Postmodernity, the Mass Media Fringe, and the 'Who Gives a Shit?' Attitude That I Used to Have and Maybe Still Do

Girl Talk's new album came out today. Or yesterday, or two days ago, depending on how long this post is in draft limbo (four days, it turns out).

If you don't know, Girl Talk is a recording artist who takes music samples from pop, rock and hip-hop, cuts them up, rearranges them, and makes an album length tapestry out of these samples, then posts them online for free.

Two questions:

1. Is it art?

2. Who gives a shit?

For the purposes of this discussion, I'm going to focus on one specific minute of the album, specifically 5:25 to 6:29 of the second track, "Let It Out," on the album.

So, question one: Is it art?

First of all I'm going to admit that I'm only focusing on this particular minute of the entire album for two reasons: one being that it features a sample by Fugazi, the second being that it blew my mind.

The Fugazi song that Girl Talk (real name Greg Gillis, so I guess that's what I'll call him from now on) samples here is "Waiting Room." It's arguably their most famous song and it's about being in prison, but I'm getting ahead of myself. Both the song and the sample start out with the reggae influenced bassline, the kind of musical style that propelled the band to its great status within their time (and now, I guess). Eventually it enters into a guitar riff that follows the bass' lead. Now, on top of that, Gillis layers on Rhianna's voice, specifically the first verse, pre-chorus, and chorus to her song "Rude Boy."

The musical connections there are easy enough to make. A reggae influenced bass line with a song a about rudeboys. It's a relatively simple aural asssociation.

But let's take a look at the deeper political connotations of the pairing. Sure, the primary usage for Gillis' music is booty-shaking, and I love my share of booty-shaking, but the dude was a bio-medical engineer before he started making music full time. I'll give him the benefit of the doubt of being smart enough to realize these things.

So, political connotations. Like I said before, "Waiting Room" is about being in prison and how nobody gives a shit about you if you're in prison. "Rude Boy" is obviously about rudeboys, a Jamaican musical subculture with ties to poverty and gang violence. Over the Fugazi sample, Rhianna sings "c'mon rude boy boy, can you get it up?/c'mon rude boy boy, is you big enough?"

She's talking about dicks, guys.

And not just dicks, but, of course, masculinity. Are you man enough to have sex with Rhianna?



But contextualized within the title of her song, she's also talking to the masculinity of poor, disenfranchised black youths. Disenfranchised minorities is something Fugazi knows, and makes music, a lot about. Growing up in D.C. during the 80's will do that to you.




But here, the questioning of masculinity is juxtaposed against a song about prison. The statement I gather from is that maybe a lot of poor black guys are in prison because of how hard they need to prove their masculinity, and thus, their worth in a society that doesn't seem to see them as "big enough." This one minute of sampling two musical acts that have very little to do with each other makes a pretty bold political statement about society's treatment of disenfranchised minorities.

I've heard Rhianna's "Rude Boy" a couple of of times, and it's a pretty sweet song. I've heard Fugazi's "Waiting Room" a whoooooole fuck ton of times because I think it's awesome. I would never consider myself dissecting a Rhianna song for the socio-political commentary, nor did I ever think of seeing Fugazi's "Waiting Room" through the the specific lens of Jamaican youths.

That's not even mentioning that never in a million years would I figure Rhianna and Fugazi work so well together.

There's a perspective on art, held by the Russian Formalists (but you really didn't need to know that), that the most important aspect of art is defamiliarization. That is, taking the normal and everyday, putting it into a different context, thus forcing the viewer to see the normal in a different perspective, and so, not-normal. I'd say for me Gillis does this very well.

So this is art.

You could argue that it isn't because all he is is taking other people's art, cutting them up, mixing them together, and calling it his own, but you'd be wrong. There's a certain level of expertise that Gillis brings to the game: he has an amazing ear for both melody and timing. He can synthesize backing guitar tracks from 70's pop-rock with contemporary underground hip-hop, altering both to make them fit, and make something completely new out of it.

So yeah, there's that.

BUT WHOOOOOOOOOO CARES?!?!?!?!?

Well a lot of people, actually. Especially the artist. Why does an artist create? Why do musicians do music? Why do writers write? Sure, because they're inspired, and they want to say something, and they want to make money, and they want to get laid etc. etc. But REALLY. Why?

Because they're scared of death. Who isn't?

Heavy, right?

Creating something beautiful that's truly worth preserving is an attempt at immortality: to have your name, and their for your self, be mentioned far after your dead is the closest thing we've got. Those who succeed at making art that truly reverberate within the culture end up becoming immortal. You know who's immortal? Ernest Hemingway. Miles Davis. Andy Warhol. Those guys are probably going to stay alive forever, as long as we, as people, keep them within the canon of their respective fields. That's our duty. That's our responsibility.

But in this postmodern world, where everybody is referencing everybody, and everybody is doing something, how do we differentiate the good in the bad? For instance there are tons of mashups on YouTube, most of which are shitty shit shit shit. My goodness, they're horrible. What separates them from Gillis? Two things: quality and prolificness. Gillis does it better. He has a better ear than most, and picks from a wider range of music. Also, most of his samples lasts roughly a minute or less, sometimes layering on more than three samples at a time. And he does this for the length of an entire album. That in itself is a feat.

Gillis is above the rest. That is true. But what's so difficult about this today, is that there's SO MUCH SHIT out there in the world. Everyone has a voice, everyone has the access to make something. Even I have a voice. Am I worth listening to? Since you've gotten this far into whatever this thing is, then you must have a reason for doing so. Hopefully it's the quality of the post, but I don't need my ego stroked any more.

But Gillis perhaps best represents the paradox of art in the Internet age. He might be considered "low art" considering his usage of popular music and its accessibility as nothing but a soundtrack to parties. But I'd argue that he's very much up there in the "high art" category because of the multitude of complex ideas presented by his juxtapositions. But he's also working within a musical form within which he is the only exception to banality. But who's to say? He won't win a Grammy, ever, simply because he's not on a major label. And he'll never be on a major label because a lot of what he's doing is very illegal. The Grammy's suck, too.

So who's to say if he's art or not? Who's to say if he's worth sticking into the canon? Somebody must be. Is it popular opinion? I fucking hope not. If popular opinion was the main factor in deciding high art from low art, we'd be in a bad, bad, bad fucking place.

You know who should have the say? Critics. Critics who are knowledgeable about whatever field they're criticizing. It seems to be the only way. But is that even possible? With the Internet, everybody's a critic. Every Amazon commenter on movies seems to think he/she has the same weight as someone educated like A.O. Scott or Roger Ebert or something.

This is really hard to think about. I'm not going to solve this in a blog post. The very fact that this is a blog post is part of the problem I'm trying to represent (how meta of me).

It's important to pick out the few and the good from the ugly masses. Because if we don't, then there really won't be a point.




Edit: Just a thought I came up with. Maybe the quality of a work dictates itself the level of its own artistic quality. Gillis shouldn't need others to promote his work as art for him. People should be able to discern for themselves. Of course this is an ideal. The solution to get there? Well, it's the solution to get anywhere: education. If from the start, kids are educated on the quality of works, then the world would be a better place. If English classes were better from the start, maybe shit like Harry Potter wouldn't be so highly regarded. If music were taken more seriously from the start, maybe more common people would start paying attention to the challenging noise/jazz/experimental guitar music of Nels Cline. Maybe. Hopefully?

Social Interaction is Overrated

According to this New York Times article, kids text a lot. GRIPPING JOURNALISM! It goes into depth as to the perceivable results of texting (lots of sex and lots of drugs, or something), but they never really get at why kids text. It's a lot more convenient, right, no shit. The article finally hits gold when one girl tells the Times:

"'Your arm gets tired, your ear gets sweaty," said Ivanna, who also doesn't like the awkward silences.'"

Sure she's lazy, and really, who likes sweaty ears? But it's the apprehension towards awkward silences that really gets me.

I don't much like texting. I don't have a nice keyboard phone to do it really well or anything, and I'm fucking terrible at T9. I usually use it for simple questions like "do we have eggs at home?" or "did you barf?" Other than that, I don't use it much. In fact, I have a very harsh loathing for "text conversations." Should an exchange via text go more than two times around, I usually either stop and call the person, or just stop altogether.

This is my phone. Hot shit, isn't it?

It seems to me that Ivanna loves text conversations. Ivanna gets to avoid any awkward silences she might have with her friends while she texts. You know how else you avoid awkward silences? By not being socially inept. That's the catch. As kids younger and younger stop talking to each other face-to-face and start interacting more on a digital level, they won't have to learn how to act when around each other on a normal social level.

Now, is this really going to happen? Are we going to wake up one day and find ourselves awash in a school yard full of Michael Ceras? Probably not. I mean, digital conversation has been around since the age of the Internet. AOL Instant Messaging probably led to thousands of teenage sexual escapades and helped kids looking to avoid the awkward silence that actually comes from talking on the phone. I've been through that; that's essentially my generation. What's the difference between my generation and Ivanna's? Portability.

Goodness, I hope not.

What does it matter that digital communication is portable? It's unlimited, unrestricted access. You use to have to go to a computer to IM someone. Now you don't. Why does this matter? In your pocket ALWAYS, then, is a way to contact everyone you know. That sounds all fine and cool until you realize SO DOES EVERYONE ELSE. EVERYONE. Who likes everyone they've ever given their number to? Not me. But what's the difference between repeated texting and someone repeatedly calling someone over and over and over again? What's the difference between texting and IMming someone over and over and over again?

Well the difference between IMs and texts are that you can block someone on Instant Messaging programs. You can do it on phones, but I've yet to occur anyone who does that. Why?

Going back to Neil Postman's idea of "the medium is the message," text messages mean inherently less than actual phone conversations. By which I mean, it weighs less in emotional/personal substance. Because it means less, it's less of a commitment to send a text message rather than calling someone. Because it's less of a commitment, it's more likely for someone to text someone because it's overall less bothersome. People are also more likely to receive and ignore a text because it does mean less. So texts are generally seen as less invasive than both phone calls and IMs because they're just little bits of whatevers. People I know just tend to receive texts and just keep on rolling. Following me?

Picture text message as little balls of paper with small messages written on them and then thrown to the receiver. Everyone has the ability to throw one of these paper balls to anyone whose number they have. But like I said, there isn't much meaning to these messages. So imagine entire torrents of paper balls filled with bullshit being thrown all over the world, none of them meaning much. Because they're so easy to catch, you end up catching all the ones thrown at you. Eventually, you're so caught up in being pelted in the face with balls of paper that all because you don't like awkward silences. It seems like a lot. I wonder how Ivanna deals with it.

Good Riddance, Keen

Merchandising!


When Andrew Keen's Cult of the Amateur came to me in the mail via Amazon, the first thing I did was flip to the chapter "The Day the Music Died [side a]." After rolling my eyes a bit at the title, I read the chapters unsurprised at the stance he took. But it really isn't that simple, Keen.

Yes, the fall of the local record store is one to bemoan. It sucks. Even in New York City, all of my favorite ones have closed down leaving me to have to take the oddly convoluted subway route to Williamsburg, Brooklyn to buy my music. It sucks that I can't hang around a record store and talk to knowledgeable people about music face-to-face. It also sucks that a lot of bands are getting shafted from profits that would be gained through their music sales.

OH WHOOPS.

Remember Steve Albini? I mentioned wanting to write about him in the first entry of this blog. In the early 90's, he wrote this essay called "The Problem With Music" for Maximum RockNRoll. In it, he breaks down the income a band that's signed by a major label and under contract, complete with a chart and everything. Adjust for inflation, and you'll find that bands are still fucked. That's the problem with music. That's the problem with art. It's simply not a good way to make money.

Keen asks "With fewer and fewer people buying the physical albums, where is the money for the record industry and the recording stars?"

Firstly, fuck the record industry. It's their own fault that it's taking them this long to realize that their model for doing business is an archaic one.

That out of the way, there's a very obvious way to create a draw for physical albums: include something special in its physicality.

This is going to sound snobby as hell, but any music I buy, I'm going to buy on vinyl. Jesus Christ, that sounded a lot worse than I wanted, but whatever. I buy vinyl neither for the false sense of the superiority nor for the superior sound quality that vinyl inherently offers. I can't really afford sexy speakers that would draw the sound out. The reason I buy vinyl is that I love both the huge album art as well as colored records. There's something special about holding a piece of music encased in a perfect one foot square.

That's not the only way to draw people to buy physical music. Later on this year, Sonic Youth front man and guitar virtuoso Thurston Moore is going to release In Silver Rain with Paper Key

which is some sort of combination of music, art, and poetry. In short, to stay competitive, artists have to be creative.

John Cusack's character in High Fidelity would probably be equally as obnoxious online.

But the recording stars? How are they going to get money? This is a tougher question to answer. My favorite band since high school has been Fugazi, a band that has prided themselves on their integrity and DIY ethic. They were on a label created by the front man Ian Mackaye, dictated that their albums be sold for no more than 8 dollars (again, adjust for inflation), wouldn't play shows that weren't both all-ages and over a certain price-point. There's a couple other bands that follow suit in the current underground punk scene today. The record label Mackaye started is still up and running.

On the other hand, another music guy I look up to, Ted Leo (of Ted Leo and the Pharmacists) has recently announced that he's probably going to stop touring and settle down because touring doesn't pay the rent (there has also been reports of his wife suffering from some health issues). If this is indeed true, then that is a great loss to the world of popular music.

What's the answer, then? Keen's solutions at the end of the book involve lawsuits to those that break the law. Fair enough. Fair enough until it gets in the way of an artist being able to appreciate his art being out in the world. Case in point: Mark Linkous died before he could see an official release of a project he did with DJ Danger Mouse that was being held up due to disputes with the record label EMI. It's fair enough until the RIAA starts making examples out of twelve year old girls and old ladies who clearly don't have the money to pay them. Lawsuits aren't a mend to the wound. They're an amputation of the limb with a rusty saw and no anesthetic.

I honestly don't know what the solution is. You know why? Because I can't tell the future. Things will come and things will change, and we as people, will adapt and deal. If you look back to old folksongs and blues that popped up before the idea of "Intellectual Property" came into the stage, those are still musical landscapes rich with artistic texture. Reading the art-oriented chapters of Keen, I kept thinking back to T.S. Eliot's essay "Tradition and the Individual Talent," especially the part where he says

"To proceed to a more intelligible exposition of the relation of the poet to the past: he can neither take the past as a lump, an indiscriminate bolus, nor can he form himself wholly on one or two private admirations, nor can he form himself wholly upon one preferred period. The first course is inadmissible, the second is an important experience of youth, and the third is a pleasant and highly desirable supplement. The poet must be very conscious of the main current, which does not at all flow invariably through the most distinguished reputations. He must be quite aware of the obvious fact that art never improves, but that the material of art is never quite the same."

Things change, Keen. For better or for worse, things change. But we can rest easy with the fact that no matter how it's being distributed, presented, or profited from, art will still always be there.