So I felt that today's lecture was fairly intriguing and that there was a lot of insight to be gained about music or at least the way we personally perceive it. When I look back on what the professor spoke to us about (ie. the misconception or overlooking of sincerity and irony in music) its pretty obvious all the signifiers and signifieds in songs back in the 60s and even those of today. Nevertheless... how easily we go without registering or paying attention to those song details and implications.
Which leads to me to asking, why?
Perhaps we take things too easily for face value?
(ie. Barry McGuire willingly recorded a traditional folk protest song [looks like a duck, must be a duck scenario])
Or is it as the professor demonstrated, we too often over generalize?
(ie. because PF Sloan was 19 when he wrote Eve of Destruction he was therefore sincere when writing the lyrics [youth = sincerety])
I am currently of the opinion that listeners are under the influence of laziness and therefore neglect the obvious sings and signals in songs.I believe that most listeners willingly concede to taking things at face value in order to avoid putting out effort. And when listeners (driven by man's innate instinct to want to categorize/make order of things) do attempt to decipher songs, it is often in a hurried manner that results in a very basic, generic categorization.
So in other words, laziness affects our perception of music?
And if that true, whose to say that this is only limited to the realm of song?
In more ways than one, I'd like to debate that perception directly correlates with laziness.
I agree with the idea that laziness affects our perception of music and maybe life in general. I want to add to this by saying that when an individual hears a song for the first time they focus on the beat, the most easily conceivable part of it. So in life people might apply that same kind of ideology when it comes to certain things. Also, i understand that the lyrics are important and they are easily accessible online now, but in the 60s it was probably harder to understand lyrics if the manner in which the singer performed it was incomprehensible or overpowered by instruments. So the audience focused on the beat and the words they could hear clearly. Also few people are going to take out time during the day to go and research the meaning behind each line of a song when they could be doing more productive things with their lives.
ReplyDelete