Tag: x factor

This song, picture, book could change your life

On By kepagewriterIn CultureLeave a comment

It may seem naive but I really do believe that art – and that covers music, literature, film, TV  paintings and sculpture – can change your life. Although perhaps I should explain that I really don’t mean that you see a single film (or whatever) and then you are a completely different person. I don’t believe that that really happens or if it does it is part of a process of change that has already started even if only on a subconscious level.

However, I do think that you are a product of whatever you read, listen to, watch. These are the things that help to shape how we think about the world. The things you love and the things you hate help to create your personality as much as the things that you do and say. They send a message to other people about what you think and about who you are. I really do believe that it is that important.

That’s why I find popular culture a little depressing at the moment. Reality TV. Simon Cowell’s choice of Christmas number one. It’s all so thoroughly empty. What sort of people will the current generation be, with their heads filled up with Made in Chelsea and their ears full of the aural equivalent of candyfloss. What will their world be like if this is all they expect from culture, all they think that people can achieve? A miserable world indeed.

I can still remember the first time I felt truly amazed by a piece of literature. At GCSe, I studied A Taste of Honey by Shelagh Delaney. I was blown away. I was an avid reader even then but I had never read anything that felt quite so relevant to me. The characters seemed like people you might meet. A pregnant teenager, her black boyfriend, her (probably but never directly acknowledged) gay best friend, her scarily uncaring mother. It was much more like reality than anything else I’d read or been taught.

Don’t get me wrong, I love Macbeth and Of Mice and Men which we also studied. But well written as they are, they didn’t feel relevant in the same sort of way. I have no doubt that studying A Taste of Honey started to shape my opinions about important things such as racism, sexuality and freedom. A first step on a lifelong journey.

It is also true that the current educational system is failing students in many ways. For a start, there is no imperative to even study a whole text. As long as you read the scenes that are to be tested in the exam and watch the film, there is no need to read the whole thing apparently. Except for the obvious one of enriching lives by reading a piece of literature which presumably wouldn’t have been included in the syllabus if not considered worthwhile in its entirety.

A lot of young people feel disconnected from the literature that they are made to read at school and this is perhaps understandable when often the most modern thing they read is Of Mice and Men. Perhaps its about time they were encouraged to think that literature is about more than murdered kings and war. If they read something about their lives perhaps they would understand why reading is so important.

I have changed a lot since I was that sixteen year old reading A Taste of Honey for the first time, obviously I suppose. We all grow up, get jobs, study, have relationships and so on. As important as all that is, I would be a different person sat here today if I hadn’t read A Taste of Honey and all of the great books, films, art and music that came after that. I’m grateful to them all for changing my life.

Music to get excited about…

On By kepagewriterIn CultureLeave a comment

It seems that nostalgia is everywhere today. Maybe I’m just noticing it because it fits in with my mood at the moment. Just the other night on the Review Show one of the panelists was musing about how music didn’t seem as important these days. People didn’t seem to take it seriously. I can certainly see how this might appear to be the case with the rise of such nonsense as The X Factor, The Voice and Britain’s Got Talent which makes it seem like no one is serious about proper music anymore. Never mind the bad influence of YouTube. Or the number of ‘alternative’ songs that appear on adverts these days. Having just listened to the top 40 – there is no depth to the lows I’m prepared to plummet in the name of this blog, readers – it is hard to escape the idea that there is very little variety at the moment. Some of the voices are quite interesting but the ubiquitous banging electronic backing track makes for little diversity. Even the two bands that favour guitars – Fun and Mumford and Sons – are a little dull and pedestrian. Everything just seems a little safe. It is certainly hard to imagine anyone getting excited by these tunes the way I was excited by Smells Like Teen Spirit by Nirvana or You Love Us by the Manic Street Preachers. Maybe the presenter was right.

However, it’s not as if rubbish music is a new phenomenon. Even though I love eighties music, I know there was also a lot of rubbish. This can be seen quite clearly when you look at the chart from this week in 1982 when Shakin Stevens and Bucks Fizz were no.1 and no.2 respectively. Not good. However, what is apparent is the variety. It might not all be amazing but it certainly didn’t all sound the same. For example, there was electronic in the shape of OMD, Soft Cell Human League and Japan; Metal in the form of AC/DC, Meatloaf and Foreigner; Pop music such as Altered Images, Adam and the Ants and Madness. Not to mention alternative classic, Drowning in Berlin by The Mobiles which was loitering just outside the top 10. To me, it seems unlikely that modern teenagers will be looking back on the current charts in 30 years time with such fondness as I look back on this one. Although maybe they will, as nostalgia is as much to do with memories and timing as it has to do with the actual quality of the music. Remembering being young will probably cloud their judgement just as it clouds mine. But still, what would be the stand out classics from those tunes that all seem largely the same.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not trying to suggest that good music does not exist. It certainly does. You only have to listen to the new albums by The Decemberists or Clap Your Hands Say Yeah – to name but two – to know that this is the case. Certainly in Sheffield – and most cities, I would imagine – there is a thriving music scene. Bands working hard, creating a fan base, honing their skills; a sharp contrast to the quick fix and the quicker disappearance of the X Factor generation. I certainly know which I’d rather listen to.

So is the gap between mainstream and alternative bigger than it used to be. It seems that in order to be in the charts, you have to be safe and similar. You need to guarantee sales. Hence the lack of excitement. I’m sure that people are still serious about music and there is still music to be serious about. Just not the nonsense that is in the charts.