Is poptimism really an ethic, as some people would have it, or an aesthetic? Is its impetus some sort of populist approach, a commitment to being unpretentious, a rejection of elitist (possibly racist, classist, sexist) assumptions, which leads one to embrace either music with a wider audience (according to some inevitably flawed standard) or music that is somehow demonstrably more accessible? Or does it come about due to an aesthetic appreciation (possibly on a rather personal, subjective level) of music that is considered "poppy," "corny," or kitsch, with political interpretations heaped onto it after the fact that then shape the course of the approach?
On a related note--how do we define accessibility? It seems like it has a number of very different components to it. There are some aspects we might posit are fairly universal. Things like simplicity, repetitiveness, and predictability (all tied together). Others are clearly arbitrary. I associate accessibility with major keys in the conventional Western 12-note scale, because of the culture in which I was raised. Minor keys sound darker to me, or tougher, and so forth depending on the context. Unfamiliar modes bring to mind foreign countries and a sense of alien-ness. As visceral and near-unshakeable as these associations are, they are culturally determined and arbitrary. But there are other conventional aspects of the music we consider accessible that are way more limited, historical-context-wise. For example, synthesizer sounds that were once normal to hear in pop music (say, twenty-five years ago) now read as dated, possibly campy or retro. Music that was seen as transgressive or shocking as recently as the 1990s has been thoroughly recuperated. And so forth. Making assertions about what is or is not accessible is very hard to do clearly and rigorously. Of course, so is making assertions about what is challenging or authentically avant-garde--a difficulty for anyone championing other value systems opposed to poptimism.
Does the fact that accessibility/inaccessibility is such a slippery concept mean that using criteria to evaluate music that are based on these ideas is somehow futile? I don't think so at this point, but I do think the imprecise, inconsistent, even downright impressionistic way these words get thrown around is the cause of a lot of confusion, confusion which obscures important questions about aesthetics and politics.
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6 comments:
you mention 'subjective' a couple of times, which by my hunch is right, but we might say instead: personal, or individual (and not, because of that, necessarily opposed to the social). putting it that way would i think also help with your question about evaluation. 'evaluation' automatically sounds like it entails the possibility of (uniform or universal) agreement in evaluation, and of means by which one could properly reach that agreement. but not everything which is like evaluation has to have those properties.
Hm...yeah, there's a lot I need to clarify here. So, I'm trying to make some distinctions here, mostly between ethical / political values and aesthetic values. Both can be shared amongst groups of people. I did mention subjectivity at one point--and in retrospect I didn't really make the point I wanted to about it. Here's the thing. When you look at writing by poptimists on poptimism, there is a tendency to resort to ethical and political arguments about classism, racism, etc. rather than to try to make an aesthetic argument, but I really think that a lot of people's attraction to poptimism stems from an appreciation of pop aesthetics (usually alongside an interest in other areas), at least initially, with the more political stuff being rather tacked on after the fact. There are a number of reasons why this might be, and I think one of them is that aesthetic appreciation does get into some really subjective and personal areas. It's also true that our appreciation of music on an aesthetic level is a profoundly social thing and that we do have ways of using shared systems of value to relate to other people about what we like or don't like--in fact, this is a huge part of most people's enjoyment of music. But talking about aesthetic value is something people are so wary of these days. I think this is partly because of a real degree of subjectivity, but I also think the problems that subjectivity poses are exaggerated. But given such a climate, supporting your views politically probably seems like a more solid position than delving into purely musical value. So it's no wonder if poptimists want to plant their flag there, I just think such a move could involve a bit of bad faith.
Of course, there's no such thing as pure musical value, or pure anything here. I'm not arguing for some sort of apolitical perspective, far from it. But I think that there has to be some room for liking (or disliking) the way something sounds, because that's a real part of how this stuff works.
Don't know if I've made myself clearer or less clear here...you've brought up some good points and I hope I've done something to address them.
now that you've said this i went back, and your post reads completely differently now! i guess i wasn't looking carefully enough at the very beginning of it.
i don't mean to be presumptuous by going on at length, i'm sure you're thinking about this stuff a lot. but i think the best of the poptimists are basically acting in good faith. so here's a thought about a way in which it can seem like they're not (seem, only, though):
the way you are making a distinction between aesthetic and political (or ethical) makes it sound like the only way you will admit a reaction to be aesthetic is if it excludes the others; if it's 'purely' aesthetic.
on the reading of kant that i've picked up secondhand from various places, the significant thing to say about this is that: while this relationship between aesthetic judgments and other judgments does put conditions on whether an aesthetic judgment is really pure, it also has the consequence that only the one who makes a judgment can, in retrospect, discover of his or her self that the judgment was not as pure as it seemed to be. i take it that this is why what i said about agreement in evaluation is important; but it's also why you're right to bring up a question about bad faith.
now, here's something: -if- someone were drawn to pop for aesthetic reasons but defended their judgments to the world in ethical or political terms, that might be bad. but if we suppose the above relationship between aesthetic and other judgments, then discussion of ethically and politically relevant factors in a judgment (or consequences of one) can have a special role to play. part of the point of being a critic - i.e. any person sharing their critical reasons/reflections with others - is to get others to share your judgments. so one thing a critic can do is put forth ways in which they have found themselves to bar themselves from liking a song for what they took to be ethical or political reasons; and they can also, on the basis of their own self-knowledge, make that same charge of others (which is risky and often presumptuous). the goal of which, i think, would be not to persuade others for those ethical or political reasons, but to get them to be able to respond on the basis of aesthetics, when possible.
of course, this is all assuming that bit about purity of aesthetic judgments. i don't know if i would prefer to talk in those terms or not. it hasn't proven too clearly useful to me so far.
This is a nice post...two links:
Music that was seen as transgressive or shocking as recently as the 1990s has been thoroughly recuperated. And so forth.
There was a good thread (sort of) about this today at the Poptimists LiveJournal community here.
And more generally about poptimism, Simon Reynolds joined a convo with a few members of the LJ community in a long discussion about poptimism/politics/ethics/aesthetics re: Paris Hilton's album recently in the comment thread here.
j.--I'm going to have to chew on that one for a bit.
Dave--Thanks for the links, there's a lot of good stuff in there.
Oh, one thing though, j., that I can definitely say right off the bat--I definitely do not believe in the possibility of pure aesthetic judgments. It's more like I'm, I don't know, doubting the purity of supposedly political judgments? Like, thinking that they are more aesthetic (as well as more tinged with all sorts of other concerns) than they are avowed to be.
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