(It appears I'm not unique since I incidentally heard a soliloquy on a subject familiar to me: 'our fascination with rebels')
In 2000 America the most effective way to insinuate one's self into the gooey embrace of the mainstream is by becoming a rebel.
Now what exactly is a rebel? Sid Vicious was a rebel, but so was Rosa Parks when she sat in front of the bus. Probably because she saw Sid Vicious sitting in the back.
Look at the pilgrims. Dressed all in black, facial hair on the men, no make-up on the women... The pilgrims were rebelling against what they thought were oppresive figures of religious authority. So they got on a boat, established a colony in the New World and became... oppresive figures of religious authority.
You see, what makes our culture simultaneously inferiating and gratifying is our uncanny ability to mussle the rebel by gradually absorbing him into the system with an intoxicating web of money, fame and chicks that ultimately dulls his senses to the point where he can no longer even remember what it is that he was rebelling against in the first place!
We're guilty of romanticising rebels in film. But unlike in the movies, in real life most of them aren't working because they've pissed off every boss they ever had because they could only get rebellious in the work place, seeing as they live in a converted laundry room in their parents' basement. The only machine these losers rage against has 'Whirlpool' printed on the front of it.
I used to have a theory that every generation rebelled against the generation before it but then I found out every generation, like the one before it, just likes to get wasted and fuck and the older generation just gets pissed off 'cause they have to work and they can't get wasted and fuck anymore. In the end, that's the problem with a lot of rebels. They believe that with freedom comed a lack of responsibility.
Come on, people... Fight the power! Be different! Because you know...
don't you want to fit in?
interesting how I'm taking 5 from my reading of "ideology, Trajectory & Stardom" by Ian Inglis, a 26-page-long - sad to say - scholarly essay on Elvis and the Beatles:
ReplyDelete"Any pop movement, at least during its initial and most profitable stages, is attractive precisely because it is believed to propose a revolt against the adult mores"
".. the analysis has much in common with the Marxist notion of incorporation, which refers to the conscious channeling of radical political/economic activities into existing institutions so as to minimize the threat they might pose to the established order"
"(Elvis') enlistment was the first and crucial step in dismantling the dangerous/delinquent persona of Elvis the Pelvis, by using his army service to depict him as the patriotic boy-next-door, before evntually re-inventing him as the wholesome family entertainer"
and, lo and behold,
"in 1962-63, the no.1 priority on John's agenda was to become rich and famous, and tidying up his image seemed @the time a relatively small price to pay4the attainment of that goal"
So you go 'local' and 'independent'.
ReplyDeleteFuck, almost everything I've been listening to for my whole life is shit. Given the mixed feelings I have for it, some of that shit can actually be described as 'dirty love'. But most of it is shit. 'Marketed teenage angst', as I've recently seen it described.
I'm a much too common man to be able to resume my opinion on the matter here, but it all boils down to something like 'listen whatever you enjoy, just be careful with the appreciation. Few actually diserve it; few should get it!'
So after reading that... what's your general opinion on the Beatles? Do a frank description (i've no idea if you liked them or not in the first place).