(no subject)
Well aware that I've been neglecting the thirty days of music meme, but in true Amanda Palmer style, I wanted to blog something that I'd been thinking about in relation to the music industry in particular instead.
It's no secret that a lot of artists who begin their career as transgressive become accepted, and arguably more mainstream, as their careers continue. This doesn't necessarily have anything to do with them selling out or conforming more to popular culture or record labels or whatever. But when an artist has been consistently doing the same thing for ten or fifteen years, a lot of people will cease to be shocked by it.
From what I've seen, this is generally considered to be a Very Bad Thing.
I disagree.
If your name is Marilyn Manson or Dani Filth, for example, and the kind of music and lyrical content you've been putting out since the early nineties has, over time, finally come to be accepted by an appreciable amount of people, this is in fact a Very Good Thing. It means that because of you, because of your initial transgression, people are able to accept things they just wouldn't have ten or fifteen years ago. They're able to contemplate your work with eyes of artistic appreciation, intellectual dialogue, or at least affable tolerance. If you've stayed true to your artistic vision and the kind of thing you want to say in the meantime, why should your fans, of all people, turn against you?
Being accepted and recognised by an appreciable proportion of mainstream culture doesn't mean you're not doing your job.
It means your job is done, and you've done it well.
Of course, that doesn't mean you shouldn't stop creating your art. In fact, it means it's a better time than ever to create your art, because more people are going to read or watch or listen, and tell all their mates without fear of being stigmatised for listening to the devil's music, or whatever. If you still want to get more transgressive, go nuts. Amanda Palmer certainly hasn't stopped offending people yet. But when Cradle of Filth released the Vestal Masturbation shirt with their first album, The Principle of Evil Made Flesh in 1994, there was an outcry. When they released the track Gilded Cunt from Nymphetamine in 2005, nary an eyebrow was raised. It was expected. It was accepted.
In 2005, an English Black Metal band were able to release a song called Gilded Cunt on a major US label and it was fine. Liv Kristine of Leaves' Eyes was on the album. So was King Diamond. There were covers of Ciff Richard, Bathory and Ozzy Osbourne. There was super-deluxe digipack packaging, a major music video and an extensive world tour.
And a song called Gilded Cunt.
If you're Anne Rice, Tim Burton or Trent Reznor, your art may not be transgressive any more. But for god's sake keep fucking making it, because the world is waiting.
Gilded Cunt.
It's no secret that a lot of artists who begin their career as transgressive become accepted, and arguably more mainstream, as their careers continue. This doesn't necessarily have anything to do with them selling out or conforming more to popular culture or record labels or whatever. But when an artist has been consistently doing the same thing for ten or fifteen years, a lot of people will cease to be shocked by it.
From what I've seen, this is generally considered to be a Very Bad Thing.
I disagree.
If your name is Marilyn Manson or Dani Filth, for example, and the kind of music and lyrical content you've been putting out since the early nineties has, over time, finally come to be accepted by an appreciable amount of people, this is in fact a Very Good Thing. It means that because of you, because of your initial transgression, people are able to accept things they just wouldn't have ten or fifteen years ago. They're able to contemplate your work with eyes of artistic appreciation, intellectual dialogue, or at least affable tolerance. If you've stayed true to your artistic vision and the kind of thing you want to say in the meantime, why should your fans, of all people, turn against you?
Being accepted and recognised by an appreciable proportion of mainstream culture doesn't mean you're not doing your job.
It means your job is done, and you've done it well.
Of course, that doesn't mean you shouldn't stop creating your art. In fact, it means it's a better time than ever to create your art, because more people are going to read or watch or listen, and tell all their mates without fear of being stigmatised for listening to the devil's music, or whatever. If you still want to get more transgressive, go nuts. Amanda Palmer certainly hasn't stopped offending people yet. But when Cradle of Filth released the Vestal Masturbation shirt with their first album, The Principle of Evil Made Flesh in 1994, there was an outcry. When they released the track Gilded Cunt from Nymphetamine in 2005, nary an eyebrow was raised. It was expected. It was accepted.
In 2005, an English Black Metal band were able to release a song called Gilded Cunt on a major US label and it was fine. Liv Kristine of Leaves' Eyes was on the album. So was King Diamond. There were covers of Ciff Richard, Bathory and Ozzy Osbourne. There was super-deluxe digipack packaging, a major music video and an extensive world tour.
And a song called Gilded Cunt.
If you're Anne Rice, Tim Burton or Trent Reznor, your art may not be transgressive any more. But for god's sake keep fucking making it, because the world is waiting.
Gilded Cunt.