Music as conversation

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

New Pitchfork column by me on answer records, fan fiction, music as conversation... thanks to piratemoggy for her help putting this one together!

http://pitchfork.com/features/poptimist/7635-poptimist-21/

Comments

[theastronomymod.livejournal.com]

An interesting read, for sure.

I do like that you have picked up on the fact that all these things are part of a continuum - that answer records, mash-ups, remixes, covers, fan fiction - and I'd add fan art - are all part of the same process. The desire to be *part* of music - in that sense of making the artform a conversation, rather than the one-way passive street of consumerism.

I've never read Jenkins' book (surprisingly) - but I just don't think I'd want to read a male perspective on fan fiction, since it is, almost overwhelmingly, such a female universe. (I am actually racking my brain to think if I've ever, actually, read fan fiction by a man - and in 5 years of curating the first pop music fan fiction site on the web, I never did. Men write fanzines, women write fan fict. It's an almost universal dichotomy.) Am going to have to have a think on his taxonomy.

[boyofbadgers.livejournal.com]

To try and characterize fan production without immersing myself in it would be as silly as playing mix and match with dance sub-genres while never setting foot in a club.

Heheheheheh.

[dubdobdee.livejournal.com]

yeah! except i feel like one of my giant-big-theories-which-is-mine (ie for my music&technology book) has been pwned :/

moral: finish stupid book like 10 years ago instead of 10 years hence

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

the kind of records that create satisfying, unifying outrage at the thought of a "classic being desecrated

I have an overwhelming urge to create a chipmunk donk/noise version of 'Imagine' RIGHT NOW.

[cis.livejournal.com]

Beyoncé, that mistress of the in-song situation, needs a Greek chorus of R'n'B nobodies to step up and vainly say their piece. "A ring? Get real." "Babe, you will never replace me."

does "Comfortable" by Lil' Wayne count as an "Irreplaceable" answer record, I wonder?

[piratemoggy.livejournal.com]

Must stop starting .rtf document called 'MUSIC CRITICISM IS NOT A FANDOM' and then writing two sentences, thinking "I wonder what K-Punk's being wrong about at the minute?" and abandoning the endeavour.

Anyway, the good news is I think this article's dead good & am glad was a help rather than a hindrance w/my mad fanramblin'.

[koganbot]

Was wondering if there'd ever been any Lou Reed/John Cale slash fiction, though my hypothesis was that all their fans were too busy forming bands to write it.

She used to be a dude around the block

[koganbot]

--I wonder if Murdock choose the title "Superstar" because of the Carpenters' great "Superstar" (which I took to be narrated by a groupie, though it could have just been a delusional fan).

--There's a Europop rap record narrated by a Billie Jean that's a lot better than the Murdock track; I've got it on cassette somewhere, but can't find which one.

--Is there a historian in the house? I know r&b and rock 'n' roll had answer records going back to "Work With Me Annie," "Roll With Me Henry," "Annie Had A Baby," and I wouldn't be surprised if '20s blues were full of 'em, but I don't know if pre-r'n'r pop had them.

--UTFO's "Roxanne Roxanne" inspired a whole slew of answer songs (e.g. "The Truth Can Be Told: Roxanne's A Man"), two of them kick-starting a couple of mini-careers by excellent rappers (that of The Real Roxanne [though this one's better] and Roxanne Shanté).

[petronia.livejournal.com]

One meme going around fan fiction circles for several years now is that of the "remix challenge": one fanfic writer picks or is assigned a story by another fanfic writer, transforms it into a different story per Jenkins, then gives it a cute name following dance music remix conventions. ("Albert Camus - The Stranger (Fat Bob's Dislocated Goth Re-Rub)").