juncture in the Pop thread too. Mark I'm wondering though: I thought you were saying in that thread that certain music is inherently transformative, is always already specially equipped to take on some different function through its sonics etc, and that this bypasses subjective "experience" of it entirely - maybe I imagined this, but it seems to make sense w/r/t your general position, so maybe not.
I think the question of "how is this music functioning as part of my life? What is it doing, what can I make it do?" is <i>hugely</i> important yeah, only I would add the predictable caveat that the actual music (its sonics etc.) and the life-functioning are always mediated <i>through</i> the subject's experience of/engagement with the music - it is through this mediation point that we connect the music with the x-trinsic factors in our minds, such that we can talk about.
And yes this mediation involves a fantasy and so is only partially about what the music <i>is</i>, and certainly shouldn't be reduced to the subject's conscious experience i.e. their experience of the experience. But the nature of this mediation - the intersection b/w the music and the life-project and the fantasy-link that sustains it - is such that the results become v. unpredictable. At this point I thought you took the position that there was only one (or a very limited number of) type of "transformative experience" that should be entertained (on the grounds of objectively constituting "emancipation" obv); in which case the <i>ethics</i> of the music's life-function could be simplified massively: since only one type of fantasy is legitimate, we can distinguish between "true" and "false" connections with the music and ignore the fact that there are many stripes of falsity.
If on the other hand the category of "transformation" is not underwritten by some objective emancipatory guarantee, then it becomes a political question of simply asserting why one particular type of life-function is better, more desirable etc. By removing the categories of objective truth/falsity we have to face the full gamut of different types of relationships between pieces of music and the way people live their lives - and while we may still think our particular approach is superior we cannot dismiss these different approaches as a priori false.
With the consequence that I don't think we can say draw up a list categorising the components of a piece of music which fall under "enjoyment" and which fall under "transformative x-factors" that serves as anything other than an attempt to describe our own particular mediation process and convince others of its value over and against their own process.
(as you can see I'm expending a lot of effort trying to ensure that any residual deference to objectivity is stamped out!)
(transformative events/projects which can be entirely separated from experience of the music are fine but I would think fall outside the parameters of what we're debating here - having said that if we're gripped by a music video or what an artist says or wears in an interview, this can't be separated from the experience of the music b/c of the way this er gripping is projected back onto the music; I would stress that pretending this doesn't happen is <i>not at all</i> what I think popism is about, although popism would certainly be reluctant to construct a heirarchy here e.g. "the music overrules the video" or vice versa, hence the music should not be <i>ignored</i> either)
"I take the Popist position to be something like this: 'This is ALL just surface level distraction, come on, admit it'. Whereas the anti-Popist position is to say, 'no, there is no such thing as surface level distraction, everything has an effect beyond its merely aesthetic or 'experiental' dimension'."
Mark I guess in fairness I should leave you your popist strawman unmolested since I have an unfair advantage by dint of Ben Watson actually existing, but... I just don't think the popist position is what you claim it to be.
I would actually endorse the position that "there is no such thing as surface level distraction", although I'm not sure if I mean it in the same way as you. The hyper-popist in me would go on to say that "not only does all music <i>up to and including</i> Britney Spears (to choose a common pop culture referent) have "an effect beyond its merely aesthetic or 'experiental' dimension", but we have no way of knowing what effect this would be, positive or negative, prior to the intersection allowing for the effect occuring (i.e. the mediation described above)."
Whereas I suspect you might argue that the only "effect" <i>beyond</i> surface level distraction which Britney can <i>possibly</i> have is inducing stultifying complicity with capital, her transformative capacity is predetermined...
"So the issue is not the aesthete's question: is my taste better than yours? but: how is this music functioning as part of my life? What is it doing, what can I make it do? The criteria are always extrinsic (rather than 'objective')."
"But x-trinsic is not really extrinsic, since there is no experience without it. (It's a transcendental condition for any possible experience lol.) "
Yeah I think we came to this juncture in the Pop thread too. Mark I'm wondering though: I thought you were saying in that thread that certain music is inherently transformative, is always already specially equipped to take on some different function through its sonics etc, and that this bypasses subjective "experience" of it entirely - maybe I imagined this, but it seems to make sense w/r/t your general position, so maybe not.
I think the question of "how is this music functioning as part of my life? What is it doing, what can I make it do?" is <i>hugely</i> important yeah, only I would add the predictable caveat that the actual music (its sonics etc.) and the life-functioning are always mediated <i>through</i> the subject's experience of/engagement with the music - it is through this mediation point that we connect the music with the x-trinsic factors in our minds, such that we can talk about.
And yes this mediation involves a fantasy and so is only partially about what the music <i>is</i>, and certainly shouldn't be reduced to the subject's conscious experience i.e. their experience of the experience. But the nature of this mediation - the intersection b/w the music and the life-project and the fantasy-link that sustains it - is such that the results become v. unpredictable. At this point I thought you took the position that there was only one (or a very limited number of) type of "transformative experience" that should be entertained (on the grounds of objectively constituting "emancipation" obv); in which case the <i>ethics</i> of the music's life-function could be simplified massively: since only one type of fantasy is legitimate, we can distinguish between "true" and "false" connections with the music and ignore the fact that there are many stripes of falsity.
If on the other hand the category of "transformation" is not underwritten by some objective emancipatory guarantee, then it becomes a political question of simply asserting why one particular type of life-function is better, more desirable etc. By removing the categories of objective truth/falsity we have to face the full gamut of different types of relationships between pieces of music and the way people live their lives - and while we may still think our particular approach is superior we cannot dismiss these different approaches as a priori false.
With the consequence that I don't think we can say draw up a list categorising the components of a piece of music which fall under "enjoyment" and which fall under "transformative x-factors" that serves as anything other than an attempt to describe our own particular mediation process and convince others of its value over and against their own process.
(as you can see I'm expending a lot of effort trying to ensure that any residual deference to objectivity is stamped out!)
(transformative events/projects which can be entirely separated from experience of the music are fine but I would think fall outside the parameters of what we're debating here - having said that if we're gripped by a music video or what an artist says or wears in an interview, this can't be separated from the experience of the music b/c of the way this er gripping is projected back onto the music; I would stress that pretending this doesn't happen is <i>not at all</i> what I think popism is about, although popism would certainly be reluctant to construct a heirarchy here e.g. "the music overrules the video" or vice versa, hence the music should not be <i>ignored</i> either)
"I take the Popist position to be something like this: 'This is ALL just surface level distraction, come on, admit it'. Whereas the anti-Popist position is to say, 'no, there is no such thing as surface level distraction, everything has an effect beyond its merely aesthetic or 'experiental' dimension'."
Mark I guess in fairness I should leave you your popist strawman unmolested since I have an unfair advantage by dint of Ben Watson actually existing, but... I just don't think the popist position is what you claim it to be.
I would actually endorse the position that "there is no such thing as surface level distraction", although I'm not sure if I mean it in the same way as you. The hyper-popist in me would go on to say that "not only does all music <i>up to and including</i> Britney Spears (to choose a common pop culture referent) have "an effect beyond its merely aesthetic or 'experiental' dimension", but we have no way of knowing what effect this would be, positive or negative, prior to the intersection allowing for the effect occuring (i.e. the mediation described above)."
Whereas I suspect you might argue that the only "effect" <i>beyond</i> surface level distraction which Britney can <i>possibly</i> have is inducing stultifying complicity with capital, her transformative capacity is predetermined...
borderpolice
Well-known member
droid said:
I'd like to point out that almost everything which I guess you mean to
be theorising about music, all the ramblings from the "theorisers"
here, is <B>virtually never about music</B> as such, about sonic
material. It is never about semi-quavers, ligatos or ADSR, it is never
about rhythm or cords. It is never about musical structure or content
(that's not necessarily a bad thing). It is almost always about
alleged or otherwise ethnicity, gender, class position of the music
producers and their audience, who should listen to what and why. It
is, very important, about: setting up social hierarchies, mostly not
of the form 'this song is better than that' or 'this sound is more
interesting than that', but rather: 'this producer is more interesting
that that', 'this band is better than that', 'this genre is more
important than that' and so on. this melange is generally interspersed
with grandstanding political pronouncements and grand sounding, yet,
when you consider the content, banal pronouncements (eg "there is no
such thing as surface level distraction"). Cogent explanation of
exactly what the connection may be between politics and musical
material (used as an excuse to talk) is never given. Of course that
has always been a problem for critics, even Adorno, who, unlike most
colleagues, really understood tonal technicality, ended up leaving the
reader baffled just why the drum roll on bar 192 in Strawinski's
"Sacre" was already reactionary, while a a certain cord in Schoenberg,
op 20 is still progressive.
This post is partly an example of the problem it discusses.
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blissblogger
Well-known member
i also have no special attachment to the world 'emancipation' but i like that phrase of zizek's and the riffs mark came up with off of it -- the phrase just struck me 'cos i thought: yes, it's true actually, 'fun' per se is not that interesting. or at least, i could track the decline of dance music, and various scenes within it, when they become about "just" fun or pleasure..... by the late 90s from big beat to trance, the scene was foundering in the nullity of pleasure-for-pleasure's-sake. (and in that sense i agree with mr buick, with a deleuzian spin, the line of flight had become a dead end --- emancipation had become shackles of a new slavery -- but dance itself has played around with such imagery of control and slavery to the rhythm since disco, the ambiguity has been part of its imaginary for a long time)
but i don't just mean this in the sense of things getting messy on the floor and the sort of pointless polydrug debauchery you'd see, i mean also things like microhouse whose hedonism is very tasteful and controlled. or funky house or acid jazz or whatever.... hedonism + taste + we are the beautiful people = hard to see as emancipatory or taking anyone on an interesting journey
but yeah 'emancipation', kind of an ungainly word, agreed, but i was using it as a general rubric type term for a whole bunch of stuff -- basically an element that could be construed as progressive/radical/disruptive/subversive/unsettling/dissident/etc etc.... all those terms.... as i said before, you could say that anything that takes you anywhere, moves you across a limit, rocks your world a bit, could be regarded as emancipatory
(true, as dom says there, is a lot of repetition and redundancy in how peple consume pop.... people do tend to get caught in cul de sacs of the what had formerly been emancipatory ... there is a certain pathos to that kind of subcultural loyalism, but also a certain kind of honour.... one always used to laugh at say aged teddy boys of the sort you'd see wandering around streets in the uk in the late 70s, still dressed for the revolution of the late 50s, but you know, they had decided who they were and stuck with it... same with old punks, old hippies... i find a certain kind of honour to that stance..... young kids today dressed as punks is a different matter )
now Tim says pop-ism isn't the denial that such emancipatory moments or x-factors exist but the refusal of any kind of rules or set ways of looking for them or predicting where they'll come from -- either saying a/ you can't make such rules, it's not possible, AND it's counter-productive or B/ you shouldn't make such rules (that relates to the curious hidden moralism of the plus/and stance, where as you can see from that thread there's a certain virtuous self-preening aren't-we-modern-and-flexible-mindedness to the various anti-Either/Or comments!)
but i'd got a completely different vibe from pop-ism or the pro-pop stance
i have both sensed, and actually seen, people pretty much say: such emancipations have never occurred in the past, there were illusions or myths people told themselves (and if they hadn't been myths, how come we're where we are now? how could they have been anything but myths?), that there is only enjoyment/product and gang of four's "market of the senses" -- the other argument i've heard is a sort of "you only get radicalised because you're predisposed to it, or have been set up for it", once again sort of denying that popular music has ever get any kind of dramatic effect in mobilising populations or changing individual's ideas or behaviour
i don't see popism as a strawman or any actual individual so much as rhetorical space people move into, partly as the endgame of a particular logic of argument, but also as an argument-ender, a way of quickly escaping the net of certain arguments.
Here's a couple of examples of pro-pop rhetoric:
Fluxblog’s Matthew Perpetua: "Importance and relevance is a scam and a trap. Don't bother with it. Don't think too much about it. Once you stop thinking about things in those terms, all of music and art becomes far more enjoyable"
note the appeal to enhanced enjoyment
Here's quite an extreme example of pop-ist rhetoric, Mike Barthel aka Eppy from earlier this year:
"Hey, anyone else think that Dizzee's "I Luv U" just sounds like pop now? Which is good, you know, but I remember it being presented as this revelatory and revolutionary thing at the time. Wasn't, really, was it?
what struck me about this (apart from the tit for tat aspect!), is that pop-ist impulse to strip away all that the stuff that actually matters and is exciting about the record in question, reducing it to some putative pure pop essence. I mean the record is incredibly catchy and punchy, but A/ that's not everything that's going on even in the song/record, let alone around it. (And when did “pop” have a monopoly on memorability or aesthetic focus?). But the real point is the reductive impulse, with its undercurrent of ressentiment. i see pop-ism working as by reducing the scope of things that you care about. The positive spin on that is a sort of minimalism of affect (perpetua's idea, at a charitable reading), stop thinking about these other factors and then this main thing--the pleasure of the moment/the thing-itself--dramatically expands. The negative spin on it is: i don't give a fuck about anything else but my pleasure.
but as i say this is a rhetorical space people pass into when it suits them, and in fact you can't actually stay there for long. so for instance pop-ists will quickly adopt rockist methods when they need to have something to actually write. so--just to pick an example out of thin air--they will do an incredibly intricate analysis of a single M.i.Adonna song based on a close reading of the lyrics and the biographic persona of the singer as manifested in those lyrics, complete with bar by bar analysis of the structure of the music. that's pure rockist methodology, auteurism plus hermeneutics, a world away from the 'it's just groovy pop'/Against Interpretation stance.
but i don't just mean this in the sense of things getting messy on the floor and the sort of pointless polydrug debauchery you'd see, i mean also things like microhouse whose hedonism is very tasteful and controlled. or funky house or acid jazz or whatever.... hedonism + taste + we are the beautiful people = hard to see as emancipatory or taking anyone on an interesting journey
but yeah 'emancipation', kind of an ungainly word, agreed, but i was using it as a general rubric type term for a whole bunch of stuff -- basically an element that could be construed as progressive/radical/disruptive/subversive/unsettling/dissident/etc etc.... all those terms.... as i said before, you could say that anything that takes you anywhere, moves you across a limit, rocks your world a bit, could be regarded as emancipatory
(true, as dom says there, is a lot of repetition and redundancy in how peple consume pop.... people do tend to get caught in cul de sacs of the what had formerly been emancipatory ... there is a certain pathos to that kind of subcultural loyalism, but also a certain kind of honour.... one always used to laugh at say aged teddy boys of the sort you'd see wandering around streets in the uk in the late 70s, still dressed for the revolution of the late 50s, but you know, they had decided who they were and stuck with it... same with old punks, old hippies... i find a certain kind of honour to that stance..... young kids today dressed as punks is a different matter )
now Tim says pop-ism isn't the denial that such emancipatory moments or x-factors exist but the refusal of any kind of rules or set ways of looking for them or predicting where they'll come from -- either saying a/ you can't make such rules, it's not possible, AND it's counter-productive or B/ you shouldn't make such rules (that relates to the curious hidden moralism of the plus/and stance, where as you can see from that thread there's a certain virtuous self-preening aren't-we-modern-and-flexible-mindedness to the various anti-Either/Or comments!)
but i'd got a completely different vibe from pop-ism or the pro-pop stance
i have both sensed, and actually seen, people pretty much say: such emancipations have never occurred in the past, there were illusions or myths people told themselves (and if they hadn't been myths, how come we're where we are now? how could they have been anything but myths?), that there is only enjoyment/product and gang of four's "market of the senses" -- the other argument i've heard is a sort of "you only get radicalised because you're predisposed to it, or have been set up for it", once again sort of denying that popular music has ever get any kind of dramatic effect in mobilising populations or changing individual's ideas or behaviour
i don't see popism as a strawman or any actual individual so much as rhetorical space people move into, partly as the endgame of a particular logic of argument, but also as an argument-ender, a way of quickly escaping the net of certain arguments.
Here's a couple of examples of pro-pop rhetoric:
Fluxblog’s Matthew Perpetua: "Importance and relevance is a scam and a trap. Don't bother with it. Don't think too much about it. Once you stop thinking about things in those terms, all of music and art becomes far more enjoyable"
note the appeal to enhanced enjoyment
Here's quite an extreme example of pop-ist rhetoric, Mike Barthel aka Eppy from earlier this year:
"Hey, anyone else think that Dizzee's "I Luv U" just sounds like pop now? Which is good, you know, but I remember it being presented as this revelatory and revolutionary thing at the time. Wasn't, really, was it?
what struck me about this (apart from the tit for tat aspect!), is that pop-ist impulse to strip away all that the stuff that actually matters and is exciting about the record in question, reducing it to some putative pure pop essence. I mean the record is incredibly catchy and punchy, but A/ that's not everything that's going on even in the song/record, let alone around it. (And when did “pop” have a monopoly on memorability or aesthetic focus?). But the real point is the reductive impulse, with its undercurrent of ressentiment. i see pop-ism working as by reducing the scope of things that you care about. The positive spin on that is a sort of minimalism of affect (perpetua's idea, at a charitable reading), stop thinking about these other factors and then this main thing--the pleasure of the moment/the thing-itself--dramatically expands. The negative spin on it is: i don't give a fuck about anything else but my pleasure.
but as i say this is a rhetorical space people pass into when it suits them, and in fact you can't actually stay there for long. so for instance pop-ists will quickly adopt rockist methods when they need to have something to actually write. so--just to pick an example out of thin air--they will do an incredibly intricate analysis of a single M.i.Adonna song based on a close reading of the lyrics and the biographic persona of the singer as manifested in those lyrics, complete with bar by bar analysis of the structure of the music. that's pure rockist methodology, auteurism plus hermeneutics, a world away from the 'it's just groovy pop'/Against Interpretation stance.
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borderpolice
Well-known member
blissblogger said:
the most important word is the "like pop <B>now</B>"! Music changes, by being heard often, by being copied, by being used in new contexts. Popularity changes contexts. even "I luv you" isn't immune!
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k-punk
Spectres of Mark
<i>"Importance and relevance is a scam and a trap. Don't bother with it. Don't think too much about it. Once you stop thinking about things in those terms, all of music and art becomes far more enjoyable"</i>
This is almost zen; I love the way it sounds like something that would be said to businessmen or something....
A number of points
1. Re: Dom's point on stultification.... Wouldn't the elusive goal be a sustainable, renewing culture, the D/G plateau?
2. The inherent emancipatory content of certain types of pop... I don't think I did say that, in fact I had a quick look through the Pop thread to check that I HADN'T said that... I think I cited Underground Resistance's claim that certain types of sound are themselves revolutionary in order to reject it... and, really, I'm hardly likely to have put Britney in any putative 'no emancipatory possibilities' category viven what I've written about her in the past...As far as I remember, the position I ended up advocating was that pop could stimulate - or (horrible term) inspire - emancipatory events... the whole point being that it couldn't in itself constitute them... but this 'in itself' is all that we are left with, for popism, which brings me to:
3. I think Simon has put his finger on exactly what I dislike about popism, i.e. what I once called compulsory trivialization. That impulse to say, 'you see, you see, it WAS only trivial, people were wrong to read anything into it' (which could hardly be described as straw man now, since Simon has cited two examples which almost literally say this). Of course, popists will say, 'it's not trivial, there's nothing more important than enjoyment', but that's exactly the problem in the position. The illusory pop object 'in-itself' does not exist, because enjoyment depends on something that is not itself enjoyable.
4. Better, as Simon says, a middle-aged punk than someone who has commensurated themselves to the consumerist zen doctrine that pleasure is all there is. Not only is that apparently purely positive position an expression of resentiment (as Simon observes), it is also a consequence of depression. I cited this quote from Badiou on k-p earlier this year, but make no apology for reprising it here:
'A crisis of fidelity is always what puts to the test. following the collapse of an image, the sole maxim of consistency (and thus of ethics): 'Keep going!' Keep going even when you have lost the thread, when you no longer feel 'caught up' in the process, when the event itself has become obscure, when its name is lost, or when it seems that it may have been a mistake, if not a simulacrum.
For the well-known existence of simulacra is a powerful stimulus to the crystallization of crises. Opinion tells me (and therefore I tell myself, for I am never outside opinions) that my fidelity may well be terror exerted against myself, and that the fidelity to which I am faithful looks very much like - too much like - this or that certified Evil. It is always a possibility, since the formal characteristics of this Evil (as simulacrum) are exactly those of a truth.
What am I then exposed to is the temptation to betray a truth. Betrayal is not mere renunciation. Unfortunately, one cannot simply 'renounce' a truth. The denial of the Immortal in myself is something quite different from an abandonment, a cessation: I must convince myself that the Immortal in question never existed, and thus rally to opinion's perception of this point - opinion, whose sole purpose, in the service of interests, is precisely this negation. For the Immortal, if I recognize its existence, calls on me to continue; it has the eternal power of the truths that induce it. Consequently, I must betray the becoming-subject in myself, I must become the enemy of the truth whose subject is the 'some-one' that I am (accompanied, perhaps, by others) composed.
This explains why former revolutionaries are obliged to declare that they used to be in error and madness, why a former lover no longer understands why he loved a woman, why a tired scientist comes to misunderstand, and to frustrate through bureaucratic routine, the very development of his own science.'
- Badiou, Ethics
This is almost zen; I love the way it sounds like something that would be said to businessmen or something....
A number of points
1. Re: Dom's point on stultification.... Wouldn't the elusive goal be a sustainable, renewing culture, the D/G plateau?
2. The inherent emancipatory content of certain types of pop... I don't think I did say that, in fact I had a quick look through the Pop thread to check that I HADN'T said that... I think I cited Underground Resistance's claim that certain types of sound are themselves revolutionary in order to reject it... and, really, I'm hardly likely to have put Britney in any putative 'no emancipatory possibilities' category viven what I've written about her in the past...As far as I remember, the position I ended up advocating was that pop could stimulate - or (horrible term) inspire - emancipatory events... the whole point being that it couldn't in itself constitute them... but this 'in itself' is all that we are left with, for popism, which brings me to:
3. I think Simon has put his finger on exactly what I dislike about popism, i.e. what I once called compulsory trivialization. That impulse to say, 'you see, you see, it WAS only trivial, people were wrong to read anything into it' (which could hardly be described as straw man now, since Simon has cited two examples which almost literally say this). Of course, popists will say, 'it's not trivial, there's nothing more important than enjoyment', but that's exactly the problem in the position. The illusory pop object 'in-itself' does not exist, because enjoyment depends on something that is not itself enjoyable.
4. Better, as Simon says, a middle-aged punk than someone who has commensurated themselves to the consumerist zen doctrine that pleasure is all there is. Not only is that apparently purely positive position an expression of resentiment (as Simon observes), it is also a consequence of depression. I cited this quote from Badiou on k-p earlier this year, but make no apology for reprising it here:
'A crisis of fidelity is always what puts to the test. following the collapse of an image, the sole maxim of consistency (and thus of ethics): 'Keep going!' Keep going even when you have lost the thread, when you no longer feel 'caught up' in the process, when the event itself has become obscure, when its name is lost, or when it seems that it may have been a mistake, if not a simulacrum.
For the well-known existence of simulacra is a powerful stimulus to the crystallization of crises. Opinion tells me (and therefore I tell myself, for I am never outside opinions) that my fidelity may well be terror exerted against myself, and that the fidelity to which I am faithful looks very much like - too much like - this or that certified Evil. It is always a possibility, since the formal characteristics of this Evil (as simulacrum) are exactly those of a truth.
What am I then exposed to is the temptation to betray a truth. Betrayal is not mere renunciation. Unfortunately, one cannot simply 'renounce' a truth. The denial of the Immortal in myself is something quite different from an abandonment, a cessation: I must convince myself that the Immortal in question never existed, and thus rally to opinion's perception of this point - opinion, whose sole purpose, in the service of interests, is precisely this negation. For the Immortal, if I recognize its existence, calls on me to continue; it has the eternal power of the truths that induce it. Consequently, I must betray the becoming-subject in myself, I must become the enemy of the truth whose subject is the 'some-one' that I am (accompanied, perhaps, by others) composed.
This explains why former revolutionaries are obliged to declare that they used to be in error and madness, why a former lover no longer understands why he loved a woman, why a tired scientist comes to misunderstand, and to frustrate through bureaucratic routine, the very development of his own science.'
- Badiou, Ethics
k-punk said:
i didn't intend to say "stultification" -- though that's a risk both for the music scene and for the scenesters (or whatever term you'd use)
i meant only that scenesters seek, in part, the repetition of earlier pleasures -- or at least there's a great deal of repetitiveness to their lives -- i.e., the nightlife grind
of course it's not that simple, as people don't listen to the same damn music every night, and most people have their ears open for new sounds (within limits)
so i suppose, yes, the goal would be the D/G plateau -- though "plateau" seems a bit abstract for describing how music scenes work -- so perhaps you could flesh out what you mean by "plateau" in relation to culture, music scenes, etc
Tim F said:
but how does this relate to music fandom and music scenester-ism? should music scenes simply press the self-destruct button once its leading lights become "bureaucrats" -- i.e., the superstar dj as high-ranking bureaucrat -- or should the bureaucrats be purged? or should the scene somehow reinvent itself, as with the so-called hardcore continuum?
and yet while i certainly admire critics who have their "ear to ground" and spot new and promising sounds, i'm not sure if i'd have much patience for music fans who did the same -- i.e., aren't these the despised hipsters and trend-spotters??? or is the contempt for nomadic trend-spotters merely a symptom of ressentiment?
what of admiration for the "underground soldiers," the people who stick with their sound after the hipsters have moved on to new vistas?
again, i'd like to see k-punk flesh out this notion of D/G's "plateau" as applied to music scenes -- i.e., or are we simply left with the stark alternative of "stultification" (k-punk's term) versus infidelity/nomadism/shameless trend-hopping
and is the fidelity in question simply fidelity to, say, the "spirit" of punk or the "spirit" of rave -- OR is the fidelity more rigorous and limiting, i.e., fidelity to certain concrete sounds, certain concrete scenes == or is such "fidelity" to the concrete in fact laziness, a failure to cope with the new, to get into new sounds, to move with the times
tim f said:
first, is the critic the same species as the fan or scenester? is it possible that what we may admire in the critic, we may dislike in the music fan? do we want everyone to be in "constant search for the new"?
second, what's so bad about being into yesterday's music? isn't possible to devise an un-orthodox approach to past music, such that even among djs playing "stultified" dance music, some djs will have much more interesting sets and selections than the hum-drum djs? and can't this in and of itself create interesting energy, i.e., among the scenesters (and perhaps others) who can appreciate when a dj has tended well to his own particular garden over the years? -- i.e., precisely by remaining true to his faith in a very particular kind of music
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Hi Dominic,
"but how does this relate to music fandom and music scenester-ism? should music scenes simply press the self-destruct button once its leading lights become "bureaucrats" -- i.e., the superstar dj as high-ranking bureaucrat -- or should the bureaucrats be purged? or should the scene somehow reinvent itself, as with the so-called hardcore continuum?"
I don't know, really. I think perhaps not knowing is <i>the point</i>. The nature of fidelity is something that needs to be redefined in every instance of it. But then I think part of my entire position is based upon a romanticised excitement regarding the <i>uncertainty</i> involved in following music and thinking about it, in not knowing whether your opinions are correct but sallying forth with them anyway.
"and is the fidelity in question simply fidelity to, say, the "spirit" of punk or the "spirit" of rave -- OR is the fidelity more rigorous and limiting, i.e., fidelity to certain concrete sounds, certain concrete scenes == or is such "fidelity" to the concrete in fact laziness, a failure to cope with the new, to get into new sounds, to move with the times"
At the risk of inducing groans, I'm tempted to say that this really isn't "either/or" here - as is hinted above fidelity can take all sorts of stripes. In either case the fidelity is to a certain idea (possibly embodied in practices): the determination of how "rigorous and limited" it is should not be made by reference to whether it's style or spirit or scene, but rather to how clearly delineated the idea is and how much effort is expended in maintaining it. So an aging punk may be noble or they may be lazy, depending on how they actually demonstrate their fidelity. (Whether punk is the correct choice in the first place is a whole 'nother can of worms)
"first, is the critic the same species as the fan or scenester? is it possible that what we may admire in the critic, we may dislike in the music fan? do we want everyone to be in "constant search for the new"?"
As per above, I'm not saying that punks or hippies have got it all wrong. I'm saying that persevering with one style and one approach isn't, or hasn't tended to be, the kind of "fidelity" which Simon's criticism has practiced. He isn't spending all his time talking about neo-shoegazers now just because he was talking about MBV in 1988, but that doesn't mean his criticism doesn't form a continuous quest-like piece (and of course there were um "adventures" of considerable length e.g. jungle c. 93-97). Rather than attempt to institute a heirarchy of fidelities, I'm merely suggesting that it can take many forms.
"aren't these the despised hipsters and trend-spotters??? or is the contempt for nomadic trend-spotters merely a symptom of ressentiment?"
I've often wondered why the approach of the hipster/dilettante etc. is always linked to a position of weakness, passivity, laziness, not to mention the implications of a devastatingly unsuccessful attachment to the pursuit of coolness which the term "hipster" always implies... as if it's impossible for a person who likes music from several styles to be wanting very specific things from music and be quite rigorous and exacting in their pursuit of them.
'Nuff respect to the underground hero as well, but I think both the purist and the dilettante can be gripped by road-to-damascus conviction, a sense that they have found the way and the light - one is expressed in terms of genre and one isn't, is all.
"but how does this relate to music fandom and music scenester-ism? should music scenes simply press the self-destruct button once its leading lights become "bureaucrats" -- i.e., the superstar dj as high-ranking bureaucrat -- or should the bureaucrats be purged? or should the scene somehow reinvent itself, as with the so-called hardcore continuum?"
I don't know, really. I think perhaps not knowing is <i>the point</i>. The nature of fidelity is something that needs to be redefined in every instance of it. But then I think part of my entire position is based upon a romanticised excitement regarding the <i>uncertainty</i> involved in following music and thinking about it, in not knowing whether your opinions are correct but sallying forth with them anyway.
"and is the fidelity in question simply fidelity to, say, the "spirit" of punk or the "spirit" of rave -- OR is the fidelity more rigorous and limiting, i.e., fidelity to certain concrete sounds, certain concrete scenes == or is such "fidelity" to the concrete in fact laziness, a failure to cope with the new, to get into new sounds, to move with the times"
At the risk of inducing groans, I'm tempted to say that this really isn't "either/or" here - as is hinted above fidelity can take all sorts of stripes. In either case the fidelity is to a certain idea (possibly embodied in practices): the determination of how "rigorous and limited" it is should not be made by reference to whether it's style or spirit or scene, but rather to how clearly delineated the idea is and how much effort is expended in maintaining it. So an aging punk may be noble or they may be lazy, depending on how they actually demonstrate their fidelity. (Whether punk is the correct choice in the first place is a whole 'nother can of worms)
"first, is the critic the same species as the fan or scenester? is it possible that what we may admire in the critic, we may dislike in the music fan? do we want everyone to be in "constant search for the new"?"
As per above, I'm not saying that punks or hippies have got it all wrong. I'm saying that persevering with one style and one approach isn't, or hasn't tended to be, the kind of "fidelity" which Simon's criticism has practiced. He isn't spending all his time talking about neo-shoegazers now just because he was talking about MBV in 1988, but that doesn't mean his criticism doesn't form a continuous quest-like piece (and of course there were um "adventures" of considerable length e.g. jungle c. 93-97). Rather than attempt to institute a heirarchy of fidelities, I'm merely suggesting that it can take many forms.
"aren't these the despised hipsters and trend-spotters??? or is the contempt for nomadic trend-spotters merely a symptom of ressentiment?"
I've often wondered why the approach of the hipster/dilettante etc. is always linked to a position of weakness, passivity, laziness, not to mention the implications of a devastatingly unsuccessful attachment to the pursuit of coolness which the term "hipster" always implies... as if it's impossible for a person who likes music from several styles to be wanting very specific things from music and be quite rigorous and exacting in their pursuit of them.
'Nuff respect to the underground hero as well, but I think both the purist and the dilettante can be gripped by road-to-damascus conviction, a sense that they have found the way and the light - one is expressed in terms of genre and one isn't, is all.
blissblogger
Well-known member
borderpolice said:
no, i think the important bit is "Wasn't, really, was it?", as dismissing the idea of it ever having been
"revelatory and revolutionary"
(and yeah true popularity changes the context, but "i luv u" -- sadly--only ever got to #29 in the UK charts so i'm not sure if it ever became pop -- more's the pity)
"Wasn't, really, was it?" is really saying: "you were fooling yourselves, chaps"
and i think that is a large part of the pop-ist impulse, it's a big "Wasn't, really, was it?" to the whole of rock history. "It was never really going to change anything, was it really?... if it had been, then things would be different, now, wouldn't they?" "So let's dispose of the whole idea of 'change', because it can only make us depressed".
Now this impulse is based in the desire to rid of the considerable burden of history, and i totally understand it (and even had something of that impulse when i was writing the Blissed Out material -- rock discourse as this massive ponderous legacy, this doctrinal baggage)... having to live up to the past.... it's both a burden and an impediment, impeding you (the argument runs, and i can see its sense) from appreciating the small significances and pleasures of the now
morley used to have this line actually at the height of new pop, going on about appreciating and looking for "the small things" and not getting hung up on the Giant Steps or Big Gestures (the search for a new Clash that had so many of his NME colleagues down in the dumps, unable to enjoy the light frothy buzz of haircut 100 and altered images. Or equally the search for the new PiL.)
upthread i mentioned, or implied, it's virtually impossible to write entirely from within the transient pop thrill which is why people keep slipping back into rockist modes; you can do it but you have to be a genius. morley is one of the few who can stay almost entirely within this dizzy thrill zone. he never falls into the sociological register, the heaviness of the Real never impinges. that's what he was like in classic New Pop 81/82 mode, you got this sense of abstract energies whizzing around but everything remained gloriously unpinned down. And Words and Music is a whole book in that zone of giddy almost-nullity. (The key argument is that New Pop came back in late 90s with all that r&b and sugababes type stuff. Lotta problems with this argument but later for that). Words and Music -- and it is the Das Kapital of popism--is delicious but a bit like eating a diet that consists entirely of sugar. (Also thought the last chapter was a bit like a Mondo 2000 article from the early 90s. The poptimistic utopia of lighter-than-light, all-that's-solid-melts-into-air pure pop connectivity definitely smacks of pre-bubblecrash, pre-9/11 mindset).
i think this sugar-high way of writing about music does capture something essential about music --- its insubstantiality, mutability, impossible-to-pin-downability, the abstractness of it at all levels. but i can't go along with its lack of a social dimension, and there is something "heavy" about music too that relates to the heaviness of real life.
and morley actually wrote somewhere that a lot of the giddy froth of his new pop writing came from a sort of running away from the Heavy and the Real represented by his father's suicide
^^^^^^^^^
re your borderpolice's complaint about the absence of close musicology, well nobody does that outside the academy, that Susan McLary approach... and even there i don't think she or robert walser or whoever successfully proves that such and such a chord/glissando/whatever has a certain effect that correlates... when you read her analysis of say a whitesnake or madonna song in terms of musical structure and infalliable emotional effects certain things have, often one's own experience of the piece of music contradicts their reading.
anyway the pop-ists don't go in for this kind of thing either!
^^^^^^^^^^
re tim's recurrent point about people legimitising their own subjective tastes with the seal of the Important
... point taken, obviously, but i should point out that there's loads of things i like and even love that don't have these X-factors i go on about, or only have the most tenuous connection with them.... i'm not sure what argument i could make that tied say Prefab Sprout to 'emancipation' but they were one of my favorite groups at a certain point. there's many more examples, quite a few current ones,
that doesn't mean that the X-factors haven't existed and aren't worth talking about and aren't worth looking for in the future
k-punk
Spectres of Mark
Tim F said:
Obviously I agree with all of this. There's a crucial distinction to be drawn between fidelity and orthodoxy.
But - just to facetiously play devil's advocate for a moment - on what grounds/ criteria do you propose to distinguish between an orthodox punk and a punk who has effectively re-instantiated the punk abstract machine? How is this to be distinguished from saying that our taste is better than theirs?