Class etc. Pt. 3 - why does African American audiences completely ignore indie, prog etc?

Why don't black people buy white music? Well... why would they? They have a lot more reason to identify with music from their own race then white people do, and exclusively at that. The opressed/opressor dynamic is still very much in place. And the old saw that all white music came from black music has a lot of truth in it. So... the question really should be, give one good reason why blacks should be listening to white music.

not that you don't have a point. and some very thick glasses.

hip-hop is filled with prog and 70s-soft-rock and rawwwwk shit, via samples and a very "experimental" ethic (song interruptions, codas, spoken-word/skits, etc. Moody Blues were responsible for more than they knew.

And Geir, Genesis CREATED both hip-hop and punk. By sucking.

but this has been discussed at length before (the 'Why does black peoples never want to ROCK?' thread i believe)

give one good reason why blacks should be listening to white music

part of the process of escaping that opressed/opressor dynamic would INCLUDE losing this notion of 'blackness/whiteness' in music generally. forget where it came from, whether that means Europe. Africa, America or whatever. forget whatever connotations occur due to preconceptions, stereotypes, the media etc. and learning to appreciate the art for what it is more than what it represents or can be considered as representing. of course if you can't relate to it then fine, but there's no need to always try and look for music you CAN relate to to be able to appreciate or even love it.

using that same generalisation, do they buy ANYTHING? can they? i thought it was supposed to be all white and Asian kids buying DMX and 50 Cent?

These guys are/were all musicians. They are not representative of the audiences.

Plus, it seems black audiences are actually less likely to buy records by white acts these days than they were in the 60s. How many African Americans dig Matchbox 20, Hootie & The Blowfish or Counting Crows?
(And, yes, those three bands suck, but that's irrelevant anyway because there are obviously a lot of people - most of them white - who seem to like them)

This is the current Norwegian Top 40 albums list:
http://lista.vg.no/show_list_spes.jsp?listType=2&byweek=vis

I don't think "my parents" are responsible for the rock records at #1 and #3 in that list..

There are African immigrants here too, remember, and most of them will buy exclusively "black" music.

Only, those who dig White Stripes (and I am absolutely no fan of that overrated band) are almost exclusively white people, which was also the case with grunge and Britpop in the 90s.

My 27-yr-old, mother of three, black co-worker from "the 'hood" (aka Oakland) likes both the White Stripes and the Hives. And she hates 50 Cent! And Puffy! But we both like Missy and Outkast...

A couple of anecdotal examples: In college in the mid-Nineties I was on the committee to book bands for the school's annual spring festival. It was acknowledged that the best way to please the most people was with a cross-over Native Tongues-syle hip-hop group. If we'd filled the bill with indie-rock, most of the African-AMerican students would have been alienated, but the indie rock kids would mostly be just as happy with the hip-hop act.

In the last month I went to a 50 Cent concert and Queens of the Stone Age concert. A lot more white faces at 50 cent than black faces at QOTSA, and this has been my experience at pretty much all other concerts as far as race/genre dynamic.

Why? A lot of reasons I suppose, and I think the first Kenan post gets at some of them. Maybe I'll think about it some more and propose a theory or two.

Black folks don't buy "white music" because it's been what the mainstream has offered for so long -- on TV and the radio ("classic rock" stations) -- not knowing that most of "white music" has African-American origins or derivations.

Consequently, many black folks shun a majority of "white music" -- derogating black folks that listen to "white music" -- while many white folks snap up lowest common denominator "black music" with each group unaware that they're being manipulated by rich folks.

And before you excoriate me, keep in mind that all I ever needed to know about race relations I learned from "Fear Of A Black Planet" by Public Enemy.

haha!

More anecdotal evidence: one of the black guys in my office came in last week in a Concrete Blonde T-shirt.

ditto

Maybe that's the attutide, but oppression eventually not stop until people start putting people in different "boxes" judging from their ethnic background. The entire idea behind rascism is that black and white people are supposed to be different, and black people living up to that myth do nothing to get rid of it, do they?

Oh for the love of God...

That doesn't seem like something you should be bragging about...

Anyway, if we're gonna get down to why the average (aka "12 CDs a year") person of either ethnicity buys what they do, it doesn't have anything to do with inbred tendencies or cultural rifts so much as it has to do with marketing and demographics. Most people just buy what they're told to. Black people are told to buy "black" music. White people are told to buy a little bit of everything, so as not to appear racist.

1. White people know little to nothing about black people.
2. I guess there aren't any blacks who go to ILM (none have made a comment here at least.)

Sure there are, they even have their own ghetto: it's called the "Jay Z vs. Nas Hip Hop Throwdown" thread.

oh but its gotten so interesting!

if you consider someone's culture to be inferior to what you consider to be YOUR culture, does this make you racist? this is VERY interesting, an extremely loaded question. i've always been convinced racism has, at least in the last 30 years, had less to do with physical aspects (skin colour) and a lot more to do with perceptions cultural differences.

Not until the entire idea that "black" and "white" music exists is gone will the this stupid fence be torn down.

These days, white people buy a lot of "black" music (although white audiences - while heavily into rap - were definitely very reluctant towards "urban contemporary R&B" for a lot time during the 90s) while you don't find a lot of Beatles/Pink Floyd fans among black fans. So obviously, black fans will need to change their taste more than white ones to achive complete similarity, and then, complete equality.

Creed.

This is your fallacy.

And Shaky is OTM about demographics. Most people don't care enough about what they listen to to seek out much of anything.

'shouldn't everyone listen to everything?' is the question really...perhaps the answer is 'yes' and perhaps yes by doing so we'd extinguish these stupid, damaging stereotypes for good...only i can't see that working out too well for the advertisers...who wants a nation of extreme dilletants? most of us are hard enough to target as it is.

Shakey is so OTM about deomgraphic targeting that my head is spinning.

Well, Geir hate to tell you this but: it's getting that way, it's just that your side's losing...

Oh, sweetie... you've never heard a Motown record, have you? I'm so sorry.

There's tons of "white" elements in hip-hop Geir, you just don't like to acknowledge them as such.

(whistles Eric B. and Rakim's "My Melody)

but what examples are you thinking of? Geir will hit you with the old 'Phil Spector introducing European musical values into afro-american soul' probably!

Never said it was. I said it was easier to acheive equality in a situation where everyone is perceived to be the same. The unfortunate part is that it is patently impossible for everyone to be the same so equality will never actually be achevied (assuming racism is solved, there's still classism, and if that ever gets solved it will probably be because aliens have conquered the world and reduced the human population to the point where we can't have race/class distinctions and still procreate enough to survive as a species).

He likes to deny that the Temps "Psychedelic Shack" is actually "psychedelic" though.

but they're all sampled, heh....actually what i was thinking about earlier was the harmonica bit in Outkast's 'Rosa Parks' and that record in general and whether Geir has heard it and what he thinks of it.

Beatles arrived in late 1962 (not really melodic until early 1963 though). By then, Motown did exist, but it didn't really become truly melodic until around "Where Did Our Love Go" in 1964.

They probably needed George Gershwin and Cole Porter though.

Geir, what do you make of Sam Cooke?

I answered it by stating that asking such a question is a bad idea.

You're making a really bizarre assumption that terms like "black music" and "white music" are 100% related to the race of the people making them. They're not. They're terms used to describe different musical cultures, different traditions and lineages that can value different things and often operate in different ways. White people can be involved in "black" types of music, and black people can be involved in "white" types of music, in exactly the same way that Koreans can play Indian music and Slovaks can play reggae.

And by the way: if you didn't make that assumption, it wouldn't strike me as quite so creepy when you say shit like "all music should be [lists qualities describing "white" cultural tradition's approach to music] and should never be [lists qualities describing "black" cultural tradition's approach to music]." If you displayed any sense that you knew those things were cultures, I could swallow that a lot more easily -- but you seem to think they're somehow genetic or pre-programmed.

And that's why you're "living up to stereotypes" bit, above, fucking bugs the crap out of me, because what you're basically saying is "black people would be treated as equals if they just gave up everything they have to bring into the common culture and just hopped aboard the European tradition." If you can't see how stupid of a statement that is, I'm not sure what I could say to convince you. And if you think black people are living up to negative stereotypes by SHOCKER liking music made within their own cultural tradition, then what the hell are you doing with your infinite support of history of European composition?

thats me tidying up Geir's point

Class etc. Pt. 3 - why does white American audiences mostly ignore indie, prog etc?

So all pop music isn't based on "black" traditions.

Gier, you're so inconsistent: A lot of Sam Cooke's songs are based on a repeating three-or-four-chord progression. Why would this interest you? Not to mention that most of Ben E King's hits were written by Leiber/Stoller, who you just got through dissing in your previous post.

He did that to an increasing extent toward the end of his life. In the 50s, those songs may have been ostinato based but they always had a bridge that was harmonically contrasting.

Not that they were very harmonically complex though. For melodically complex popular music during the 50s, you would have to look to Nelson Riddle's arrangements for Frank Sinatra - particularly torch albums such as "....Sings For Only The Lonely"

Now, there's another thing The Beatles changed forever.

Haha! Except for the Beach Boys' "Surfin' USA", right?

The Beatles made composing your own material sort of a rule.

To make a new song, you need a newly composed chord sequence.

Intro:
Am / / / / / / /
Verse:
C / / / / / / / Dm / / / F / / / C / / / / / / / Dm / / / F / / /
Chorus:
C / / / G / / / Dm / / / G / F / C / / / G / / / Dm / / / G / F /

Under My Thumb:

F#m / / / E / / / D / / / / / / / F#m / / / E / / / D / / / / / / /
A / / / / / / / D / / / B / / / F#m / / / E / D / A / / / / / / /

Completely different from each other that is

Plus the harmonies (not as in vocal harmonies, but as in chords), obviously

C / / / C / / / C / / / C / / /
F / / / F / / / C / / / C / / /
G / / / G / / / C / / / / / / /

(I'm actually in favor of derailing this thread from the original topic, which wasn't going so well!)

Most?? A fair percentage but nowhere near "most." Again, you simply ignore what you want to: Motown, Stax, neo-doowop, the Curtis Mayfield school -- oh, but I forgot, those weren't really songs!!

The Beatles were thinking "back to our roots" and they made some of the worst songs they ever composed. I absolutely hate all of those tracks you mentioned there. Add the awful "Come Together" too.

I said during the first 2-3 years of the 60s. Motown and Stax didn't have a lot of hits until mid-decade.

Now quit ignoring my Greek music thread, in which the basis for many of your positions has been handily dismissed FOREVAH

The fact remains that Africans had no separate word for "music" until after imperialism.

Music doesn't need improvisation anyway

I speak about mainly West African cultures, which is where the idea that "Africa=rhythm" comes from.

Africa North of Sahara has had contact with Europe for thousands of years, and I suppose they have a word for music there. They also have a pretty strong melodic tradition, as evident in the "rai" music.

www.blackpeopleloveus.com

Discuss.

I love this question because we can righteously shout "all of 'em!!" (instead of the also trutful but less impressive "two")

Then again, it wasn't based on her work.

Some indigenous languages lack a specific word for music, illustrating the blurry distinction between communication and music in their culture.

This is a key word in the quote you just cited Geir

Africa – the continent where music is so close connected to life itself that you lack a spesific word for music. The song, the dance, the drums are integrated in daily life. To us, the musicians give a taste of a strange and facinating culture, even though the music is performed on stage and not in an african village. Swinging ryhtms, song and dance, this will be an expireance not easely forgotten.

that is a far cry from 'no word for music'

All music is communication. These linguistic distinctions you're making are meaningless.

It isn't related to any Western art forms at all.

There is no English word for that art form.

Symphonic violinists from the 18th century would laugh their asses off if some symphonic percussionist presented today's so-called "contemporary classical music" to them and claimed it is actually music.

Around fifty percent of African American respondents to the poll said they listen to gospel music regularly. Only around twenty percent said they listen to rap regularly.

So, Geir, what do you think of gospel?

NOTE: study is called "Jazz in America: Who's Listening: Research Division Report" and is edited by Scott K. DeVeaux. The ISBN for the study is 0929765400. It is fascinating reading.

the hip hop world loves Phil Collins. How white is Phil Collins.

Premier had everybody singing along to 'in the air tonight' at a recent show here :)

Those who listen to gospel have stopped buying records, obviously...

Much of what passes for modern soul in the US sounds like AOR.

You mean it sounds like Boston, Toto or Journey?

Is it "obvious" that black people don't buy gospel records because gospel records don't show up in the billboard urban chart? Or because they're not on MTV Europe?

Mainly true, but it depends what pitch. Pitch should follow certain harmonic rules. Schönberg, for instance, isn't melodic. As isn't any solo drumming either, despite different pitch.

All African percussion music = melodic

False. Those don't fit into the note system, thus they don't play notes.

It's fine to have your ideas, but to pretend they have sound grounding in musicology — anybody's musicology — is intellectually dishonest.

Anyway I think black audiences ignore indie prog etc. coz EVERYONE does as nabisco noted. And if you look at the socioeconomics of the indie fanbase its fairly out-of-reach for most of the black population and even in that socioeconomic category there are plenty of pressures towards maintaining a "black" continuum instead, not least pervasive racism, the notion of the talented tenth etc.

Harlem 1920s and the history of America to thread.

(haha also "Bringing Down The House")

Okay now I'm going to go way out on a limb and say that there's a *really interesting* point in buried in Geir's assertion about Africa and music -- generally you only begin to develop seperate cultural spheres to the extent you develop an economic base to support them and a class capable of consuming and producing them.

So lets transpose this to literature -- the epic poem as a qualitative advance on the folktale, the novel as a qualitative advance on the epic poem, a result of specialization, externalization, the ability to place society's embedded forms as outside the self (and simultaneously bring them up close) turn them around, stroll behind them and see how they work.

So yeah "music" as a seperate cultural sphere -- I dunno if it existed in greece -- and "music" as rising above the individual itenerant singer-songwriter to a qualitatively difft. level of resources, theory, and time to hone appreciation. All definite advances, but ones whose fruits can only be realized by their negation, the restoration of music to broad layers of society, the turning of its formal innovation towards practical ends, etc.?

Like I'm saying is *yeah* different words are needed -- like we wouldn't say "epics, poetry, novels, plays, journalism, it's all just literature INNIT?" so why should we do the same with music? The problem is that geir is doing the equiv of saying "epic poems are literature and NOTHING ELSE" when instead he should just use words like the rest of fucking society and call what he likes "western classical and classical derived pop." or hell even "melodic pop" is okay and then let us call all this other stuff music too.

Like if there was a I Love Literature discussion board and somebody came on complaining about how the things people talked about and liked had very little in common with the Illiad or something.

[I've been reading Bakhtin can you tell?]

1. I know at least a couple of African-Americans who are in the fan bases of all the artists I'm most especially into, and none of them fall into the "R&B / rap" trap. In fact, my best friend from HS was this African-American girl whom I would be able to interact with no matter what the subject, whether it be what was going on in school or pop culture or sociopolitical issues, and I certainly have no "street cred".

2. Most Hispanics have shitty tastes in music. I've only met 20 people in my general ethnic group who share my musical tastes or something similar, and all 20 of them were of the "outcast" variety as well. Hell, the only hip-hop fans I've ever met IRL have been Hispanics who think they're "brothers from the 'hood" types. All the African-Americans I knew from my (all girls') HS were teen girls who loved love songs; they loved Simply Red's "Holding Back the Years" as much as those Bone Thugs N Harmony ballads.

3. Yes, sometimes I wish I had been born African-American. At least I wouldn't be as ashamed of people in my ethnicity.

LOL on the quote, btw. I must refrain from commenting further until I've seen several other "Boondocks" comic strips.

As for the post I made -- geez. I feel this need to say "sorry" now. I just had to deal with relatives today, and I cannot believe how comical they are in a sad sack sort of manner. It's as if proper enunciation, the wearing of fitted clothing, embracing other cultures if just for a day, and thinking of oneself as an American first is all just too mind-bogglingly hard for them to conceive of doing. I quickly get swept up in a whirlpool of regret that I was born into this motley crew, think of how many other similar-in-ethnicity families there are out there that are this way, and want to roll up my eyes and give up.

*consults Illuminati*

(tho it does mean we can talk about him on his threads like he's not here)

(jess those mad paperbacks are pretty easy to find)

There is no such thing as "defeat" here anyway. I know what is my opinion on this, and I know I will stick to this opinion on this. I will NEVER EVER be willing to accept ANYTHING that cannot be played on a tuned piano or notated in notes as music!

THAT and ONLY THAT is music!

!!!

You can sing along to Destiny's Child and Aaliyah, but those songs become boring without the production and grooves while Max Martin's songs work fine without the production or grooves.

What do you make then of the argument that rock and roll is FUNDAMENTALLY about production, ever since the famous ehco applied to Elvis' voice during the Sun Sessions?

As for rock, I have never been into rock anyway. My music is pop - classic singer/songwriter pop in the Ivor Novello tradition.

Y'know, there's something kinda sweet about this.

What about documenting the EMOTIONAL address of Britney Spears?

What about the role of the Conductor as Producer?

What about the subjectivity of terms like allegro and piano?

There's too many problems with your 19th century Philosophy Geir!

Sadly, it has. It shouldn't have though. Because it has led to a lot of tuneless and unlistenable crap that would never have been accepted as music 150 years ago.

Geir, is it possible that your nostalgic perception of the 'glory age of the music' is nothing but a wild fantasy of your own imagination?

Times change, but the democratization of music is probably a positive historical development, don't you think?

Maybe it's time to for you to rethink your priorities - if you're going to continue living a miserable life, at least spare us your complaining...

I AM part-black, and I've often wondered the same thing. Anyone claiming that there aren't massive, self-imposed cultural borders around most black Americans needs to come up with a better reason than some bullshit, whiny "oppressed/oppressor dynamic". That crap won't pass in 2003, sorry. The fact of the matter (from someone who knows) is that there IS a very clear definition among many blacks as to what they "should" and "shouldn't" be listening to, and any black kid who's caught blasting a little Metallica or Siouxsie or The Cure gets questioned, made fun of, treated like an AIDS patient with an open sore. And that is FACT.

Would anyone here care to explain to me the many discussions I've had with several black co-workers about music, wherein my co-workers PROUDLY proclaimed that they don't listen to "that shit", that "it ain't for us", etc.??? Would anyone here care to explain the NUMEROUS ribbings and strange looks I've endured over the years from blacks, for blasting too much "white music"????

Surely, someone's going to tell me I just don't "understand", that this is all a figment of my stupid, hick, prejudiced, "conservative" imagination??!?!?!?!? :-)

I don't think its to do with race but whether they are open minded abt it.

Right, OK, fine. But you do understand that everybody — not just us, but every professor of music everywhere, not just in the last hundred years but really throughout the tradition you claim to champion — disagrees with you on this point...don't you?

(strictly speaking, Bach can't be played right on a piano, since Bach himself intended his keyboard pieces for the harpsichord)

this is where geir tells you this isn't the case John.

''You're a waste of space
No natural grace
You're so bloody thin
You don't even begin

To interest me, not even curiosity
It's not animosity, it's just you don't interest me

You're an energy void
A black hole to avoid
No style no heart
You don't even start''

Re: Sterling's Randall Kennedy comment... I, too, often serve up empty sarcasm in lieu of a valid response when confronted with something I can't easily shoot down. It's okay... it's the HUMAN thing to do... *wink*

Geir would, if he'd ever be open to such a thing, be well served by reading Derek Bailey's Improvisation, Harry Partch's Genesis of a Music, Foucault's Discipline and Punish and many other texts.

To your point, Scott Kos, why do you think the rigidity you experienced is somehow unique to African-Americans? I mean, I got called a fag by other white kids for listening to R.E.M. and Black Flag (another way of saying "It's not for us?").

Of course in a race divided society yr. going to get responses to that from both black and white people -- demanding otherwise is absurd. And kicking up a scandal about "black people" as a general demographic being closed minded is actually particularly absurd since we might as well kick up a scandal that "whites are racist" (because y'know, some are) or etc.

Anyway if you have the time Ishmael Reed's "Airing Dirty Laundry" goes through this all in more detail than I care to muster right now.

I mean the "black people not perfect SHOCKAH" stories are as old as reconstruction.

I certainly agree that the issue belongs to other groups besides the black kids who threw spitballs from the BACK of my old school bus... *grins*. But I just figured that since the subject of this thread was BLACK audiences...

However, I do have a friend who grew up in Indiana, who got called a "big-time fag" growing up for being into Prince and The Cure (not just a regular-strength fag, but a BIG-TIME one, mind you). Of course, dressing up like Robert Smith one Halloween probably didn't help matters...

get yer nose out of the fucking books for a second and take a walk outside... breathe in a little fresh air... I'm not doing "what he does"... I'm simply recounting PERSONAL EXPERIENCE, as it applies to the subject of this thread. I mean, starting a debate and then feigning indifference when the other guy actually turns out not to be one of those closed-minded hicks I assume you're so much higher than??? Well, Sterl, some people might call that a little flippant... Said people may also remark that backing oneself up with information gleaned from other people's writing is a tad weak...

And as for this literature thing, generally, most art forms have gone in the wrong direction during the last 100 years.

Send Geir to ILE and let's have some new fun!!

Oh... Benny Hill Theme Song fer sher.

And if you look at the socioeconomics of the indie fanbase its fairly out-of-reach for most of the black population and even in that socioeconomic category there are plenty of pressures towards maintaining a "black" continuum instead, not least pervasive racism, the notion of the talented tenth etc.

It was more the "revelation" aspect and outrage you were expressing w/r/t it like "Social Segregation produces Cultural Differentiation! More on this breaking story at eight!". And making the accusation that "backing oneself up with information gleaned from other people's writing is a tad weak" sort of calls into question the point of y'know, reading and learning and stuff which I'm sure you didn't mean to do, or at least I hope you didn't.

But, where does this definition spring from? I think there is a strong impulse to distance yourself from the culture that imposed itself on your culture. (Let's not forget that segregation ended less than a generation ago in the US)
---------------------------------------------------------------

Geir, what do you think of Cuban music?

You mean like Geir?

Touche O NAte!

If memory serves - Dan Perry? can't remember who else - and I went into how basically *everything* can be transcribed using musical notation on another thread (in particular we were discussing scratching and sampling).

The problem is Geir sets up rules and dictums that break down under any kind of scrutiny, but which read like loud pronouncements reinforcing his cultural myopia. Geir chronically uses terms in ways that no one else accepts, which makes communication kind of impossible, especially since his own private terminology is so inconsistent and riddled with innacuracy.

-- John Cage

"you don't have to call it music, if the term scares you." - john cage

"I AM part-black, and I've often wondered the same thing. Anyone claiming that there aren't massive, self-imposed cultural borders around most black Americans needs to come up with a better reason than some bullshit, whiny "oppressed/oppressor dynamic". That crap won't pass in 2003, sorry. The fact of the matter (from someone who knows) is that there IS a very clear definition among many blacks as to what they "should" and "shouldn't" be listening to, and any black kid who's caught blasting a little Metallica or Siouxsie or The Cure gets questioned, made fun of, treated like an AIDS patient with an open sore. And that is FACT.

Would anyone here care to explain to me the many discussions I've had with several black co-workers about music, wherein my co-workers PROUDLY proclaimed that they don't listen to "that shit", that "it ain't for us", etc.??? Would anyone here care to explain the NUMEROUS ribbings and strange looks I've endured over the years from blacks, for blasting too much "white music"???? "

And, to Sterling:

No, I'm certainly not calling into question the idea of reading and learning. I was just reacting to my impression that you were relying solely on book quotations to put across your point... which, theoretically, makes it more the point of the PERSON WHO WROTE THE BOOKS FROM WHICH YOU'RE QUOTING... plus, I didn't take kindly to your initial "oh, Randall Kennedy decided to stop by", as though it were a dismissal, implying that I simply regurgitate others' viewpoints instead of relying on my own thoughts, ideas, experience.

And I stand by my initial assertion. Furthermore, it's not simply "social segregation" I'm talking about. It's SELF-IMPOSED segregation, much like the black kids at school who apparently never saw the irony in their CHOOSING to always sit in a cluster at the back of the school bus (for example). I'm not talking about the poor sons of sharecroppers who've spent their entire lives in Jim Crow Mississippi with nothing but Delta blues to inform them *smiles*... I'm talking about the beneficiaries of our post-civil-rights-struggle era... kids who grow up in the suburbs and in decent middle-class neighborhooods, black kids who were fortunate enough to attend my preppie-ass middle-class Catholic school, who were obviously able to take the presence of whites and various other types of people for granted. Kids who, compared to their parents or grandparents, have limitless opportunities to grab the world by the balls and find out what makes it turn. Kids who are not FORCED, by any legal or serious social means, to only cohabitate with "their own"... but rather impose that logic on themselves, due to some silly ideal of what it means to be "cool" or "down" or "black". And "blackness", as defined in the conventional immature, narrow-minded vein (by people of ALL races and groups), means "keepin' it real", staying "hard", staying "street", staying "ghetto", never moving beyond the borders of "blackness"... borders which most CERTAINLY have no room for anything other than hip-hop and other "modern black music".

And, to those who believe that the self-contained musical tastes of some blacks are due to a history of prejudice and oppression: Why aren't people of Jewish descent (for ex.) "known" for only listening to music made by, and catering to, a "Jewish audience"??????

BEST MENTAL IMAGE EVER

Tzadik's Radical Jewish Music series to thread!

THAT'S WHAT I'M ASKING. I'm not claiming to understand it or have a series of reasons to explain it...

Does John McWhorter have anything insightful to say about this? Or is he another black neocon we don't want to drag into it?

Er... wait...

What exactly is puerile about the RJM series? Is it puerile to conceive of a series of records informed by and developing various possibilities of Jewish culture? There's been a lot of good music in that series.

He *is* asking for a good liberal pat on the head, and working to make privelaged, hip-hop-listening college kids feel more secure in their adoption of saying "n****" when singing along to hip-hop music (aka adopting the impoverished-black-underclass cause?).

This is also known as the Insane Clown Posse solution.

whatever. you brought the guy up. since you say he IS asking for approval from liberals, then how the FUCK does that apply to what I was saying: That no one -- blacks or otherwise -- should be falling back on tired, comfy old tropes about the impacts of slavery-racism- Jim Crow to explain everything from the shoes blacks buy to the colors they paint their houses????

And why isn't America fully integrated?? Aside from the topic of white flight from (certain) neighborhoods that start to go downhill with the arrival of (certain types of) blacks, I have no experience of my own to bring to the table on that one. Never claimed to have written a dissertation on the subject.

As far as the music thing goes, and why many blacks refuse to INTEGRATE THEMSELVES fully into aspects of "white culture", such as its music... well, you'd do better driving through your nearest black neighborhood blasting Kate Bush's "The Dreaming", and asking open-jawed passers-by why they aren't gettin' jiggy wit' it. You'll find all the answers you need there, my friend... *smiles*

"Would anyone here care to explain to me the many discussions I've had with several black co-workers about music, wherein my co-workers PROUDLY proclaimed that they don't listen to "that shit", that "it ain't for us", etc.??? Would anyone here care to explain the NUMEROUS ribbings and strange looks I've endured over the years from blacks, for blasting too much "white music"???? "

The whole world is NOT contained within a college campus...

But the rest of that post, about "a genuine stereotype that will continue to be pondered so long as it is perpetuated by a large enough amount of people in tandem with the media/marketeers", is what prompted my reply. That's an excellent point in some regards, but in others, MY point is just as valid.

Like I mean that there would be fewer young black men in jail and more in universities and fewer hate-crimes and better wages etc?

Do you actually think that?

I simply revert to my original intention in stating that the black community ITSELF has the greatest power in eliminating many of the problems/roadblocks/issues that confront it.

Is what Scott said above.

Now what this implies is that somehow listening to Outkast rather than Kate Bush is a "roadblock" which the "black community" (which exists WHERE exactly?) most confront. I find this rather confusing.

OK, Sterling, NOW you're just picking a fight. That is so completely off the mark, in relation to what I'm saying. There's a difference between stating your case, and being determined to disagree. It doesn't matter whether or not black people listen to "white" music, ultimately. But since the point of this thread is why black people aren't more generally into prog/indie, I thought I'd state what I believe (from my experience): That those who DO ignore "whiter" forms of music do so because where they are culturally -- and what they already are accustomed to -- is much more comfortable than stepping out into unfamiliar terrain. The SAME, by the way, MORE than applies to white friends of mine, who refused to stray beyond Metallica and Soundgarden, and give Prince or Coltrane a chance...

And, just for the record, for the "I have a black friend" crowd... A good BLACK female friend of mine, from a few years ago, LOVED most of what I gave her on mix tapes. Even dug Gn'R's "One in a Million". And *gosh* she didn't even talk white....

*grins*

I was just laughing to myself, thinking: "Is THAT all I needed to do? Let people know I had an honest-to-goodness black friends??"

Okay, I'll stop now. I shouldn't be laughing so much on the job...

Somewhere waaaaay upthread I pointed out that most people (aka, "the average listener", "buys 12 CDs a year", etc.) just buy what they're told to. Black people are marketed almost exclusively "black" music - and this gets reinforced by a variety of social dynamics, some of which Scott has pointed out - the behaviors reinforce each other. You've got economic forces pushing a group to conform to a certain cultural identity because it generates the most money, you've got dynamics within that group that reinforce a perceived need to conform and "stick together", and you've got cultural barriers cutting the group off from other sources (fear/ignorance of the unfamiliar). These are vast generalizations, but this stuff seems fairly obvious to me.

now I'm humbled. You just took what I said and made it waaay more compact, and in a less abrasive form!

what, I can't get a "whassup" from Sterling??!?!

*laughs*

Personally, I don't think music would be that important. However, if more of the inhabitants of the NYC and LA ghettos had chosen the Martin Luther King approach or participating in society rather than the Malcolm X approach of opposing society and creating their own society instead, then they would have been better off.

But, that being said, I understand very well because people get angry at their oppressors, and I think the murders on those two guys in 1968 did exactly as much damage against unification in the US society as any violence (from either side) in Israel/Palestine obviously damages the peace process in the Middle East.

I'm so sick of this shit - read his autobiography, you're way off the mark. And by the time MLK was assassinated, his social program had gone far beyond integration to include the inequitable distribution of wealth via capitalism, protesting the Vietnam War, etc. Not really things that had to do with black people "participating" in society.

Maybe you should firm up on your disastrously inconsistent music "theory" before tackling history...

x-post

-- Kenan Hebert (mondria...), April 21st, 2003.

OTM OTM OTM OTM

Because there are white people who listen to black music....???

"Where are the obligatory niggaz?"

Please, no one post in it after me.

There are like 500* fallacies in the first post alone.

*exaggeration obv., but not by much.

(I'll be saying this a LOT in the coming weeks)

Well, anyone can revive threads for whatever reason -- I'm assuming someone was either bored or wanted to have a bit of (un)fun.

Ah, therein the eternal mysteries of ILX. ;-)

Anyone seen Geir and Blofeld in the same room?

Purism has never brought much good to the world at all, the best music is always a result of compromise - i.e. a compromise that keeps all the white elements (melody, harmony etc) in the foreground and all the black elements (the bass and the pulse/beat namely) in the background. They are all there, mixed together to perfection in the perfect compromise.

Thats right Geir no-one enjoys music but you do they?
No-one else has a good time.

Only you. In your room. Where dancing is not permitted.

Here comes Geir to tell us why we all have not been enjoying music all this time. We just thought we were.
Man its a strong illusion.

Geir, please...

ew

http://home.online.no/~knhongro/Geir/pop/Dodgy.jpg

mmmm...Dodgy. "Twin Town" wouldn't be the same w/out their propulsive rhythm

anyway i just wanted to post to rep Malibu's Most Wanted as a bit of a deeper movie than ppl. give it credit for and a share of pretty damn funny moments. i actually think donna would quite like parts of it.

there's a rilly well done and scathing bit about repping "gangsta" as blackness and it makes a strong (read funny) case for "race as performative".

xpost

-- Geir Hongro (geirhon...), April 21st, 2003.

How do you know this, Geir?

I am pretty sure you aren't going to find a lot of Yes-fans or even Korn-fans in Bronx or Compton though.

Britain's entire Ugandan Indian population to thread.

B-b-but where can you find Yes-fans??????

(punk just killed all the little prog bands, for a while anyway)

He's been tunnelling underground for so long he's forgotten what it looks like on the surface. He's Ilm's Mole.

I love how we're talking about "black people" as this abstract idea rather than human beings.

Of course by "we" I mean Geir.

I think the general consensus was reached long ago that a) Geir doesn't know anything about actual black people, their history, their culture, or their social behaviors and b) Geir's theories about the "structure" and "purpose" of music are constructs of his own with no actual basis in musical theory or practice.

Actually, the thing about Geir that I find the most curious is that his musical philosophy is completely in line with eurocentric crypto-fascist politics, but he actually does not seem eager to actively advocate or espouse such politics - he sees himself as egalitarian rather than discriminatory (somehow, without realizing that completely innacurate and and derogatory generalizations are inherently discriminatory).

At the beginning of the twentieth century, a chacona-style figure reappeared in the hands of African-American musicians in New Orleans, Chicago, and, notably, the Mississippi Delta, where the Devil was again said to be active. It sounded obsessively in Skip James’s “I’m So Glad,” one of the greatest of the Delta blues, and can be heard rumbling beneath Ellington’s “Reminiscing in Tempo.” Descending chromatic basses gave a slow-marching power to some of the more ambitious rock songs of the sixties and seventies—Dylan’s “Ballad of a Thin Man” and “Simple Twist of Fate,” Led Zeppelin’s “Dazed and Confused” and “Stairway to Heaven.” Somehow, four centuries after the lamenting bass surfaced, its meaning remained the same. It summoned up the dark comfort of heartbreak and depression: the heart descending step by step to the bottom and going back up to repeat the journey.

Universal figures such as the chacona—“memes,” as musicologists call them, borrowing from sociobiology—reveal the interconnectedness of all musical experience. If you could bring together a few seventeenth-century Afro-Cuban musicians, a continuo section led by the Master Bach, and players from Ellington’s 1929 band, and then ask John Paul Jones to start them off with the bass line of “Dazed and Confused,” they would, after a minute or two, find common ground. And very interesting music it would be, too. Purists of all genres can never stand the fact that the genealogy of music is one long string of miscegenations and mutations."

Alex Ross, New Yorker, July 03

This is very perceptive...and interesting. Someone should pursue this line of thought further.

Is Geir a fascist?

but *then* his father, who is a politician, decides that "acting black" is bad for his campaign publicity and hires two black classically/shakespearean trained actors (who are, natch, only able to get thug roles) to "play" thugs and fake-kidnapp jk and take him through the ghetto to "scare the black out of him" (this plan proposed by said father's black campaign advisor). the scenes where the two actors go and practice their "hood" accents and mannerisms and go shopping for "hood" clothing and try it out (in a stereotype clothing-tryout-montage, again natch) are things of real beauty.

i started a thread called "The Scandinavian Right" on ILE aeons ago, before Geir actually appeared here - think it was inspired by Danish/Norwegian elections.

The Beatles did represent the perfect compromise between "black" and "white" music styles, as did also Motown and Phil Spector at about the same time. Purism isn't needed, compromise is the best thing. And the 60s were the best time of compromise, because the compromise was true and it featured the best of both worlds, "white" harmonic and melodic sophistication and lyrical content, "black" rawness and rhythm and groove.

By removing one of the two you remove something from the music. No white popular music act has ever tried removing the rhythm section though - even prog had a rhythm section, thus all prog was a 50/50 compromise between "white" and "black" music. And one should stick to that 50/50 compromise, not try to remove the melody/harmony part from it like a lot of black acts (and even some white ones, from Yardbirds to Eminem) have tried to do.

And, yes. Everybody should try to sound like The Beatles. And everybody also includes black acts, naturally

And, yes. Everybody should try to sound like The Beatles. And everybody also includes black acts, naturally

And, yes. Everybody should try to sound like The Beatles. And everybody also includes black acts, naturally

And, yes. Everybody should try to sound like The Beatles. And everybody also includes black acts, naturally

And, yes. Everybody should try to sound like The Beatles. And everybody also includes black acts, naturally

And, yes. Everybody should try to sound like The Beatles. And everybody also includes black acts, naturally

And they all lived Happily Ever After.

The End

See here for an explanation of the classic example.

There's a Horizon Programme later on this week about nanotechnology and the perceived fear of scientists that the ultimate effect of this is the universe getting turned into grey goo.

That Geir statement reproduced above reminds me of that.

considering that Geir actually knows absolutely zero about African Americans, I'd say it's more like his point lies down in its grave and prays for the quiet death it so deserves.

Also, I know a bunch of minority emo kids, haha.

"TURN THAT EMO OFF AND PUT SOME JAY-Z ON!!!"

significant, of course, that he so loves Gabriel-era Genesis, because they embody the moment in British pop culture where the middle classes who were involved in it were aspiring to an old idea of "white European culture". already before that time there'd been a whole movement of people from similar backgrounds saying fuck that (the biggest influence on Tamla Motown's UK breakthrough in 1964/65 was Radio Caroline, which was bankrolled by Jocelyn Stevens, editor of the Hooray-Henrys-at-play magazine Queen). the white bourgeois European-ness of prog rock is about as influential on even Chris Martin, awful though Coldplay's music is (witness his apologetically saying he's not as "real" as the Wu-Tang Clan, writing a song for Jamelia, calling out Timbaland) as Henry Williamson is on Joss Stone. that's why Geir is so defensive; *his side lost*. they'd already lost in the mid-60s; the prog era he so reveres was a retrenchment which had little influence on future British cultural developments. he reminds me of the elderly Mosleyites I've come across who talk about Blair having a plot to "destroy the English race" through "ethnocide"; the paranoia of the defeated.

(Many apologies to Geir, as the analogy can be seen as terribly insulting to him, even in spite of his contributions to this thread)

i feel really suckered by all this. geir is immobile and ridiculous but his outlook is absoloutely stable and perfectly orderly (tho it does take constant vigilance [ie sticking his dick into every other dance or hip hop thread] to defend, hmm) and ordering all music in an all encompassing system of value is pretty strange, never mind it's racist structure; a wounded kid's crackpot bedroom scholarship carried out ad infinitum (i love playing armchair shrink, don't i)

anyway, suckered: calm rigidity in the face of head-beating conflict serves some kind of NEED for our hero and i (we) should just be able to ignore it all, but i can't help but get my undies in a bunch when i read what he writes, over and over and over agaaain...

Read the title of the thread.

Plenty of the early-seventies prog rockers were big, serious Jazz fans. The impact of Jazz on '70's prog is conveniently forgotten, but listen to king crimson's "circus", or "cat food" w/keith tippett Chris Squire recalling his first meeting w/Bruford - this curly-haired hippie, wearing a pair of plimsolls with "JAZZ" written in felt tip pen on one, and "I HATE (keith) MOON" on the other. David jackson's influences - Roland Kirk, Charlie Parker, Sonny Rollins,
John Coltrane, Sonny Rollins. Hardly the stuff of "white european bourgeioseness". Plus, the whole movement (really, a movement if seen in retrospect, a lot of it was just bored beat/psych musicians hearing "In the Court of the Crimson King; An Observation by King Crimson", and realising that there was more to life than knocking out more of the same yadda yadda - look at the histories of most of the second generation prog acts, and the spectre of failed beat grouperry is never far away) I digress, er, the big thing about it was massively driven by keyboard tech. Try to imagine just what a GIANT revolition it must have been for a keyboard player, in 1969, to play a mellotron. Holy fuck, bang on the keys and a REAL CHOIR is singing "aaahhh" at you!! twist a knob, and youre playing a REAL VIOLIN TRIO from the keyboard. now, what are you going to do with that, eh? Now add a minimoog in to the equation - it's 1971, right? Have you ever been confronted with something like this before? What are you going to do with it? plenty of contemporary musicans wouldn't have anything to do w/any of it, in fact the muscian's union tried to get the mellotron banned. Painting '70's progressive rock as some kind of reactionary movement won't stick, I'm afraid.

Personally, I don't think it's too useful to extrapolate anything from geir's views on music, culture etc. geir's views are odd, to me, by any standards. I lurk on a number of progressive msuic lists, and geir would stick out on some of those. He isn't a typical Genesis fan, in my experience. Given his thing for melody, one would expect him to like the later stuff, and dismiss the self-indulgence of the early genesis albums, like Q did years ago.

Coldplay, Starsailor et al? Fuck 'em up the ass.

In the 60s, the boundaries were about to be torn down between "black" and "white" music. The Beatles mixed raw R&B elements (I don't deny them being heavily influenced by R&B and rock'n'roll) with somewhat more "European" melodic and harmonic stuff than even white rock'n'rollers would do in the 50s. On the other side, there were the Motown acts who, while preserving their gospel influenced vocal style, and the "ecstatic" was of singing, at the same time took more time to care about the tunes. While the twee psychedelic concept album never was picked up by Motown (which is why Motown were terribly old-fashioned from 1967 until "What's Going On" redefined their style), Motown were very much in the forefront in 1963-66 when it came to tearing down those stupid boundaries.

While Motown and The Beatles, from two different backgrounds, both helped blur these boundaries, Phil Spector also did, through a "white" songwriting style and use of strings/influenced from classical music, combined with the same gospel influenced singers (most of them black), again creating a perfect combination here.

Because I do think it is a good idea to get rid of all kinds of purism. Even I like my music with a rhythm section. I do prefer The Beatles or Genesis more than I like Bach or Mozart. But I also do prefer to have the melodies there, because, really, I consider melody the most beautiful invention Mankind has ever come up with, and I see no reason why melody should be buried just because it happened to be developed by the same people who did a lot of really bad things towards Africans in the 18th and 19th century.

Melodies deserves to live forever, in all music, not just in ancient classical European music from previous decades. This most of all means that it should live in popular music, in its traditional European form. And then, other "black" elements might be added, such as a rhythm section and sometimes a somewhat more emotional vocal style, because as long as the melody and its harmonies are being kept, the music isn't harmed by those elements ever.

I simply want black and white people to make the same kind of music, and that music should be a 50/50 compromise between "black" and "white" music styles, which is exactly what both The Beatles and Motown were.

Mixing politics into this is completely sick because this has nothing to do with politics. Music isn't politics. Music is music, and it is nothing but music and should be nothing else than music.
And I do realise that this "absolute music" idea is a European one, developed by German composers in the 19th century, but it is still a bloody good one, that music should work in itself, and shouldn't be mixed by politics, or with anything else for that matter. (For that exact same reason, I also tend to ignore the quality of the lyrics as long as the melody works).

But it's the opposite way round, in fact. All of Genesis' 70s output was terrificly melodic, and as opposed to most other prog band, Genesis never tried to give the impression that their music was improvised. I think the only Genesis member who shows a slight jazz influence is Phil Collins (not that jazz is any less "head music" than Genesis anyway though). Listen to Steve Hacket's obviously one hundred per cent precomposed and obviously non-improvised guitar solo on "Firth Of Fifth" for instance.

In the 80s, they were still melodic, but not as strong, plus Phil Collins had this thing about R&B that made him incorporate the Earth Wind & Fire brass section in his band etc. I like 70s Genesis a lot more, mainly because Phil Collins had less of a creative input in the band than any of the other members by then.

See, all the later phil collins oh lord stuff, when I see the song titles, I sort of have some fond memories in there somewhere, but when I try to actually listen to any of that stuff, urgh.

http://www.toughpigs.com/extraweezer17.jpg

Yeah, like [insert male ILM poster's name here with hilarious consequences]!

'I simply want black and white people to make the same kind of music, and that music should be a 50/50 compromise between "black" and "white" music styles, which is exactly what both The Beatles and Motown were.'

Despite the fact that it will probably be reversed next time he wants to take everyone on, i do think something has been acheived here. Geir is now using the first person to express his ideas rather than pretending - for the most part - that they are dogmatic truths.
That's really the most we can ask of him in the sure knowledge that he will not be persuaded otherwise, as hardened long-time posters know. What he says is still terribly faulty of course - he is unable to recognize that different kinds of music use different kinds of melody, as per the scale being used, the compositional rules etc.
His bias against 'purism' is incomprehensible(under this definition would come most music made by most cultures, if Geir were in charge of the British Museum god knows what would happen to the glorious artifacts and artistic testaments produced by peoples in splendid isolation many of which represent the best elements of human creativity), his identical feeling for improvisation is the same.
Complaining about politicising music is unbelievable since he did that with this very question. What kind of answer did he expect?
A musical one or a political one? No he just wanted to poke us with sticks and now hes squealing like a pig because he hes condemmned himself with his own words. His view are pretty much identical to the majority of European musicologists before the 1930s, so i have no trouble with recognizing where he fits in in terms of these ideas.

as for Geir's own epic manifesto, it pretty well sums him up; a terminally bounded mind. "wanting" people to make the same kind of music ... this is the thing, Geir, why are you so fixated? why are you so quasi-religious about it? why can't you see a wide range of music as A Good Thing without wanting to listen to all of it yourself? i know plenty of people who'd never listen to any hip-hop, but they don't have a moralistic desire to sweep it away and insist that all western popular music conforms to a particular style. there's plenty of melodic music of the sort you like still selling, and audiences don't seem to be bogged down in "hipness" - the current number one album artist in the UK was "developed" by Mike Batt, of all people.

Generally, again, I think Geir is Gier, and extrapolating anything from his opinions is futile, because...Geir is Geir (I'm sorry, Geir, for referring to you in the third person like this, it's very rude, I know.)

"know your place" is the last thing EG King crimson says to me, I mean, like, "know your place" = humble pie, for instance, but we've been through it all before, of course.

Did you find those old "Zig Zag" magazines interesting?

i sure as hell did find the magazines interesting - enormous cultural/sociological meaning there. the Feb 1977 Steve Hillage interview had me envisaging him as one of the children on a nature ramble in the 1962 British Transport film "Take To The Boats" (it's a bloody long story). if British music had stayed that way forever doubtless Geir could still handle it. it's the twin legacies of the Windrush generation and the venture-capitalist offshore radio spirit that he can't cope with, bounded mind that he is ...

http://guitargrl22.tripod.com/pics/w/riversmirror.jpg

'Music is music, and it is nothing but music and should be nothing else than music.'

'And I do realise that this "absolute music" idea is a European one, developed by German composers in the 19th century, but it is still a bloody good one, that music should work in itself, and shouldn't be mixed by politics, or with anything else for that matter'

The contradictions are, like melody, timeless and endless.
I suppose under the heading of 'anything else for that matter' would come literature, poetry, visuals, acting, vocals, environment, technology, philosophy, story/programme, ideas, meaning, symbol, domestic or social utility/application, reference to culture or history, educatative value, social protest, lyrics, passion, impersonality, awareness of current artistic trends, religiosity,
costume, audience, life and change.

It's also untrue that emo is whiter than white. Emo is often VERY groove based. Just have a listen to Shotmaker or Engine Down. Grooves ahoy.

there you go

Bingo. Well said, Robin. There's part of me that feels guilty sometimes for not being able to like Lil Jon that much, and esp. knowing that it has a good deal to do with crunk not being "melodic" enough for me. (Like, oh no, I'm no different from Geir!) But of course I'm happy that crunk exists and excited at new directions in music. Which Geir obviously isn't.

If you look at current hitlists (I am speaking of singles, not albums), there isn't exactly a wide range of music to be found there. In fact, the singles lists haven't featured a wide range of different musical genres since the 80s.

This is Geir's entire personal theory of music in one sentence

And there was a much larger varieties on different genres on the singles charts in the past than there is now. It isn't like 20 years ago, when the same 13 year-old could possibly be into recent hits by acts as diverse as Culture Club, Human League, Men At Work, J. Geils Band, Michael Jackson and Iron Maiden.

You may be into something. And note that the American music I dislike most, either black or white, usually hails from the South of the US. Both country music and blues are harmonically very simple and repetitive when compared with, for instance, jazz (which is also "black" music, but - despite its Southern Origin - was mainly developed in the North). Also, I clearly prefer the Northern Motown music to the Southern, harmonically simpler (but possibly emotionally "rawer") Stax/Volt stuff. It may be a question of high culture vs. low culture, and generally I think that popular music would benefit to incorporate as many high culture elements as possible.

and geir, i DO believe that i DID say that you're NOT the only one who reifies your tastes.

Quarter-tone scales are not necessarily high culture if used in "rai" music or Indian/Pakistani music. That being said, I respect those Asian and North African cultures a lot, and I have heard some really magnificent and musically interesting stuff by Khaled and Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan among others.

You might want to reword that; people will jump you for having eurocentric views of high culture!

Tad, I've been discussing music with Geir since 1995. I think I have some measure of what he's about.

That must means Toni Basil's Mickey IS DIE GESAMSTWERKE

I understand this is the DSM-IV definition of a mentalist.

Virtue is a patience.

What the fuck are you talking about?? "Obsession With Race"???

Personally I don't give a FUCK what skin colour people have got. I care about MUSIC! Eminem and El-P are just as crap and musically worthless as Public Enemy and Jay-Z while on the other hand, Seal and Tasmin Archer have both made a lot of great melodic music. This isn't a matter of race it is a matter of music. What music should be and what it should not be. And most, of all, it is a matter of defending the most beautiful invention Mankind has ever made: The full tempered melodic/harmonic music system!

i dunno about indian classical music (is sundar around?). but lots of european classical is based on "traditional" european music -- e.g., chopin's mazurkas, the mighty five (who were all about integrating russian folk-music into classical form), beethoven's "ode to joy" (which is, essentially, a beer-hall singalong), mozart's the magic flute (which is more of an eighteenth century Broadway music than an opera, per se).

1. Nelly
2. Cotton Mather
3. Flaming Lips
4. Alicia Keys
5. Outkast
6. Jayhawks
7. Travis
8. Destiny's Child
9. Britney Spears
10.Coldplay
11.Eminem
12.The Rapture
13.Missy Elliott
14.El-P
15.Stereophonics
16.Beck
17.Jay-Z
18.Doves
19.Christina Aguilera
20.Robbie Williams

That is, having a mixture of different styles, not just one style dominating. If, say, 40-50 per cent of the Top 20 list had consisted of strong melodic music, then there would have been no need to worry, really. The melodic/harmonic tradition would survive and would still be vital and alive, not a museum piece. What I fear is that this wonderful melodic/harmonic system (like I say, the most beautiful invention ever by Mankind) will not be used for creating new music anymore, which would be too bad because new generations need new songs to sing.

And to answer the "Don't you ever dance?"-question. Well, "Don't you ever sing or play an instrument?"

Where have all the flowers gone?

-- Geir Hongro"

I've just been looking over the American top 40 singles. Please tell me what Alicia Keys, 3 Doors Down, Dido, Linkin Park, Jay-z, Jessica Simpson and Matchbox Twenty have in common, because I can't seem to figure it out...

uh... Seal?????

-- Geir Hongro (geirhon...), January 26th, 2004.

They do you clown.

As for military drumming, I am not a military expert, but it probably had a function, and wasn't meant to be enjoyed as stand-alone music.

I wouldn't consider metal and hip-hop a particularly wide range of music. I guess one thing here is that 13-14 year-old boys these days are a lot more afraid of listening to typical "feminine" music than 13-14-year-old girls are. The girls' listening habits (which have usually always been about mainly ballads, but also a generally openmindedness towards anything that they do appear to hear combined with an unwillingness to turn into "music nerds" to get to hear more stuff) haven't changed all that much, I guess.