Bach ... er, rock is dead
by Matthew Chandler
Has it all been done? By placing the means of production into the hands of so many, while simultaneously limiting access to a variety of expression through media consolidation, the collective creative output has reached a period of relative stasis. Only rarely does some little group of weirdoes pop their heads up out of the soil and shout, "Surprise!" And that hasn"t happened for some time. Even the independent/underground music culture suffers this fate. It becomes harder to separate the artistic wheat from the chaff. Vital expression becomes a fashion statement, a finite goal rather than a lifetime journey. The influence of popular culture drives those brave enough to create toward a mindset of expecting to make a living from believing in themselves, and having people pay to watch them do it. Can Sleepytime Gorilla Museum be called avant-garde or just King Crimson Kabuki theater? Are Negativland avant-garde or are they just taping random crap? Are these groups ahead of their time and challenging, or pointless? The short version: If it"s all being reissued, why bother creating it? The Velvet Underground, John Coltrane and Iggy and the Stooges already did it better than you and your musical compatriots could ever hope to, so why bother? It seems as though one must simply have faith. Somewhere, someone is declaring something "dead" just as another pundit is declaring it "back." Pick up any rock rag and it will be noted that "rock is back," all on the backs of bands like the Datsuns, the Strokes and myriad groups of trust fund punks that found their old denim jackets in the backs of closets, long ago hidden away when Def Leppard suddenly became uncool. According to The Source and even the Grammys, hip-hop is back, courtesy of The Roots and 50 Cent. Styles and modes of expression come back because someone hungers for them. Candy-assed Creed-emulators, meat-headed Limp Bizkit-biters and sappy Norah Jones-clones have been brought forth in the current major label signing binge of every act with tight jeans, an afro, a soul-baring confessional or any combination of same. The key is that these purveyors of all things new and hip are examining the old standards and practices from a fresh perspective. Ornette Coleman was once an idiot in the eyes of the mainstream jazz press. Is it so unbelievable that a gay-bashing hack like Eminem can be molded into the Second Coming? Costumed acts of social monkey wrenching were being performed long before - and perhaps unbeknownst to - groups like Dearnt. From The Residents to Kabuki theater, performers donned disguises to retain anonymity while making statements that criticized the status quo in musical, political and sexual mores. Therein lies the genius of such hijinks: Bored Midwestern kids with a desire to Fuck Shit Up don masks, assume identities, turn their own thrashcore songs inside out and make everyone that isn"t in on the joke so mad as to actually start fights. Self-parody formed the dialectic of social change in a music scene long mired in covers and pre-recorded dance nights. Did they know it? Does it matter? The answer: Without regard for consequence, we create. Sometimes the mere act of creation is a form of destruction. But destructive music doesn"t destroy, it stuns; it deconstructs. Throwing punches and lobbing missiles will never be avant-garde or make any truly valuable political statement. Something as simple as power chords - as retro a rock maneuver as substituting "Yeah" for actual lyrical content - can be infinitely ahead of its time.
