Folkwrongica

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

I got absorbed enough in this Guardian piece to miss my tube stop:

http://music.guardian.co.uk/folk/story/0,,2071468,00.html

A lot of its anecdotal material is good and I can't much disagree with the central argument (tho as they admit Tosches summarises it more neatly) but I didn't like the conclusion - even as a staunch poptimist "the inherent democracy of pop junk" is a MASSIVE handwave.

Comments

[blue-russian.livejournal.com]

Even without the subhead, I was uncomfortable in the first few grafs:

One of the main tasks folk song collectors have always faced is choosing which of the many songs their informants sing are folk songs and which aren't....But it's not always so clear, especially when informants claim that all their songs are traditional, which, since they are usually being paid per song, they usually will.

Conjures up imagines of men in spectacles with tape recorders grilling impoverished and grizzled old men with guitars.

[carsmilesteve.livejournal.com]

but isn't that what lomax and sharp did?

(i am not certain, but that was my understanding of how they did their field recordings)

[boyofbadgers.livejournal.com]

It is exactly what they did!

[boyofbadgers.livejournal.com]

Well, in the early days it was with pen and paper, but the point still stands.