Christmas No.1: Cage Against the Machine?

John Cage was an avant-garde composer from the US who believed that every type of music, from classical to blues to pop, was of equal worth. In 1952 Cage wrote 4’33” and revelled in the controversy it created. His most famous orchestral piece, 4’33”, is a three-movement composition consisting of 273 seconds of silence.

John Cage

Up until his death in 1992 Cage vehemently defended the piece against accusations of pretentious gimmickry. At a time when there were strict boundaries between ‘proper’ music and pop music created for the masses (sound familiar?), Cage simply wanted to produce a piece of ‘music’ that showed the equality of sound. In those three movements, for Cage, everything you hear can be interpreted as music.

So, it is this ‘song’ that has been tipped to do what Killing In The Name did last year: prevent Simon Cowell from scoring another Christmas No.1 via his X-Factor ‘conveyor belt’ of performers. And with its Facebook group attracting over 53 000 members, 4’33” may well succeed.

But those who say you should buy Cage’s ‘masterpiece’ in order to stop another ‘manufactured’ song becoming Christmas No.1 are missing the point.

The ‘manufactured pop artist vs. credible musician’ debate reeks of hypocrisy, seeing as they’re probably on the same record label anyway. Unless you only listen to music made in your pub down the road, you can hardly claim to be a purveyor of ‘real’ and ‘decent’ music. Every band on a record label is a commodity there to make the record label as much money as possible. In order to be a viable resource, some acts are splashed all over the tabloids, while others are dressed up in skinny-jeans and put on the front of NME.

Any sign of credibility in a non-mainstream band is an illusion. Rather than it being a case of hoping your favourite band doesn’t supply its music to an advertisement, it’s now an inevitability.  After hearing punk-funk-Marxists Gang Of Four’s Natural’s Not In It advertising for Xbox this month, it’s pretty clear that nothing is sacred.

The almost offensive irony in having a song that deals with Marx’s theory of alienated labour advertising a computer console, with the lyrics, “The problem of leisure/What to do for pleasure/The body is good business/Sell out, maintain the interest“, probably wasn’t lost on the advertisers. It just goes to show that even the most unlikely of songs are now up for grabs to be sullied in the pursuit of maximum profit.

It doesn’t matter if it’s Wagner (the one who did Ride of the Valkyries) or Wagner (you know the one), it’s all part of the same machine. Once you accept it’s as much about the art as it is about the money, things become a lot simpler. Cage said, “Wherever we are, what we hear is mostly noise.  When we ignore it, it disturbs us.  When we listen to it, we find it fascinating”. Maybe music isn’t anything more than that.

So, you shouldn’t buy 4’33” because it is ever so smart and the X Factor is ever so vulgar. You should buy 4’33” because if you do, on the 19th of December at 18:55 on Radio 1, silence will engulf the nation and background noise will become the centrepiece. And that will be music to all our ears.

Join the Facebook group here: www.facebook.com/cageagainstthemachine

Don’t forget to buy whichever song you deem worthy of the No.1 spot before Sunday night!

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4 thoughts on “Christmas No.1: Cage Against the Machine?

  1. Pingback: | BCB Radios Music Blog - Untitled Noise

  2. avatarAdam

    I dont mind bands selling there music to advertisers. Since we dont buy it anymore we have to create a way to finance full time musicians.

    If slow club were rolling in cash from CD sales then they would look like dicks for allowing music used on toothpaste ads. But since I dout this is a case I have not problem with then licensing that music to be used in a way dout hat they might actually be paid. (go back to the interview I posted up a while back to hear them talking about it).

    Nothing is ‘sacred’ seems quite extrem. It not seem blasphemous for gods sake. Its just peoples music been used.

    Adam

  3. avatarNico Post author

    I take your point- it’s a bit sanctimonious of me to write off a band for making money in a business where it has become increasingly difficult for them to actually make any money. Fair enough for small bands to do it I guess. If I was in one I’d probably do the same (maybe…). But it’s just a shame really- for example instead of enjoying the last bit of ‘Underbelly’ on Wild Beasts’ ‘Two Dancers’, I just immediately think of that Santander advert, which takes the pleasure out of it really….

    Also, Gang of Four letting their song on an advert really put a bee in my bonnet because it goes against everything Gang of Four were originally about. In that case, it completely destroys the song.

  4. avatarAlbert

    It is indeed a true fact that the money for small time musicians these days is in live performance and syncing their music, far more so than relying on sales of recorded music. But it doesn’t necessarily have to be through advertising revenue.

    Local band Scars on 45 made a packet out of being synced in a popular US police drama a couple of years ago (the name of the show escapes me) and Wilful Missing have a tune in the next series of Waterloo Road. TV and film is a really useful way of making a living from music.

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