Wednesday, June 22, 2016
Saturday, June 18, 2016
Post-Rock, Subcultures and the End of Authenticity

The prompt for your second short paper is linked to in the previous post. Paper is due on Friday. Enjoy.
Assuming that at this point you should be on your way to completing the Garofalo textbook, here are the final readings for the session --readings in bold are required; readings in italics are (highly) recommended.
On Jamaican Music:
from Dick Hebdige, Cut'n'Mix here.
On 'co-optation':
Thomas Frank's "Commodify Your Dissent" here.
On Gender:Simon Frith and Angela McRobbie, "Rock and Sexuality"
Simon Frith, "Afterthoughts"
Richard Dyer, "In Defense of Disco"
Find these articles here as a single PDF file --nb. skip the initial Sara Cohen article.

On 'sub-cultures':
Here are the Dick Hebdige chapters from Subculture: The Meaning of Style. Refer back to the Punk: Attitude film screening.

On sampling, mash-ups and the 'postmodern turn':
Andrew Goodwin, "Sample and Hold"
E Ann Kaplan, "A Postmodern Play of the Signifier?"
Negativland, "from Wired: Negativland Interviews U2's The Edge"
Also, to clarify (or further obscure) 'postmodernism' please help yourself --in case you have not encountered it in your other studies-- to Fredric Jameson's "Postmodernism and Consumer Society"
Sunday, June 12, 2016
For Those About To Rock: Return of the Aura
"I mean, man, whither goest thou? Whither goest thou, America, in thy shiny car in the night?"
-Jack Kerouac
-Keightley, "Reconsidering Rock"
Here are a couple of articles to integrate Keightley's Reconsidering Rock article. The first Frith article is required; the second article is a highly recommended read. Enjoy the Lester Bangs reviews from Creem. Reebee Garofalo's article on Soul ("Popular Music and the Civil Rights Movement") is required.
Simon Frith - "Rock and Popular Culture"
Simon Frith - "The Magic The Can Set You Free": The Ideology of Folk and the Myth of the Rock Community
Paul Clarke - "'A Magic Science': Rock Music as a Recording Art"
Lester Bangs - Various Record Reviews from Psychotic Reactions and Carburetor Dung
Reebee Garofalo - Popular Music and the Civil Rights Movement
Also, here is Andrew Chester's "For A Rock Aesthetic", Richard Merton's response, "Comments" and Chester's response to the response, "Second Thoughts on a Rock Aesthetic: The Band". It's all here at this link --the whole epochal exchange in one handy location.
Please read in 'Rocking Out' up to and including Chapter 8.
AC/DC, Let There Be Rock (1977)
Reverend Bon tells you all about it. As you can see the 'aura' is back around Angus' head.
Wednesday, June 8, 2016
The In-Between Years (or The Empire Strikes Back)

The Folk Revival:
The Kingston Trio - Tom Dooley
Pete Seeger - Turn Turn Turn!
Joan Baez - Silver Dagger
Bob Dylan - Masters of War
Lyrics here.
Surf & Hot Rod Combos:
The Beach Boys - Surfin USA
Dick Dale & The Del-Tones - Miserlou
Link Wray & His Ray Men - Rumble (Outtake)
The Stingers (Jack Cole) - Mustang
Uptown R&B from Motown/All songs by Holland-Dozier-Holland:
Martha & The Vandellas - Nowhere To Run
The Four Tops - Reach Out I'll Be There
The Supremes - You Can't Hurry Love
Marvin Gaye - How Sweet It Is
Girl Groups/Phil Spector Wall of Sound/Songs by Weill & Mann:
The Ronettes - Be My Baby
The Crystals - Then He Kissed Me
The Crystals - Da Doo Ron Ron
Cynthia Weill & Barry Mann songs NOT produced by Phil Spector:
Lesley Gore - It's My Party
The Wall of Sound in full-effect:
Ike & Tina Turner - River Deep, Mountain High
The Righteous Brothers - You've Lost That Lovin' Feeling
Readings:
Keightley, "Reconsidering Rock"
nb. You will not be responsible for this reading for the midterm. We will discuss the issues and concepts raised in it after the exam. I do however urge you to read it as it offers a lot of points that would help your review of material that will actually be covered on the midterm.
In Garofalo you should read up to and including Chapter 6.

R'n'R or Trasubstantiated R'n'B?

Elvis Presley - That's All Right, Mama + Blue Moon of Kentucky
Bill Haley & The Comets - Crazy Man Crazy
Fats Domino - Ain't That A Shame + Blueberry Hill
Little Richard - Tutti Frutti
Chuck Berry - Almost Grown + Little Queenie
Bo Diddley - Pretty Thing
The Chords - Sh-Boom
Frankie Lymon & The Teenagers - Why Do Fools Fall In Love
Whitey's Lindy Hoppers: Something Wild
This is the Lindy Hop, the Jitterbug, the Suzie-Q. The clip is an excerpt from H.C. Potter's Helzapoppin' (1941).
More Lindy Hoppers doing "The Big Apple" in 1939 at this link here. Enjoy.
(In this clip the dancing starts at the 2:15 mark.)
from Jonathan Demme's Something Wild; The Feelies play David Bowies's "Fame" and Jeff Daniels dances with his eye on the 'Other' for cues.
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