Introduction. The Rhizome and the arborescent model. The powerful tree trunk, here representing a hierarchy of opinion against the horizontal, discontinuous and free flight of the rhizome. The trunk is filiation. The rhizome on the other hand represents multiplicities. It has no beginning or end, just a middle (a milieu). It is a subterranean shoot, it spreads horizontally, and at certain junctures plateaus arise. A rhizome is about connectivity. It does not run opposed to the arborescent (or state) but it is a line of escape/flight, a different way. No one language in a rhizome, multiplicity. Arborescent might seek a universal language. Nomad thought verses state space. The overall aim is to investigate the music press and the changes that have occurred due to advances in communication and technology and to look at the potential future of the music press plus industry and the implication for the consumer, artist and the record labels. Plateaus. What are the new plateaus that have arisen due to advances in technology and communication? New web sites, the advent of file sharing. The consumer ideally jumps from one to another (metacritic.com) and makes informed decisions on what to listen to or buy. The eventuality of the rhizome might be becoming ‘a self facilitating media node,’ (Nathan Barley, Channel 4). What about those who can’t reach these plateaus? Is the arborescent structure still in existence? The event. ‘The best of all worlds is not the one that reproduces the eternal, but the one in which new creations are produced, the one endowed with a capacity for innovation or creativity: a teleological conversion of philosophy,’ (p79, The Fold, Deleuze). Deleuze’s theory of the event and the growing sense that music is becoming more about the event. The live sphere is the only one that doesn’t represent an absence. Can the press ever influence us more than the first hand experience? Examples, Polyphonic Spree, Arctic Monkeys. War Machines. The war machine is a kind of movement which is separate to the state, and it causes concern to, or somehow disturbs the sedentary cultures within the state. For the purpose of this discussion the arborescent root within the music industry could be equated with the state. Independent labels and bands as war machines. They try to mix the state apparatus up. Runs away from as well as struggle against the state. Eventually become recoded by capital, example Creation records. Reterritorialization and deterritorialization, capitalism and the attempt by the state to limit desires. Do the new plateaus mean a creation of desires. Hell is For Heroes and Captains of industry case studies Interview with an independent label and band. The band have been signed to a major, and independent, and a have released an album on their own label. Captains of Industry is run as a collective, skills which can be used are used. There is no management structure and yet they have been relatively successful. How much can a small label and a rock band do? The culmination of war machines to strangle the arborescent root. Bands that have been directly affected by the changes in technology- Arctic Monkeys, Wilco etc. Are there pitfalls to file sharing? Conclusion. Is the music mainstream music press losing its influence? How much did it have in the first place? Is there a cycle going on- the arborescent, the struggle to topple it then the creation of another? If we are bored of trees, why do we keep planting them?
Tag: music
TERRITORY: MOTLEY CRUE. RESEARCH Research focused on reading autobiographies; The dirt (Motley Crue) and TommyLand (Tommy Lee, drummer of Motley Crue). Research also included interviews with local Newcastle based rock bands such as Firelight, Laconia and Fables Last Stand. DELEUZE & GUATTARI Early Motley Crue were minor, resisting and struggling against everything around them, including the present music scene and image. Later Motley Crue were major, as they grew successful and popularised a scene of sleazy hard glam rock. Motley Crue also exemplifies Deleuze & Guattari’s theory of desire as a productive force. FOUCAULT Foucault argued power and resistance were connected to immediacy and anti-authority struggles. Motley Crue were rebelling against everything present around them, with a strong attitude of anti-authority. Interestingly, as they got famous and successful they arguably became a source of authority for fans and inspired bands.
Objectives • I want to look at how much of yourself you have to sacrifice in order to become what you want to be: how much you have to sacrifice your talents for the record company, the fans and even the other band members. • I want to explore how far commercialism has embedded itself in the music industry. • Is it possible to create and release music with any real amount of integrity? • What does it mean to ‘sell-out’? • How can a band keep ‘it’ about ‘the music’? • What does ‘the music’ entail? How Done • I will look at and compare the record contracts of a major label and an indie label. • I will look at Marx’s views on commercialism and capitalism and how they affect culture. • I will assess how much control bands have over their music and what they could do to keep it about ‘the music’ so that they do not ‘sell-out’. What Achieved • By doing this I will have more of an understanding of what kind of balance there needs to be with the band and the record company in order for the music to be heard by enough people without it loosing its integrity.
An exploration into punk, its roots, its philosophy and where it is now.
Aims • To look at the role that capitalism plays in the running of the major record labels in the modern day music industry, and to compare this with the way in which independent labels are run, i.e. understand the goals of the respective labels • To understand how the industry works and whether Marx idea of a worldwide monopolisation of capitalism can be defended. • To look at the future of the music industry after advance such as the internet and the resurgence of independent labels and what role capitalism will play in the years to come.
Using the philosophy of Deleuze and Guattari I will discuss the revolutionary potential of music. I will so do with reference to the Black movement in America. My main aim is to show how, through the music of blues and jazz, Blacks constructed a culture of resistance; giving rise to their freedom and subsequent status as citizen in America. I will look at … the deterritorialising power of music: how traditional blues and jazz improvisation deviate from formal musical structures to produce new forms of expression, and how the oppressive routine, and identity of the slave may have been ruptured by the singular effects of such music. … how blues and jazz incorporates both African and Western references to form an intensification of multiple heterogeneous and non-heterogeneous relations that are productive of different modes of thought and experience. … how Blacks found a distinct voice through their music, and how this led to their becoming other than slave, and to their emancipation.
Objectives: – · To explore the impact of sound recording on the way we interact with music. In the past, people experienced music solely through live interaction: performances, concerts etc. Now music is widely available in recorded form, also through the mass media outlets of radio, television, the Internet. Does this devalue music, simply making it more disposable, or does it transform the potential role of music in a society where traditionally defined boundaries are shifting and collapsing in upon themselves? · To look at the effect of new methods of creating music, such as synthesis and sampling, both on the audience and on the creators of music. Through sampling, music is being made both by recycling and re-contextualising music that has come before, and by reclaiming sources previously dismissed as ‘noise’ to be placed in a musical context. Through sound synthesis, on the one hand acoustic instruments are being mimicked electronically with increasing authenticity. On the other, electronically generated sounds which radically diverge from our traditional sound palette seem increasingly commonplace in a world that is similarly transfigured. · To investigate the way these new techniques reflect the changes in our human/social condition- our relationship with technology, the mechanisation of society. To what extent do changes in musical creation and consumption come about as a result of these social changes, and to what extent do they actually inform the changes. Concepts: – · Mechanisation of society. Simulation and the hyperreal. The shifting role of art in a mass media culture. Territory: – · Western music and culture from the early 20th Century to the present. Sources: – · Jean Baudrillard, Simulacra and Simulation. Roland Barthes, Image-Music-Text. Peter Manning, Electronic and Computer Music. Numerous recorded musical sources ranging from early forays into musical experimentation with sound recording, through to contemporary examples.
The investigation is based on Peter Shaffer’s screenplay Amadeus, an elaborate story of the relationship between the legendary musician Wolfgang Mozart and his contemporary counterpart Antonio Salieri. Critics have interpreted the film in various ways, however its philosophical content had been left untouched. The project’s first concern is the identification of two philosophical trends within the characters of the play – Mozart being aligned to the baroque and Salieri portraying notions of traditional philosophy. The interaction of the characters in the plot in this context raises new philosophical issues such as creativity, genius, autonomy and the concept of God and also displays the philosophical influence over mans interaction with his surroundings. This discussion takes place alongside Walter Benjamin’s similar interpretation of Trauerspiel, The Origin of German Tragic Drama. The project’s second concern lies not in the content of the film but in its creation and subsequent afterlife. Shaffer constructed the play on fragments of truth regarding the real Mozart, which he then exaggerated and developed into a fictional story. This process of destruction and reconstruction is investigated in relation to Walter Benjamin’s theory of the mortification of art in which art is constantly reinterpreted to produce new meaning. Benjamin argues that through the creation of new meaning the original object is redeemed. It is the final concern of the project to investigate this theory and explore to what extent Mozart has been redeemed by Amadeus. The result is a project that not only investigates the baroque concepts of afterlife, mortification and redemption but also illustrates these notions in its method of exploration.
The title of my Stage 3 project asks the question ‘Is It Ethically Acceptable That The Journals of Kurt Cobain Have Been Made Accessible To The Public?’ Objectives: 1. To determine whether one can justify the posthumous publication of the Nirvana singers’ extremely personal journals when it will become abundantly clear that the publication would have been against his will. 2. To compare and contrast Cobain to Franz Kafka in terms of both having had their diaries published posthumously against their will. To compare the similarities in their personalities and writings. 3. To argue against Max Brod, friend of Kafka and publisher of his diaries, who, owing much to the Kantian tradition, would say that one does not own one’s own thoughts, therefore endorsing such publications. Change: In terms of viewing specific changes, I will investigate into how the views of reading somebody’s personal thoughts may have changed in the seventy years between their deaths (Kafka- 1924, Cobain- 1994), or indeed the publications of their diaries by those close to them (Max Brod- 1958, Courtney Love, Cobain’s widow- 2002). I will ask if the changing nature of the diary and the celebrity could justify the publications. Sources: Primary sources will of course be the published diaries of Cobain and Kafka themselves, with additional material in the form of commentaries on the diaries, and biographies on the subject (one written by Brod himself). Expectations: I expect to discover that by the end of the project I will have found no explanation or excuse that will justify the publication of Cobain’s diaries, or even Kafka’s by arguing for the authenticity of the individual as we may find within the work of Heidegger and Nietzsche.
The Dream. . . .‘Do I have to change my name? Will it get me far? Should I lose some weight? Am I gonna be a star? I’m just living out the American dream and I realized that nothing is what it seems. . .’ These lyrics are taken from Madonna’s recent song ‘American Life’ highlight our society’ pre-occupation with achieving the ‘American dream.’ The car, the house, the family, the job and the respect of friends all constitute our life’s aspirations, what we value and most of all what we fear that we not achieve. In my project I have explored the following objectives and idea of the American dream, highlighting it through Arthur Miller’s play Death of a Salesman, and Louis Begley’s novel About Schmidt and using the lyrics from Madonna’s song American Life. OBJECTIVES: ~ What constitutes the American Dream and how, or if, it has altered over time. ~The relation of its concept to the philosophies of Sartre, such as fear, freedom, emotions and existence ~How these concepts are related to the main character’s in Death of a Salesman and About Schmidt ~Whether we have a choice in our quest to achieve it or whether we have become ‘trapped’ by its rules. ~To what extent do we have any freedom and how this aspiration affects our existence ~Is the American Dream really the most satisfactory state to be in? The humiliation that Willy experiences as a result of not quite achieving this dream drives him to take his own life. With arguments over the importance of attaining the American dream aside, this single incident demonstrates the power and influence of it over today’s society. The question is, are we trapped, is there really ‘nowhere to run’ or is it up to us to change our values?
Project Title: ‘A Study of the Rise of Twentieth Century Popular Music, And its Subsequent Relationship with the Public Consciousness’. Concepts and Key Words: Music as Entertainment vs Music as Education. Music Defining Morality. Music as a Political Power. Generation Gaps. Music as a Conspiracy of Hope. The Decline in Instruments and the Rise of Machines. Music Reinventing itself. Objectives: 1. To view the effect that music has had on determining the public consciousness from before the Second World War throughout the following decades to today, and vice versa. 2. To understand why popular music has changed so much in such a relatively short period of time, and to establish the influence of world events (such as the Vietnam War) and cultural variations in light of these changes. How music reflects the changing nature of humanity and different times in a postmodern age. 3. To study how music has become more universal since the 1950s. For example, to view not only how has music become less specialised for each listener, but how different genres of music have merged to create new styles altogether, becoming universally popular in the process. Of course, in the midst of all this, we have the effect and the parallels of the public consciousness running alongside these changes. 4. To estimate how the relationship between music and the public consciousness will develop in the twenty first century, based on the signs of today. Will there be another select group of individuals who will be capable of changing popular music as we know it, reflecting again immense change in the world, or will the predictable rise in technology simply overtake man’s capacity to create music in an original way to mirror these developments? Sources: Assorted books and magazines from personal collection, as well as extensive material from the University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne library. In addition to this, research has and will be taken from the internet (individual group and general websites), as well as video and newspapers. Project Territory/ Field of Exploration: With such a broad and worldwide study area, it is difficult to locate a precise territory, but the focus shall primarily be on the contrasting and comparable changes and effects of/on music between Great Britain and the United States. The Gap Between Humans and Things: A distinction will be made throughout the project between humans and the outside events that influence and determine their lives. It is music here that is often able to bridge that gap; it is able to play such a large part in the life of the individual that it creates a route to a better one. While humans have remained the same in the years covered by the project, the changes seen in the life of popular music are quite dramatic.
OBJECTIVES 1. To study the meanings and interpretations of myth, what it means to man 2. To look at the changing attitudes towards inherited truths and traditions from the Middle Ages to the Enlightenment period where superstition and faith were seen as unreason due to the advancement in science. 3. To examine the effect that the Enlightenment had in initiating the existentialist movement and to discover why myth was rejected there also. 4. To study two men, famous for reinventing myth in the postmodern era, both realising that myth is needed to restore coherence in society in order to enhance the experience of mankind. These two men are Car Jung, the psychoanalyst and Richard Wagner the composer. SOURCES Books borrowed from the library of the university of Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, various internet sites, newspaper articles, magazines and CD’s. FIELD OF EXPLORATION I am going to loo at the history of theatre and entertainment trough the ages, drawing on three examples. The first will be a look at Greek tragedy in the time of Euripides where going to watch one of these performances was essentially a ritualistic act. The second example will be Racine and his attempt to please the court of Louis XIV and finally, examples taken from Ionesco, a renowned figure of the theatre of the absurd, which forces the question of whether there is any meaning to existence. CHANGE Throughout the project there will be a strong element of change. I am hoping to illustrate the shift in the beliefs from the colourful myth embracing era of the Middle Ages, through the revolution in thought and discovery of the Enlightenment to the existentialists who believe that man must choose his own way without the aid of universal, objective standards. THE GAP BETWEEN HUMANS AND THINGS My aim here is to show how, through exploring my project territory, man was separated from myth initially and then actively dismissed it as fantasy, later being reunited with it through the fields of psychoanalysis, opera, literature and theatre.