Is the Audience for Popular Music Created by the Music Industries?

Theodor Adorno proposed the argument that popular music is a mass produced commodity in the forties. Pointing out that popular music is researched, marketed, produced and invested in much like any other commodity. This argument seems to bare considerable wait as genres and styles of music often contain sounds that bare similarities. Artistic interpretation means that often songs are repeated but in a different way or genre and creates different emotional and cultural responses to the originals (Dark Side of the Moon/ Dub Side of the Moon.) The creation and existence of sub-cultures whose function is to resist the products of culture industries also seems to refute Adornos’ assertions. Often music industries have been forced to react quickly in order to profit from an emerging trend it has not foreseen due to a shift in the political or cultural landscape. It seems, however, undeniable that the music industries that control more than one media outlet (Sony to give one example) can have no impact on how music is viewed and received. It can be said is that it is a dual entity, always in opposition and affected by many factors. Industry can create culture, culture can fuel or change industry.

Review of Mixmag Magazine.

Mixmag is your weekly read of choice for people who love all that’s alternative, underground, dancy or trancy. With reviews of up-coming albums, festivals and clubs it’s aimed at a mature audience but definitely not a nine to five one. Maixmag also functions as a one stop shop for all your mixing and DJing needs, as well as part time travel guide to the best club trance scenes in Europe. But articles aren’t all about where to find a decent rave or the best new beats on the block. Some take a humours, but still aggressive, side-swipe at authority and the introduction of laws that threaten the growth, or existence, of Clubland.
When albums or musicians are reviewed/interviewed emphasis is on the music not there soaks or grooming habits. Mixmag album reviews also come with a downloader’s guide suggesting the best tracks to download and ‘Like this? Try...’ tips. Good for bulking up you iTunes.
Rating: 7.5 turntables.

Are Blackness and Whiteness Useful Concepts in the Study of Popular Music?

It’s my view that the ‘black music’ and ‘white music’ are useful for talking about the origins of genres of music or for looking at how different cultures combined in the evolution of popular music. However these terms become defunct, or at least highly questionable, when talking of the history of popular music very quickly. There have been many examples not only of sounds, genres and styles combining to make new sounds such Rock ‘n’ Roll. But also artist’s taking other cultures sounds and sometimes doing it better, Eminem for example or Jimmy Hendrix. The former emerged as a dominant and controversial white artist in a predominantly black genre and the latter for the same reasons. Also in the past and even the present there are numerous times when white artists have covered songs originally performed by black musicians making it more popular and vice versa. ‘Blackness’ and ‘whiteness’ are useful terms for looking at the history and genealogy of music or even analysing aspects of contemporary music, but cannot simply be used as terms on their own.

Can Popular Music Really Achieve Genuine Political Change?

Popular music has long been used as a vehicle to express political opinions, to promote policies and ideas. This is not just phenomenon that appeared during the sixties, one example is the anti-English folk songs of the Irish that spoke of freedom and the atrocities of the English. Popular music has long been seen as a threat by establishments. Whether Capitalist, Communist or Dictatorship, the awareness of music’s power to captivate and galvanise its audience into actions has often been cause for both concern and policy change or making. Examples of this include the Criminal Justice Act, the BBC’s refusal to play Paul McCartney songs about Ireland and Bob Doles campaign against Time-Warner’s promotion of Snoop Dogg. However not only does popular music cause its own censorship but can contribute to important political and social change. Billy Holidays song ‘Strange Fruit’ and the pictures that provided the inspiration for the song can be seen as playing an important, if minor role, in changing the attitude towards and social standing black Americans. In my view popular music cannot achieve political change on its own, but it can certainly start and aid the process.

Are youth Sub-cultures Genuine signs of Revolt of Simply the Manifestation of Style?

Sub-cultures can be a revolt. They can show dissatisfaction with the politics in the time of their conception, take for example the miner strikes during Margret Thatcher’s rule as PM. They can embody a new trend or movement in music, as we have been seeing recently with Emo. They can be formed around a minority community coming together for security like the black ghettos of 60’s America. On the other hand subcultures develop a style which allows for members of that subculture a free expression of identity through the image of the self whilst also removing and indicators of class or job they develop a uniform. You can be a bank clerk by day and a Goth by night.
However, often these projections of self image and the cultures, communities, grievances or sounds that initially started and formed the core of the subculture become common place. Adopted or marketed to the masses it is no longer a threat so the revolution, the statement, meaning or message dies and it simple becomes a fashion with no meaning.

Does the Emergence on the Digital Download Signal the end of the Music Industry?

This statement, or ones much like it, have often been used in the past especially when there has been any significant advancement, not just in the entertainment, industries but in all areas of life. Film studios said that TV would make the cinema obsolete, cassettes would kill the music industry. These prophesies of doom however did not come to fruition, the advances made merely change the way in which we listened or viewed product. Digital downloads are no different. Yes a few years back there was and a lot of ‘piracy’. Now however with more flexible DRM laws, the funding and software Apple is producing, which makes operating inside the law easier for the consumer, coupled with a growing awareness of the need for internet security more and more people are using legitimate legal sights which actually contribute the music industry. Also people will always want to go to a live concert. As I said this is changing the way we listen to music as now we restrict our tastes by not needing to listen to anything that we don’t like. We are becoming more insular.

Can poplar Music ever really be unplugged?

In the 21^st century electric, digital and general all-round technology saturation of our culture, and world, has reached the level where nothing is truly unplugged. Albums can be recorded and produced on a single piece of affordable technology in a bedroom. Though music can still be unplugged. Church choirs use their voices to produce music; schools sing songs and nursery rhymes accompanied by a piano. Okay these performances can be recorded, cleaned, produced and replayed electronically but it’s important to note that not ALL performances are. This would reopen the debate as to what classifies as ‘popular music’. If we, for this blog, we take that to mean mainstream artists, groups and their work, I don’t believe they can ever be truly ‘unplugged’ because of recording equipment used, the amplification to their voices etc. But I think that in those situations where the artist is producing an ‘unplugged’ album or concert then the meaning of unplugged changes, in other words it means that electronic technology, and equipment, will not be used to alter or distort the product in a way that would create an inaccurate record of the artists’ skills/work.

What is World Music?

The idea and meaning of world music has changed in the last half-century. Development in the production and distribution technologies and practises of the music industry has transformed the market from one that was primarily national to an international market dominated by American ideologies, formats and values. However this leaves countries with a problem. They wish to maintain their own cultural musical identity, but often the musical infrastructure is insufficient to support or promote artists at the global level needed to fully recoup the cost of investment in them. Therefore countries place quotas for airplay or pass legislation that at least makes sure those musicians can prosper and foster support in their home countries without too much competition from outside. This also allows for the development of the national music industries as has been seen in the case of Canada and New Zealand. Unfortunately though this means that home countries often take on the role of talent scouts, identifying the best of the national talent and promoting them until a Major record label picks them up and distributes them internationally.

Is Popular Music a Mass Produced Commodity or a Genuine Art Form?

Adorno splits music into two categories ‘popular music’ and ‘serious’ music. The main thrust of his argument is that popular music is pre-digested, mass produced and demands little or no active involvement on the part of the listener to give it meaning. This is because each individual part has little or no bearing on the whole in the way that serious music does. Adorno goes on to give examples of how certain symphonies would have no or less meaning if their other elements were different. Much like art no two pieces are the same. Each one is individual and its composite elements go to make the whole. For example Metamorphose of a Narcissus by Dalí, when glanced at seems a simple, if strangely worrying, landscape. When studied more closely other elements stand out that you suddenly realise have lent to the foreboding air of the picture. Popular music is that glance. It is seeing the Mona Lisa simply to say you have, instead of appreciating the artists’ attention to detail, light, or technique, which is serious music. Popular music is there to give “the masses” an escape, distraction without effort. It has replaced religion as the opiate of the people.Its is indeed a mass produced commodity, this doesnt mean its all bad.

How useful is Peterson's production of culture perspective in understanding the birth of rock 'n' roll?

I have found that Peterson’s account of the reasons for the development, and popularity, of rock music in the 1950’s using production of cultural perspective to be intriguing and informative.
I feel the he demonstrates the symbiotic relation ship between Broadcasting Industries, Record Company and Technology aptly. Also his historical reasons for the rise of any alternative style of music, not to the likening of ASCAP executives, being understated until the 1939 licensing dispute, which of course led to the founding of BMI paving the way for Jazz, R&B, Gospel and Country to come together and form Rock sixteen years later was fascinating.
However there are problems with this article. For example in the introductory foot notes he says that ‘Rock’ will be used as an umbrella term for all forms of rock. Surely there must be some distinction between rock music that comes from a country, gospel, or R&B background? Also he disregards technological developments of instruments themselves, which made recording and performing easier. He also doesn’t explore the changing style of music, referring only to the ‘crooner’ style of the 1940’s.

What is popular music?

Popular music can be defined by several criteria in several different ways. For example it can be defined historically, by the means in which it is preformed, produced and marketed or the way in which it is consumed. Popular music can be categorised by class, audience and cultural capital. However each of the above methods of categorisation, definition and analysis have their own floors.
If for example we were to define popular music as mediation between high and low art, where do we place Nessun Dorma performed by Pavarotti that became a number one chart hit in 1990 following its use as the world cup anthem or the dance tracks that make use of samples from opera or orchestral pieces for example the techno remix of Beethoven’s symphony number five, first movement.
Looked at in terms of industry and quantitative measurement, we encounter problems when it becomes clear the what sells is not always good or that popular e.g. the ‘Crazy Frog’ or ‘Flintstones Theme Tune’. Popular music can only be defined by acknowledging the wide spread of cultural, ideological, class, industrial and technological elements that form the ever changing, fluid entity that is ‘popular music’.