Rolling Stone. Independent Films.
This post was going to be about two things: Rolling Stone and... "independent films." The Rolling Stone observation came to me out of the blue the other day, not reading that magazine or anything in particular. I was thinking about how RS always gives short shrift to indie or experimental or non-mainstream bands (unless it's one they've decided to latch onto, and with those you can always tell) and why that is. Then it occurred to me that it's nothing less than the struggle for relevance and, ultimately, survival.
The magazine exists for new readers as one of two things: either a gateway or an imposingly inescapable deathtrap. Jann Wenner certainly understands this, and that's why you might have 15 separate five-star reissues from, say, 1974 but nary a perfect score for months if not years in the modern age. Rolling Stone, as crusty and outdated as it has become (and perhaps has been for some time), is, to many, the authority on rock music from something like 1965 to 1978. These were the glory days, although critics from the period might not use those exact words to describe the purportedly ruthless and manipulative publication. Since punk and the independent/underground scene got started, they've never really been on top of things (or so I comprehend) and thus serve as a print version of the rock 'n roll hall of fame, making polite gestures toward new acts, but reserving most real enthusiasm for their 47th interview with a McCartney or a Jagger or whomever else has decided, against logic and good taste, to put out yet another tired album. For those with lifetime subscriptions still stuck in musical reactionary mode on classic rock radio, this strategy has worked perfectly.
However, if they started getting exciting about anything new or different (outside of the traditionally ghettoized David Fricke [he even has his own sidebar safely away from the real music]) they'd also have to acknowledge that they're not the authority on such matters. (Who that might be depends largely on your particular tastes, including print/online, but pretty much no one can fuck with The Wire.) Rolling Stone would become a minor music tabloid with trashy drug stories and occasionally interesting liberal political pieces, retaining essentially no place of importance in popular culture. One can only hope.
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Much less to say about independent film. One thing I've noticed since coming to Seattle, although it has nothing to do with the city in particular, is that people use the phrase "independent film" in the same way they might mention a dental exam or cleaning their gutters. It goes like this: "So, yeah, last weekend we [bowed to the cultural peer pressure and] watched this 'independent film'. Ugh! It was, like, totally weird. I'm glad that's over." To be fair, I probably share similar feelings about reality television, so it's not as if I'm entirely unbiased myself. I tend to not argue the point about such things, either broadly or even if I've seen the specific movie in question. I just kind of chuckle mirthlessly to myself the same way I do when I read that George W. Bush wants to enlist the armed forces to fight bird flu, or that the United States has refused to participate in the Montreal Climate Change Conference. It's either laugh or suffocate painfully in the grip of our idiotically unthinking and increasingly narrow-minded culture.
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PS Coldcut's SolidSteel show on Resonance FM was about as good as radio gets. (Which, on a streaming connection, isn't transcendent but still near-thrilling.)
The magazine exists for new readers as one of two things: either a gateway or an imposingly inescapable deathtrap. Jann Wenner certainly understands this, and that's why you might have 15 separate five-star reissues from, say, 1974 but nary a perfect score for months if not years in the modern age. Rolling Stone, as crusty and outdated as it has become (and perhaps has been for some time), is, to many, the authority on rock music from something like 1965 to 1978. These were the glory days, although critics from the period might not use those exact words to describe the purportedly ruthless and manipulative publication. Since punk and the independent/underground scene got started, they've never really been on top of things (or so I comprehend) and thus serve as a print version of the rock 'n roll hall of fame, making polite gestures toward new acts, but reserving most real enthusiasm for their 47th interview with a McCartney or a Jagger or whomever else has decided, against logic and good taste, to put out yet another tired album. For those with lifetime subscriptions still stuck in musical reactionary mode on classic rock radio, this strategy has worked perfectly.
However, if they started getting exciting about anything new or different (outside of the traditionally ghettoized David Fricke [he even has his own sidebar safely away from the real music]) they'd also have to acknowledge that they're not the authority on such matters. (Who that might be depends largely on your particular tastes, including print/online, but pretty much no one can fuck with The Wire.) Rolling Stone would become a minor music tabloid with trashy drug stories and occasionally interesting liberal political pieces, retaining essentially no place of importance in popular culture. One can only hope.
---
Much less to say about independent film. One thing I've noticed since coming to Seattle, although it has nothing to do with the city in particular, is that people use the phrase "independent film" in the same way they might mention a dental exam or cleaning their gutters. It goes like this: "So, yeah, last weekend we [bowed to the cultural peer pressure and] watched this 'independent film'. Ugh! It was, like, totally weird. I'm glad that's over." To be fair, I probably share similar feelings about reality television, so it's not as if I'm entirely unbiased myself. I tend to not argue the point about such things, either broadly or even if I've seen the specific movie in question. I just kind of chuckle mirthlessly to myself the same way I do when I read that George W. Bush wants to enlist the armed forces to fight bird flu, or that the United States has refused to participate in the Montreal Climate Change Conference. It's either laugh or suffocate painfully in the grip of our idiotically unthinking and increasingly narrow-minded culture.
---
PS Coldcut's SolidSteel show on Resonance FM was about as good as radio gets. (Which, on a streaming connection, isn't transcendent but still near-thrilling.)
Posted on Wednesday, November 30, 2005
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