Rules Of The Game #31: Rockism And Antirockism Rise From The Dead

[koganbot]

Here's my latest, in which I reveal myself to be a rockist, unless that's not what I'm revealing. I also don't come to a conclusion about what rockism is. Stay tuned for the exciting sequel.

The Rules Of The Game #31: Rockism And Antirockism Rise From The Dead

EDIT: Here are links to all but three of my other Rules Of The Game columns (LVW's search results for "Rules of the Game"). Links for the other three (which for some reason didn't get "Rules Of The Game" in their titles), are here: #4, #5, and #8.

UPDATE: I've got all the links here now:

http://koganbot.livejournal.com/179531.html

Comments

[mcatzilut.livejournal.com]

Something else:

"In fact, I’d say that as a critic I’m the real deal and Geoff isn’t in that I challenge my readers whereas Geoff throws them bouquets."

Sounds like an argument between being proscriptive and description, which is somewhat at the heart of the rockist/poptomist tension. Geoff wants to talk about Underwood, because people are listening to her already. You want to talk about Miranda, because you think people should be listening to her. But the truth is that neither of you are being totally honest. Because Geoff isn't throwing them 'bouquets' to make them comfortable. He's throwing them 'bouquets' because he thinks that it's more interesting to anthropologize and discuss what people are interested in. And you aren't discussing Miranda to challenge people, but because you find her artistically interesting. If you thought she'd challenge people, but you didn't find her interesting yourself, you'd discard her. Just like if Carrie sounded VERY popular but wasn't actually popular, Geoff wouldn't bother with her.

[koganbot]

Geoff wants to talk about Underwood, because people are listening to her already. You want to talk about Miranda, because you think people should be listening to her.

This is entirely fantasy on your part and has nothing to do with either Geoff or me. Of course I'm referring back to something I wrote two weeks earlier, so I can see why you wouldn't necessarily get what I was saying, but I have no idea where you got that from and I think you're pretty confused. In any event, Geoff barely said anything about either Miranda or Carrie other than to make the claim that Miranda challenges listeners' assumptions whereas Carrie reassures listeners, and the bouquets that Geoff was throwing at we the Miranda fans was to congratulate us for challenging ourselves, which of course doesn't challenge us at all, it just sucks us off (or would if we took it seriously). Whereas I challenge my readers not because I write about Miranda Lambert (my guess is that I challenge them far more by writing about Ashlee Simpson and Taylor Swift, actually, though you'd be right to say that my primary motive is that Ashlee and Taylor are interesting rather than that my writing about them challenges readers) but because I continually ask my readers questions about why people such as us - incl. my readers, presumably - justify music in the way that we do, e.g., by calling certain things "authentic." And right, in this column I didn't go into what it is I do that challenges my readers, but I think it's pretty obvious.

[mcatzilut.livejournal.com]

Ah. I see where I got confused. I thought you were saying that Geoff was throwing bouquets at his readers by championing Underwood and that you were doing the real deal. Ie: I read "In fact, I’d say that as a critic I’m the real deal and Geoff isn’t in that I challenge my readers..." as saying "therefore voting Miranda Lambert our number one" was somehow more challenging. As in, I know that you were a critic who supported Lambert and didn't support Underwood (at least didn't champion her in the same way) and I was looking at the way that became communicated to the audience. Vis-a-vis, I assumed that when you said "I challenge my readers" you meant by championing Miranda.

What I think I really had difficulty parsing was the audiences you're assuming for yourself and Geoff. Are you assuming that the readers you're challenging are the same readers that he is throwing bouquets at? (Ie: Music critics?) Because while he is lauding you for challenging yourself [with Miranda], he's also making an argument about the relationship between a music critic and his audience. He's saying that you *could've* pandered to your audience and voted Underwood #1, but you like to be challenged, and you're smarter than you're audience, and so you voted Miranda (which, obviously, automatically also challenges your audience).

Am I reading too much into this?

[koganbot]

Are you assuming that the readers you're challenging are the same readers that he is throwing bouquets at?

Good question. But the poll and his essay were in the Nashville Scene, which is an altweekly (the guys who bought the Voice from Stern and then sold out to the New Times bozos), which presumably has a readership that prides itself on being alt, hence would lean more towards Miranda than Carrie. And the critics in the country critics poll definitely lean far more alt than the mainstream country listeners do.

Also, Geoff cheated in his essay by saying that "Before He Cheats" finished number thirteen in 2007 while neglecting to say that "Before He Cheats" had finished fifth in 2006 (and would have finished higher still in 2007 if he'd combined votes over years the way that Pazz & Jop does), which doesn't put her poll numbers up there with Miranda's but doesn't make her as unliked by critics as he thinks.