The rockism debate (with bonus essay!)

Well, to play Devil's Advocate for a moment, there's also rock and roll's emergence, where most of the influential artists were black (Chuck Berry, Little Richard, Fats Domino, etc.). Same thing for doo-wop or even R&B (and I'd say a lot of people could make claims to having grown up with R&B, considering the classic music of Motown is as big as it is).

(I do agree with what you're saying to a point, though. There is definitely something to the idea that most of the genres that get disparaged are predominantly full of black musicians in the public eye.)

edited 18th Aug '13 8:11:16 PM by 0dd1

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I will state my views here as simply and concisely as is possible without losing nuance.

To my mind, the idea that "authentic" music automatically has an edge over "inauthentic" music is very presumptuous. I also find the fetishisation of what I would call emotionally indecisive music—indie-ism, as Quag puts it—a pretty absurd trend resting on faulty assumptions. Furthermore, I do not consider taking pleasure in disposable, silly music necessarily shameful.

But I am not a poptimist. While I do believe that pop music can be as deep and meaningful as less immediate music, I think that the pressure of the environment frequently forces those within it to act in stereotyped ways that are not conducive to making art that is deep and meaningful. Such art within a pop context is the exception rather than the rule.

Yet independent music can be as restrictive and uninspired. In part, this is simply a matter of saturation—great music is, by definition, great, as in not the average—but I would also chalk it up to those same poisonous attitudes related to expression, be they focused on authenticity or maintaining a sense of "cool."

Genre prescriptivism plays into this in a very big way. If music has certain specific attributes in common with other music, then it is fair to put all of that music into a genre. Yet treating that genre as if it be a rule that dictates musical conduct and measuring musicians against that is absurd. As I see it, intent determines form. While randomly throwing elements together because they are cool individually rarely works out, purposefully incorporating ideas outside of one's mien in order to further an underlying theme or ethos is simply a part of the creative process.

I can see how it evolves: Certain genre fandoms can be extremely tribal and political (e.g. extreme metal), with cultures very averse to change; and from a purely financial perspective, it is easier to market music that falls neatly into certain categories. But unless one's particular artistic vision exists solely within such distinctions, this is an unfair expectation for a creative person. Whether it is acceptable emotions or styles or instruments or accoutrements, such demands from without are, again, highly presumptuous.

In the end, I prefer highly individual music that expresses or conveys ideas and feelings that resonate with me. Whether this is shimmering pop ephemera or caustic noise experimentation is ultimately irrelevant. If I connect with the sound and the character of what I am listening to, then all else is simply window dressing.

I'll hide your name inside a word and paint your eyes with false perception.

Amazing how we didn't talk yet about the factor of "cool" or "coolness". Rockists usually prefer this stance either becuase they don't wanna embarass themselves or simply want to maintain a cultural posture. This, in part, ties into ancient Greek (mostly from philosophers) and Christian values (mostly from the Church) that didn't want music to stimulate the bodies (hence why rockists despise genres like House, which are meant to dance to. Even if early rock music was also quite danceable).

Not to mention the gender bias that exists regarding some of said fandoms ("If you don't like rock music, and like pop music, then you're effeminate and campy"). Which ties into the sexism prevalent in some music fandoms (Rock and Rap music, especially).

This.

Tbqh, extreme metal has been change ever since it first came into being around 1984/1985. Considering that it more or less drove metal away from its more rock and roll inspired roots and into a much more compositionally expansive domain, all of metal's major development more or less happens there. Considering the big new thing lately are the more experimental/progressive bands (Demilich, Funcunt, Zealotry, Immolation, Svart Crown, Aosoth, The Chasm etc.), it's actually making ground possibly faster than it was when the first pioneers made their marks. Even so called "worship" bands are changing how we see "old school" music with bands like Blaspherian, Nocturnal Torment, Dead Congregation, Obliteration, Profanatica, and Demoncy taking the classic aesthetic and wrapping it around a more insidious outwards-looking-in approach to songwriting.

Extreme metal isn't adverse to change, only the illusion of it. There's a reason why Necrophagist, Spawn of Possession, Hour of Penance, Born of Osiris and so on are regularly laughed at and spat upon, and it isn't because they're "not fitting into the box", "mainstream and popular", or "not following genre conventions".

edited 20th Aug '13 11:14:48 AM by StillbirthMachine

Only Death Is Real

See, I just listen to whatever sounds appealing to me, regardless of label or genre or whatever. Like, I would probably never call myself a Fall Out Boy fan, but their song "Sending Postcards from a Plane Crash" might just be one of my favorite songs ever. Or, despite my love of folk and folk rock, I've never liked Cat Stevens' "Wild World"*

. Similarly, while I've always had a certain affinity for rock music and tend to venture more toward it than others when push comes to shove, Kanye West has risen to become one of my favorite artists of all the people I listen to. I listen to everyone from people on big labels with big names (The Killers, Green Day, Lady Gaga, Eminem, etc.) to indie darlings and people "you haven't heard of *sneering grin*" (The Apples In Stereo, She And Him, Iron & Wine, Macklemore) to even just local talent (The Gaslight Anthem, Idöl Threat, Taylor Hope), everything from the big influences (The Beatles, The Who, Electric Light Orchestra, Simon And Garfunkel) to forgotten and obscure things that just fell through the cracks or never even dug their way out of the cracks to begin with (the Fu-Schnickens, Pepper's Ghost, Leila and the Snakes)...

You get the picture. On one hand, I understand people's musical palettes are often limited by their own personal tastes (and my tastes happen to be very wide as far as musical taste goes), which is totally fine. The issue is when they start conflating their personal tastes for quality in general, or if they are unwilling to even attempt to expand their tastes. I'll be honest, I had a very rockist mindset for a long while, but I've managed to "recover", so to speak, in that I've opened up the doors to anything and everything I can hear. Which isn't to say I enjoy every damn thing that hits my ears—I'm still pretty critical all things considered —but I at least try to give everything a fair chance, and I've found that often I have a change of heart on a song or artist I might not have either given a fair chance at all or maybe heard but didn't like previously.

I suppose maybe a lot of this is just anecdotal and, to be quite honest, might just be coming off as wanking about how totally unique and open minded I am guys honest!!!one!1! But I do still stand by the idea that unless you don't come at any and all music with an open mind and a willingness to leave your prejudices at the door, giving it a chance to let it move you like a swaying breeze (or a deadly quake), you're not listening to music the right way.

edited 20th Aug '13 9:16:39 PM by 0dd1

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True, but in turn, one, however much they don't want it to be true, also has to except that sometimes the reason they have said prejudices is simply because they don't like a particular sound. Guitar solos have a tendency either to bore me or occasionally irritate me, although not always. I'll always try to listen to one with an open mind, but its pretty rare that doing that does anything but prove to me further that I just don't enjoy the way guitar solos sound.

I think an important factor here is the importance of timbre versus texture to different people. People who conform to any particular mindset of prejudice when it comes to music, be it "rockist", "poptimist", or any other similar such thing, tend to be obsessed with timbre, or the way the music sounds, over anything else. A "rockist" has to have prominent guitars in their music, with perhaps the odd piano driven song. Nothing else will do for them.

On the other hand, someone who is more interested in the inherent texture of the music will often not care, or perhaps even know, the genre of the music they are listening to, but will enjoy listening to many different types of music just to listen to the various different sounds present throughout them.

I think I fall somewhere inbetween the two, perhaps leaning towards the textural side. If something isn't rich in texture it will usually bore me, regardless of the present timbre, but there are certain timbre's I cannot stand the sound of, generally either coming from guitars being played in a certain way which I can't quite define, or certain vocal styles which just don't please my ears. Quality is completely subjective. A song which sounds brilliant to me will sound awful to a lot of other people, and a song which sounds awful to me may sound very similar to a song I consider brilliant.

At the end of the day. Just enjoy listening to music. Don't worry about why, you'll just annoy yourself trying to figure it out.

edited 21st Aug '13 7:37:44 AM by porschelemans

I'm so sorry that my avatar doesn't appear fully in the shot, but the cat was threatening the photographer.

A+

And to answer an earlier post: "self-indulgence" is a kind of moving target. The charge seems justified when the musicians are doing stuff gratuitously over & above what the music calls for ... but not when the music itself is ambitious enough to demand it.

By that standard, most of Yes and King Crimson's stuff isn't self-indulgent (okay, I'll give you most of Tales from Topographic Oceans) because their musical goals require precisely the kind of high musicianship they're applying. It's the same reason that the great bebop musicians weren't being self-indulgent—the complex message matches the complex medium. By contrast, Blue Öyster Cult (whom I love) always struck me as a tad self-indulgent: no prog-rockers they, but their playing always seemed busier than their song structures really required, to the extent that the former would often muddy up the latter. Long story short: "self-indulgence" is relative to one's musical goals.

Just put that on my Facebook. 'Cause I can and 'cause it's cool.

Somehow you know that the time is right.

Pretty much what I was trying to say in my long, rambly post, but I don't know how to condense it down to a bumper sticker.

Either way, yeah, that.

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(three guesses what my favourite Yes album is )

YUUGI WANTS YOU FOR DRINKING BUDDY

I am a bit of a Rockist myself: I really do prefer real instruments and Ringo Starr's on Drums to synth versions of Guitars, Strings and Drum Machines. I don't necessarily look down on people who like that stuff, it's simply my Preference. To Me, Congratulations (by MGMT) is better then then singles from Oracular Spectacular (Again, By MGMT). Wonderous Bughouse is better then The Year of Hibernation to me (Both are made by Youth Lagoon).

It's not that I hate Electro-Music, and of course there are good songs that use mostly Synth stuff and Drum Machines, it's just that, given the option, I will always pick Real instruments.

edited 26th Aug '13 10:06:06 AM by DingoWalley

I take offense to the insinuation that electronic instruments aren't "real". Most of the time there's a real human being banging away on the keys to make those beeps and boops—and when there isn't, there's a real human being actually writing the melody that the computer is playing. If programming a song isn't real, then composing a song for an orchestra isn't real, either.

I will grant that synthesizers trying to sound like other instruments are almost uniformly awful. Synth strings? Bluh. Just get a string quartet! It'll be worth the extra money! But when synths are used to make sounds that no other instrument could ever make, the results are breathtaking.

Check Derrick May's "Strings of Life" for synth strings done really well. Or other famous early Techno tracks for that matter.

edited 26th Aug '13 3:21:57 PM by Quag15

I'm usually not a fan of synth strings, but they can be done well. Particularly interesting are situations in which the synthetic or sampled portion is juxtaposed with live instruments in a complementary fashion (e.g. Coil's "Ostia (The Death of Pasolini)") or, as is naturally the case with devices like the Mellotron, distorted in such a way as to make it a whole new timbre.

I'll hide your name inside a word and paint your eyes with false perception.

I'm mostly okay with synth strings if the person is obviously working on a budget and couldn't afford to hire a string quartet. On the other hand, if big performers (especially ones who are known for their lush orchestral productions, *coughJeffLynnecough*^note Why yes, I am still pissed that he prefers synths over life orchestras now, why do you ask?) do it, I feel like there's no excuse unless they specifically want the sound of a synthesized string. If you can afford to hire a string quartet with no problems, that's when I take issue.

Same thing with synth horns. Even worse, actually—I've never been able to stand synth horns—they always sound so flat and lifeless to me. Compare The Beatles' original recording of "Got to Get You Into My Life with this live version Paul Mc Cartney performed in 2009. Not quite the same oomph to it, and the chords played on the keyboard even sound really dissonant at certain parts, notably when it gets to the riff at the end of the chorus. It just sounds really cheap, and for a performer with such gravitas as Paul freaking McCartney, that's just unacceptable. Everything else about the song is great—hell, even the keyboard player is at least playing well—but the sound coming from that keyboard just ruins it all.

edited 2nd Sep '13 12:46:55 PM by 0dd1

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Except the cost and logistics of touring with a full backing of a horn or string section can at times prohibit even the most popular and successful artists from bringing in such features to anything more than one-off concerts while still proving profitable. One has to remember that being able to play 50 concerts with perhaps slightly cheaper tickets in exchange for having slightly odd synthesiser arrangements for some parts of some songs is preferable for everyone over an artist only playing 10 gigs, fully backed on every song, with extremely high ticket prices.

I do agree that on recordings synths should be used either for being synths or as a way round not being able to hire an actual orchestra etc., but I feel one should be more forgiving of live performances, and also remember that the great thing about synthesisers is that there are a lot of cases where they can produce a sound that no other instrument easily can.

I'm so sorry that my avatar doesn't appear fully in the shot, but the cat was threatening the photographer.

I do like synths when used in unique ways (or when they're just being themselves), certainly. One of my favorite bands was very synth-heavy in their beginnings, especially on their most popular album. Hell, without the synthesizer, I doubt The Killers would've ever existed. I guess I just figure that if someone is prominent enough to literally be able to burn money and not have to care, they should have relatively little problem hiring at least a small horn section. I remember I went to see TMBG, a band who survives off of a fierce cult following, in a cramped little club and even still they had a horn section with them.

If nothing else, at least for one-off shows like the concert in the video I linked. I could see definitely how there'd be trouble with having tons of backing musicians for a tour, but a one-off wouldn't be nearly as troublesome I'd expect.

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@Stillbirth Machine: I'm aware of critics of tech-death, but is there some sort of backlash against the big players, please explain.

As for electronics, just doen't add a keyboard to your metal band and call it Symphonic Metal. Nothing against keyboards, if you are trying to go for a sound that isn't possible with a musical instrument.

@reub 2000

Synthesisers are musical instruments.

I'm so sorry that my avatar doesn't appear fully in the shot, but the cat was threatening the photographer.

In more underground extreme metal circles, technical, melodic, and brutal death metal are generally seen as bad jokes and what happens when extreme metal loses its artistic focus, turning into self-indulgent displays of technical ability, regressing into the thrash/traditional metal that preceded it, or being dumbed down into "backwards baseball cap bro metal". This is primarily in the oldschool/revivalist metal community although the folks into the post-Immolation/Gorguts/Demilich experimental stuff tend to share somewhat similar opinions.

As for symphonic metal, if it's got the sound, I don't really care whether or not they used the synth. As long as it's good.

Only Death Is Real

Porschelemans, of course Synthesizers are an instrument. The Problem is the Synthesizer is trying to be every other instrument including a Synthesizer. Instead of being a Specific instrument like a Piano, a Guitar, a Bass or a Drum Set, it has the ability to pretty much be all 4 of those, as well as Strings, Horns, Woodwinds, other Percussion instruments and other types of Keyboards. Heck, it can even do basic background Vocal stuff (Ooohs and Aaaahs mostly).

There's a time and a place for Synthesizers: Making it every instrument your band has and masquerading them as another instrument is not it's time or place.

Depends purely on how good you are at using synthesisers. If it sounds good it sounds good, doesn't matter how it sounds good.

I'm so sorry that my avatar doesn't appear fully in the shot, but the cat was threatening the photographer.

It can also be an accordion and, as I've found with my keyboard, several different Chinese instruments and spacey sound effects that don't really gel too well with anything else.

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What I'm saying is that a synth isn't an orchestra. It's a synth. Like tofu is yummy stuff, just don't try to convince me that it's a hot dog.

Still, it can be used to replicate the same sound as an orchestra. I don't mind bands being called "symphonic" even if they don't have the real deal if they more or less capture the same general feel.

Only Death Is Real