Re: Re: Music is not political (Was Re: music is political)

["Stephen Goodman" <spgoodman@earthlight.net>]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "a k butler" <akbutler@tiscali.co.uk>
To: <Loopers-Delight@loopers-delight.com>
Sent: Wednesday, 05 April, 2006 10:48 AM
Subject: Re: Re: Music is not political (Was Re: music is political)


> At 20:56 04/04/06, you wrote:
>
>>i think Attali's point about a future stage of "composers" (which he
>>wrote 30 years ago), where the former passive consumer of music,
>>whose main function was a capitalistic one of purchasing recordings
>>of music, instead in some fashion creates (or 'composes') their own
>>music has proved somewhat accurate. he could not forsee PodCasts,
>>file sharing, mash-ups, ableton Live, and so on, but given his
>>remoteness his prescience seems remarkable.
>
> so you think capitalists are turning into artists because they can take 
> someone else's music and re-sample it?

I would put forth that they're not really "artists" per se, but then my 
dividing line between "creatives" and "non-creatives" tends to be 
well-defined.  Resampled material is one of those items that creates 
firefights on this newsletter, but it's just not on the same level of 
artistic endeavor as original music is.  A "mash-up" of Bowie's "Ashes to 
Ashes" is not an original song, although whatever resampling/remixing done 
might be original in nature.  The area of what "art" is, is currently 
blurred, thanks to the flux period we're going through regarding what 
music 
production/creation/composition/performance "is".  I'm confident that at a 
point in the future real artists will emerge from the current melange of 
material, but for now they get either smothered, reconverted or outright 
shelved by big music companies, who still don't Get It.


>>i think people who don't "believe" in politics are playing into the
>>hands of those systems who would control us.
>
> Where are these people who don't believe in politics?

I don't "believe" in politics, as a one-size-fits-all solution to 
anything. 
But I've gone over this before already, and can balance it out with the 
statement "I hate politics, and I hate it even more when I have to 
participate."  Democracy is like that, in that it requires participation 
by 
as many as possible.  So perhaps it could be said that, as Afghanis find 
their way to democracy, the big record companies will find their way to 
being able to both discover and distribute creative 'product' someday - 
else 
their roles will become one of distribution and marketing.  (I don't think 
they can see this coming any more than they anticipated P2P, the Internet, 
or portable music devices)

> We all believe that the government exists. ( possibly not 
>Klobucher...who 
> can tell)
> Rather there are people who believe that politics is the government of a 
> country.
> ( oh, and the study of the government of a country)
>
>>  at least privately realize the political ramifications
>>of their participation in the world in all its aspects, and not to
>>deny these things.
>
> The government of the country you live in won't be influenced by the 
>music 
> that you play.

Yep, unless the country's small.  Then you never know!

> just quoting loads of stuff doesn't make a case.
> There's plenty of dictionaries that connect politics with government.
> The Wikipedia can be edited by anyone, so how do we know you didn't just 
> change
> it before quoting it :-)
>
> If "everything is political", then the word "politics" becomes useless.

Shh!  We need someplace for political addicts to go to when we don't need 
them!  :)
Stephen Goodman

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