Pop is a sham

Someone else pointed out what we know — mass culture is a product disguised as individual self-expression:

In the sphere of luxury production, to which popular music belongs and in which no necessities of life are immediately involved, while, at the same time, the residues of individualism are most alive there in the form of ideological categories such as taste and free choice, it is imperative to hide standardization. The “backwardness” of musical mass production, the fact that it is still on a handicraft level and not literally an industrial one, conforms perfectly to that necessity which is essential from the viewpoint of cultural big business. If the individual handicraft elements of popular music were abolished altogether, a synthetic means of hiding standardization would have to be evolved. Its elements are even now in existence.

The necessary correlate of musical standardization is pseudo-individualization. By pseudo-individualization we mean endowing cultural mass production with the halo of free choice or open market on the basis of standardization itself. Standardization of song hits keeps the customers in line by doing their listening for them, as it were. Pseudo-individualization, for its part, keeps them in line by making them forget that what they listen to is already listened to for them, or “pre-digested”.

The most drastic example of standardization of presumably individualized features is to be found in so-called improvisations. Even though jazz musicians still improvise in practice, their improvisations have become so “normalized” as to enable a whole terminology to be developed to express the standard devices of individualization: a terminology which in turn is ballyhooed by jazz publicity agents to foster the myth of pioneer artisanship and at the same time flatter the fans by apparently allowing them to peep behind the curtain and get the inside story. This pseudo-individualization is prescribed by the standardization of the framework. The latter is so rigid that the freedom it allows for any sort of improvisation is severely delimited. Improvisations — passages where spontaneous action of individuals is permitted (“Swing it boys”) — are confined within the walls of the harmonic and metric scheme. In a great many cases, such as the “break” of pre-swing jazz, the musical function of the improvised detail is determined completely by the scheme: the break can be nothing other than a disguised cadence. Here, very few possibilities for actual improvisation remain, due to the necessity of merely melodically circumscribing the same underlying harmonic functions. Since these possibilities were very quickly exhausted, stereotyping of improvisatory details speedily occurred. Thus, standardization of the norm enhances in a purely technical way standardization of its own deviation — pseudo-individualization. – Theodor Adorno, On Popular Music

This doubly applies to nu-metal. The whole essay is worth reading.

0 thoughts on “Pop is a sham”

  1. Negruvoda says:

    First!!!!

  2. Pepsiman says:

    Being only vaguely familiar with Adorno, I’m guessing this was written before the whole “free jazz” movement took hold. I also imagine that some freak would want to bring back his zombified corpse and make him listen to this site’s “Best of metal” listings and see what happens.

  3. tiny midget says:

    i just wanna say that Levy_Spearmen’s mom was a great fuck! i think i got her pregnant though…

  4. Death Metal Black Metal says:

    Pop and Rock music are frauds designed to appeal to adolescent feelings of rebellion and cosmopolitanism. Pop music is a product, not art. Metal escaped this by evoking an epic narrative instead of an isolating ‘egocentrism’.

    Also, check out these bagnin’ riffs!

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZwfiQhC6FD0

  5. Levy_Spearmen says:

    tiny midget, she’ll get welfare and bring this shit down faster. Congrats.

  6. whatwhat? says:

    Thanks for the article, I learned a cool new word today, pseudo-individualization. I don’t like jazz, but I like Boris Vian, so I can’t fully agree with Adorno on jazz being complete bullshit and self-perpetuating standardization.
    Other than that, good stuff for the lucid view on the vicious circle we live in the modern world of pleasures. Thanks for the food for thought man

  7. Levy_Spearmen's Mom says:

    Tiny midget? Come back! Come back please, don’t leave me! I’m carrying your baby goddamit!! *sob* *sob*, please…

  8. Levy_Spearmen says:

    Mom? Mom? Is that you? Please don’t cry. (sobbing)

  9. Glen Benton says:

    Middle finger in the air if your pussy’s tight
    All the boys are getting hard down to fuck tonight
    One thing on my mind
    Drink the city dry
    Do it all in the stall one boy at a time

    Pull it pull it pull it up and pull it out, pull it pull it pull it
    Flashing flashing cameras all around
    You want this bomb ass pussy
    Smashing, Smashing bottles doing lines
    P-poppin’ pills and getting high
    I’m so fucked out of my mind

    [Chorus]:
    I do what I want, middle finger in the air
    Gonna party party party like a millionaire
    Imma dance like a slut, and I don’t even care
    Gonna party party party like a millionaire
    Millionaire, like a millionaire, tonight I’m gonna party like a millionaire

    Gettin drunk as fuck, my lips are sippin’ potion
    you can kiss my ass, yeah in slow motion
    we ain’t even near done, time to have some real fun
    Need a fix big and thick holla if you have one

    Pull it pull it pull it up and pull it out, pull it pull it pull it
    Flashing flashing cameras all around
    Come smack this bomb ass booty
    Smashing, Smashing bottles doing lines
    P-poppin’ pills and getting high
    I’m so fucked out of my mind

    [Chorus]

    I can do it over here
    I can do it over there
    Do whatever I want
    Middle finger in the air
    Who wants this bomb ass pussy
    You want this bomb ass pussy
    Who’s got that bomb ass pussy
    I’ve got that bomb ass pussy
    White girl with a bomb ass pussy

    I don’t give a
    I dont give a give a fuck
    I don’t give a, D.G.A.F. til we die
    I don’t give a
    I don’t give a
    I don’t give a fuck ‘cuz I’m a Millionaire

    [Chorus]

    D.G.A.F. baby (D.G.A.F., D.G.A.F., D.G.A.F., D.G.A.F.)
    Millionaires

  10. Levy_Spearmen says:

    What is D.G.A.F.?

  11. Millionaire says:

    Don’t Give A Fuck

  12. Otto V.B. says:

    One hand in the air if you don’t really care
    Two hands in the air if you don’t really care
    It’s like that sometimes, I mean ridiculous
    It’s like that sometimes, this shit ridiculous

    One hand in the air if you don’t really care
    Middle finger in the air if you don’t really care
    It’s like that sometimes, man, ridiculous
    Life can be sometimes ridiculous

    I’m so appalled, Spalding ball
    Balding Donald Trump taking dollars from y’all
    Baby you’re fired, your girlfriend hired
    But if you don’t mind I’ma keep you on call

    We above the law, we don’t give a fuck ’bout y’all
    I got dogs that’ll chew a fucking hole through the wall
    But since they all love us, I need more rubbers
    And If I don’t use rubbers, need more covers

    Housekeeping, I mean goddamn
    One time, let it be a bad bitch sweeping
    That know we get O’s like Cheerios
    That know because they seen us in the videos

    That know the day that you play me
    Will be the same day MTV play videos
    That was a little joke, voila
    Praises due to the most high, Allah

    Praises due to the most fly, Prada
    Baby, I’m magic, ta-dah
    Address me as your highness, high as United
    Thirty thousand feet up and you are not invited

    Niggas be writing bullshit like they gotta work
    Niggas is going through real shit, man they outta work
    That’s why another goddamn dance track gotta hurt
    That’s why I rather spit something that gotta purp’

    Champagne wishes, thirty white bitches
    I mean this shit is fucking ridiculous
    Fucking ridiculous
    I mean this shit is fucking ridiculous

    Five star dishes, different exotic fishes
    Man, this shit is fucking ridiculous
    Fucking ridiculous

    How should I begin this? I’m just so offended
    How am I even mentioned by all these fuckin’ beginners?
    I’m so appalled, I might buy the mall
    Just to show niggas how much more I have installed

    I’m fresher than you all, so I don’t have to pause
    All of y’all can suck my balls through my drawers
    Dark Knight feeling, die, you be a hero
    Or live long enough to see yourself become a villain

    I went from the favorite to the most hated
    But would you rather be underpaid or overrated?
    Moral victories is for minor league coaches
    And ‘Ye already told you we major, you cockroaches

    Show me where the boats is, Ferrari Testarossa’s
    The Hammer went and broke so you know I’m more focused
    I lost thirty mil’ so I spent another thirty
    ‘Cause unlike hammer thirty million can’t hurt me

    Fucking insane, the fuck am I saying?
    Not only am I fly, I’m fucking not playing
    All these little bitches too big for they britches
    Burning their little bridges, fucking ridiculous

    Champagne wishes, thirty white bitches
    I mean this shit is fucking ridiculous
    Fucking ridiculous
    I mean this shit is fucking ridiculous

    Five star dishes, different exotic fishes
    Man, this shit is fucking ridiculous
    Fucking ridiculous

    Success is what you make it, take it how it come
    A half a mil’ in twenties like a billion where I’m from
    An arrogant drug dealer, the legend I’ve become

    JA TOTALEN GEIL!

  13. Internatio says:

    Adorno would surely vomit everything metal, including anus-approved metal, he was just a mundane elitist with a few “marxist” quotes added because you had to do that in the 50s and 60s.

    He seemed to criticize the powers that be for what they did to culture but fundamentally he blamed more the masses for not beeing able to do better rather than blaming the pseudo-elite for not helping the masses.

    If Adorno et al. are true there is no explanation for any revolution beside the actions of a handfull of individuals.
    Silly.

  14. hornet pork labia says:

    I love how Prozak just protrudes out of the ocean like a mythical fish and shows us his genitalia.

  15. SKIT says:

    BEVERLY MARSH
    BILL DENBROUGH
    BEN HANSCOM
    STAN URIS
    RICHIE TOZIER
    EDDIE KASPBRAK
    MIKE HANLON

  16. My ding ding dong. says:

    You touch my tralala

  17. he is a sham says:

    Levy_Spearmen is a sham

  18. Rebecca Black says:

    It’s prom night
    That boy’s kinda cute
    It’s prom night
    I like his hair

  19. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NzJgUD3yuFY&feature=related says:

    Holy fucking shit, the new ENSLAVED EP fucking sucks dick.

  20. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z21WOHz9xRA&feature=related says:

    METAL IS NOT INDIE ROCK!!!!

  21. Levy_Spearmen says:

    I am a sham, SHAMWOW THAT IS! Tr00 METAL RIIIIIIIIIGHT BROOOOOOSKI!

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CztvSpKdCeY

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