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Underground > Radio & Music >

fuck corporate rock (shins cont'd)

autopilot disengaged

15:28 / 23.02.02

(written as reply to shins thread - reposted here 'cause that one's dead - and edited when i realised i'd misspelled 'publicly').

...getting back to the shins + mcdonalds, i *do* have a problem with corporations co-opting other peoples' creativity to better connect with the youth demographic.

now maybe i'm clinging to an old-fashioed idea of a countercultural pop culture, an adversarial axis to the establishment. if so, good. that's my choice.

corporations are not cool. they need the help of musicians, designers etc to appear so. now, ok - there are people out there who are willing to lend their services in writing corporate anthems, shooting slick promos etc. i still disapprove, especially when its difficult to sidestep the fact you're collaborating with a morally questionable super-exploitative entity like McD's - but, y'know, it's a career choice...

however, if you're supposedly in this for yr artform, or claim to have something to say, full stop - why are you pimping for these assholes? 'cause all you're doing by letting them use yr music is making them cool by association - giving them the one thing their money shouldn't be able to buy - yr support. know this: in publicly standing shoulder-to-shoulder with them you are, once and for all aligning yrself with them and what they stand for. if that's ok with you, yr choice.

but don't expect me to respect you in the morning. what i'm saying here is: associaton is a two-way street.

i have no idea who the shins are, and am less likely to seek them out now, for what i do know - but i just want to say that the commercial takeover of every sphere of pop culture is not inevitable. that said, every time a band grants the use of their music, it becomes less of an 'issue', increasingly normalized, and a more difficult point to contest.

as has been pointed out, there are high-profile hold-outs - the beasties, radiohead (both of whom have, rather, used their power to get behind charities and activist groups they *believe* in).

don't believe for one moment that this is no big deal. one band at a time, maybe not - but as a cultural symptom? it's sick.

[ 23-02-2002: Message edited by: autopilot disengaged ]

[ 23-02-2002: Message edited by: autopilot disengaged ]

A

03:01 / 24.02.02

That was really well said, autopilot. I'm glad there are still a few people who don't have that completely cynical, defeatist attitude that so many folks seem to have nowadays.

I've never heard the Shins, either, and as a result of this, i really have no desire to hear them. Maybe their music is good, and maybe it isn't, but i don't support McDonalds, and i have no interest in supporting their pet alternative shills.

11:33 / 26.02.02

Just heard this last night: Cat Power's "Sea of Love" is in a MetLife ad.

My fiancee, who was introduced to Cat Power's music at a bizarre live show, couldn't believe "that crazy girl? you mean... that crazy girl?" had a song on TV.

11:38 / 26.02.02

Hey, um Radiohead had their songs used in Olympic commercials on NBC, and didn't Thom Yorke appear on South Park?

Matthew Fluxington

11:41 / 26.02.02

Being a guest on a tv show (particularly a tv show which one is a fan of..) is in no way like having yr music in an ad. I don't think there's anything ethically wrong with being a musical guest on SNL, Leno, Letterman, et al...wouldn't you agree?

11:46 / 26.02.02

Sure it is! If you're on SNL, you're on because NBC wants you on. NBC is the media arm of GE, one of the biggest defense contractors in America. You're supporting weapons of mass destruction by appearing on TV. Death to the man!

Matthew Fluxington

12:02 / 26.02.02

I don't know, that's such a tangental relationship - and it's a case in which an artists gets to play live for people who may never see them otherwise. I know SNL is a bad example - they haven't had anyone really weird or interesting on in ages (have you ever seen that one with Captain Beefheart? weird!), but when Radiohead were on a year or so ago, I thought it was great and kinda subversive. They went on in front of a massive audience and played two of the least-rock songs on Kid A ("Idioteque" and "The National Anthem") and played them live like any other thing. To me, it was sorta like them telling everyone "Listen, you can make rock music with all these other sounds and instruments. Do it.", and I loved it.

Did you see Outkast on Letterman when Stankonia came out, during the election? That was great too...

I don't know, I think it's a good thing for exciting musicians to sneak their way into tv programming. And I don't think doing that is in any way the same as appearing in an ad.

UNLESS it is a sponsered event - U2 on the Superbowl for example - that's pretty much the same as appearing in a Metlife ad.

autopilot disengaged

12:41 / 26.02.02

yeah: the whole issue is way less black and white than my initial post made out - but i started with my ideal, and intended to start a debate which would explore from there, hypothesis/antithesis stylee. i wasn't about to start with a compromise.

basically: i'm not taking issue with the fusion of advertisement and artistry - there are some amazing things produced by in-house or freelance designers etc - but more the way in which somebody who claims to be independent, sensitive, progressive will donate some of their aura, fanbase etc - to an organization that, in practice, opposes and retards such values.

i can see why some groups choose to do it. i wouldn't condemn some of them (partially depending on the relative politics of the company etc) and i do understand the temptation to deal with the devil in the short term to hopefully assure yr music a better future.

and something else to consider is that maybe consciously attempting to subvert the oppressor etc is another tactic (though of questionable effectiveness). brecht's whole thing of changing the world whatever the cost to yrself - despite the fact you might have to get yr hands dirty, lose yr saintly purity etc.

i'm not sure about that - anyone wanna make a case for it?

Regrettable Juvenilia

13:19 / 26.02.02

[rot]

Even the coolest indie pop icons have been reduced to flogging household goods these days. Why, just look at Stephin 'Magnetic Fields and loads of other bands, which are all actually just me' Merritt, in a pose from his latest advertisement for underarm deoderant:

[/rot]

Matthew Fluxington

13:55 / 26.02.02

heh.

Seriously, I was kinda sad when Malkmus broke a decade-long streak of no-adverts by modeling in a Mark Jacobs ad. Of course, he was just hanging out playing guitar and a bag was in the distance somewhere, but still.

14:01 / 26.02.02

Q: for Flux:

My girlfriend was watching a rerun of "Friends" the other day, and I noticed the bumper music was or was a reasonably facsimile of Pavement's "Rattled by the Rush." Know anything about this?

( I swear I'm not making this up)

Matthew Fluxington

14:13 / 26.02.02

I don't know anything about that.

There were a number of Pave singles that were used on MTV's Real World and other MTV shows - "Rattled By La Rush", "Range Life", "Gold Soundz", "Stereo", "Shady Lane", "Cut Yr Hair", "Spit On A Stranger"... but I think that has to do with some kind of clause that allows MTV to use whatever songs submitted as videos as soundtracks to in-house programming. I kinda doubt that Friends actually had "Rattled" on, but I can't say for sure.

03:42 / 27.02.02

Y'know, I don't care for the band, but I've gotta admit that I was glad to see this:

"Chumbawamba Passes Its Song Along to General Motors, Money Earned from Deal Passes Along to Anti-corporate Activist Groups to Monitor GM "

Here's another link at Salon.com

And here I thought it was weird when "Bomber" Bob Dornan wanted to use one of their songs as his campaign music.

ODDBEDFELLOWSPATROLGO!

04:12 / 27.02.02

Doesn't Moby, the Most Licensed of All, contribute the bulk of his pay to ecological causes?

Matthew Fluxington

22:20 / 16.12.02

To answer Todd, about a year after he asks - I recently found out that Pavement would not allow "Rattled By La Rush" to be used in Friends, so the producers of Friends had session musicians create music that sounded similar instead.

22:53 / 16.12.02

I saw a Reverend Horton Heat flyer or poster or something in 'Friends' once.

Think it was the excruciating episode when they go and see Counting Crows, maybe.

Mind you, RHH are shit.

05:57 / 17.12.02

I think you meant to say "Reverent Horton Heat are the shit!"

No star here laces

09:57 / 17.12.02

This thread may well beg the question "what do you think youth culture is all about"?

I think one can very convincingly argue that it is about the archetype of the devil-may care, no thought for the future, rebellious youth who does hir own thing no matter what the authorities tell them. This archetype is, of course, the ideal consumer. The person not impeded by outmoded concerns like thought for society, or any sense of moral responsibility. The person who when they want something, goes out to get (i.e. buy) that thing. We see this assumption everywhere in our implicit attitudes to youth (calling someone 'grandad' for buying uncool record = not knowing what to buy means you are old = preserve your youth forever by the power of your informed purchasing skills). Even the very use of music to define an identity stems from this mindset: "I am the cds that I buy".

To add the layer of 'independence" to this...

Independence = doing your own thing without the controlling influence of powerful forces. But apparently successful and independent no longer equals independent. Is Jay-Z independent? He runs his own record label... If you sell your own product for money that you get to keep, how does that affect your independence?

So actually 'independent' does not mean independent, in the musical context. It means 'niche'. Which is but a whisker away from 'elitist'. In a 'youth' context niche means 'cool to a subset of youth'. I.e. the definition of approved consumption for one type of youth. Thus maintaining your 'cool' and not 'selling' it to a corporation simply means you are favouring niche consumption over mass consumption. It's all still consumption and all still plays to the standard unconstructive tropes of our society which are that consumption = identity, and that happiness is predicated on consumption.

Refusing to sell your music to a corporation is therefore just as pernicious as selling it to a corporation, and simply replaces greed with sneering elitism, which is hardly a trade-off to be proud of.

15:24 / 17.12.02

Yeah alot, some, all of the money that Moby makes from car commercials he poors into political groups that are green.

As for Chumbawamba, I hate that one song, but heard about there politics and decided to ckeck them out. They are actually pretty damn good.

So what are all your thoughts on selling songs to corporations to fight those same corps in other ways. Moby said something like their are just going to rip off my work for their commercials so I might as well take the money and use it against them.

20:20 / 17.12.02

how can you 'sell out'? to 'sell out' you have to buy in. fuck that. don't buy in and you can't sell out. Lyra is right. fuck all that shit. do what ya want. all ya CAN do is TRY and make the world better. if that's what you want to do.

Matthew Fluxington

20:31 / 17.12.02

...and surely the world is made better by having your song included in an ad campaign for a huge corporation, yes?

autopilot disengaged

22:24 / 17.12.02

it's late, and i'm not going to get into this right now. as is obvious, this isn't a yes/no binary situation. but that doesn't mean all actions - if well-intentioned - within a system, are equivelant.

and i'd suggest the actual question posed by the thread is 'what is the relation of pop culture to the music industry?'