Our Culture is Missing Something

Never has an album continuously made my spine tingle like Arcade Fire’s, “Funeral.” Maybe it’s the nostalgia derived from the individual songs that gets me. Maybe it’s lead singer/songwriter, Win Butler’s subtle, yet perfectly arranged lyrics that give way to encompassing feelings I didn’t even know there were words for.

There are too many aspects of this album that give it permission to be labeled one of the all time greats of the 2000s to quantify. Arcade Fire somehow successfully combines electronic, disco and folk influences within one album to arrive at one beautifully composed record that continuously touches on the theme of an unspecified neighborhood and the value of personal reflection.

The album acts as social commentary, poking at our culture’s inability to take advantage of what lies right in front of us. What the icons of our day are missing is the ability to sell an idea without having to be so blatant about it. Popular music has become an art (or lack thereof) for entertainers who don’t aim to explore their own emotions beyond what’s right on the surface. Where pop-music acts a way for artists to put their feelings, however shallow they may be, out there, Arcade Fire turns the tables and puts the listeners own personal insight on the front burner.

The depth of the album’s impact is measured by how much the audience is able to take away from what they’ve heard. The most widely known Arcade Fire song, “Rebellion (Lies),” featured in the television show “Six Feet Under” and Bono’s “Project Red” campaign, poses the idea that ignorance, especially on a personal-insight level is unconsciously saying that you’re done trying to grow into a better person.

“Sleeping in is giving in, no matter what the time is, sleeping in is giving in, so lift those heavy eyelids.” The song engages the idea that people attempt to relocate their obstacles to an out-of-mind place, and in turn inadvertently asks the audience to determine what the potential future holds when living so independently from personal responsibilities.

“People try and hide the night underneath the covers, people try and hide the light underneath the covers.” The goal through the song “Rebellion (Lies) doesn’t seem to be to push the audience towards any particular action or goal, but rather towards their own personal realizations and recognition of who they really are.

Even when Arcade Fire turns their focus towards personal realizations and discovery, the album doesn’t switch gears towards melancholy. Butler lives inside of his emotions. Through the lyrics the audience becomes mindful that his own desperation isn’t fleeting. The prevalent theme of the song, “Crown of Love” is knowledge of self, even in the most desperate times. The honesty that’s derived from his personal insights gives tangibility to heartache without having to be expressed in Layman’s terms.

“They say it fades if you let it. Love was made to forget it. I carved your name across my eyelids, you prayed for rain, I prayed for blindness.” Beyond being perfectly phrased to give insight into love-induced desperation, it’s also simply eloquent.

Honest emotion isn’t something most people are seeking when they flip on the radio. As a culture, the prevalence of emotion in music may be accepted with a bit of cynicism amongst newcomers to this cathartic type of music. Where the term, “emo” used to derive meaning from emotionally charged content, it turned towards encompassing whiny, adolescent, ready-made music. The idea of sitting through an entire album that subtly begs it’s audience to look inward without coming off as borderline manic depressive is a mere pipe-dream for the pop-icon martyrs of our day. Arcade Fire almost effortlessly entangles their music with emotion, but avoids coming off overly dramatic.

 

Mind Control

There’s a huge gap between what constitutes art vs. entertainment. They really don’t even go hand-in-hand anymore.  Artistry is derived from creativity and a thorough understanding surrounding the usage of a particular medium. Art has the capabilities of transcending generations by inciting change or introducing a new style or idea created through personal revelations and experience.

Many aspects of pop culture seem to parallel the parameters of art. So well actually, that our culture, for the most part, thinks they encompass the same things. Pop music closely resembles legitimate art, but only by carefully picking apart the aspects of influential art, then utilizing the parts that seem to garner the highest monetary response in the consumers. What comes is music that incorporates some artistic qualities, but in turn completely loses its own creativity.

Producers of popular music follow trends. They find out what incites consumers to buy, and then they apply their findings to creating an album that will potentially sell millions. They find borderline (at best) talented potential pop icons then alter their personas to create an ideal image. Uglies and fatties need not apply. They then are paired with repetitious music that takes some of the qualities of actual artistically inclined music, but they alter those qualities beyond recognition to serve the purpose of selling more albums.

So now, that catchy, fast paced drum beat that say, Radiohead concocted, is now used throughout the entirety of a whole pop-album. It was proven that particular beat stuck in the minds of those who listened to it. So now they’ve not only taken a major original contribution to music and basterdized it by straining and hoarding the catchiest parts, but in turn have also completely lost any residual clout by voiding their own music of any originality.

On the surface this garbage is entertaining. When it gets stuck in the collective heads of an entire audience, it becomes familiar. When something is familiar, the audience is more likely to gravitate towards it. The multi-billion dollar industries that make and promote pop-music are not ignorant to this, they pioneered it. And they’re selling it and making billions. And we’re buying it.

Our culture participates in passive listening. Often times we can’t admit that this music does make a significant impact on us because we aren’t consciously aware of it. These songs sung by “the beautiful people” make the audience question their own physical appearances because they don’t match up with what they see on TV. These songs also tend towards sub-human levels of intelligence. How many songs can possibly be produced revolving around hittin’ the clubs or teenage quazi-love songs? These prevalent themes reiterate to their audience that these things hold actual importance, which they absolutely do not.

How many pop songs are devoted to say, expressing the satisfaction of hard work or pushing listeners towards personal mental expansion? Not many.