Friday, November 25, 2005
Tuesday, November 15, 2005
More tales from the sordid indie underworld
As our turn came I had to kneel in substantial puddles of this guy's spit while setting up all my guitar pedals. There's spit getting on my cables, guitar stand, etc. It was really very difficult to avoid dragging equipment through this stuff without suspending thick ropey strands of saliva all over the place. Finally I accidentally got some on the back of my hand. Fucking gross. I grabbed the nearest absorbent material at hand, which appeared to be some kind of forgotten notebook. I threw it onto the largest puddle of spit right in front of my mic stand, and used my boot to wipe up some of the dude's phlegm.
After I was done I glanced down at the notebook and it appeared to be filled with lyrics from this band, a mailing list sign-up, etc. By then it was too late, but the stage was clean and I proceeded to rawk the haus.
Monday, November 07, 2005
Tallahassee...
Saturday, November 05, 2005
Music Will Never Change the World
To sustain themselves during times of unpopularity, anonymity, and indifference, band members will fix their hopes on flimsy and ephemeral achievements such as getting signed to a record label or gaining radio airplay. With vast reserves of youthful idealism available, they will endure long periods of roadsickness, poverty, sleeping on floors, etc. And this, really, is fine with me: as a society, we need people willing to do this so we can listen to new tunes all the time.
But please, let us have the strength to dispose of one existential illusion: that what we are doing as musicians will actually "change the world". Bullshit.
In describing orchestral music, Stravinsky once said
"I consider that music is, by its very nature, essentially powerless to express anything at all, whether a feeling, an attitude of mind, a psychological mood, a phenomenon of nature, etc...Expression has never been an inherent property of music. That is by no means the purpose of its existence. If, as is nearly always the case, music appears to express something, this is only an illusion and not reality. It is simply an additional attribute which, by tacit and inveterate agreement, we have lent it, thrust upon it, and as a label of convention -- in short, an aspect unconsciously or by force of habit, we have come to confuse with its essential being."
The above passage has been interpreted as a critique of Romanticism but it is equally serviceable contradicting the notion that the content of instrumental music can ever be representational. With rock music, of course, an artist can easily craft words that directly or indirectly express his intentions. But does that ability necessarily give music some kind of mojo to drive events and history? I say it does not. If you disagree, give me one good example.