The Thought Police Are After Me
Listening to The Resistance [music store link], I was kind of idly thinking about my 1984 fanmix and how it'd be very appropriate... then Muse started singing about thought police and I thought "Hm, that's a bit on the nose there, isn't it?"
Of course one of the reasons I love Muse is that pretty much all of their songs can be related back to 1984 and other dystopias. And I do indeed love dystopias.
What is going on in this song it's like explosions and then... Chopin.
Fanmixing is, I think, kind of a balance; on the one hand I want the songs to be fitting for the subject matter, but on the other hand you also want to give it a kind of emotional, lyrical depth. I don't know how successful I've been when it comes to that since I tend to be extremely obvious in lots of my song selections. Not to the point where I'm indiscriminately grabbing werewolf songs for my Remus fanmix (though genderbender Shakira's "She Wolf" would be hilarious y/y? Ah well, guess I'll just have to save it for Nina and Madison...), I do try a little to like, seem like I put a bit of thought into it (since I really really do). I think the Illyria one is the most confusing one I've made.
You can see all the fanmixes I've publicly published. Is it tacky to reuse songs in different fanmixes? My gut says yes, but then again the very concept of fanmixing implies that reinterpretation of musical texts to new contexts is legitimate; so re-reappropriating songs should also be pertinent. Even so, given the fact that through fanmixing I am recontextualizing the songs, it seems disingenuous or confusing to be using those same texts that I've already implicated in other situations.
But whatever.
Part of it is my own bias with musical associations anyway. When I hear a certain song - for example, Pink's "Cuz I Can" or Stabilo's "Flawed Design" or Wicked's "For Good" (made even more interesting by the pre-established narrative context of the musical - there's no way I can't not think of Starbuck or Sam or Xena and Gabrielle. Thus when I see them out of those contexts I get really disoriented and my first reaction is rejection.
Unless it's for a crack fanmix. If it's supposed to be humor, I'll let anything go, since humor (and therefore, parody) has a different set of rules.
I'll try not to do it, but if I do (and in fact I already have twice three times)
I've never taken any kind of music theory or musical pop culture classes so yeah I don't actually know how this works - like, there's a lot of areas we can talk about; the use of classical music in modern films (like, semi-ironically, Carmina Burana in The Sum of All Fears), score music written for films and popular songs reappropriated/integrated into the films (both nondiegetic and diegetic) and on and on and on. And, now that we have fans playing with shit, we've also got vids and fanmixes (to start with) to talk about.
...And then there's copyright law.
ETA: On the iTunes LP they have lyrics as well as song notes/band interpretations. "The Resistance" is actually a song about 1984. Goddammit.
Of course one of the reasons I love Muse is that pretty much all of their songs can be related back to 1984 and other dystopias. And I do indeed love dystopias.
What is going on in this song it's like explosions and then... Chopin.
Fanmixing is, I think, kind of a balance; on the one hand I want the songs to be fitting for the subject matter, but on the other hand you also want to give it a kind of emotional, lyrical depth. I don't know how successful I've been when it comes to that since I tend to be extremely obvious in lots of my song selections. Not to the point where I'm indiscriminately grabbing werewolf songs for my Remus fanmix (though genderbender Shakira's "She Wolf" would be hilarious y/y? Ah well, guess I'll just have to save it for Nina and Madison...), I do try a little to like, seem like I put a bit of thought into it (since I really really do). I think the Illyria one is the most confusing one I've made.
You can see all the fanmixes I've publicly published. Is it tacky to reuse songs in different fanmixes? My gut says yes, but then again the very concept of fanmixing implies that reinterpretation of musical texts to new contexts is legitimate; so re-reappropriating songs should also be pertinent. Even so, given the fact that through fanmixing I am recontextualizing the songs, it seems disingenuous or confusing to be using those same texts that I've already implicated in other situations.
But whatever.
Part of it is my own bias with musical associations anyway. When I hear a certain song - for example, Pink's "Cuz I Can" or Stabilo's "Flawed Design" or Wicked's "For Good" (made even more interesting by the pre-established narrative context of the musical - there's no way I can't not think of Starbuck or Sam or Xena and Gabrielle. Thus when I see them out of those contexts I get really disoriented and my first reaction is rejection.
Unless it's for a crack fanmix. If it's supposed to be humor, I'll let anything go, since humor (and therefore, parody) has a different set of rules.
I'll try not to do it, but if I do (and in fact I already have twice three times)
I've never taken any kind of music theory or musical pop culture classes so yeah I don't actually know how this works - like, there's a lot of areas we can talk about; the use of classical music in modern films (like, semi-ironically, Carmina Burana in The Sum of All Fears), score music written for films and popular songs reappropriated/integrated into the films (both nondiegetic and diegetic) and on and on and on. And, now that we have fans playing with shit, we've also got vids and fanmixes (to start with) to talk about.
...And then there's copyright law.
ETA: On the iTunes LP they have lyrics as well as song notes/band interpretations. "The Resistance" is actually a song about 1984. Goddammit.