Field Notes Part One

For our first set of field notes I decided to take a look into the internet based information and culture that surrounds "crossover" music. I started off by looking for fan sites of artists that had produced mash ups of rock and rap. I was unsuccessful in finding any concrete culture relating to the artists mash ups because they had done so much other work that was one genre or another. My search took me through many different sites and I became frustrated. I couldn't just find a Myspace page or something similar that was a bunch of fans talking about their favorite crossover artists.
After a while my mind trailed off and I turned to YouTube to subside my frustration. I decided to listen to a little of DJ Danger Mouse's The Grey Album. I liked his music and it fit in to what I was looking for field notes on. On YouTube I found a music video called "The Grey Video". It was a music video done to DJ Danger Mouse's mix on Jay-Z's song "encore".
The video starts off as if its the 1960's and the Beatles are performing live in front of thousands of screaming girls. It's the stereotypical Beatles live show in a concert hall full of Caucasian girls and a few guys yelling as loud as possible. Everyone is dressed properly and in typical 60's fashion. The Beatles begin to perform and everything seems in order until Jay-Z's voice starts rapping over the Beatles' music. Right as Jay-Z starts his first verse it shows a few of the typical 60's Caucasian girls yelling and screaming for the Beatles. Then the screen flashes to an African American girl dancing to hip-hop with a more modern and scandalous outfit. The video continues for a while flashing between the Beatles performing in the concert hall and Jay-Z performing the song on stage. After a while the beat changes and the stage changes dramatically. The lead guitarists strips away his guitar and blazer and starts dancing as if he were in a hip hop video. The other guitarist and basists disappear in a trap door and two African American women appear in their place and start dancing in a hip-hop fashion. The video concludes with this scene and the one Beatle left on stage break dancing and then making his exit by backflipping off camera. "The Grey Video" illuminated some of the vast differences in culture of the two genres, and yet the video seemed to flow extremely well, just as the song does.
After I was done watching the video, I gravitated toward the comments at the bottom of the page. The comments used a lot of foul words directed at others comments on the video. It seemed that this crossover between a modern day rapper and music legends from the 60's had a erupted a debate for the ages. Most people were in approval of the mashup and admitted to being both Jay-Z and Beatles fans. Some of the fans of the song were either a fan of one or the other. All together, it appeared that the song had brought together fans of both classic rock and modern rap. As for the other people who disliked the song they were pretty consistent with their comments. They repeatedly pointed out that the song was disgracing the Beatles' music by mixing it with rap. The supporters were quick to point out that they were stupid and knew nothing about music. No matter their arguments around the music, it seems like there is an interesting culture surrounding this type of crossover music and I'm looking forward to doing more field notes on the subject.
Here's a link to the video: The Grey Video

Delay on Fieldnotes

Sorry for the delay on our first set of fieldnotes but we are interviewing one of our main sources of information tomorrow, so in order to put together a good post we need to delay a day. Check back in a day to see the post.

Critical Review, Maira

Maira's look into the "Indian American Youth Subculture" is no doubt an ethnographic study. She starts off with an ethnographic moment in a heavily crowded club having its Bhangra Night. Her explanation of the night seems very similar to any other night at a club playing hip-hop. Maira explains that this youth subculture, created by second generation Indians, is heavily influenced by the cultures around it and takes things from american hip-hop, techno, and reggae. Another thing that Maira points out that is very interesting is the differing of cultures from different cities in the United States. While interviewing DJ Tony from Chicago Maira finds that New York Deejays perfer rap remixes to mix with and Chicago Deejays perfer hip-hop to mix with. Throughout Maira's writing it continually seems that there is a dilemma that comes along with invloving American culture aspects into their own Indian youth subculture.

Discussion Question: Do you think that by involving American Culture aspects into their own Indian youth subculture they are disrespecting their heritage?

Ethnography Project Introduction

For our project, Chris Taylor and I will be looking into the effects on culture that "combination" music has. Examples of this music are Run DMC and Aerosmith's "Walk This Way", Jay-Z and Linkin Park's album "Collision Course", and Dj Danger Mouse's "The Grey Album". We will try to examine the blurring of genre lines and look into the reactions of either culture to this type of music. We will focus mostly on the combination of the rap and rock genres in our study.

For our study of "combination" music we will interview people who identify solely with one genre or another. We will ask them questions in order to find out how they think and feel about the music, and what they think about the other genre after hearing a "combination" song. Through the study we will try to ask the question if the combination music starts its own genre or does it just join either one of the genres it came from. We will also try to ask the question is this type of combination music targeted at one of the genres rather than the both of them at the same time.

Critical Review, Hodkinson

Hodkinson's examination of the goth scene in England focuses on the translocal connections of the scene. Hodkinson talks significantly about the "open arms" type of culture the goth groups exhibit. Goths while visiting other areas in England and even out of the country will interact with and commune with the local goth group in that particular area. Hodkinson also talked about how goths seemed interested in meeting people like themselves from other areas. Later on in the chapter Hodkinson talked about how goths were related in many ways even though they were from different areas. Most notably, he talked about how they were brought together through commerce and media specifically the internet. Hodkinson concludes with the point that he wanted to make, that goths are not a bunch of individual local groups but one cohesive group in a bunch of different areas.

Discussion Question:
Hodkinson talks about how goths from different areas are accepting of eachother and quite interested in finding out about one another. Why do you think that goths are so welcoming of other goths from different areas?

Critical Review, Cohen

In her article Cohen starts off by defining and describing the pros and cons of ethnography in an anthropological sense. Shes points out that ethnography is surrounding yourself in the culture and people you are studying and getting an inside look at a group of people. But she is quick to address that it is possible to miss certain things about the culture being studied because the one writing is not a full part of the culture and may miss certain understandings that natives know by second nature. She moves on to applications of ethnography in the music world and some of her own studies. For instance, Cohen studied two rock bands out of Liverpool in attempt to grasp their way of life. Through her study she was able to focus in on the hardships of a band working together to make one finished project. I found it interesting that she pointed out the bands struggled between the musical side and the "commerce" side when making their music and not just the vision of what they thought would be great music. Cohen's article concludes describing the spread of ethnomusicology through increased documentation on the internet and also her hope that in the future the cultures surrounding music will be well documented and studied.

Discussion Question:
Is a study done by ehtnography legit, or is it a false representation of a culture because those being studied may react differently with a stranger around?