Categories: Different Matter
Originally Published on: March 9, 2012
In yet another late night chat with our ever suffering editor-in-chief, we stumbled upon the issue of classism not only in society but within the music community. Socially speaking, I am guessing most people would concede that people in the music industry as a whole do not constitute the most well regarded, highbrowed, upper echelon of groups. That is not to say that the music industry as a whole garners no respect, but its members certainly don’t equate to medical practitioners, lawyers, politicians, educators, and until very recently bankers.
Now, there are plenty of people who exist in multiple roles in more than one industry. I believe we even have people like this right here at Alternative Matter. My guess is that the professionals in these other disciplines would identify themselves primarily as their other roles. Whether writing for a music Zine, playing in a band, or even running a small indie label; the folks who also have other professions would, at best, refer to their musically related work as a second career, or more commonly and perhaps accurately, as their hobby. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that, but it does help make my point about the view of our industry. (NOTE: I actually appreciate the contributions of these fine folks completely. Keep up the good work!)
Most people I know in the industry have learned to not only accept, but basically not take even take notice of, that little initial moment of the “oh, another slacker that never grew up” reaction/look we get when people discover our industry description. The fun begins once that moment has passed and the level of your uselessness is assessed through the labyrinth of details about your precise role in the industry.
For the most part, I don’t really put a lot of stock in what people do for a living. I might find what they do interesting, but that has no real bearing on what I think about them as people. I have met plenty of people both great and horrible in my life and have found no correlation between the quality of their being and their job description. Perhaps that is why I find the process of dealing with non-music industry folk that are trying to asses my value via what I do mostly enjoyable. Watching the degrees of judgement/disappointment on their faces as I take them on the rollercoaster ride that is the varying roles and descriptions of what it is I actually do within the industry is quite fun. (NOTE: if someone is genuinely interested in what it is I actually do, it is pretty apparent, and I am happy to spend as much time answering questions as they like.)
The following is a fairly accurate ranking of the words used to describe my differing roles (from good to bad):
Writer (author)
Composer
Teacher
Producer
Engineer
Song writer
Musician
Bassist
Then they can be severely adjusted in raking by adding one of the following adjectives which also honestly describe what I do (again from good to bad):
Orchestral/classical
Atonal
Jazz
Avante Garde
Folk/Country
Rock
Funk
Punk/Metal (they tie it seems)
Just with that small collection of descriptors there can be literally hours of fun. Unfortunately, these judgements on a person’s worth based on these same words become even more sinister within the music industry. One of the reasons it is actually worse is that the ranking of these words becomes a jumble as they tend to shift in direct relation to the descriptors that are appropriate to the person casting the judgements. The goalposts don’t just move, they never stop moving!
I refer to this as musical racism. It is a separatist, elitist, superiority complex that takes the basic concept of healthy competition and twists it into a virus that is weakening the industry at every level. This is how we have ended up with such a ridiculous number of ‘sub-genres’. Essentially, every band has its own these days! That is not to say that people should not specialize, but making a judgement on a person simply based on their description within the industry is as lame and mentally impotent as judging someone based on the colour of their skin or place of birth. The actual character of a person or the quality of the music/writing/works that they produce should be the components on which we base our opinions.
Granted, there are some sub-genres of music that I have yet to find anything appealing, but I am always open and hopeful for that to change. I also do use these descriptions to help me decide where I want to focus my listening and time on. After all, this is why we have these descriptions. However, I endeavour not to judge others on their individual tastes. Here is why I think it is foolish: If I separated myself from everyone that disagreed with my exact tastes, I would have to leave all of humanity to live utterly alone in a cave somewhere. And so would you, because there are and have never been any 2 people on the planet who have the exact same tastes. Variety is the spice of life, anyone?
So, how can we possibly hope to get respect from the rest of the world when we can’t even seem to respect each other within our own industry? Take a look in the mirror. Are you a musical racist?
2 Comments
- Simon Collier says:
March 9, 2012 at 04:56
There you go William! Here I am minding my own business, needing to work & you throw another debate bomb at me so now I am drawn to respond……. Racism is the word you use, sure I understand why but I would beg to differ, there is a massive amount of racism in music which I’ll get to shortly. I think the word genrism or genre-ism would be more accurate but to your point, the various genres have been forced into play mostly by the media & marketing departments of record companies, no journalist these days can express themselves properly without a tag to hang the style on. So what has subsequently happened is bands come up with them in an attempt to carve themselves an identity, we were both involved in the ‘punk rock ‘n’ roll’ scene for a long time which was essentially a hard rock, punk & rock ‘n’roll hybrid, it’s all rock ‘n’roll to me but if we used that tag everyone would immediately think of Elvis. The elitism & segregation angle I totally accept, look at how that genre was maligned!
My experience with people at the bottom of the music chain these days is very negative; mostly everyone is completely self serving & has no interest in what anyone else is doing & takes never support their peers then wonder why they themselves gain no support. This is an elevated echo from the days when bands had an outside chance of getting some kind of deal worth having from a label so there was a competitiveness but it has since deteriorated rather than improved. Bands on the same live bill can’t be bothered watching each other let alone go out especially to check each other out, I can imagine many readers having experienced the band that played before them walking out with their gear never to return in the middle of their set. Dog eat dog I guess, nobody buys each other’s music & on the whole most people still buy into the biggest hyped bands.
My father certainly thinks I’m a slacker, music isn’t a job, when I was 14 he was advised it was just a phase I was going through, 48 now & still looking for the other side of said phase. As for my adolescent peers, I think they just think I’m a delusional eccentric loser, fortunately I have never worried too much about what other people think of me & one advantage of age is that disregard is ever more reinforced. What I do know is that if I had applied the same level of effort & commitment to any ‘conventional’ business I would be sat here with an unwieldy overdraft & no job prospects, music now being a financial desert with the entire oasis held fast by bands of marauding majors.
The phrase ‘musical racism’ is what drew me in; music is racist, ageist, culturist, sizist & yes of course overwhelmingly elitist. ‘Black music is now the biggest seller on the planet’, a statement I have seen several times, hello, wake up, it’s nearly all black music, popular music was born from the blues without which no rock ‘n’ roll etc etc etc. Interestingly the black community no longer embraces the guitar, did they jump or were they pushed? Later we get hip hop & that’s after jazz & reggae but what I notice is that black guys / girls don’t make it outside of their ‘own’ current genres, we rarely see black people playing any form of rock & the only traditional sounding reggae genres that get through are played by pretty white boys in the right trousers wearing the latest haircuts … Olly Murs please take note. I will lay this firmly at the doors of the media & marketing companies & let’s face it the public at large are lead firmly sheep-like in their market choices. When I engage in this conversation the names Hendrix, Roachford, Living Colour, Hot Chocolate, Sly & The Family Stone, Bloc Party etc are banded about, not a great number 40 – 50 years of popular rock music! I would say we are moving backwards not forwards. And no I haven’t even talked about any Asian music culture but that may be for another day. It’s also rare you’ll see a fat white bloke get a deal, especially if he’s over 25!
I think the bottom line is that the music underground, that is everyone who isn’t signed to a major label or already long established with a fan base grounded on their time on a major or good independent label (remember those?) really need to start working together, that’s bands, labels, writers, video makers, we are a fragmented community of great magnitude. Divide & rule, yes they do.
Anyhow I’ve got to run, got to rehearse with my black fronted white 30 – 48 year old band mates, this hip hop dub rock soul band won’t take over the world if we don’t keep fighting the oppression.
“Fight the power”…….
My experience with people at the bottom of the music chain these days is very negative; mostly everyone is completely self serving & has no interest in what anyone else is doing & takes never support their peers then wonder why they themselves gain no support. This is an elevated echo from the days when bands had an outside chance of getting some kind of deal worth having from a label so there was a competitiveness but it has since deteriorated rather than improved. Bands on the same live bill can’t be bothered watching each other let alone go out especially to check each other out, I can imagine many readers having experienced the band that played before them walking out with their gear never to return in the middle of their set. Dog eat dog I guess, nobody buys each other’s music & on the whole most people still buy into the biggest hyped bands.
My father certainly thinks I’m a slacker, music isn’t a job, when I was 14 he was advised it was just a phase I was going through, 48 now & still looking for the other side of said phase. As for my adolescent peers, I think they just think I’m a delusional eccentric loser, fortunately I have never worried too much about what other people think of me & one advantage of age is that disregard is ever more reinforced. What I do know is that if I had applied the same level of effort & commitment to any ‘conventional’ business I would be sat here with an unwieldy overdraft & no job prospects, music now being a financial desert with the entire oasis held fast by bands of marauding majors.
The phrase ‘musical racism’ is what drew me in; music is racist, ageist, culturist, sizist & yes of course overwhelmingly elitist. ‘Black music is now the biggest seller on the planet’, a statement I have seen several times, hello, wake up, it’s nearly all black music, popular music was born from the blues without which no rock ‘n’ roll etc etc etc. Interestingly the black community no longer embraces the guitar, did they jump or were they pushed? Later we get hip hop & that’s after jazz & reggae but what I notice is that black guys / girls don’t make it outside of their ‘own’ current genres, we rarely see black people playing any form of rock & the only traditional sounding reggae genres that get through are played by pretty white boys in the right trousers wearing the latest haircuts … Olly Murs please take note. I will lay this firmly at the doors of the media & marketing companies & let’s face it the public at large are lead firmly sheep-like in their market choices. When I engage in this conversation the names Hendrix, Roachford, Living Colour, Hot Chocolate, Sly & The Family Stone, Bloc Party etc are banded about, not a great number 40 – 50 years of popular rock music! I would say we are moving backwards not forwards. And no I haven’t even talked about any Asian music culture but that may be for another day. It’s also rare you’ll see a fat white bloke get a deal, especially if he’s over 25!
I think the bottom line is that the music underground, that is everyone who isn’t signed to a major label or already long established with a fan base grounded on their time on a major or good independent label (remember those?) really need to start working together, that’s bands, labels, writers, video makers, we are a fragmented community of great magnitude. Divide & rule, yes they do.
Anyhow I’ve got to run, got to rehearse with my black fronted white 30 – 48 year old band mates, this hip hop dub rock soul band won’t take over the world if we don’t keep fighting the oppression.
“Fight the power”…….
- William says:
March 9, 2012 at 08:45
Beautifully ranted, my friend!
Okay, I need to address a few points though…
I have no problems with the use of descriptions in music, that is what genres were supposed to be all about. Words to help guide people through the vast wonderland that is music. However, I am steadfastly opposed to genres being used as CAMPS or being regarded as UNIFIED SEPERATIST factions. Yes, I call that Genre-ist which is accurate and definitely an integral part of my second point…
I use the term musical racism in this context because it a) evokes the kind of response and interest that you displayed b) it goes beyond just the genre issue and covers all of the silly separations [i.e. critics v bands, bassist v drummers, labels v producers, sound-guys v lighting guys, whatever] and c) because all of these things are equally as FUCKING STUPID as real world racism. I guess I could have substituted racism with sexism, or ageism, but I went with the one I thought would put the biggest exclamation point to what I was trying to say.
As to your points on different races within music of any genre, I only wish for people to play, write, and perform whichever music they feel and love without them feeling hobbled by some lame societal edict as to what styles are acceptable. Luckily, there are quite a few people from all different walks of life that refuse to play the MUSIC OF MY PEOPLE game and we benefit for it. I back people getting out there and mixing it up. Find common grounds and uncommon grounds and use them both to inspire and create. Just imagine a life where no-one had taken the risk of mixing chocolate and peanutbutter!
As always, I appreciate the feedback and challenges. Although we don’t agree on every point, I know we are both after the same thing, which is a better musical world for all. I also have such huge respect for what you do as a label and a musician that I consider myself more than lucky to be able to refer to you as friend. Sometimes, it is the folks down here in the sediment that make it all worthwhile.
Thanks again, Si!
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