--- Victor Johnson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > I simply do not like much of > the modern hip/hop/r&b > music that seems to be very popular, for the most > part because of the > repetitive electronic sounding beat that drives me > mad.
Of the artists I mentioned, only one (Mary J. Blige) works predominantly with beats such as you describe. Lauryn Hill works as much with more organic and traditional soul sounds as with electronic hip-hop, and Maxwell, D'Angelo, Erykah Badu, and Jill Scott almost exclusively work with organic and, yes, acoustic instrumentation. I was *not* attacking Kate or her motivation/point in posting the article. What I'm questioning is why this trend--i.e. this *change*--is only notable to marketers and certain segments of the public when it occurs in predominantly white music. The change/trend has been around in predominantly black music for quite a while. And most of the white public, including much (though *certainly* not all--hi Bob!) of this list is completely ignorant of it. What is more, this change has *not* been a zero-sum game; i.e., the sonic palette of black music has *expanded* to include organic sounds and artist-written songs while more electronic music continues to enjoy both creative and commercial success. (Of course, this expansion is itself a cycle, retrieving the greatness of '70s soul while continuing to push hip-hop forward.) This article, on the other hand, suggests that teens and Sam Goody staff--most of whom we must presume to be white--see a move coming *from* electronic pop music *to* guitar-based music. What is more deux, the article ties three not-necessarily related concepts (e.g. guitar rock, singer-songwriters, and authenticity) into one apparently seamless whole. I.e., guitar rock and singer-songwriter styles are in a certain sense one and the same, and these styles are inherently more authentic than whatever came before. This is bullshit on two accounts to my mind. In general usage the "singer-songwriter" term is called on to perform double-duty. While most often it refers to a specific genre descended most directly from folk, (though with other influences of course), it also retains the literal meaning that is its etymology--an artist who sings and writes songs. These two concepts and categories do not map onto each other perfectly, of course, and it is in this slippage that the crux of my argument lies. I am not talking about mere semantics here--that would be simple enough to resolve. Rather, I suggest that the word slippage both reflects and contributes to a slippage in the way people "order" music in their minds. (Just struck by what a felicitous triple pun order is here: order as organize, order as hierarchy, and order as request. I think all three meanings apply.) Anyway, the s-s term's double duty means that our kneejerk reaction is to assume that artists outside of that genre, narrowly defined, do not meet its literal definition. The ones who write their own songs are the singer-songwriters--of course! A similar assumption is made about rock artists, and here we see the twinning of these two genres. Many in the general public assume anyone outside of these genres have *no* hand in writing their own work (can I tell you how many times I've had to convince people that Madonna actually co-writes most of her work?). This is true even when there is stylistic common ground--as there is with the instrumentation of a Badu or Scott record and much rock 'n' roll. But who gives a shit, right? It matters because of the second assumption--about authenticity. The assumption that the inner self is authenticity's sole location catalyzes assumptions about the romantic genius of the solo troubador to give the s-s genre something of a monopoly on integrity and "realness." Those who fall outside the genre in our minds also fall somewhat outside these values in our minds. In my view authenticity takes many forms--including the sheer bliss of a disco tune or the tragic horror of an Eminem suicide ballad. (Actually, in my view authenticity is too highly rated as an artistic virtue, and sometimes the most authentic thing one can do is to foreground inauthenticity. This explains the lion's share of my love for Madonna.) Anyway deux, and in my opinion, it is this complicated implicit mental order that allows us to see a return to the s-s/rock *genre(s)* as an inherently good thing--even when artists have been filling the literal definition of s-s and the aesthetic values of authenticity for years, albeit in other genres. And yes, I think a certain implicit racism accompanies this mental order. No need to dredge up the intellectual/political/military history of colonial racism here, but I think it is no secret that the values of rationality and romantic interiority/self-examination have their roots in the Enlightenment and that, from this vantage point, the values of the world's sundry darker peoples have been somewhat inscrutable and devalued. While we all have "tastes," to be sure, those "tastes" are always deeply socially embedded and rest upon traditions of which we must be aware and whose values we should question at least occasionally. More simply and more to the point, we must remember that most racism is neither explicit nor conscious, and any belief or practice to the contrary is the surest way to nurture its continued growth within ourselves as people and as a people. Whew! --Michael NP: Eminem, _The Marshall Mathers LP_ ===== ____________________________________________________________ "Greetings cards routinely tell us everybody deserves love. No. Everybody deserves clean water. Not everybody deserves love all the time." --Zadie Smith, _White Teeth_ Yahoo! GeoCities - quick and easy web site hosting, just $8.95/month. http://geocities.yahoo.com/ps/info1
