We need to have a chat.
There's a strong tendency in the indie community to snobbery, to
prejudice, to a privileging of your own tastes above those unknown simply as a
matter of principle. This is a problem. I participate in and am
influenced by this culture myself-- I loved "fun." (the band) until I
realized that the music they made was "pop," and then I couldn't
listen to it without that feeling of shame that most people associate with
taking money from the tithing basket, or, more colloquially, maybe stealing
candy from a baby. Whether or not
pop is fundamentally worse than other genres is up for debate (there’s a post
or two below on that subject). Either
way, simply the application of this label is enough, on its own, to turn people
off of a genre.
This
gets in to a deeper gripe that I have about labels. I’ll save you tens of minutes of reading and
just summarize it: Labels destroy
nuance. They can be handy shortcuts to
meaning, if the context is fully understood, and the communicators have the
same background to be able to appreciate a given label in the same way, but,
more often than not, in serious conversation, which this kind of is (okay, in a conversation of relevance, even if silly),
using a label shortcut has a strong tendency to lead to miscommunication—when I
say anarchist, I mean an individual ascribing to a particular political
philosophy, well-considered, who consequently behaves in society in a way that
is more constructive, often, than another individual. When you hear anarchist, you might hear a
person who has a Molotov cocktail fetish and really just wants to see the world
burn, for funsies. When I say hip-hop, I
mean groups the like of Dessa and K’naan.
When you hear it, you might think of Grandmaster Flash and Run-DMC. Neither of us are wrong (at least in the
latter case, surely) but we are clearly operating with different nuances of the
idea of a particular label. Point being,
labels are silly. Ascribing so much
meaning as to predicate our likes and dislikes on labels alone is also silly. In a negative way.
Most
of the authors of this blog are some variation on the theme of bleeding-heart
liberals, disgustingly left, whatever point on the authoritarian/libertarian
continuum they may be at. Chances are,
if you’re still reading, and especially if you pride yourself on your taste in
indie music, you identify somewhere in the vicinity. You get frustrated at movies that fail the
Bechdel Test, you point out the lack of racial diversity In promotional
materials, you point out the lack of morality represented by the endorsement of
capitalism in promotional materials.
Maybe. You are socially
conscious. And yet you are wrapped up,
in large, in a music scene which is overwhelmingly white and male. For me, when I think of indie music, the
first groups that come to mind are Modest Mouse, Neutral Milk Hotel, Why?,
Amanda Palmer, and Los Campesinos!. In
this group, there are a sum total of two women, and, to the best of my
knowledge, no one who doesn’t identify as white, not to mention only one
individual that openly identifies as non-heterosexual. We, as a population of music-listeners and
livers-in-society, are snobbish about our politics, and snobbish about our
music, but refuse to see any connection between the two. We listen only to music that has been
correctly christened (by whom? That’s
another question that I’ll not pursue for the moment here, but let it be noted
that, now that “Indie” is a “sound” rather than just a literal description of
the independence of a band, there ought to be some wariness of groups that call
themselves indie without being in any way actually independent, or else it
ought to be recognized that we are being predisposed to like music by the Man
just labeling it “good”)(to put it extremely), and are able to be turned off of
other music simply because it doesn't have that golden ticket, that label that
tells us it is good (or because it
has a label that tells us it is “bad,” of course). If you happen to be politically sensitive,
you could note, also, that none of the above artists live below the poverty
line, or would be called anything other than “middle class,” wealth-wise (here
there may be some selection bias, as artists that become popular are
necessarily less likely to be poor after becoming popular, but we also pride
ourselves on listening to artists that no one has ever heard of, so I hold that
my point still stands).
Are
there exceptions to this western patriarchy?
Surely so. But exceptions, while they do not prove the rule, in demonstrating the effort to which we must go to
find them, surely do raise their eyebrows wryly at us while pointing to the
possibility of a soft rule.
The Wingnut Dishwasher’s Union
comments “I don’t need to tell ya / crackers are great with amnesia / when it
comes to forgetting / centuries of racism.” Is this sort of behavior, even in
our music-listening lives, our private lives, conscionable?
In short, no.
It isn’t.
It is exactly this kind of
sentiment that can lead us to forget that there are people out there with fundamentally different life experiences
than those that we have. I would assert
that music is often written out of the struggles of a person’s life, and if we
listen only to people like us, with struggles just like ours, we run the dangerous
risk of thinking that those struggles are universal, or the only important
ones, or even the most common ones, or, hell, even just relevant in any way at
all.
Plato, in “The Republic” makes an
extensive case for the importance of media censorship in an ideal society. The character of Socrates argues very
coherently that a person with no example of unvirtuous action has a much more
difficult time conceiving of acting unvirtuously—thus, it is for the good of
everyone if examples of unvirtuous actions are not displayed publicly, whether
through theater or poetry, television or a web browser. This argument seems abhorrent to us now,
reminiscent of a totalitarian state, or a controlling parent, but I would hold
forth that it is not such a silly idea.
I do not think that it is practical to ever expect there to be an
impartial body that can correctly and without corruption determine what media
ought or ought not be let through to the public, much less which actions are or
are not virtuous, and so I will never argue seriously that such a system really
ought to be implemented at a societal scale, but I think that to discard the core
of the argument simply because it is not always practical is a mistake. Just as Plato argues that a person with no
concept of the unvirtuous cannot act unvirtuously, virtue ethics suggest that a
person exposed to much virtuous action tends to act virtuously. We cannot expect to have all of our media
filtered such to make us better people, but we can surely filter
ourselves. I am a hypocrite, and enjoy
the majority of low budget shitty horror films, but even without watching
“Decadent Evil,” I can tell you that it will contain primarily examples of
unhealthy gender roles and power relationships, and as such, I can elect not to
watch it (even if only because I know I won’t enjoy it as much if I have to
keep complaining about the heteronormative sex fantasies that keep occurring in
the flick—I am a hypocrite) Similarly,
while I surely will continue to listen to a shitton of indie, because it just
feels so good, I can consciously select against the worst of it (which you
already do, if you are reading this blog and taking us “seriously”), and, more
relevantly, I can also consciously select music that is good, and leads abstractly
to personal betterment.
Subject of conversation number
two: Social consciousness sorted, you
are surely now convinced that you need to broaden your tastes. But to what?
There are things closer to the indie scene that are excellent listens—Dessa
is a feminist artist from Minnesota, often labeled as rap or hip-hop that gels
well with the indie palate. K’naan is a Somalian refugee, now naturalized
U.S. citizen who makes music often labeled similarly to the above, but with
such a different cadence that arguing that it belongs in the same category as
Nicki Minaj is as difficult as is saying that the music isn’t influenced by his
life story. But I’ll admit it, I have an
ulterior motive. I’m driving at
something.
Indie culture and left youth
culture (whether that be hipster or something else) are difficult to
disentangle (for reasons obvious enough to obviate statement). This is a culture that has a serious fondness
for dramatic irony and sarcasm, an endearment for isolation from emotion. Modest Mouse is surely emotive, but it
conveys an emotion surrounded by the biting self-criticism and sarcasm that are
an integral part of the music that they make—Why? often says one thing meaning
the exact opposite. Amanda Palmer has
whole songs that are satires of a particular aspect of pop culture, or of
themselves. I like this. I am a part of youth culture today, after
all. However, I am finding more and more,
that I like sincerity. I like the
bravery that it takes for a person (or group) to come out and say “This is my
stance. I am not perfect, and cannot be
perfect, but this I believe, the hell with absolute idealism, and the cynicism
that comes of falling short thereof.” I think
genuinely caring about things unreservedly is pretty cool, and you don’t
find this, often, in indie music. Much
as I love metaphor, just coming out and saying something is sometimes more
powerful. Tl;dr: In the words of Kane White: “Sarcasm is killing sincerity,” and sincerity
is pretty alright.
So
here, indecorously in the last paragraph, is my thesis: You need to give punk a chance. That’s one hell of a vague label, and a lot
of things are shoved in there that are really squarely on some sort of “indie-‘true’
punk” continuum. Punk gets a bad rap as “just
a bunch of screaming” or “three-chord high school bands” or, god forbid “plebian.” But I’m going to tell you to listen to one
thing. Listen to “Home, Like Noplace Is
There” (sic) by “The Hotelier.” “The
Hotelier” is a group so small that they don’t even have a Wikipedia page
yet. They dropped this second album out of nowhere,
other than Worcester, and, apparently, the depths of their hearts, in February
of this year. This is an album that you
can’t ignore. I listen to music mostly
casually, but this album is one of the few that I can just sit down, doing
nothing else, and just listen straight through.
And then again. And then
again. And then again. If you’re into labels, this album has often
been identified as a part of the emo-punk revival. There are a few tracks that scream at you,
but once you reach them, you don’t even care, because it’s so clearly out of
genuine emotion. Will those tracks ever
be my favourite? No. I am still too
influenced by the cult of the indie. But
would the album be the same without them?
Absolutely not. This is an album
made by someone who’s been through things that you, dear affluent reader,
probably have not. This is an album for
the downtrodden to identify with. This
is the first 100% honest album I have ever listened to. This is not to be missed. Other, wealthier, more well-known websites
have written about this album better than I ever can, and I won’t take their
words from them—what remains to be said is this: The Hotelier frontman probably lives below
the poverty line. He is white, and male,
and so isn’t so much broader than what you are likely used to, but it is
different. This is a thing to listen
to. This is a genre to listen to. If you care about social change, this is the
place to find people who are behind you all the way, whether it be The Wingnut
Dishwasher’s Union, The World/Inferno Friendship Society, or The Hotelier. Is the punk scene also pretty white? Yeah.
I don’t think you should listen exclusively in this domain. But if you want unveiled emotion, this is the
place to dabble, and “Home, Like Noplace is There” is most certainly the place
to bathe.
-Peter
Below is a link for the first track on the album, which is, as titled, one hell of an introduction, if you catch the lyrics.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PHsBgcwOw6Y
