John Peel = ultimate Poptimist?

[awesomewells.livejournal.com]

With the exception of Julie Burchill, this post isn't intended to call out anyone in particular, but the fact that that John Peel thread went the way it did *this far* into the existence of Poptimists depressed me more than anything else I've read here. The Peel-bashing seemed to only undermine the sort of arguments this community has been making, and reinforcing the sort of arguments this community has been defending itself against, for ages.

By which I mean that 'Poptimism' as ideology, if it even exists, is about making the case for what you like regardless of critical consensus. That really Poptimism isn't about going 'OMG GIRLS ALOUD IT'S AMAZING' or 'you MUST LIKE this Mariah Carey album otherwise you're not a true Poptimist' or 'it doesn't matter that people say The Beatles were better than Aqua, it's all ephemeral pop and whatever you like matters', or whatever gets levelled by over-committed and under-researched bloggers. It's about making the case for what you like and risking indifference or ridicule. If not, why have we been bothering to share all this African hip-hop or German dancehall or Scandinavian dentists rapping about how ecstacy will mash your life, stuff that no one is ever going actually buy in this country? And I'm struggling to think of anyone who did that for music, ESPECIALLY on a national pop platform like Radio 1, before John Peel.

As a mid-90s indie rock kid, my abiding memory of listening to John Peel is one of dissatisfaction. Because from 94-97, it was mostly not indie rock AT ALL, it was all drum and bass or happy hardcore or thrash metal or obscure music from Peru I didn't have a clue about. I thought it was mostly rubbish, if I'm honest, but in hindsight I'm grateful for the opportunity to have heard it. This, after all, was one of the first DJs to play jungle on Radio 1 who later saw his own show shortened to make way for a dedicated drum and bass slot.

Julie Burchill attacks Peel for being hippy, or middle class, or more pointedly ignoring black music, when in fact he played lots of it. Does it really matter if a critic, genuinely, doesn't like a single black American hip-hop or rnb record of last decade, if they're instead bigging up music from South America or the Middle East or Eastern Europe or, well, anywhere that gets TOTALLY IGNORED by the most vociferous of accusatory Internet crusaders.

Not to mention the fact that Burchill is, as dubdobdee suggests elsewhere, more responsible than most for the current musical climate. The inability to get over punk in particular - when the history of NME is told by IPC these days, no one mentions Mark Sinker or Ian Penman or even whoever wrote for them in the 1950s and 60s, it's all Burchill and Parsons and hip young gunslingers.

It's possible that my picture of Peel is heavily rose-tinted here, just as my picture of Burchill is as reductive as the argument I'm attacking her for. But really, despite what your fans want to hear (or what consensus polls tell you they want to hear), isn't playing whatever you love pretty much as Poptimist as it gets?

Comments

[jauntyalan.livejournal.com]

"he seemed to me a bit like a butterfly collector, and never aware of music as a vehicle for living emotions"

this may be true, but it's not a reason to hate. the reasons you do pick out are his voice, and a certain base of his more vocal 'booster' fans. his role, what he did and how he did it, is still very much poptimist. like him or not.

[martinv.livejournal.com]

"never aware of music as a vehicle for living emotions"

Hadn't spotted this comment before. Can anyone reading this that ever listened to Peel talking about music really believe for a second that this was true?

[jauntyalan.livejournal.com]

sort of yes. i mean it was clear if you did get to know him that he was involved with his music, but at the same time a lot of his shows had a detached 'and this one, and this one' feeling too.

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

the only passion I ever heard from him was "love of the music" which is so nebulous and vague - I can't even imagine him talking about joy or rage or sex or dancing or any of the thrills which the music itself was about. as I said, he loved music like a butterfly collector loves nature.

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Lex is there a radio DJ who does talk about the music like that? Remember Peel's job wasn't to be a critic!

Peel wasn't an especially passionate broadcaster, I agree - which was fine, because you could hear the enthusiasm in his voice when he DID get more excited or angry and it carried a lot more weight.

[martinv.livejournal.com]

I think you're right here. It was clear enough when something moved him, even if he couldn't articulate why (which I don't think is really the point.)

His passion might not have been the passion of an obsessive in a certain area, but that's because his range was pretty broad. He wasn't going to shout and scream about every single track he played, but I always felt there was a sense of 'wow, look at all this amazing stuff.' And also often 'no time to talk, more amazing stuff to play.' And I think that's pretty much what a radio DJ should be doing, or certianly should have been back then...

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

I think this is part of why I hate radio.

[martinskidmore.livejournal.com]

Martin is right. Surely just about everyone has heard him talk about the first time he heard 'Teenage Kicks', driving on the motorway, and he had to pull over to listen to it, and he started crying? I remember him playing an amazing Amayenge (Zambian band) session track called Mnise Mnise, or some such spelling, and being choked up and struggling to speak after it. Other DJs may have had more excited voices, but I can't recall any moments like that from any other DJs.

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

it is totally a reason to hate! and no, I don't agree that Peel was poptimist, at least not according to how I define it.