Last Thursday I went to see a Wild Flag show with a friend and even though, being presented as an indie rock supergorup, the Portland based quarter does not really have much in common with the vast majority of music that I generally listen to, it was definitely one of the best shows I have seen in a long time. It was raw, it was energetic and the band themselves seemed to be having a lot of fun. It was one of those experiences when you walk out of the venue feeling genuinely happy after a couple of hours jumping around in between a bunch of strangers (the crowd at this show could have been more lively, though). Inspired by this happyoccasion, here’s a (slightly pretentious) piece on music.
“A teenage girl creaming while she listens to some boy-band, a monk digging on the God he hears in Gregorian chants, or John fucking Coltrane himself climbing up into the sky on a staircase made of sixteenth notes, it's all the same. If it takes you there, it's good.”
-Theo Vilmos in Tad William’s “War of the Flowers”
According to Wikipedia music has been around for at least 50,000 years and has evolved into becoming a “fundamental constituent of human life”. During prehistoric times most of the music present had its origin in sounds present in nature and even though it was sometimes used for entertainment it was mostly something that one would associate with shamanistic practices. It was practical and reflected the objective world. It is interesting to think about how much it has actually changed given that all of the big religions still rely on it heavily and that in the context of capitalism music itself has become a commodity and the making of music has given a rise to a whole industry so one could still argue that there is something practical to music. On the other hand, it has also been elevated to being an art and can serve as a way of channeling thoughts, feelings and general notions that are as far away from being objective or reminiscent of natural patterns of sounds and rhythms as much as possible. Given that music is also much more accessible in the contemporary society and something of a given ingredient of basically any culture and hence incredibly various the question of the criteria by which we judge music seems to be more prominent than it might have previously been.
I guess one way to go would be to simply asses the technical prowess of the artists in question and deal with critiquing music the same way one would approach an analysis of a painting. While this seems perfectly legitimate, it does not seem to be sufficient. Of course, skill is something that should be valued and viewing a piece of art as an art piece that can be taken apart and interpreted can definitely be a helpful set towards appreciating and understanding it but it is questionable whether this method of ascribing value could fully encompass music as a fundamental constituent of human life” or, in other words, a part of a way of life or a culture that one identifies with and that hence pervades everything he or she does and associates with. In talking to people whose taste in music might be different we are often inclined to say things such as “I can see why you would like that”, “I can respect them as an artist” and similar phrases that fully acknowledge that something is good according to a certain criteria that is at the same time not sufficient for it to be good in a more absolute, overall sense. We see why a certain artist could be liked and yet we are not crazy about them. What it seems to come down to is a process of finding a place for a certain piece of music in the system of values and beliefs that each of us implicitly constructs based on our heritage, past experience etc. Once a piece finds a place in the system it becomes a constituent part of it, it becomes more intelligible and more intuitive to our subconsciousness and starts to resonate with who we think we are.
Even though I am not a huge Tad Williams fan and I find the War of the Flowers to be rather mediocre, I am strongly in favor of the quote above and what it seems to be speaking to is exactly that feeling of finding something that can be a part of the system that one fits the world into, that makes sense in the overall scheme that is the essential take on how things out there are related for each specific individual. As people change, the preferences change and certain things stop to resonate as strongly and become valued less and substituted with something that is more sensible in this very specific, localized sense but the principle reminds the same and a former boy band fan will feel the same excitement for her new preferred type of music. Consequently, establishing a value scale between the two seems almost impossible. Feeling cannot be treated as objective variables and I can’t think of a number that could quantify the butterflies that accumulate in your belly while you’re waiting for your favorite band to come out on the stage and blow you away. How good the band objectively is becomes more than secondary in this context. The music is good because you feel it, because when it randomly comes up on your iTunes you feel the need to drop everything and just stare at the wall listening with a stupid smile across your face. It is good because it makes sense in a way that is inherently yours and intuitive even if it is twenty minutes of guitar feedback, an Italian opera aria or Nicki Minaj talking about her ass.
