Okay wow so Blogger has changed everything so much that it apparently refuses to work in the browser I typically use. Now I have to use it in a different browser, which totally ruins the internet for me. I'm not particularly fond of this layout either, especially since it's incredibly easy to miss the title box and the "Publish" button is no longer in the logical place- below the text box, which is proper because as writing goes on, the text scrolls and progresses downward, thus when you're finished you're at your lowest point...
Anyway, that little rant is dreadfully ironic considering the thing about which I originally planned to rant, and on which I will be ranting from this point. Normally I don't complain about the "new" things in life. When Facebook updates, I'm "meh" at best since I've grown used to change every once in a while. The rest of the denizens of the internet don't seem to see eye to eye to me. This is especially true when we get on the topic of entertainment. I'm going to say a word right now, and you're probably going to recognize it...but I want you to think about it's connotation. Ready?
Nostalgia
Thought about it? I mean, what do people really think about it? It's hard to say really. Usually "nostalgia" is referring to some...thing...a movie or a game or a tv show, at least in it's internet form. Nostalgia is essentially a sequel to "epic," an old world that gets slightly warped and egregiously abused to the point that you get tired of it. I don't blame nostalgia though, it's not it's fault that people seem to use it to prolong the life of fads and trends only resurrected by the advent of modern technology and used as a replacement for new experiences.
It could be quite the drinking game really. Go find some videos that are likely to lead to similar videos...the soundtrack to a videogame from two generations ago might do nicely...and take a drink any time someone mentions "nostalgia," "Good times," or reminisces about the game in any way shape or form. I don't recommend doing this with Toonami since you'll pass out rather quickly. So here's my next question. How did we get so obsessed with nostalgia....and why?
Bob Dylan may have written one of the truest songs ever when he wrote "The Times They Are A-Changin'" because dear God do times change. In fact, you could argue that the only thing that doesn't change is the fact that things change. The only reason you could argue against that is because now people seem to have footholds in the past. Whereas before, when something changed, there wasn't any going back, we the people now have the ability to not only review those past things, but pretty much resurrect them. YouTube is the main provider for this ability, wherein you will find...pretty much anything you ask it to. Full episodes of old TV shows and entire walkthroughs of games that died from water damage long ago. They're all there now. Hell, you can even find old commercials and bumps you didn't even know you wanted to see again.
Before YouTube, there was nowhere near as much of this type of thing available. Nostalgia was something that came from photo albums and boxes in the attic. It was about YOU and YOUR memories, typically not the thing or story itself. That's why it always strikes me as odd that 17-18 year olds are having these feelings of "nostalgia," considering it used to be a rare word that was uttered or used when middle aged or elderly people were thinking about what they were like when they were 17-18, and maybe regretting leaving such a life behind.
As I've said in the past, entertainment has become a lot more potent in recent decades, and far, far more immersive. In the 50s, you had novels and TV shows and movies, yeah, but they're nowhere near as expansive as they are now. They don't spawn games and other novels and incarnations in every form of media imaginable. The characters aren't as deep or developed, and they don't last as long. Today we have sensations that are based around stories...there's such things as "fandom" and "multimedia." These stories can go as far as to define entire periods of our lives, even in childhood...the same time that used to be defined by playing baseball and...whatever else. Kind of a different life. I won't pretend I know what that's like since I grew up with franchises like most other people my age.
Though I grew up with the same things as everyone else, there's still disparity about the world "nostalgia" that makes me not want to do it. Personally, I'd find it kind of insulting when used to describe something I did. When someone comments "Oh, the nostalgia!" it basically says "I remember this for the memories it gave me." People who leave their comments at "nostalgia omg" without expanding are basically just saying they liked something because it's old. It's from their childhood. Which was better than now. Look, I know we're a transitional generation....and I know it's not the best of times right now as the world tries to figure out how to keep up with itself, but honestly, it wasn't really those shows and games that made your childhood great. It was the fact that you were carefree enough to have them be the only things on your mind. Now you're older, responsible, and you've gotten used to the ideas and stories presented to you when you were younger. New entries just don't have the same effect on you as the old ones did because now you know some of the sad truths of the world that have always been present in a series. But you don't see them as much in the old entries of a series because when you knew them best, you were a kid. So uh...let me ask you this....WHY did you like those things? Could you answer that in detail?
As far as 90s cartoons go, it's true there were some uniquely gifted writers, animators, and designers active at the time. But let's not forget that in the 90s we also had cartoons that were made even earlier than that. Take for example, Tom & Jerry, which I now occasionally watch on Cartoon Network around lunch time. When I watch those cartoons now, some of the slapstick actually makes me laugh. The absurdity of the situations makes me chuckle. I don't really remember laughing all that much at shows when I was a kid. This is really weird because I have a wide understanding that these shows were made entirely by adults that have a real understanding of how the real world works. Yet, at the same time, I understand that that is what makes cartoons new and old FUN. These people get to experience a world without limits so that the viewer can experience a world without limits. Tom running under an anvil and getting flattened isn't coincidence...it's completely deliberate. It's just so absurd that you have to revel in it. It might even pose a mature question...what happens in a world in which people can't die? Kind of a neat thing to consider, yeah?
Yet instead of considering these things with the new, more mature viewpoint that the children of the 90s now have, most just settle for "this was from better times!" Believe me, I miss being a carefree kid too, but I can still admit to using entertainment today the way that I did then. I'm constantly looking for new things while revelling in the old ones...and when I happen to stumble on a few episodes of Dragonball Z or Dexter's Lab, I'm always far more interested to catch what I missed as a kid when I was taking everything very, very seriously. When I say I took it seriously, it means I was always entirely immersed in the world of the show, even to the point where I sometimes didn't even understand what was going on. The same thing applies to videogames, where I might play the first level or world of a game over...and over.....and over...and over...and never win but never get mad either. Somehow the goal of the game was never to get to the end, but play until I was finished. Maybe it's these weird outlooks that I had that give me my view on nostalgia now.
Even so, I'd say describing something as "nostalgic" is shallow. There's so much more to that work than the time at which it was released. There are other things that make those stories great. Or not great. "Nostalgia" doesn't even commit to whether or not something was even good. It's irrelevant to the series itself since it really refers to the context surrounding it. Again, I have fond childhood memories of games that I never played past the second level. They're actually fond memories, despite the fact that I can't actually have made a fair judgment on the game based on the amount I'd played. Maybe games were never "good" or "bad" to me. Even though I understand now that I can never experience things for the first time again, I almost don't want to since I can now look at things more completely and accurately. I'm not comparing things to their older counterparts, and when I'm playing a sequel to something I've actually played, I have to fight the urge to enjoy it less due to the fact that it's not entirely new.
This whole nostalgia craze is toxic to the current creative environment too. If people are staying rooted in past series and refusing to get into new, modern things, then there's far less people to draw on for making something the next big thing. People will write off entire franchises simply because they have replaced the old ones, despite the hours of work put into them and the level of quality that ultimately results. People will condemn further entries into a series just because they haven't experienced them in the same context that they did earlier entries, despite the fact that all the things they thought would be awesome as a child are now in this game or show. When they're too busy watching, researching, talking about, and commenting on 297 episodes of Dragon Ball Z, they're not going to notice all of the new series out there that will come to define this time period.
It's ironic, since nostalgia only effects certain people. The concept itself isn't really timeless. Comments concerning nostalgia are often accompanied by "I weep for kids today since they won't have shows/games as good as these!" That's hilarious. The kids today are too busy making future nostalgia on their own. Just like Bob Dylan suggests, what's here today will be different tomorrow, and when the times change once again, the kids that were screwed out of the supposedly implacable experiences their older siblings/friends/random older people on the internet cherished will long for the context of their old shows and games. And who knows what they'll see. Coming back to right now, I know what I want to see is depth over nostalgia. Let's talk about why something is actually great. Let's recognize things on their own merits, and keep the ones we find we love for no apparent reason our own little treasures. We can use these things to connect the dots, not just admire the unfinished bigger picture.
Consolidate. Combine. Fuse. Integrate. We have so many luxuries these days. Not only did us 90s kids get to enjoy the richest selection of stories and entertainment ever available, we also have the means of enjoying them whenever and however we wish as we so choose. It would be an abuse of those luxuries to use them just for playing the same old things over and over again. As they say, there's a difference between growing up and getting old.
Thursday, April 19, 2012
Monday, April 16, 2012
The Chronicles of Indie
Okay so it's a Monday night and there are a shit ton of things I could be doing right now for school but I really wanted to write something like this, dammit! This is how we write best I think.
Of course, I have to come back in a way that's appropriate, so I'll once again be *ahem* "borrowing" a topic from Cat. I'll be using some different rhetoric, of course, since I like to try and appear...understanding of both sides. You might recall a post I did waaaaaay back about the lack of "rock stars" in this day and age. Well, this is kind of an update on that.
I've been kind of inclined to get back into music lately. I'm blaming it on my friend Wes, who invites me to be in a band of his once every few months. Once he invites....he's persistent, and I could go on and on about how I really believe in him and the things he's trying to do musically. Anyway, when he called me and asked me to be in his latest project, I asked him what type of music we'd be playing, and he used the one word I'd fear would come out of his mouth. He used it twice in fact. The word was "indie." It was kind of disappointing since I know how Wes likes punk music and bluegrass and anything that sounds good, and I was really up for being into something punky. But alas, when I heard he and his two fellow recruits a few days later, they were indeed, very very indie.
Let me preface this by saying they weren't bad musically. I was pretty impressed by their vocal togetherness and the way they were able to keep the song(s) together with tempo and everything, since personally I'm shit without a drummer. This isn't even really about them as much as it is about ideas and themes and sounds.
Earlier today, I was thinking about what a record might look like if I put one out today. I had a bit of an interview with myself, and I ended up trying really hard to contrast the "record" with indie music. I figured my record would be an amalgamation of punk, rock, alternative...whatever I felt like. It'd be about stupid shit like Facebook friends and Youtube comments and aviator glasses. It'd be raw, imperfect, and full of dirty, scratchy guitar. I'd want it to have sounds that range from Foo Fighters style hard rock to the quirky raps of Gorillaz. Apparently though, the last thing I would want it to be is indie.
The first word that came to mind was "sterile." Indie music is so so clean. The guitars are always clean, if they ever stray from being acoustic. There's not a hair out of place. The vocals try their damndest to avoid emotion. It's not dirty or punchy or action-packed. In a way though, that's brilliant. Indie is a good indicator of where we are as a race. Right now, we're a bunch of germaphobes, afraid to let our kids play outside since even the fricking sun can give them cancer, let alone the millions of invisble organisms that are floating around that we can't even see. Our food and water has to be specially processed to be considered safe. The five second rule no longer applies. On a human level, showing emotion is a sign of weakness. Indie music very much represents us right now. The emphasis here is on intelligence and cleverness, rather than the raw emotions and feelings that other music channels.
It's interesting because when you look at popular music, all of them are about dancing. Rap is so huge today because that's the thing everyone shakes their ass to. It's why dubstep and techno are so popular. What the hell was disco? Something to dance to. How about jazz and swing? How about trumpets and drums? Shit, way way back when, music was used for two things: celebrations and marches. Even rock was part of a huge dance craze...I mean, that's kind of what the Beatles were before they'd been famous long enough to get bored with the same old song and dance. See, even that cliche puts song and dance together. The curious thing is that you really can't dance to indie music...it's slow and doesn't really have a beat.
Maybe we as a people don't have a beat, and that's why indie is creeping up on us as a dominant genre. Maybe we are shedding our emotions and dirty minds for cooler heads. I mean, think about it. Indie musicians are all about their own integrity and talent. It's supposed to be them, an acoustic guitar and the truth....and maybe a guy with a beard playing bass, but that's it...and maybe a violin....and maybe a female singer with short hair...but that's it. Oh and maybe a flutist. But that's all. None of this computery, autotune bullshit...just my Mac for recording. And then what you end up with is droning vocals that barely go outside of a certain range because that'd be too risky. Trying to avoid computers, technology, and electronics ultimately and ironically makes the resulting music sound...very robotic.
That's part of the gimmick and intelligence of it though. Think about it. There's probably an indie song out there that's about genocide in Africa, and the whole thing is done in typical indie style: acoustic guitar, keys, bearded bassman, and maybe some brushes on a drum. It's sung in monotone. Dissonant? Cleverly. Why? Because the song is supposed to represent how lackadaisical the world is about the topic. The way the vocals are sung are indicative of public opinion...it expresses that we don't really care about what's going on. That's true, and it's very clever, yes. But you're not going to get people to a) think about it long enough to understand that THAT's what you were trying to say, and b) do a damn thing about it without explicitly including the genocide hotline in your lyrics somewhere.
See, music is used very much like therapy today. Something like the Foo Fighters is basically catharsis: you yell, you scream, you throw yourself around and air-drum until you almost barf and then you kind of crash afterwards. Science says it doesn't solve problems, but it sure feels pretty fucking good. Indie, on the other hand, is kind of like real therapy: it's this long, painful, sensical solution to problems that you probably should use to help you get better in the long run. It also costs 100 bucks an hour. Here's the thing with music: it ain't therapy and I'm not paying 100 bucks for a CD. I listen to music because it FEELS good and it makes me kind of want to DO something, not because I'm looking for insight or like...permanent solutions to my problems...this is a terrible metaphor.
The fact of the matter is that indie doesn't really have the things that I personally want in music. It doesn't really have what the general population wants either, since I can't really shake my ass to it. I guess maybe some people do want to spend a little time interpreting the symbolism behind lyrics about someone getting up and shaving their beard or whatever. It sure won't be the bassist doing the shaving however. One of the things I can't fathom is how this translates into a fun live experience. I mean, you do get a whole lot, and I mean a WHOLE LOT of "Ooooh"s in the choruses of an indie song since that seems to be the only word they can fill a big vocal with. I mean, that Gotye song, "Somebody that I used to Know" or whatever? I can't understand why someone would feel the need to hear that one live since there's so little going on in it and it's not really exciting. Are you challenging yourself to see if you can stay on your feet while rather unexciting music plays for an hour? I respect indie in the ways that I've mentioned, but I really can't place what puts an indie band show on par with a show from a few decades ago...yknow, which is apparently the last time before indie that music had any integrity.
Okay so back to the rock thing. I always get nervous about rock dying, largely due to people confusing it with indie. Look at this year's Grammys. What do Foo Fighters and Mumford and Sons have in common? They were both nominated for best rock album of the year...in the same category...implying they're similar. How does that work? Especially since Chris Rock or Kanye West or whatever was probably nominated in TWO DIFFERENT categories for the SAME record. Seriously indie...if you're going to be indie, go be indie. Leave the rocking to people who aren't afraid of the distortion switch.
I really, really want to see another hard rocking band come along...kind of like the successor to Foo Fighters. If I were to make an album right now, it'd be a compendium of things that are all very true and human...stupid shit that we're all too proud to admit we care about. I really want to write an old-school MCR song about a friend deleting their facebook like it's some big tragedy. I want to write a song about how people frigging text other people whilst stiting right next to you. I won't pretend to give a shit about the big things. Instead, I'll write a song about how Pop Tarts are the greatest invention ever for a starving college student, and I'll do it in the style of someone who's climbing Mount Everest with the aid of a jetpack.
We need a good band who can rock out hard in the name of how self-absorbed and silly we are.
Of course, I have to come back in a way that's appropriate, so I'll once again be *ahem* "borrowing" a topic from Cat. I'll be using some different rhetoric, of course, since I like to try and appear...understanding of both sides. You might recall a post I did waaaaaay back about the lack of "rock stars" in this day and age. Well, this is kind of an update on that.
I've been kind of inclined to get back into music lately. I'm blaming it on my friend Wes, who invites me to be in a band of his once every few months. Once he invites....he's persistent, and I could go on and on about how I really believe in him and the things he's trying to do musically. Anyway, when he called me and asked me to be in his latest project, I asked him what type of music we'd be playing, and he used the one word I'd fear would come out of his mouth. He used it twice in fact. The word was "indie." It was kind of disappointing since I know how Wes likes punk music and bluegrass and anything that sounds good, and I was really up for being into something punky. But alas, when I heard he and his two fellow recruits a few days later, they were indeed, very very indie.
Let me preface this by saying they weren't bad musically. I was pretty impressed by their vocal togetherness and the way they were able to keep the song(s) together with tempo and everything, since personally I'm shit without a drummer. This isn't even really about them as much as it is about ideas and themes and sounds.
Earlier today, I was thinking about what a record might look like if I put one out today. I had a bit of an interview with myself, and I ended up trying really hard to contrast the "record" with indie music. I figured my record would be an amalgamation of punk, rock, alternative...whatever I felt like. It'd be about stupid shit like Facebook friends and Youtube comments and aviator glasses. It'd be raw, imperfect, and full of dirty, scratchy guitar. I'd want it to have sounds that range from Foo Fighters style hard rock to the quirky raps of Gorillaz. Apparently though, the last thing I would want it to be is indie.
The first word that came to mind was "sterile." Indie music is so so clean. The guitars are always clean, if they ever stray from being acoustic. There's not a hair out of place. The vocals try their damndest to avoid emotion. It's not dirty or punchy or action-packed. In a way though, that's brilliant. Indie is a good indicator of where we are as a race. Right now, we're a bunch of germaphobes, afraid to let our kids play outside since even the fricking sun can give them cancer, let alone the millions of invisble organisms that are floating around that we can't even see. Our food and water has to be specially processed to be considered safe. The five second rule no longer applies. On a human level, showing emotion is a sign of weakness. Indie music very much represents us right now. The emphasis here is on intelligence and cleverness, rather than the raw emotions and feelings that other music channels.
It's interesting because when you look at popular music, all of them are about dancing. Rap is so huge today because that's the thing everyone shakes their ass to. It's why dubstep and techno are so popular. What the hell was disco? Something to dance to. How about jazz and swing? How about trumpets and drums? Shit, way way back when, music was used for two things: celebrations and marches. Even rock was part of a huge dance craze...I mean, that's kind of what the Beatles were before they'd been famous long enough to get bored with the same old song and dance. See, even that cliche puts song and dance together. The curious thing is that you really can't dance to indie music...it's slow and doesn't really have a beat.
Maybe we as a people don't have a beat, and that's why indie is creeping up on us as a dominant genre. Maybe we are shedding our emotions and dirty minds for cooler heads. I mean, think about it. Indie musicians are all about their own integrity and talent. It's supposed to be them, an acoustic guitar and the truth....and maybe a guy with a beard playing bass, but that's it...and maybe a violin....and maybe a female singer with short hair...but that's it. Oh and maybe a flutist. But that's all. None of this computery, autotune bullshit...just my Mac for recording. And then what you end up with is droning vocals that barely go outside of a certain range because that'd be too risky. Trying to avoid computers, technology, and electronics ultimately and ironically makes the resulting music sound...very robotic.
That's part of the gimmick and intelligence of it though. Think about it. There's probably an indie song out there that's about genocide in Africa, and the whole thing is done in typical indie style: acoustic guitar, keys, bearded bassman, and maybe some brushes on a drum. It's sung in monotone. Dissonant? Cleverly. Why? Because the song is supposed to represent how lackadaisical the world is about the topic. The way the vocals are sung are indicative of public opinion...it expresses that we don't really care about what's going on. That's true, and it's very clever, yes. But you're not going to get people to a) think about it long enough to understand that THAT's what you were trying to say, and b) do a damn thing about it without explicitly including the genocide hotline in your lyrics somewhere.
See, music is used very much like therapy today. Something like the Foo Fighters is basically catharsis: you yell, you scream, you throw yourself around and air-drum until you almost barf and then you kind of crash afterwards. Science says it doesn't solve problems, but it sure feels pretty fucking good. Indie, on the other hand, is kind of like real therapy: it's this long, painful, sensical solution to problems that you probably should use to help you get better in the long run. It also costs 100 bucks an hour. Here's the thing with music: it ain't therapy and I'm not paying 100 bucks for a CD. I listen to music because it FEELS good and it makes me kind of want to DO something, not because I'm looking for insight or like...permanent solutions to my problems...this is a terrible metaphor.
The fact of the matter is that indie doesn't really have the things that I personally want in music. It doesn't really have what the general population wants either, since I can't really shake my ass to it. I guess maybe some people do want to spend a little time interpreting the symbolism behind lyrics about someone getting up and shaving their beard or whatever. It sure won't be the bassist doing the shaving however. One of the things I can't fathom is how this translates into a fun live experience. I mean, you do get a whole lot, and I mean a WHOLE LOT of "Ooooh"s in the choruses of an indie song since that seems to be the only word they can fill a big vocal with. I mean, that Gotye song, "Somebody that I used to Know" or whatever? I can't understand why someone would feel the need to hear that one live since there's so little going on in it and it's not really exciting. Are you challenging yourself to see if you can stay on your feet while rather unexciting music plays for an hour? I respect indie in the ways that I've mentioned, but I really can't place what puts an indie band show on par with a show from a few decades ago...yknow, which is apparently the last time before indie that music had any integrity.
Okay so back to the rock thing. I always get nervous about rock dying, largely due to people confusing it with indie. Look at this year's Grammys. What do Foo Fighters and Mumford and Sons have in common? They were both nominated for best rock album of the year...in the same category...implying they're similar. How does that work? Especially since Chris Rock or Kanye West or whatever was probably nominated in TWO DIFFERENT categories for the SAME record. Seriously indie...if you're going to be indie, go be indie. Leave the rocking to people who aren't afraid of the distortion switch.
I really, really want to see another hard rocking band come along...kind of like the successor to Foo Fighters. If I were to make an album right now, it'd be a compendium of things that are all very true and human...stupid shit that we're all too proud to admit we care about. I really want to write an old-school MCR song about a friend deleting their facebook like it's some big tragedy. I want to write a song about how people frigging text other people whilst stiting right next to you. I won't pretend to give a shit about the big things. Instead, I'll write a song about how Pop Tarts are the greatest invention ever for a starving college student, and I'll do it in the style of someone who's climbing Mount Everest with the aid of a jetpack.
We need a good band who can rock out hard in the name of how self-absorbed and silly we are.
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