Fascism, rock and roll, and hip hop

Just some passing thoughts, but I think an enormous change in art and culture is just how entrepreneurial it has become. There is no longer any moral approbation on quote-unquote selling out. Punk rock culture was entrepreneurial in a modest sense, but its business practices often carried moral freight: $5 Fugazi shows, for example, and no merch for sale.

That way of doing culture presumed a moral value in opposition to a world of mass culture. But now all culture has been balkanized, and every new subculture (for lack of a better word) relies on the same commercial internet infrastructure, and not on the old networks of off-the-grid DIY zines and mail order catalogs.

ETA--for all the claims about decentralization, it's also worth nothing that the bulk of our culture now operates through algorithms. And I don't think it's controversial to suggest that such conditions impinge on the form and content of art, culture, etc.
 
Last edited:
honestly, there are indie pop artists who have a lot of what's being asked for in this thread, too. People like Rina Sawayama, Mitski, Lucy Dacus and the other members of boygenius, maybe Troye Sivan, all have expressly political and fairly radical personae and have at least dabbled in making political statements with their music. Rina's song XS is basically just straightforward Marxism packaged with a catchy hook and beat.

 
akillesheel said:
honestly, there are indie pop artists who have a lot of what's being asked for in this thread, too. People like Rina Sawayama, Mitski, Lucy Dacus and the other members of boygenius, maybe Troye Sivan, all have expressly political and fairly radical personae and have at least dabbled in making political statements with their music. Rina's song XS is basically just straightforward Marxism packaged with a catchy hook and beat.

Click to expand...

I've never heard any of those names. Is that because they are niche or I am old?
 
SnoopRob said:
I think that a part of where you're going wrong is that you're equating short-term musical movements as somehow representative of mainstream music across time. Yes, each of the musical trends you discuss did happen, but they largely died out after a few years or they were rarely mainstream. Other than for a few years in the late-60s to early-70s, I don't think the mainstream of music has been terribly political.

I significant issue today to musicians taking on social issues in any significant way is the fractionalization of music into musical niches beyond the very, very thin layer of top 40 pop that still exists (which is often very generic and superficial, as you say) . With streaming services, it is possible for folks to dive more and more deeply into specific genres and subgenres of music they like and to largely ignore music they do not. Because of that, I'm not sure that hardly any musical artists or the music industry as a whole has the widespread reach to inspire people in any mass way.
Click to expand...
On your first point: maybe individually those movements didn't last long, but proto-punk was a contemporary outgrowth of acid rock, and punk rock closely on its heels, and then hip hop. How long were we without oppositional voices? I'm not also talking about political per se. There's also rebelliousness in art forms. For instance, early Sonic Youth wasn't really political in lyrical content, but making music out of noise opens a different way of looking at the world. Even more for German industrial, like Einsturzende Neubauten, who at times literally made music by jackhammering the floor of the club they were playing or by using air compressors or pipes or found objects.

On your second point, yes I think the fragmentation of music is very much at the root of the problem here. It's not the whole explanation but it's a bunch of it.
 
SnoopRob said:
Also, this song seems appropriate for this thread...

Click to expand...


Propagandi has been around forever, but hardcore in general is having a resurgence, and almost all of those bands are, to put it mildly, in your face with their politics. There’s a band called No Cure that is one of my favorites at the moment, they’ve got a song called Hang Me From the Bible Belt:

 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top