the impulse to group-historicise vs the causes of bad writing

[dubdobdee]

follow-up to:
(a) a post i made on freakytigger's thread
and
(b) the part of my EMP paper which i actually pussied out of and didn't explore (as requested by dickmalone(a) i was wondering about the social context "ver kidz" are downloading all this material INTO, and suggested that the impulse to group-historicise what's shared is going to catch up with every new

Comments

[dickmalone]

Thanks. To pick at it a bit, though, how did rock-pre-punk process new information, if not via a chain of influences? Do you think writing's better when it's not contextual, or are you saying that you think this focus on influence narrowed the scope/worldview of both writing about music and music itself?

[dubdobdee]

first, i think there is a shift, from "chain of influences" as a matter-of-fact minor locationary point to make (among many): and "chain of influences"as establishing-quality

[thomppw]

so uh wasn't that an account of a chain of influences which then stops at the point of explaining what is in fact important and new about rock as a cultural project?

admittedly this is a bit snide of me, sorry :(

[dubdobdee]

uh, yes, that's exactly what i'm saying, thom: the attempt to explain or explore what was special about rock as a (no longer quite) new thing went through a massive crisis of confidence, and ended up routinely defining its "true" self against itself by weirdly uncritical outreach to all kinds of other "non-rock" things -- "influence" being a touchstone word in this evasion; that once you've said it, you apparently don't have to say anything else

[thomppw]

no, i meant - isn't this an account of 'influence' on rockwrite? - it's humbug of me, though, cuz it isn't, plus now having gone and looked at your abstract i gather that the "what were the chain of things that led to rockwrite going wrong" isn't the center of it in the way i took it to be from this post. (wasn't at EMP.)

[koganbot]

so i think the analytical argument kicked in abt the time it became necessary to argue -- within rock -- that we were going back to RESCUE the genre from where vit went wrong, and to cite (as roots of quality) elements OVERLOOKED AT THE TIME; generally meaning the VELVET UNDERGROUND obv

Wait wait wait, (1) delete "as roots of quality" and this was a very good argument that (2) was made by actual human beings, e.g., Lester Bangs (who'd have used the Troggs more than the Velvets as his touchstone), Dave Marsh (would have picked Question Mark or the Miracles), Peter Laughner (Velvets all the way), etc. etc. etc., and that (3) wasn't about influence actually, but was more along the lines of "How do we do what they were able to do, what's wrong with now that's preventing us - or the MC5, anyway - from being able to do what they did then? Let's try to bring it (garage rock, punk rock, power pop, bubblegum) back into rock, as a return of the repressed, but in our own way, and let's search out within the present the things that seem to have

[koganbot]

I still don't think you've successfully explained to me what your critique of "influence" is - that is, what type of argument about influence you think is the "bad" argument, or how one deploys the "good" ones, say Harold Bloom or yours. (And I've probably spent as much time as anyone except maybe you trying to understand what your critique of influence is

[koganbot]

Close quote after "[Gang of 4, Slits, Stooges])." Delete "how" from "as a model for how his own attack."

[koganbot]

remarded - remarked

[dubdobdee]

yes these argts were posted very off-the-cuff and unrigorous to get me back into thinking about them, so w/o doubt full of holes as is -- i have printed out yr replies and am taking them off to shropshire to discuss with my dad instead of getting him a birthday cake ponder while i read my advance copy of luc's book

off-net from 5-ish today till late monday