IT IS WHAT IT IS

Didn’t really want to touch upon music too much although it is the passion and obsession of my life. Although semi-consumed with a multitude of thoughts and emotions bang-bashing around inside me regarding it, it being such a personal experience, I’ve always believed commenting on it was one’s way of trying to imprint yourself and your beliefs on a world that is too weak to be content with its own tastes and preferences, or on people who don’t have taste but merely want to fit in (aagh, scum of scum, but I don’t really want to go there at the moment), so I’ve never really bothered. Always happy enough with whatever is rocking my socks at a particular moment.

However, I bought an album recently that, while seventeen years old, highlights some issues in music that were discussed over a beer or two on Sunday evening. So we’re talking about issues rather than a particular album or epoch in music.

The issue being experimentation in music: where’s the line between music that does what it should – moves the soul, body and mind (that’s kind of roughly in my order of preference) – and experimentation-fuelled shite that only says “we’re so clever and funny and oh so original with our lack of adherence to any particular patterns or structures in our music?” So clever that you can see that they’ve enjoyed themselves so much fucking around on whatever pieces of equipment they happen to have in front of them that they’ve forgotten that music, and art in general, is a relationship between the creator and the receiver with both parties gaining something from this interaction. Sometimes I get the feeling that those praised by critics – who the fuck are they? – as being at the cutting edge, pushing envelopes and all that stuff are only interested in themselves and are so self-absorbed that they’re essentially taking the piss out of their audience with their output.

And sometimes I think that without those at the edges for others to follow, music, and art in general, wouldn’t move anywhere particularly quickly and while what they may create may be a bit patchy, hard-going, unlistenable or whatever due to its experimental nature, the fact that they are moving a music or whatever into a new area means that the artists who follow more traditional, consistent structures that make for more solid and entertaining packages are less restricted and have more possibilities available to them, and, therefore, the art-form in question benefits as a whole due to this.

So I guess, if you have any interest in the value of any particular art-form to bring colour and add meaning to our lives, you have to go with the second line of argument though, and this is the ‘though’ that is the point of this piece, I wish more people would recognise that such creations are ‘merely’ examples of forms that are charting new territories and should be listened to or seen as such, and are not things that actually provide much in the way of actual entertainment. Let me repeat: they are fine, and worthy, and necessary, and should be supported, but it is the ones that follow that will benefit most by producing more consistent works that a person out for pleasure will get more from on a day-to-day basis.

NOTHING IS IMMUNE TO CRITICISM. Don’t just say something is ‘good’. Something is good – or bad – for a particular reason: what are those reasons? Savour the good. Accept the bad. Art is not maths: ‘good’ plus ‘bad’ does not equal ‘gobodad’. Some may see more good, some bad, who cares as long as you know where you stand?

OPINIONS ARE ONLY OPINIONS. If you like something, you like something and that is the only reason to like something.

BEING DERIVATIVE SUCKS!!!

Being influenced does not, and it's unavoidable anyway. Experimenting within recognisable – or not – structures moves everyone forwards, backwards, sidewards or whateverwards and means our landscapes are constantly evolving and revolving, and, therefore, new colours are there for us all to enjoy if we are prepared to open our ears and eyes a little more.