pop-as-sound vs pop-as-ethos

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

This is something which came up a) between Gareth and I last night at Lovelife, and b) in the comments box of the last post in the wake of Sweden's first round upset/The Knife's dominance of the pie thingy.

It's been noticeable recently (over the past year or so definitely) that the ahem 'online pro-pop community' seems to have collectively decided that 'pop' is a fixed sonic genre: synth-based, very gay (large elements of androgyny and burlesque), very white (a deliberate move away from turn-of-the-century r&b-influenced pop eg Britney, Xtina), and Swedish for preference. I don't like much of this stuff as I find it all very bloodless - those I approve of (Annie, The Knife) often have a harder electro edge, but for the most part it's incredibly unimaginative and wimpy (Bodies Without Organs, those terrible people whose entire career seems to be based on covering the Pet Shop Boys) - and as we all know, WIMPY = INDIE.

But surely the entire point of 'pop', the point of music made with commercial impact in mind, is that it can never be rooted in any particular sound: it's anything and everything which cannibalises anything and everything else, leading to sonic results all over the musical map. It's an ethos rather than a genre - I think the scattergun Xenomania approach typifies it quite well - which means that the pop umbrella can cover everything it or you or the public wants it to.

How do you view pop? And what's your view on the trend towards wimpy, bloodless Scandinavians being held up as some sort of ULTIMO-POP?

Comments

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

The problem here is "with commercial impact in mind" - Bodies Without Organs and Robyn have a fairly big commercial impact in Scandinavia. They know what the Swedish market likes! Are they pop there but not elsewhere? (I've had this conversation with Dr Thomson)

I like big synths and campiness, though I don't think my tastes in pop are remotely fixed to those.

I was thinking yesterday - in the context of Tokio Hotel vs Go Team -that what I want from pop is generally a bit of vulgarity.

[dubdobdee.livejournal.com]

I view pop as a FIELD OF CONTEST -- in which sonic fetish-objects, wielded as they were moralistic battle-winning technologies of affect. twist in the hand and engulf and transform the warrior, or -- thick with the rust of a thousand triumphant campaigns -- fall to crestfallen dust as they are hefted aloft

[dickmalone.livejournal.com]

"synth-based, very gay (large elements of androgyny and burlesque), very white (a deliberate move away from turn-of-the-century r&b-influenced pop eg Britney, Xtina), and Swedish for preference"

STRAW MAN.

There has been an unusual amount of good Swedish pop lately but that doesn't mean people think of pop as being Swedish Lex!

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

I think the peculiarity of the Swedish market is important here too. Here you have a small country whose main claim to musical fame is producing one of the most enormously successful pop groups ever (also one of the 'whitest' probly), and crucially that pop group evolved out of quite respected chart-veteral folkies. This is surely at the root of Sweden's image (external, maybe internal) as a country that Takes Pop Seriously.

[thenipper.livejournal.com]

I have evidently missed Annie's "harder electro edge"!

[thenipper.livejournal.com]

Also, for the talk of pop being genre-blind, voracious appetite, Lex is the first to say that -eg- Franz's "Take me out" can't be Good Pop because it has guitars on it! It seems to me it's much more pop than the dull new The Knife album.

[chezghost.livejournal.com]

Also it would appear that Bodies Without Organs are the weak link following the might of Army Of Lovers (but then again just the one great great track or what?) and Alcazar (just the four or five great great tracks or what?) and they are surely both 'bloodier' than BWO.

[byebyepride.livejournal.com]

lj ate a long comment on the poptimism version of this thread, but here is an abbreviation:

pop is not what you listen to, but how you listen.

i.e. fanboys with ljs enthusing about Robyn = indie.

hearing Robyn on radio 1 = pop.

And I totally think that Robyn in Sweden = pop, in UK = indie.

(at the moment, she could become pop in UK (unlikely) or stop being pop in either place)

This means that pop cannot be used as shorthand for 'good' because the c***ing arctic monkeys have obviously released a pop album. (and a lot of 'pop' at the moment, has the sonic ingredients of 'indie' (if by that you mean guitars played by chin-stroking post-punk gubbling tw*nts).

[byebyepride.livejournal.com]

And the whole 'gay synth' = pop argument is programmed into the most indie thing ever i.e. 'Romo'.

[(Anonymous)]

The idea of differentiating yourself from your older sister the pop mainstream via noisy guitars and squalling vocals is a pop mainstream idea.

He Who Explains Himself In Bits And Pieces

[poptasticuk.livejournal.com]

As quite possibly the most pop obsessed person on the planet, I have to respond to this. Pop to me is pretty much synonymous with happiness - it's almost Platonic, to me pop is like "the good" and every song's closeness to "the good" is determined by how poppy it is, how happy it sounds. If you think BWO are wimpy, you must be listening to the wrong songs. Listen to Sunshine In The Rain or Conquering America - does that not sound like pure sparkling happiness to you? For me pop is:

- extravagant & OTT
- uplifting in sound & usually message

It doesn't matter which instruments are used to reach this result, although obviously some instruments (such as synths as you mentioned) make it easier than others. Of course there are some great sad, slow songs which could be called pop, but these tend to have other pop qualities in such a huge way that makes up for what they lack.

Pop is certainly not about fitting into what's currently popular, because that would make Arctic Monkeys more pop than Annie, which they're obviously not - they're more popULAR. The word "pop" may have been derived from "popular", but it's become something quite separate, yet many people still can't separate the two.