What Is Rockism ?

xp

brittany did a solo project i think--thunderbitch

yeah, i recoiled from the shakes' first project, but loved the second

What I said on the other thread:

there is no clear distinction between aesthetics and social commentary

Yeah, I don't agree with this at all, or at least I don't think it's any truer than saying "there is no clear distinction between aesthetics and physics".

― The nexus of the crisis (Sund4r), Wednesday, October 24, 2018 8:45 AM (one hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Tbf, though, you clarified your position, ogmor, and I understand it better now.

I've heard Physical Graffiti! IIRC I loved Ten Years Gone and obviously Kashmir but didn't find much of the rest particularly exciting. I'm sure I could put together a LZ compilation from all their albums that I'd enjoy

If this isn't Rockism...

https://imgur.com/a/dgFzB8f

Oops:

https://imgur.com/a/dgFzB8f

the fact that some things are definitely red and not orange does not mean there's a clear distinction between red and orange

― ogmor, Wednesday, October 24, 2018 10:39 AM (fourteen minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

You're making the apples and oranges idiom complicated

ppl have been appealing to physics to justify and explain aesthetic/musical preferences & principles since ancient times so it seems like an apt comparison. I'm taking 'social commentary', 'social positioning', 'sociology' (?!) or whatever other reductive name you want to give it to refer to the wider human/social/human significance, or if you like, the semantics behind the semiotics. The Actual Music is the means to an end* - das effekt as bach wld have it - and when the ends are rotten it seems masochistic to insist we dwell on exactly how they were achieved

*w/ standard caveat abt redundance of authorial intent, things being repurposed, misheard, mutable &c.

Yeah, I do think it is. I just hear "you can't separate the music from the physics" far less than I hear "you can't separate the music from the social commentary/political context", at least from the sorts of writers who are discussed most often here. But the position you were taking was less extreme than the position I originally thought you were taking (and which is one I have heard elsewhere).

Danava are cool btw.

although I'm listening to Chris Lightcap now

Middle school aged kids still want to learn these songs on guitar.

One notable thing is that apparently Bon Jovi has become a solid part of the canon, at least as far as these kids are concerned.

is it Wanted Dead or Alive?

That intro part is pretty fun to play and sounds more complicated that it is so it makes u feel cool

Yeah, I was asked to teach that one for sure. Also, a kid requested "It's My Life" from guy who was training me at a new gig last week.

I went with some friends to see Wolfmother a few years ago, they were ok but I chiefly remember this couple’s conversation outside the show:

Girl: I'd rather see Led Zeppelin, y'know?
Guy: I'm not gonna lie, I'd see them, but it's not what it was.
Girl (gesturing at the venue): THIS isn't what it was! This isn't even what it is!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKDvJTxZDbA

“The past is never dead. It's not even past.”

I’m not looking for masochistic dwelling on the horror of bad music. I don’t believe, though, that this band is all manufactured nonsense that can be explained away with those two statements. I ‘d like to know more about how and why their music fails, if someone thinks that that it does.

yeah it's funny like if this was some hairy old band from cleveland that was exhumed for a numero group comp rock dorks would j/o over it

Boy the last Endless Boogie record was a drag.

I ‘d like to know more about how and why their music fails, if someone thinks that that it does.

Their music is plodding, rudimentary & graceless; the singer is a shrieking abomination; his lyrics are risible; the songs' melodies are unremarkable. The guitar riffs are OK.

Why do you think it succeeds?

Was just listening to that long first song - I was surprised that they were able to capture a little of the folk melodicism that was there in late '60s/early '70s British hard rock. I know it's partly a Zeppelin thing...

But I thought it was cool. That's a cool thing for a 19-21 year old to capture. The song is constructed nicely.

I don't mind the lyrics.

I cannot tolerate his voice at even the lowest audible volume.

c'mon tim this band is garbage and you know it

Alabama Shakes have kinda disappeared, huh?

They're off raising kids and shit. Might be a while before the next LP.

Girl: I'd rather see Led Zeppelin, y'know?
Guy: I'm not gonna lie, I'd see them, but it's not what it was.
Girl (gesturing at the venue): THIS isn't what it was! This isn't even what it is!

What isn't and what could never be

I don't think the melodies in "Anthem" are rudimentary either. A bunch of interesting contours for the simple chords.

https://pitchfork.com/thepitch/beach-house-are-the-chainsmokers-type-of-thing-and-i-kind-of-want-to-die/

I've been thinking about what Whiney said about there being no true poptimism right now, and I think he's right. This article demonstrates a few things about the new-era rockist orthodoxy to me, which relies heavily on a flipped set of assumptions around race and gender compared to traditional rockist attitudes, but is at its core, the exact same thing. I feel like there's this assumed college age-white-frat-boy-who-is-inherently-racist-and-sexist bogeyman figure who may not actually exist that appears (either subtly or prominently) as a figure in a lot of this era's rockist writing, whereas previous rockist orthodoxy reflexively considered anything liked by women, people of colour and the queer community as unserious and not worthy of attention. Some features of this era:

* Reflexively disliking or hating pop music without any real thought is okay if the band in question is perceived to have a fan base heavily consisting of white frat-kinda-guys, or the band is composed of white-frat-guys

* White-frat-guys "don't understand" or "appreciate" the true meaning or feeling behind music, and therefore their efforts are less authentic and valuable, especially when they refer to or sample music by women, people of colour or the queer community

* Saying you like a certain band still infers a level of assumed intelligence or coolness, but it's important that the band you like is: a) female-fronted, and b) not known about by, or actively enjoyed by the-white-frat-guy

It's an understandable correction to attitudes that permeated rock writing for many years, but because it relies on treating certain music with automatic contempt, and certain music as automatically above reproach, it's just rockism in a new outfit.

guessing this is gonna turn into a shit show

I didn’t realize Beach House were such a big deal.

One issue I've noticed in over the past 15 or 20 years is that critics seem to feel the need to comment on all the genres, instead of just the ones they are most qualified for, whatever that means.

Is it rockist to be annoyed at Sirius XMU, their leading alt rock station channel 35, for playing Mariah Carey?

Which Mariah song did they play?

One issue I've noticed in over the past 15 or 20 years is that critics seem to feel the need to comment on all the genres, instead of just the ones they are most qualified for, whatever that means.

― nicky lo-fi, Sunday, 18 November 2018 02:17 (twenty-seven minutes ago) Permalink

I feel like it’s just becoming more obvious that’s what’s happening ... the age of the generalist music critic feels over if anything, maybe bc it’s become more obvious to more people that’s what’s happening

Not defending the piece under the microscope here or anything but i don’t think triggercut’s approach is an esp effective line of attack

My post about generalists is unclear... I mean it’s become obvious ppl don’t know what they’re talking about but generalist was like the default critic for years

I think the difference is that it used to take a lot of work to be a halfway convincing generalist whereas now it’s possible to cobble together quite quickly just enough knowledge to reliably parrot a received opinion on just about any area of music. So the barrier to entry is a l t lower.

Having said that it’s something i’m often guilty of.

Well at one level I think generalist is just an honest critical perspective at one level bc most people *are* generalists as listeners & as criticism starts to become more abt subjective experience of records it will start to reflect this, which is good... I imagine someone who follows me would rather know I love a Kane brown song as long as I foreground that I’m a country dilettante

Authoritative generalist is like an artifact of another era

Authoritative objectivist generalist? Idk

I think thinking about the idea of critical generalism is a much more than interesting discussion than triggercut's gross aggrieved-sounding framing of the piece.

"to be annoyed at Sirius XMU, their leading alt rock station channel 35, for playing Mariah Carey?"

I listen to this station at least once, more often several times, a day and as recently as five minutes ago, and I would weep grateful tears if the above occurred when I was listening (my other fave is The Heat.)

So we are using ‘rock’ as a verb and a big umbrella term – not a narrow genre – and trying to avoid the traps of what music critics call ‘rockism.’

http://thequietus.com/articles/25545-women-who-rock-evelyn-mcdonnell-interview

one set of values being substituted for another does indeed constitute a fundamental revision of the value system even if it remains structurally analogous. flipping a value system with race and gender at its core does not give rise to 'the exact same thing' unless one wrongly assumes that racial and gendered stratification of our society has had the potential to systematically benefit *any* racial or gender group with even remotely similar probability throughout history and up to the present day -- it's simply absurd. how many ways do we need to remind ourselves that reverse racism isn't a thing that has ever *really* existed?

some other quibbles:

- 'the old rockism' never respected the taste of what you call the 'white frat-kinda-guys'. now i'm nothing even close to an expert on the history of how the value system of the popular music press has evolved over time but to me it seems like the last time the tastes of the unremarkable and unenlightened white male were actually acknowledged as worthy of special consideration or even normative was like... the 50s? from the 60s onward the pop music press seems to have largely reproduced the values/tastes of a certain subset of white males who disdained much of what they saw in mass culture and felt that the 'typical' consumer, especially female but also male, was insufficiently discerning and had no regard as to what works were likely to have lasting 'impact' or 'influence' or otherwise signpost some kind of progress, whether artistic or social.

- has the value system even *actually* been revised? plenty of people have disliked or even been blatantly biased against rockist-favored work for the entirety of the period rockism has prevailed -- although, of course, the music press seldom reflected the views of those people. now that more such people have the opportunity to participate in the music press and amplify their voices, their views are sufficiently shocking to those who have come to expect one thing from the music press that they fallaciously convince themselves that an entire sea-change of the press's values is imminent if it has not already occurred. meanwhile all available evidence actually points to the continued prosperity of traditional rockist-favored acts like, e.g., the national, war on drugs, father john misty, jason isbell, spoon, whateverthefuck-else.

so what's actually changing? i remain unconvinced.

In other words, dave matthews band, why are they so bad & hated

Yeah, afaict, critics in the ostensible heyday of 'rockism' preferred Donna Summer and Blondie to Black Sabbath or Rush (although they probably preferred Elvis Costello to all of the above).

Yeah there's a lot of stuff in the old threads (possibly even this one if you load all the messages) about how rockism as such was always at least in part a self-hating mindset which reserved its greatest scorn for the rock it didn't approve of.

Ha, there's a solid chance that I made the same point a decade and a half ago.