[rumori] re: genre

Steev [rumori] re: genre
Thu, 3 Dec 1998 10:38:50 -0800 (PST) (00912710330, Pine.LNX.4.05.9812030934170.24488-100000atflotsam.detritus.net)

This genre thread that Wobbly brings up is quite interesting
and I must weigh in.

First - Of course the answer to Erick's question is, yes, Tower, et.al.
WILL make an "appropriators" section if they see it as a profitable market segment. Period. That's what genres are REALLY about, market
segmentation, or so the marketeers think, even though surveys show that
most people like to listen to a variety of musics.

However, it's interesting to note that about 80% of the CDs I purchased
over the last year have been purchased because they had something to do
with appropriation or recontextualization of some sort. It's what I focus
on, not only as a creator but also as a, dare I say it, "consumer" of music. And not just music - the most expensive book I've ever bought was
the Robert Rauschenberg Guggenheim Retrospective which came out last fall.
I bought it because Rauschenberg, to me, is the quintessential visual
assemblage/collage artist of the 2nd half of this century. (before I
really knew much about him, one of my teachers at CalArts told me that my
music to her was like the audio counterpart of Rauschenberg's work. I soon
found that I agreed.)

So, if the marketeers and peddlers of mass culture ever "discover" that there is a significant proportion of consumers like me, we can bet
our gold cards that there will be an "appropriation" shelf at Border's, and a "sample-based" bin at Tower and Virgin, even if they contain product that ranges stylistically from Charles Ives to Amon Tobin. It doesnt
matter to them, as long as it sells.

However, I doubt that this is likely. It's probably as likely as a section
of "guitar music" or a book shelf for "painters that use camelhair brushes." Sampling and Collage is becoming, or has become, simply another tool, and when it's done without that self-conciousness, that intent, it
is now nothing special. Just as capoeira originated as a music and dance
that concealed a martial art from its performers' opressors, sampling used
to be inherently revolutionary. Now it is not, just as capoeria is now
most often performed simply as an artform. Now sampling is just another
technique, a routine gesture, unless the user directs it purposefully
toward a revolutionary goal, and his audience perceives it as such.

Which brings me to my own work. I am an artist who recycles culture
almost exclusively in what i do. I do this for political and ideological
reasons, as well as aesthetic ones. I am a marxist, and I intend to use
detournment and cultural recycling to do my part in the destruction of
late capitalism. This will be accomplished by slowly eroding
cherished western notions of property, authorship, and creative genius.

By fighting on this front of the Culture War, we help to make the world a
better, brighter, more interesting place for our generation, and those
that follow. Artists of the world, unite! You have nothing to lose but
your copyprotect schemes.

Oh and speaking of Capitalism, I have a new CD out and for sale, called
"Original". For more information on this precious art object, see http://detritus.net/steev/original, or email me.
Thanx for you time.

smh


Steev Hise, Technical Thug
steevathise.org http://www.cyborganic.com/people/steev recycled art site: http://www.detritus.net -----------------------------------------------------------------
"On the whole, philanthropy seems sort of redundant - they're already giving 70-hour weeks to the creation of new technology meant to
empower the world. That's not enough?" -Po Bronson, Wired
-----------------------------------------------------------------

________________________
http://detritus.net