Bad taste in the information age

My parents had little interest in books, movies or music. They would go to a show or a movie once in a blue moon. While my dad was a great storyteller, his interest in other people's narratives was very limited. For him, the best things to do for fun were to fish, go to a simcha (Jewish wedding or Bar Mitzvah) to dance and eat, or watch Mutual of Omaha's Wild Animal Kingdom, and exclaim every once in a while to no one in particular, "Look. Just like human beings!"

My mom wasn't a soap opera watcher. She was very much in this world. Although I do note that I was named after Stewart Granger, the B-grade British movie actor, so at one time in her life movies must have been important. But she did have one weakness to her dying day. It was Barbara Streisand.

When she was dying with cancer, I picked up a video of Barbara Streisand in concert for her. It was the first and only video she ever owned. I can't say how many times she watched it. But she loved that thing.

For me, Barbara Streisand is awful. She has so much vocal talent but she uses it for naught. She oversings. Every note is an emotional landmine. It's like a soap opera brought to music. She has all of the subtlety of a nuclear blast. But for my mom and god knows how many millions of others, she is a singing icon. They don't want subtlety. They connect with every long held note. It's emotionally satisfying to them.

Bad taste is not unique to this age. I was reading about Sarah Bernhardt in the paper today, and she too mined histrionics into a world-wide career. But maybe that's a bad example. Freud loved her performing. So did DH Lawrence. Maybe being over the top was a sign of artistry back then. Who knows?

But it sure isn't a sign of artistry now. It's a sign of being obvious, of resorting to cheap tricks.

While bad taste isn't unique to this age, there is something unique about the role that bad taste plays in society today. In the information age, knowledge of popular culture has been transformed into something that isn't just an entertainment. It's part of everyday conversation. And knowledge of popular figures in entertainment is a kind of consumer product. So we get bombarded with news yesterday of Jennifer Aniston and Vince Vaughn - two people I barely have seen perform - being pulled over on a highway and passing a sobriety test. Being pulled over by a cop. Nothing happened. And this is news.

Awareness of popular culture is something that is almost necessary today to be desirable to others. It's a sign of being with it. If you don't have a fancy house or a fancy car, and very few young people do, information and awareness of pop culture is a surrogate for material wealth. It's a sign of sexual desirability. We've turned bad taste into an almost necessary accessory to be attractive. It's not just entertainment anymore or pure escapism. It's a path to getting that girl or guy.

For my mom, watching Barbara Streisand was an emotional experience. She loved her oversinging. She loved the fact that she was Jewish. She loved the whole package. But for many others who would gladly pay a few hundred bucks to see Barabara Steisand in Vegas, it's probably more about the cultural phenomenon. Being in the front row of a concert like that and being able to talk about it after is like having a Mercedes or a house in the Hamptons. It's a symbol of success and a way of feeling desirable. My mom, god bless her soul, wouldn't have paid three figures in Vegas to see Streisand. She was perfectly happy to have that video. Now, if the tickets were 20 bucks, and she could find a cheap hotel and flight to Vegas, it would be a different story.

Selling sounds, Part I

Last week I went to the symphony. And while I was listening to Shostakovich, I leaned forward a bit. The guy in back of me immediately told me to sit back. I was blocking his view. And after the piece, he started to discussing the music with his wife, and I overheard them. I had been listening with some level of concentration, but he had been listening with a focus I haven't had since my twenties.

Certain kinds of music reward the focused listener. I didn't much care for that Shostakovich piece, but intellectually there was some meat there.

You can't say that about pop music. It's designed to be meatless, and is all about mood and texture. If you start to analyze and break it down, it just doesn't hold up. Even the best of it, which can reward repeated listening, just doesn't hold up. Like all of pop culture, it's about immediate consumption, something sweet on the tongue. Bestseller books. Blockbuster movies. And all of TV. If you are someone who likes to linger and examine, it's just not possible to get excited about narratives - musical or otherwise - that are so thin and predictable. So for me, there is nothing of value in pop culture in and of itself. But it is... popular... and you need something to talk about with people. So I do find myself reading a bit on Yahoo about the travails of pop icons I don't even know just so I can be somewhat aware and conversant.

And every once in a while something with meat becomes popular. Why and how I don't know. But it does happen. Dylan in his early music. Doctorow in Ragtime. They have a magical ability to be accessible and meaty at the same time. But hardly anyone has that kind of eye of the needle talent, and no one can seem to hold onto it for very long. So popular narratives are usually trashy, obvious and predictable.

For someone who is such a snob, I do however, find an exception to some pop music. I listen to it. I write it. Ever since I disovered the blues as a 12 year old, there is something about the raw emotions of some pop music that appeals. When I saw Howlin' Wolf for the first time as a 13 year old, I was in awe. He was such a commanding presence. There's power in simplicity, in simple rhythms, and raw feeling. And he had that and more.

Most pop music doesn't aspire to be so visceral. Today, the closest you can come to that is rap, but in a short span of about 10 years, rap degraded into simply a phony veneration of gangster culture. Rock degraded as well in short order from its 1970s forays into art into a phony veneration of anger, sex, and bad hair. So it goes with all music. I'm sure there is something brewing musically that I don't know about that is temporarily doing more than just providing escape.

Pop music fulfills predominately a fantasy role. It's about performers with a lot of sex appeal, singing about wish fulfillment on the part of their fans. Elvis played the same role. Mick Jagger amazingly still does. That's not an aspect of pop music that interests me except as a sociological thing. For me to invest my heart, it has to be real as they say. And neither Elvis, Mick or the many performers of today, Cold Play, Gwen Stefani, you name them, are genuine.

There are economic implications for selling cheesy music, however. And maybe I'll get to that point tomorrow.