Week Eleven: Does the Music Industry create the market?

Adorno characterizes popular music as a production line. It starts with industrial production, then to popular music, then finally to the listener. As he puts the industry at the top of the line, his opinion is that it has control.

My opinion is that the music industry doesn’t solely create the market, but it plays its part in it. I feel the market is created with the help of the contributions of the industry, the music material and the consumer. If you took one part away the whole aspect would be incomplete.

The music industry depends on knowing its market and being able to sell material that will appeal to the market. Therefore the market has great control on the industry. People know what music they like and don’t have to buy what they don’t like. Whatever the music industry puts out there, it is up to the consumer to determine what will be successful.

Bibliography: Longhurst, B. (1995) Popular Music and Society, p10

Week Ten: Review of NME magazine

In this May Issue of NME the editor tells us, “We’ve stripped things back to let the words and photography shine through more”. Yet I’m looking at 161 ads, including adverts advertising advertising space. Right…

The sexy pair of legs on the first ad gives the first indication of who NME aim to please. Guys ageing from 15 to “I wish I was still 15” will enjoy reading features of their favourite genres of music, which is of course, indie and rock. You can feel free to send in your own review of what you’re enjoying or what you're (most often) not.

It’s got all the latest info on gigs, festivals, latest bands with new material from your favourites. This makes the free gift and exclusive with Coldplay a happy bonus, especially the ‘free’ part.

Week Nine: Are Blackness and Whiteness useful concepts in the study of Popular Music?

To better understand music we tend to classify it. Before segregation was illegal the music industry made markets out of ‘black’ and ‘white’ music. Barry Shank talks about 'white fascination with black music'. Where white artists like Elvis were famous for singing what had been defined ‘black’ music.

One singer, Estelle, expressed a controversial opinion about white artists singing soul music [Adele and Duffy] : 'I'm not mad at them - but I'm just wondering, how the hell is there not a single black person in the public eye singing soul? … As a black person, I'm like, 'You're telling me this is my music?''

Duffy responded to Estelle’s comments in an interview on Radio 1: 'If the talent and the desire is there, I don’t really think it matters what colour you are. We don’t live in the 1950s anymore. We're in a multicultural country.'

I think music has proven to be more than what we label it and it shouldn’t be identified by someone’s skin colour. Times have changed and music has evolved with the artists crossing between genres.

Week Eight: Are subcultures a sign of revolt or an expression of style?

With music comes culture and with different genres come subcultures. How do we define subculture? Are they created in reflecting the times or for someone to find their identity?

For example, in the seventies the punk genre of music gave raise to the subculture of skinheads.

Stanley Cohen suggests that subcultures are ‘a gallery of types that society erects to show its members which roles to avoid.’ (1987) Skinheads were definitely people to avoid, as they tended to create riots.

Dick Hebdige however linked style with socio-economic situation ‘…appropriating the rhetoric of crisis…’ (1979) The seventies were tough times and as much as youth wanted to rebel, they also wanted an identity. They did this with eccentric style with leather jackets and safety pins.

I feel the revolt and style definitions to subculture are linked. After all by rebelling against social norms the subculture defines itself with its own styles.

Week Seven: Can popular music be a genuine force for political change?

John Street commented “music has symbolic force, it deploys the power of language to create visions.” Many music artists have tried to use their celebrity influence to put a political view across. However is it really effective?

John Lennon and Yoko Ono released a Christmas single in 1971 delivering the iconic message through the lyrics ‘War is over, if you want it.’ Well it’s 37 years on and there is still war in the world.

Band Aid raised awareness of poverty in Africa and raised a significant amount of money, but the problem is still there.

A lot of music can contain the artist’s personal political beliefs and can provoke political action on a small scale. Does this mean the listener takes it in? Or do they just listen to music they like?

Music is a good tool to put a point across, but does it have a grand politically changing power? I don’t think so.

Week Six: Is DRM the best way to save the music industry?

DRM: Digital Rights Management attempts to control digital music content online. I think this is an impossible task.

The Internet is an almost uncontrollable force. There’s a multitude of websites and programs with downloadable music and there are possible ways to crack security codes.

The music industry is facing great difficulty with losing money to people who would rather download an artist’s track for free than pay for their latest CD.

Limewire (a music sharing program) now has a disclaimer that pops up to warn you what you’re about to load is an illegal version. It keeps them out of trouble, but you can still download the track.

The fact is that illegal music sharing is easy and vast amounts of people do it. Is it really likely the music industry can take every music track off the Internet? If they could how would they find a more productive way of publicizing new material?

Week Five: Can popular music really be unplugged?

In my opinion music started off unplugged. People can sing without any additional equipment (a cappella).

Yet considering popular music in the means of distribution and making music heard by a wider audience, technology is needed. Music grew along with technology from vinyl to mp3.

Paul Therberge states, ‘without electronic technology, pop music in the 21st century is unthinkable.’ In a modern world it is hard to imagine how we’d be able to hear new music or determine what is popular without technology.

The definition of unplugged music nowadays is an artist performing live. Yet they still use technology, singers don’t usually perform without microphones. Live performances aren’t usually the main material on an album and if they are it’s usually a bonus feature.

In a recording studio you’ll see a great range of dials to alter the sound. Experimenting with sounds is how music evolved after all.

Week Four: What is world music and why does it exist?

When I worked in HMV you put CDs into the ‘World Music’ section if you weren’t sure where they went. Here it defined world music as music of the world. Therefore anything could go into it as that definition describes all music.

World music in this country is generally perceived as non-English speaking or music from external culture.

As with all genres in the music industry this kind of music is put into a section, we get certain ideas of what it is and identify it with “the musics of the first and third worlds.” (J. Guilbault)

I think world music exists to make music of another culture outside our own accessible. As Guilbault observes, “World cultures must be conceived also as translational”*. Just because the music comes from another place, doesn’t mean it can’t translate to our own. There are still issues you can find in the music that are relevant to us.

*(Interpreting World Music: A Challenge in Theory and Practice, Jocelyne Guilbault, Popular Music,Vol. 16, No. 1 (Jan., 1997), pp. 31-44)

Week Three: Is popular music a mass produced commodity or a genuine art form?

Adorno defined popular music as ‘standardised’ and believed that it is a mass produced commodity like products made in a production line.

Some agree with this concept as a lot of artists are moulded by the music industry in order to make money. Television shows like ‘The X Factor’ produce pop stars and a lot of winners from the BRIT Awards this year came from the BRIT school.

Regarding whether popular music is an art form, you have to define art. Art is primarily original content created by an artist to convey a message. A lot of popular songs lack originality, as they tend to be covers or written by songwriters. The messages of songs don’t seem to be as important as the money generated from them.

Yet with an emergence of artists coming from the Internet with self made content, there is evident value in originality, which can be defined as genuine art.

Week Two: What are the strengths and weaknesses to Peterson’s production of culture approach to the birth of rock and roll?

There are different theories to the birth of rock and roll. There is dispute which track or artist was the first to spark the trend. Richard A Peterson defines the birth of rock and roll through his theory of production of culture.

“Individuals, organizations and industries that produce cultural products and the techniques used to do so thus define culture.”

He thus provides four roles:

The craftsman (create work but stays out of limelight, e.g. songwriters),

the showman (promotes themselves and pleases crowd, e.g. recording artist),

the entrepreneur (creates solution to unexploited demand, e.g. manager/producer)

and the functionary (follows rules and fulfils roles to distribute, e.g. radio station).

This provides insight into the context of how rock and roll was produced and distributed, but it fails to explain an exact reason why the genre of music was popular and caused upheaval in its time.

What was new and revolutionary about rock and roll music?

Week One: What is popular music?

Popular comes from the latin ‘popularis’, which means ‘belonging to the people’.

In the commercial sense this may be true, as music is accessible to anyone to download, but then again corporations cling to copyright and some artists argue their ownership once it goes into public domain.

Through the years the specific term of popular music changes in people’s perceptions. Some people take it on surface value: Popular music is music that is popular. In this case it can go across the genres of rock, folk, indie and excreta. Others narrow popular music to a single genre of ‘pop’ music, which many people identify as a negative with less artistic value.

Shuker sums the concept up as ‘all popular music consists of a hyprid of musical traditions, styles and influence and is also an economic product which is invested with ideological significance by many of its consumers.’

Well to me music is music, people like what they like. What is deemed is popular is hard to pin down, as no one has the exact same music tastes and in my opinion this makes music more interesting :-D