The City Veins

Before I start back in on Bayes, I’d like to make an allusion to an issue now existing outside of these pages that currently only band members will understand, but will be explicated later: that this argument has now become the manifestation of differences of opinion not limited to music, primarily relating to how each of us as individuals relates to the world and deals with confrontation. I understand this is vague, but that is intentional.

Bayes has good points. If he didn’t, there wouldn’t be any debate: I would just throw up an Omicron and yell “In your face”, assuming that would speak for itself. But that’s not the case, and the fight must rage on.

So, a few matters of historical accuracy:

(I don’t feel like citing, so ask if you want the reference. I am not being coy, I actually value evidence)

1. New Kids on the Block are not generally considered the first “Boy Band”. It is argued by many that The Beatles were the first Boy Band. And if it’s not them, it’s the Monkees, or the Temptations, the Sex Pistols, or countless others.

2. When I say value, I mean value that can be created objectively and agreed upon using criteria that cuts across genres. Thus, when Bayes says “there are bands that I value” this is not what I am referring to. Furthermore, the fact that he categorically denies the value of Rap, Hip-Hop, and R & B demonstrates that this objective process is not occurring.

3. Bayes still struggles with the difference between value and preference.

“I then asked myself the question, why should I like something just because it was the first even if it’s not really better? I am gonna get a lot of slack for this, but I think Ryan Adams is better than Neil Young.”

Bayes is correct; one should not like something more because it came first. However, if it also meets an additional set of criteria, you should think it’s better.

4. I reject Bayes’ reference to Cultured Capital because it represents his interpretation of my lyrics and not their intended meaning. I was mad that a bunch of carpet-baggers were grouping me in the “Bridge and Tunnel Crowd” when I had lived in this area my whole life (with 2 years exception). I was not saying they were wrong for applying value (capital) to cultural processes, just that their application was misguided and that basing value on the proximity to which one lives to black people to be racist, not a celebration of diversity. I cannot figure out how this is equitable to our debate or how I should take my own advice.

5. Bayes’ view means that the innovator will always be valued less than the modern incarnation. The nature of progress is that every artist must either imitate or build upon what occurred beforehand. Again, as I’ve stated before, you cannot isolate a work from it’s historical context. Yes, modern Cooperstone Tires are better than those little play-wheels from colonial Williamsburg, as they were also better than the Firestone tires my grandfather made in the 1950’s. But the advances in tire technology over the last 50 years haven’t changed the technological landscape in the way that the first wheel did. And it’s not always simply the first that is greatest, there are innovators past and present. Music is even more subjected to innovations across the landscape of time because it does not exist on one linear plane. There are many paradigms and shifts of convention. Bayes will grant that the Beatles are of primary import, but that’s because that opinion is so pervasive throughout society he cannot afford to reject it (Charles and I actually wonder whether the modern decomposition of the Album format will change how we think about the Beatles) less he alienate the reader. After that, value simply becomes a question of who is most recent.

I guess, actually, very few of those points are historical in nature.

As a final note, I am loving this debate. Part of that is because I think I am unquestionably in the right (which of course may not be true), and part of it is because this continues as an extension of a debate I had in my aesthetics class in undergraduate school. Coincidentally, I also assumed I was unquestionably right in that debate as well, though in hindsight I think I blew it. This gives me the opportunity to make amends. Regardless of what others think, I’m sure I will eventually assume success on this point as well; it seems to be a pattern.