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moshkito View Drop Down
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Direct Link To This Post Topic: The cultural legitimacy of prog, metal and punk
    Posted: March 02 2014 at 11:32
Originally posted by Toaster Mantis Toaster Mantis wrote:

The best I can clarify the "cultural legitimacy" part right now is the genres in question having some kind of unifying artistic ethos or philosophical principles behind its style, consciously or not, that comes from a certain heritage within world cultural history perhaps continuing other movements or reacting against them through the specific cultural vantage point of its origin - in a way that leaves some kind of long-term lasting impact on cultural history.
 
The only concern I worry about, is that we have a tendency to dwindle these down to just one person, or thing, and that tends to isolate the group/event, and make it less important than otherwise.
 
In many ways, that is the difference in the cultural legitimacy of anything. If only 4 people got up, burned themselves in protest, and newspapers ignored it, it was lost in the translation and no one will know about it or understand it and its motivation. But when a bunch of newspapers and media get onto it, and publicize it, now we consider it important, while a movie, play, painting, or novel, had a similar event that we did not know about because we did not read it or heard about it, and the local news in San Diego didn't mention it! That's a problem, because now, a scene in London is likely to get ignored as much as a scene in San Diego will get ignored in London!
 
Now, it's "cultural legitimacy" is an issue, because London is bigger, and 3 people wrote about it, and in San Diego, no one did! That's scary!  And later, of course, you come to believe London is right, because San Diego couldn't possibly have a scene, unless it was part Mexican? ... that's not only non-sensical, it is also insulting!
 
In the end, all arts happen, and sometimes they are concurrent, and sometimes they aren't. But the time elements are not always that far apart.
 
In America, for example, the heroes that everyone had were movie stars and eventually some rock stars. Elvis, not withstanding, since his legacy is fame and money and not meaning, the others were all social rebels of a sort. Jimi, Janis, Jim, were no different than your Sylvia Plath's. But if you separate all these, and strictly by themselves, the majority of rock fans don't give a damn about Sylvia or the work she left behind, or her screams, which were no different than Janis! And then, someone is gonna come up and ask me about Iggy Pop! Same thing, and pretty much the punk version in New York, a vision of excesses gone crazy. Is it legitimate? Well, his getting famous, along with the brothers and other bands, the answer would be yes, but again, a similar band in San Diego, couldn't find any legitimacy anywhere else because no one in NY is gonna buy it.
 
I honestly feel that the question is too simplified, to get a good answer, and a college professor would probably nail that paper with a C or a D, for lack of continuity and completeness, and total oblivion to the rest of the world.
 
But it is a valid concern, and something that is difficult to discuss in a board that is only interested in rock music, and doesn't give a poop about anything else, because they never go to the movies or the opera or the museum, because they have been bought out by the Ring, the Potter, and Pepsi!
 
Now, with that in mind, where is the cultural legitimacy, specially when you are not important and no longer a part of the throng? And you think the media will help you, here?  It dilutes the legitimacy, and leaves the top ten alone and a self-fullfilling prophecy, that convinces you that you are wrong and the masses (in this case numbers, not masses!) are telling you what is right, valid and important.
 
The scary part of the 60's that blows away a lot of people is that the scene happened, no one denies it anymore, and it made huge money for many people, which is no longer denied in the world of "greed is good", but the rest is kinda left behind, and ignored.
 
Only to be resurrected by you and I at PA! (I love that part!) ... And sadly, this thread dies out since it is not a top ten thread!
 
 


Edited by moshkito - July 06 2014 at 13:59
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: February 16 2014 at 13:03
The best I can clarify the "cultural legitimacy" part right now is the genres in question having some kind of unifying artistic ethos or philosophical principles behind its style, consciously or not, that comes from a certain heritage within world cultural history perhaps continuing other movements or reacting against them through the specific cultural vantage point of its origin - in a way that leaves some kind of long-term lasting impact on cultural history.
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: February 14 2014 at 04:54
^ Well I sorta get some of that (although it's Friday so I'm slightly inebriated) but I'm not sure that legitimacy should be conferred on certain music just because similarities can be traced in other art forms. I mean we are very often a race of copy cats and plagiarists versus artists who arrive at similar content independently. It stands to reason that form and structure will be replicated across many artistic disciplines but surely the overriding criteria for our discussion here is subject matter?
Yes, many of the musical styles we afford value were a conflation and accumulation of zeitgeist, scenes, shared influences and similarly minded individuals creating their own space for expression. However, so much of the music I seem to value highly appears to have been that sourced from mavericks (Thelonious Monk) misanthropes (Mark E Smith/the Fall) madmen (Lee Perry) and recluses (Scott Walker, Syd Barret) Although we can categorize the foregoing into broad generic styles, to claim with any credibility that say, Monk was Jazz would be at best misleading and at worst only serve to undermine his uniqueness. I guess I'm trying to say that erm...the driver (artist) is more important than the vehicle (music style) hence our endless rubbernecking as we slow down past crash sites like PA....
Good point you raised about the anger/dissent/protest in Pete Seeger and Gil Scot Heron being drawn from the same ne-er-do-well as that of Punk, albeit the fashion cops ensured that neither camp would hook up and become stronger/more influential by sharing their core values etc.Brand loyalty is engineered to be as strong in the record shops as the supermarkets.
All up, I still cling to the idea that cultural legitimacy involves all the perils of a moving target and a never ending revisionism that is invariably monopolised by condescending academics. People in the future will be able to read books about Prog, Metal and Punk which outline their respective credentials with a view to knowing their value. This will mean squat to those who lived through their creation. Better to live than to know I say.Wink



Edited by ExittheLemming - February 14 2014 at 05:58
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: February 13 2014 at 14:04
Originally posted by ExittheLemming ExittheLemming wrote:

To progress this thread any further I think everyone would be quite keen to learn what the OP means by the term 'cultural legitimacy' (in simple terms and frames of reference we can ALL understand) Thumbs Up

Funny that you should post this after my post.

Cultural legitimacy is a funny thing. It can go both ways, and become a hit single and make someone famous, and it can go the other way, and no one ever heard it, but 40 years later someone finds that it was good and very strong, and we didn't see it at the time, because we were into something else.

This is the part that is hard for us all. It is only "culturally legitimate", if you check the other arts, and you can compare them and see what gives. There are many roads and scenes that came and went, and many of those scenes were legitimate, though you could rightly say that they were peculiar to the scene in one place or another. For example, the glam thing in Hollywood/Sunset Strip was not the same as London or NY, but you or I can not say they were not legitimate at all.

Punk, was legitimate in that it was a voice for something in London that was not being heard, regardless of what it seemed to be and came from. But that type of anger, was always around in one form or another, and did not have the same theme. Hearing Gil Scott Heron rap in "Performance" will send chills up your spine! But we can not say that eventually this became a valid form, because its strength was massive and it was to the point, although Gil was going after something that most of us do not think about, specially at the time, when ... the joke was that when you went to San Francisco you go with flowers in your hair, and when you go to London, you have a silk scarf around your neck. And no one in rock'nroll pays attention to the lyrics! Which is the real issue in the end! It's like they are not a part of it all, or the music. 

Where does one start is the problem. The OP is very nebulous and generic, and in a sad way, helps bring out a lot of ideas, that ... many would rather not hear or study, but these are ALWAYS, the enzyme that makes a lot of these scenes come alive. 

It is our not wanting to accept them, or appreciate them, that hurts and causes the anger. But one can easily compare Pete Seeger to the Pistols, and rightly say, there was a point to their voice, though there are times when we just don't want to hear it! Because it isn't the music that we want to talk about?


Edited by moshkito - February 13 2014 at 14:06
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: February 08 2014 at 07:15
Again, sorry I haven't had time for participating on this forum in general and this thread in particular, but this very long article from that webzine mentioned in the OP must surely be relevant. It basically concerns modern underground metal's legacy from not just the literary traditions of epic poetry but also the cultural/religious traditions underlying those. The specific examples used are Atlantean Kodex, Caladan Brood and Summoning but other artists are mentioned... it actually briefly touches on classic prog rock's influence too.
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 30 2014 at 05:59
To progress this thread any further I think everyone would be quite keen to learn what the OP means by the term 'cultural legitimacy' (in simple terms and frames of reference we can ALL understand) Thumbs Up
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 28 2014 at 07:19
Hi,
 
If any of you, want a slight parallel and how things sometimes connect, check this link out and make sure you read it.
 
In America, like everywhere else, a lot of things connect, despite the media always wanting to hide history, in one way or another. It is very nice to see the NY Times show some care on this one, but like the Washington Post, there are times when these folks like to be anti-establishment, and show the group how screwed they can be. And to this day, there are many countries that hound their singers and artists mercilessly, and incarcerate them.
 
A life like this, rarely goes by un-noticed, and to say that anyone, punk, or rap, or otherwise, does not have the ability to stand up is very incorrect.
 
 
There is as much legitimacy to prog, as there is metal, as there is punk or anything else. It's how we relate to it that is different and the true issue. Sometimes, just like school, we just don't bother with history, and you might even consider that American high school history books removed indigenous and black folks from their history up to about 20 or 30 years ago! Sort of like jazz and blues never existed kind of thing, which goes really well with Tom Dowd's short history on his DVD.


Edited by moshkito - January 28 2014 at 07:24
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 27 2014 at 15:02
Originally posted by ExittheLemming ExittheLemming wrote:


I don't often either understand or agree with you Pedro but I do concur with this sentiment. Perhaps play-write John Osborne was an unwitting carrier of the latent Punk virus via Look back in Anger. However, this was 1956 and contemporaneous musical developments at the time were certainly neither in harmonious or dissonant step with any such literary zeitgeist. (perhaps I resent your implication that the theater and cinema had their fingers closer to the pulse than musicians at this time?)
...
 
I think there is a link, but it could/should/would likely be slightly nebulous.
 
It is like saying that you and I don't ever go to theater, film, or see any arts, when in places like London, New York, LA, San Francisco, Paris, Tokyo, it almost the main reason WHY people go there in the first place! BUT, I do not want to suggest that rock music or jazz or whatever, also did not influence these because I think it DID.
 
In some ways, I think that rock music had a lot more guts to do what it went on to do later, than theater or film for example, but when you see Godard just tearing up the whole concept of "film" as if he was ripped senseless with a camera on, it makes you wonder who is reading who, and who is seeing what and who is copying who?
 
If you get a chance, pull out "Tonight We All Love in London" and then ask yourself, what is the connection between all these folks, and this is the part that we're not asking ourselves.
 
Sadly, there is not enough of these "artistic things" these days, to help show music better and the media state is so harsh on these things that I think there will be another revolution soon.
 
Who woulda thunk it. Citizen Kane, is still true after all these years!


Edited by moshkito - January 27 2014 at 15:06
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 27 2014 at 04:53
Originally posted by moshkito moshkito wrote:

 
I am more of a believer that the "punk" think is actually a continuation of a movement that started 10 years before in theater and film, and was called "angry young men" (both English and American variety!), which became well known at the time and gave us some writers, actors and directors, and I really believe that it was just a natural progression of the arts that it would eventually come up and down to others. The proto-type punk, like Sid or Johnny, is an enfant terrible that is rejecting anything and everything, and their feelings were not being heard, until someone decided to take a serious stab at it, and one producer, specially in London, made this scene come alive. But that 's like saying that Marlon Brando screaming Stella is not almost the same thing. Sometimes that is all it takes. America's version, of course, was Martha and George screaming at each other after Tennessee Williams spent his time insulting all his characters! Lyrically, it was very similar to a lot of rock music, right after the anti-war sentiment.
 
The sad part is that "reactionary" scenes don't usually last, and have a tendency to fizzle real quick, and the punk scene came and went and that was that. But sometimes, I still question, was there anything else worth while in the whole scene? And, honestly, I can not find too many things in it that make it worth discussing other than the attitude, but that's like saying that Mick Jagger is not a "punk", and he is! But he is a famous punk!


I don't often either understand or agree with you Pedro but I do concur with this sentiment. Perhaps play-write John Osborne was an unwitting carrier of the latent Punk virus via Look back in Anger. However, this was 1956 and contemporaneous musical developments at the time were certainly neither in harmonious or dissonant step with any such literary zeitgeist. (perhaps I resent your implication that the theater and cinema had their fingers closer to the pulse than musicians at this time?)

That angry young WOMAN, Ulrike Meinhoff probably summed up best the dichotomy at the heart of permissive culture v activist dissent:

Protest is when I say this does not please me.

Resistance is when I ensure what does not please me occurs no more

As far as the very notion of the OP's 'cultural legitimacy' goes, maybe the Greek myth of  Erostratus can teach us a salutary lesson i,e, the destroyer of a cultural artifact is always more famous than the artifact he defiled

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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 26 2014 at 13:20
Originally posted by Cactus Choir Cactus Choir wrote:

...
I've always maintained that linking the advent of punk to Thatcher/Regan is a myth and historically incorrect. Neither was in power before 1979 so how could punk have been a reaction to them? The UK economy had been going down the pan since the early 70s but there was an old school Labour Government in power in 1977 (the "Summer of Punk") with a still comfortable welfare state and relatively low unemployment. I've read one theory that punk would have been much harder if Thatcher had been in power as she brought in youth job creation schemes that you had to attend or lose benefits. Under Labour you could loaf around on relatively decent unemployment benefits and form bands!
 
I am more of a believer that the "punk" think is actually a continuation of a movement that started 10 years before in theater and film, and was called "angry young men" (both English and American variety!), which became well known at the time and gave us some writers, actors and directors, and I really believe that it was just a natural progression of the arts that it would eventually come up and down to others. The proto-type punk, like Sid or Johnny, is an enfant terrible that is rejecting anything and everything, and their feelings were not being heard, until someone decided to take a serious stab at it, and one producer, specially in London, made this scene come alive. But that 's like saying that Marlon Brando screaming Stella is not almost the same thing. Sometimes that is all it takes. America's version, of course, was Martha and George screaming at each other after Tennessee Williams spent his time insulting all his characters! Lyrically, it was very similar to a lot of rock music, right after the anti-war sentiment.
 
The sad part is that "reactionary" scenes don't usually last, and have a tendency to fizzle real quick, and the punk scene came and went and that was that. But sometimes, I still question, was there anything else worth while in the whole scene? And, honestly, I can not find too many things in it that make it worth discussing other than the attitude, but that's like saying that Mick Jagger is not a "punk", and he is! But he is a famous punk!


Edited by moshkito - January 26 2014 at 14:01
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 21 2014 at 06:08
Hey everyone, sorry I haven't replied to this thread for the last couple days... but I've been rather busy in real life and haven't had time to read your posts in depth let alone respond to them. Stay tuned for me to drop in later with some more in-depth commentary and clearing up some things I apparently didn't make comprehensible enough.
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 20 2014 at 13:49
^ Ah... what's the point. Yeah, fine, fine, fine, whatever. I wish I hadn't started now. Is there anything good on telly? Is it tea time yet? That tablecloth needs a damn good ironing. I wonder if the car-wash faeries will pass by my drive tonight, I have a strange feeling that beneath all that grime and road salt there is a shiny red sports car, I'll be glad when winters over and I can drive around the countryside with the windows open and Highway Star blasting out of the stereo, oh what bliss to get away from this preten...
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 20 2014 at 08:19
Originally posted by Dean Dean wrote:

... no one goes running around shouting that The Kinks used an ostinato motif in You Really Got Me, it's a riff. Sorry Pedro, but it's just a Pop tune - a very good one of course, but a Pop tune none-the-less, and in this particular case I do not believe that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. That's not to say that some Prog Rock couldn't be regarded as Art Music but it is never going to be "classical music".
 
 
Yeah, but that's like saying that Bach never worked a "riff".
 
Or Mozart! (you're kidding me!)
 
Or anyone else.
 
The only problem is that for the most part we're dealing with three lines of music (the drums need one?) where most "classical works have 10, 12, 15, 20 or more ... and that makes it, as you say "pop music" and I agree.
 
But there are compositions, by many folks that try to encompass a different sounding instrument, let's say on a keyboard, to make up for something else. I would imagine that we're looking at that as one thing only, and not it's visual design (if there was one -- hard to proove and discuss, anyway), or intent by its creator.
 
But generally, it is a cultural phenomena ... and very similar to one of the most famous attributes to "gothic literature",  the french revolution and its barbarous and public murderous activities.  This is the reason why I like "Marat/Sade" the play, because all of a sudden, it is also a group of low lifes trying to get a life, and an aristocracy that won't allow them.  They are incarcerated! It's a bit of an exageration, but it feels the same. This was what we felt in Lisbon in the 50's and is well documented, just as it was in Spain during Franco's time and the Civil War. Now you know why "Blade Runner" is so valuable to me! And its music!
 
This is the experience that I know, and one of the things that shows it the best is Garcia Lorca and Picasso ... even if we don't realize that, and what "Guernica" is really about. A kid looking out the window and seeing all the bloodshed and hurt. But we think that "reality" doesn't exist, because we are in our "safe" environs, and that can't happen! Now, I can not say that any rock bands will come to the fore and be the equivalent 50 to 75 years later, but you and I do not know this, and probably won't see it in our lifetimes.
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 19 2014 at 11:42
Meh, I remember reading that musicological analysis of Close to the Edge, as I recall it tried hard to prove something but kept stumbling on the fact that so much of it could be traced back to fairly standard rock music structures and progressions, even the overall 4-part structure was more related to standard rock tunes than classical sonatas. As I have often said - Close to the Edge is three normal rock songs crashed together with the final part being a coda that is a medley of those three tunes. The only classical elements are contrapuntal, ostinato and fugato motifs introduced by Wakeman to hold everything together (this much is documented by Wakeman himself) ... and of course ostinato in rock music is better known as "a riff" - giving it a musicological Italian name does not make it "art music" - no one goes running around shouting that The Kinks used an ostinato motif in You Really Got Me, it's a riff. Sorry Pedro, but it's just a Pop tune - a very good one of course, but a Pop tune none-the-less, and in this particular case I do not believe that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. That's not to say that some Prog Rock couldn't be regarded as Art Music but it is never going to be "classical music".


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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 19 2014 at 10:58
Originally posted by rogerthat rogerthat wrote:

 ...
I think the problem people have with this notion is that high or low may come to be equated with the respective economic or social strata.  To extend this logic, as if only academics and such other highly degree-d individuals have the right to decide what is high and what is low art.
...
 
The problem is that ALL books that deal with history of ALL the arts, are done as academic pursuits, or it will be ignored, and has been ignored for hundreds of years, because the majority of the "lower classes' were uneducated, and in many cases, could not even read or write. I've wanted to put together a conglomeration of posts from folks in this board to show how valuable a lot of this work is. But even some folks get terribly yanked when that one guy did an insane breakdown of "Close to the Edge" in the most academic of styles ever done. I don't think we have to go that far, but I'm not sure that we can ignore, that kind of mentality and insanity, and would not want a portion of it, on our work. Or you can go read some pornographic stuff around the century (The Oyster comes to mind!), that has a lot of this discussion in place about the lower classes not being educated enough to even vote, let alone have a say in anything!
 
Education, is ALMOST, a 20th century thing. But you can go back to the Romantic Era of the arts, and already see the lower classes fighting back. If you ever watch the "Sharpe" series, Cornwell's stories are big on showing you how the lower classes helped bring the fight to the "people" and such as well. Even though it is a novel, the period that it takes place already shows signs of fight against the "authority" or the "upper classes" that were in power.
 
I kinda look at the turn of the 20th century as the time when things finally took hold, and individuality in the arts became OK and appreciated, specially in painting and literature. And later, in full force in music as well.
 
I think that, RECORDING, is the difference. Now we KNOW, there was music around all that "classical" and "artistic" stuff, that we know was ignored and not considered intelligent music. And there are many rock bands out there that are far more interesting than any work that Schoenberg, or Rachmaninoff put together, but they are not getting the credit because it is electric and not orchestrated in the way that "it is supposed to!".
 
It's a new dawn and day.
 
We're in the middle of it!
 
And we're the teachers and the folks that will help carry all this stuff through.
 
For me, "PROGRESSIVE" is one of the parts of it all. For me, a lot of it is the "classical music" of today, because all the other stuff has gotten boring, repetitive, and the ballerina has already banged her head and died, according to Ian Anderson!
 
But the "upper classes", will never again, have a say or control over what is good or bad or "classical music". And, honestly, I think that is a great thing!


Edited by moshkito - January 22 2014 at 10:35
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 18 2014 at 21:53
Originally posted by Toaster Mantis Toaster Mantis wrote:

 

In the field of literature, I remember reading interviews with both Stephen King and Amy Tan that at book fairs the questions they were asked by fans revolved around characterization and plot structure whereas "high" authors like Don DeLillo and Cormac MacCarthy were more often asked about the prose style. I think there's some truth about how in literature "low" audiences are more concerned with plot and character, whereas "high" audiences are more concerned about prose style and abstract theme. Just notice which authors of crime fiction have been embraced by academic elite audiences, it' s usually ones like Raymond Chandler and James Ellroy who abandon traditional narrative structures and use very stylized prose. I also remember reading something somewhere about how the metal artists became popular among cultural elite audiences are often more concerned with exploring sonic textures than with identifiable riffing and traditional narrative song structure, but I can't find it now. (when it doesn't have to do with image, like Black Ivory Tower's article about blackgaze pointed out)


Very interesting points.  Metal's own tendency to constantly militate against this typecasting as, well, 'dumb', 'brawn' music seems to confirm the stereotype in a way. As Pedro just said in another context, why would one react strongly to something if one didn't feel insecure that way.  It ties in with my observations of simplistic notions about what makes for good music held in metal circles, the problem not necessarily so much that such notions are held (they may well be by individuals for whatever reasons they see fit) but that these notions are widely endorsed within the metal community and taken as conventional wisdom.  Indeed, music that was actually sophisticated would not seek to constantly shackle its frontiers by rigid adherence to metal norms and would rather seek to subvert the norm.  That is what experimentation is all about.  I just watched Todd Haynes's brilliant short on Karen Carpenter (though I am not supposed to Tongue) yesterday so I could relate to your observations above.  

I think the problem people have with this notion is that high or low may come to be equated with the respective economic or social strata.  To extend this logic, as if only academics and such other highly degree-d individuals have the right to decide what is high and what is low art.  That is something we need to avoid and whether it is high or low depends entirely on the particular individual's level of appreciation.  And by implication, categorising art as high or low based only on the profile of majority of the audience may be simplistic (though I see we are getting into ought v/s is again); the Beatles could after all combine a high level of commercial as well as critical appreciation.  Granted, that's Beatles, but critical analysis that fails to spot genius for what it is is more than a bit of a waste.

 I however fully endorse the line of thinking that an interest restricted merely to plot and narrative is a relatively low level of appreciation and that which extends to form and style is a higher level of appreciation.  If that sounds elitist, I couldn't care less about that. Wink At the end of the day, every avid reader is not necessarily a bestselling author in waiting either. Some people do get more deeply involved in art than others, deal with it.  It is only in art that people have huge problems with accepting this reality. Nobody would grudge a car enthusiast or an amateur chef his passion and knowledge on the subject.


Edited by rogerthat - January 19 2014 at 01:50
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 18 2014 at 17:36
Originally posted by ExittheLemming ExittheLemming wrote:

...
At the risk of coming across like a 'low culture' toerag, what the hell does that mean? ain't the foregoing just a very eloquent way of saying those outside the 'cultural elite audience' are incapable of appreciating the abstract in a work of art?
...
 
As I have mentioned before, this is a problem that we will see an answer from in the next 50 years. Because of RECORDING, this is the first century that we have actually heard anything that was not "accepted" or considered "music" and the histroy of the art form.
 
There is no history of popular music, other than heresay and a few songs, all of which were, still following the old tradition of mouth to mouth and hand to hand, but there was no music, or notation about it anywhere.
 
I've come to believe that there always was other music's out there, popular or not, but too many of them were dismissed as just "bar room" stuff, or "whatever" stuff (so to speak!!!), and with RECORDING, this is no longer going to happen, and someone is always going to find something or other in those, and you and I can easily say and see that there are rock bands that are far better than Rachmaninoff, or Schoenberg! AND more adventurous!
 
But we have this "class" thing that is pathetic, and even some folks love to trash me on it, when I'm always the first to try and debunk that and put down the old historians of the arts, as snobs, which even my family IS, being a part of a very high literary force! They still ask me why I post in places that are not educated and would not understand what I am saying!
 
I'm here, aren't I? Now you know why! That bridge has to die and disappear. Just like we have to stop worrying about black or white, gay or straight. This is about PEOPLE and their spirit as an art form. Do we accept their beauty or not and go find excuses as to why we don't like them or the music? Now you know why I do not go around saying rap stinks, because it doesn't, specially when our attitude does more than all of it out there does! It has a right to live!
 
The cultural rag thing is for folks that feel threatened by their (lack of?) knowledge of things in general, as it threatens their "FAN" concept and ideals. Otherwise you would ask something like -- how do you see that if I may ask? instead of getting offended like so many do here! You would learn something! As would I be appreciative of your asking and helpig me clarify my comments better!


Edited by moshkito - January 18 2014 at 17:48
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 18 2014 at 17:21
Originally posted by Toaster Mantis Toaster Mantis wrote:

...
Then there's the stuff I mentioned earlier about art either actively or unintentionally evoking some external context of meaning, rooted in cultural tradition or autobiography or sociological/political circumstances, lends itself easier to academic analysis despite not having any bearing on its objective quality. This might explain why academics writing about popular music might take so easily to hip-hop, indie, psychedelia and punk, whereas most metal artists' influences from "high culture" is either second-hand through pulp/B-movie escapist genre fiction or filtered through that aesthetic, but of course this theory relies on much generalization and speculation about people's motivations that's hard to verify in particular if you go beyond specific examples.
 
You really want to read Patti Smith's book.
 
It's tough to figure out how to explain all this, and put it into words and many folks here have no idea, and they don't care for ideas, because Kansas is their favorite band, and all of a sudden, your argument is taken out as worthless because of another point that might not, necessarily, be as valuable or important, except to that fan.
 
The fact that some of those individualistic scenes get attention is easy, to show and explain. They stood up and did something different! Kansas, didn't! They had a pop song that did really well on radio and was fantastic for the new FM radio in America, before it became commercialized!
 
I think that as time goes by, that some of this discussion will go more towards the artistic side of the discussion, I hope anyway, because otherwise it is just like the 300 pages on Italian googah, or 300 pages on something or other, and no one, will EVER take a look at those again, and so much of it gets wasted! But I think that the eventual  demise of the populist thing is that no one will ever remember any of it. And too many of the bands out there suffer because of it, even though they tried.
 
As long as you and I see that and we make that visible, I will let the other folks do reviews that this song and that song is progressive because it sounds like Genesis! Or that it is Metal because of the compression or loudness on this or that!  Cool  Ouch  Confused  LOL  Cry  Tongue


Edited by moshkito - January 18 2014 at 17:22
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 16 2014 at 07:01
Originally posted by Toaster Mantis Toaster Mantis wrote:

If there's anything my studies of the subject have taught me, it's that the difference between "high" and "low" culture is mostly a matter of which audiences embrace the art in question. What in turn decides that, though, comes up to different factors.

In the field of literature, I remember reading interviews with both Stephen King and Amy Tan that at book fairs the questions they were asked by fans revolved around characterization and plot structure whereas "high" authors like Don DeLillo and Cormac MacCarthy were more often asked about the prose style. I think there's some truth about how in literature "low" audiences are more concerned with plot and character, whereas "high" audiences are more concerned about prose style and abstract theme. Just notice which authors of crime fiction have been embraced by academic elite audiences, it' s usually ones like Raymond Chandler and James Ellroy who abandon traditional narrative structures and use very stylized prose. I also remember reading something somewhere about how the metal artists became popular among cultural elite audiences are often more concerned with exploring sonic textures than with identifiable riffing and traditional narrative song structure, but I can't find it now. (when it doesn't have to do with image, like Black Ivory Tower's article about blackgaze pointed out)

Then there's the stuff I mentioned earlier about art either actively or unintentionally evoking some external context of meaning, rooted in cultural tradition or autobiography or sociological/political circumstances, lends itself easier to academic analysis despite not having any bearing on its objective quality. This might explain why academics writing about popular music might take so easily to hip-hop, indie, psychedelia and punk, whereas most metal artists' influences from "high culture" is either second-hand through pulp/B-movie escapist genre fiction or filtered through that aesthetic, but of course this theory relies on much generalization and speculation about people's motivations that's hard to verify in particular if you go beyond specific examples.


At the risk of coming across like a 'low culture' toerag, what the hell does that mean? ain't the foregoing just a very eloquent way of saying those outside the 'cultural elite audience' are incapable of appreciating the abstract in a work of art? You make the notion of 'traditional narrative structure' sound like a quaint nursery rhyme that only toddlers, the nil by mouth and mentally infirm continue to invest with any authenticity. Sorry to sound so blunt but this type of arcane speculation is all the confirmation bias the rest of us need to deduce that Prog,Metal or Punk require no retrospective cultural legitimacy conferred on it by academia to validate our tastes.


Edited by ExittheLemming - January 16 2014 at 07:56
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Direct Link To This Post Posted: January 16 2014 at 05:33
I tend to agree with Iain here, that is if I'm reading him right. Very often these pieces look at history in a backhanded sort of way. They emphasise certain patterns that we today, with the gift of looking back from all kinds of different perspectives (much due to a thing like the internet), implement on days gone past without paying much attention to the people who lived it. 

Edited by Guldbamsen - January 16 2014 at 05:38
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