Pop Music and Rock Elitism

If you have listened to a rock album or two it might get easy for you to fall into the trappings of being a music snob, or a rock elitist. That’s just my own word for it, but a rock elitist is what I consider to be the epitome of douchebaggery in the realm of music appreciation. I’m not much of a music player myself but I like to pick apart music and correlate it to some cultural context or theories, any kind of music really. But rock elitists believe that pop music is just utter trash and not fit to be called music, some even refuse to listen to anything other than their preconceived bubble of rock music. These guys (or girls) are quite easy to spot, they’re the people who openly mock pop music in a social setting, rant about how good his/her favorite band is, and at some point will try and ultimately fail at their attempt of getting the electric guitar to wail. I speak of this from past experiences so yes I was one of those people. In my defense I was only an impressionable youth of 15 who had the pleasure of listening to OK Computer for the first time. By the ending notes of No Surprises I was wholly converted to the religion of Thom Yorke as I considered them to be the Third Revelation. Now as I enter my 20s I’d like to say I know better and begin to extend my hands into other genres of music.

Sooner or later these elitist will realize that 1. They are a snob and 2. Unfortunately for them rock music is also a part of the pop music tree. So how does that come to be? Well it all started with something called pop culture in which you have probably been much acquainted with. But what is pop culture exactly? Pop culture or popular culture is the all encompassing culture in which massive numbers of people or perhaps the whole world enjoys deeply. Pop culture is accessible to all, it is quite literally popular. Some cultures can only be enjoyed and practiced in a certain part of the world, but not pop culture, it is a product of human civilization in which it can be enjoyed by people around the world regardless of your geographical location or your own cultural predisposition. In a normal western society pop culture refers to products like movies, music, fashion, art, literature etcetera etcetera.

So what started it all? Like all good things pop culture is also born out of strife and struggle. The term was first coined in the 19th century when things like mass industrialization and modern capitalism were on the rise. Then the members of the working class had to move from rural townships to join urban society, but sadly they had no forms of entertainment whatsoever. They did not have the tools to understand high culture nor the access to bourgeoisie society. So they decided to create this new form of culture, which is accessible to all regardless of social status. And born out of the ashes of capitalism and class struggles came pop culture the unexpected yet pleasant child of Marxism.

So in these two paragraphs I’m going to be talking about theory, just a little bit. These theories are going to help us understand more about pop music and what they actually mean to modern society. The first one is Theodor Adorno’s Culture Industry and the second one is less of a theory but more of an idea by G.W.F Hegel, that idea is Zeitgeist. Although a bit contradictive in the value in which I’m trying to convey, Adorno’s explanation of culture industry provides quite a solid base in trying to explain pop music in general. First introduced by Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer who are sociologists from the Frankfurt School of Thoughts. In their essay “The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception” they discuss how products of culture are commodified, manufactured, and mass produced as a means of sedating society. They believe that the consumption of pop culture that is served by mass media renders people docile, that they are only servants to their base instincts because of pop culture’s tendency to grant instant gratification. Adorno and Horkheimer claims that pop culture is a form of mass produced culture that is reserved for the mindless in a capitalist supply driven society. They also claim that pop culture in their forms are inferior to high culture which stimulates intellectual pleasures and are technically more difficult to execute properly. The main idea that Adorno proposes is of a capitalized industry that churns out culture in their many forms to modern society.

While I will use the idea of an industry and manufacturing line of culture in this case music. I do not agree however with the idea that pop culture is inferior to high culture, I won’t go into details about deconstructing this idea but as someone who delves into both realms of culture I believe that the two stimulates a different kind of experience that is not necessarily inferior to each other. Next is the idea of cultural zeitgeist by Hegel, zeitgeist literally meaning spirit of the time in German, is a phrase that is usually used to describe the ideals and beliefs which dominate society in a particular period of time. According to Hegel art is always inextricably linked to the cultural zeitgeist at the time. Whether the creation of art is motivated by the zeitgeist itself or the products of art created are the representations or that which creates the zeitgeist. Think Woodstock and flower power in the 60s or Jazz in the roaring 20s as examples.

Viewing the pop music industry in Adorno’s perspective brings out that yes music is a product of culture and also that music is being mass produced in such large numbers by a capitalist industry. We can see these industries as major record labels such as RCA or EMI and even before the time of commercial music there are places which produce music at a high level of quantity such as Motown or Laurel Canyon. Rock being one of the genre offered as a product of music makes it one part of the pop music scene. So congratulations you snobs just shat on yourself a whole lot by talking trash about pop music. But different from Adorno we’ll talk about how pop music as a whole has contributed to our society in ways that is definitely not inferior from high culture. Because of its accessible nature pop music created a music scene where it is highly enjoyable for everyone around the world. The influences and cultures that are shaped by pop music is astounding actually, how from one branch of music can come a multitude of genres that pay homages to their founding fathers. Take blues for example, the famous grandfather of rock itself. Specifically delta blues where Robert Johnson originated from, his guitar techniques and sounds that he create spawned rock music, metal and whole lot of other genres. All from just a man who played his guitar hopping from one bar to the other, although supposedly he got those techniques from the devil himself after standing in the middle of a crossroads at night.

Pop music has shaped society in the 20th century and it’s no strange thing that it has become one of the most revered aspects of modern lifestyle. Much of the backlash that comes toward modern pop music is directed by boomers, gen X ers, and some edgy gen Z’s in Youtube comment sections saying “I’m 12 and I listen to Led Zeppelin”. My observations is that these boomers and gen X ers who say that kids today don’t know what music is like or music nowadays is trash and real music should sound like blablabla. All that actually came from their own frame of references, because of what they’re listening to at that age was predominantly rock then their conception of what music should sound like is the rock sound. But we have already established that rock music is part of pop music so then what they are listening to then is essentially just pop music in general. Even the early days of The Beatles were absolutely bubblegum pop boy band music in songs like “I wanna hold your hand” or “All my loving”. When they have started to venture out and mature conceptually then they started to create more experimental records that serve as a basis for modern rock music.

What I want to discuss mainly is how pop music perfectly captures the cultural zeitgeist throughout the 20th century and how it encapsulates experiences lived by generations. I have already explained about Hegel’s zeitgeist and it includes social realities like political states, social movements, and the overall social dynamics that the 20th century has bore witness to. From the sexually charged 1950s which saw baby booms from across the world after the finish of World War II. The 50s introduced the world to popular rock music from artists such as Buddy Holly, Little Richard, Sam Cooke, and of course the king himself Elvis Presley. The 50s saw a polarized society caused by Elvis and his moves, older generations believe that his dances were so vulgar and sexual that they should not be shown on TV. The 50s was a time of changing values and political shifts from a largely conservative and religious society, to a more secular liberal population. The 1950s was also host to the rise of gospel, soul and black culture as they started to break free from the grasps of segregation. A rise that was pioneered by musicians such as Aretha Franklin, Nina Simone, Ray Charles and while he is not a musician but played a big role in modern black culture, that is Mr Martin Luther King Jr.

By the 1960s the cold war was in full swing, President Kennedy was assassinated, the US went to war in Vietnam, and England had started to produce their brand of pop music. The 1960s were the golden age of rock, where everyone thought it was the best thing since Jesus, out came The Beatles and their age of Beatlemania, The Rolling Stones who were rebels who liked to dance, Led Zeppelin and their myths and legends, and The Who who were pioneers of mod culture in the UK. Out in the US things were also starting to pick up, from the psychedelic rage of Jimi Hendrix, doomsday activism of Bob Dylan, The Doors with their Californian holy land mystique, and the middle class nuclear family aesthetic of The Beach Boys. There came woodstock and hippie movements and anti war sentiments all fueled by music, drugs, and beat poetry. The generation wide scream of change coming yet again from music.

The 70s came disco, tights and Saturday Night Fever, came David Bowie with his take on creative freedom and personas, and punk is starting to bare its fangs. Born from anti-establishment sentiments and anarchy came punk in its purest form by The Clash, Sex Pistols and Sid Vicious, Ramones and all other that spawned a movement and punk sub culture. Music groups from other countries also broke through the international markets in the 70s, groups like ABBA from Sweden. The music captured a period of feel goods and creative leaps in all industries.

Every decade in the 20th century has their own moods and trends which are captured and taken into forms of entertainment by popular music. Whether it’s the technological boom of 80s synthwave, indie aesthetics rising from the remnants of post punk, the 90s Seattle grunge scene that captured the bleak outlook of Gen X, or Britpop arena music out in England. But where does that leave the 2000s the 2010s? What is the cultural zeitgeist captured through pop music in our day and age? A lot in fact, the post 9/11 paranoia captured through music carrying political messages, the R&B boom led by Beyonce, sub-urban teenage soap opera through the rise of pop punk, and the rise of Kanye West as he revolutionized hip-hop. Naming just a few trends that have risen in the 2000s that gave the new millenium its character. The angsty, anxious, and digital transition 2000s. While the 2010s was a weird period of time as people started to do everything with the internet, Radiohead and their future anxieties are proven right, People watch and enjoyed concerts through phone screens, and industry pop superstars came and went. The 2010s were also host to the Korean wave, the rising K-pop phenomenon which held the attention of the whole world.

So after reading this and you still decide to be a music snob then by all means go ahead. But know that listening specifically to a genre just because you hate all the others or think that others does not deserve to be called music is elitist and you should be ashamed. On this note I say that music and all other forms of art are an extension of human culture and we should take notice to its patterns and all its connections to others, art or music are means of expressing oneself the media is just the tools used by the artist to convey their messages. These individual stories created by artist in turn create the mood, the reality in which social life is hosted so it’s not so strange that everything is influenced by each other really. And now at the end of this essay I shall urge you to listen to Frank Ocean right now because he is the truth as said by Beyonce