Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t7fkt Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-22T17:27:39.676Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

From Microphone to the Wire: Cultural change in 1970s and 1980s music writing

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 April 2019

STEPHEN GRAHAM
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

In this article I examine localized cultural change that nevertheless serves as an applied instance of broader change. Focusing mostly on British, white male musicians and music writers active in the improvised and experimental music scenes of the UK (and, to a lesser extent, United States and Europe) across the 1970s and early 1980s, I identify clear shifts in taste, attitude, and practice. These shifts arc across what Ben Piekut calls the ‘mixed avant-garde’ of the 1960s to what I describe as the ‘unpop avant-garde’ of the late 1970s and 1980s, in which influences from popular and non-Western music play more significant roles than before and liminal, quasi-popular practices such as noise are in the emergence. I trace the appearance of the unpop avant-garde through independent music publications from the period, most prominently Microphone, Musics, Collusion, Impetus, and Re/Search, using these published scene discourses as barometers of the musical atmosphere of the time.

Type
Articles
Information
Twentieth-Century Music , Volume 16 , Issue 3 , October 2019 , pp. 531 - 555
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2019 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

AMM. ‘Letter’. Collusion, 4 (Feb–April 1983), 41.Google Scholar
Anderson, Virginia. ‘1968 and the Experimental Revolution in Britain’, in Music and Protest in 1968, ed. Kutschke, Beate and Norton, Barley. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013. 171–87.Google Scholar
Ansell, Kenneth, ed. Impetus 1, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, and 10 (1976–79).Google Scholar
Ansell, Kenneth, ed. ‘Talking Heads’. Impetus 8 (1978), 331–7.Google Scholar
Ansell, Kenneth, ed. ‘Tracking On’. Impetus 10 (1979), 436–50.Google Scholar
Austin, Larry, ed. Source 4 and 10 (July 1968 and June 1971).Google Scholar
Baker, Laurie Scott. ‘Eat Your Blues’, Microphone 6 (July 1972), 2.Google Scholar
Barnett, Anthony and Riley, Peter. ‘3-part Sequence of Reviews’. Musics 11 (February 1977), 6–10.Google Scholar
Bell, Clive. ‘Bell on Barthes’. Musics 21 (March 1979), 5.Google Scholar
Bell, Clive and Hohki, Kazuko. ‘Enka: Japanese Ballads’. Collusion 2 (Feb–April 1982), 17–19.Google Scholar
Bell, Clive, Hohki, Kazuko, and Toop, David. ‘Soundscapes of Venezuela, Istanbul and Kyodo’. Musics 21 (March 1979), 21–4.Google Scholar
Beresford, Steve. Interview by author. 19 August 2016, Café in Marylebone. Private tape recording.Google Scholar
Beresford, Steve. ‘Some of My Best Friends Are Composers’. Musics 1 (April/May 1975), 16–17.Google Scholar
Bratus, Allesandro. ‘Scene through the Press: Rock Music and Underground Papers in London, 1966–73’, Twentieth-Century Music 8/2 (2011), 227–52.Google Scholar
Burwell, Paul. ‘Musics: A Hexagram’. Musics 23 (November 1979), 4.Google Scholar
Burwell, Paul. ‘Piobaireachd’. Musics 15 (December 1977), 24–5.Google Scholar
Charlton, Hannah. ‘Music in Greece’. Musics 23 (November 1979), 26.Google Scholar
Charlton, Hannah. ‘Rapidly Circling the Plaza – Hannah Charlton Documents the Legendary Improvisation Group, AMM’. Collusion 3 (June–September 1982), 28–32.Google Scholar
Clark, H. ‘Music Ecology and Human Sensibilities’. Musics 14 (October 1977), 20.Google Scholar
Cooper, Lindsay. ‘Women, Music, Feminism’. Musics 14 (October 1977), 16–19.Google Scholar
Curran, Alvin. ‘MEV, Soup and History’. Musics 23 (November 1979), 14–15.Google Scholar
Cusak, Peter. ‘More From Holland’. Musics 15 (December 1977), 28.Google Scholar
Essellier, Francoise, ed. VH101 4 (Winter 1970–71).Google Scholar
Frith, Fred. ‘New York Sounds’, Musics 23 (November 1979), 27.Google Scholar
Garratt, Sheryl. ‘Androgynous Heart-throbs – Confessions of a Teenage Bay City Rollers Fan’. Collusion 3 (June–September 1982), 14–15.Google Scholar
Gendron, Bernard. Between Montmartre and the Mudd Club: Popular Music and the Avant-Garde. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2002.Google Scholar
Graham, Stephen. Sounds of the Underground. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2016.Google Scholar
Graham, Stephen. ‘(Un)Popular Avant-Gardes: Underground Popular Music and the Avant-Garde’, in Perspectives of New Music 48/2 (2010), 5–20.Google Scholar
Harrison, Max. ‘Review: Spontaneous Music Ensemble. by Oliv I, Oliv II’. The Musical Times 110/1521 (1969), 1150.Google Scholar
Harvey, Steve. ‘ESG: Family Jewels’. Collusion 4 (Feb–April 1983), 14–15.Google Scholar
Huyssen, Andreas. After the Great Divide. London: Macmillan Press, 1986.Google Scholar
Lewis, George E. ‘Improvised Music after 1950: Afrological and Eurological Perspectives’, in The Other Side of Nowhere: Jazz, Improvisation, and Communities in Dialogue, ed. Fischlin, Daniel and Heble, Ajay. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2004 [1996], 131–62.Google Scholar
Middleton, Richard. ‘The Musical Significance of Pop’. Contact 1 (Spring 1971), 10–12.Google Scholar
Neville, Richard ed. Oz 18 (February 1969).Google Scholar
Noyes, Charles K. ‘The Use of Water in Music Creation’. Musics 11 (February 1977), 16.Google Scholar
Nyman, Michael. Experimental Music: Cage and Beyond. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 1999 [1974].Google Scholar
Parker, Evan. ‘Music in the Future’. Musics 1 (April/May 1975), 12–13.Google Scholar
Parsons, Michael. ‘Cornelius Cardew’. The Listener (November 1967), 728–9.Google Scholar
Parsons, Michael. ‘Sounds of Discovery’. The Musical Times 109/1503 (May 1968), 429–30.Google Scholar
Piekut, Ben. ‘Indeterminacy, Free Improvisation, and the Mixed Avant-Garde: Experimental Music in London, 1965–75’. Journal of the American Musicological Society 67/3 (2014), 769–824.Google Scholar
Potter, Keith and Villars, Chris. ‘Editorial’. Contact 1 (Spring 1971), 1.Google Scholar
Prévost, Eddie. ‘Letter’, Microphone 6, (July 1972), 6.Google Scholar
Quist, Jean. ‘How Cheap Can You Go’. Musics 23 (November 1979), 6.Google Scholar
Riley, Howard. ‘Improvised Music and the Establishments’. Microphone 2 (March 1972), 1–2.Google Scholar
Rowe, Keith. ‘Review of John Cage/David Tudor Concert, 22 May 1972’. Microphone 5 (July 1972), 8.Google Scholar
Russell, John. ‘Letter’. Musics 22 (June 1979), 2.Google Scholar
Savage, Jon. ‘Introduction’, RE/Search 6/7 (1983), 5–6.Google Scholar
Seven Days 2 (1971).Google Scholar
Sinker, Mark. ‘Review of Musics: A British Magazine of Improvised Music and Art 1975–79’. The Wire, November 2016, 79.Google Scholar
Taruskin, Richard. ‘Chapter 8 A Harmonious Avant-Garde?’, in Music in the Late Twentieth Century. New York: Oxford University Press. www.oxfordwesternmusic.com/view/Volume5/actrade-9780195384857-chapter-008.xml (accessed 6 March 2017).Google Scholar
Toop, David. Interview by author. 6 October 2016, email.Google Scholar
Toop, David, Beresford, Steve, Cusak, Peter and Steward, Sue, eds., Collusion 1 (August 1981).Google Scholar
Unsigned. ‘A Real Natural Sort of Occurrence – the Los Angeles Free Music Society’. Musics 11 (February 1977), 15.Google Scholar
Unsigned. ‘Collectives’, Musics 15 (December 1977), 3.Google Scholar
Unsigned. ‘Musics Meetings’. Musics 20 (December 1978), 2.Google Scholar
Unsigned. ‘MUSICS BENEFIT’, Musics 20 (December 1978), 3.Google Scholar
Unsigned. ‘SEXISM/LANGUAGE/MUSIC’. Musics 21 (March 1979), 2.Google Scholar
Vale, V. ‘FAQs’, Re/Search. www.researchpubs.com/about/faq/ (accessed 12 July 2017).Google Scholar
Vale, V. ‘Industrial Culture Handbook’. Re/Search 6/7 (1983), 2.Google Scholar
Vale, V. Interview by the author, 1 September 2016, e-mail.Google Scholar
Vale, V. ‘Monte Cazazza’. RE/Search 6/7 (1983), 68–81.Google Scholar
Vale, V. ‘Non’. RE/Search 6/7 (1983), 50–67.Google Scholar
Vale, V., ed. RE/Searchs 1 and 2 (1982).Google Scholar
Vale, V. ‘Throbbing Gristle’. RE/Search 6/7 (1983), 6–19.Various. ‘Camden Canal Project’. Musics 20 (December 1978), 15–17.Google Scholar
Vale, V. ‘Echoes’. Musics 15 (December 1977), 8–15.Google Scholar
Vale, V., ed. International Times 2 and 4 (31 October–13 November 1966 and 28 November–11 December 1966).Google Scholar
Vale, V. ‘MUSIC/CONTEXT’. Musics 20 (December 1978), 4–27.Google Scholar
Vale, V. Musique en jeus 1, 2, and 6 (November 1970, March 1971, and March 1972).Google Scholar
Vale, V. ‘Practicing’. Musics 21 (March 1979), 12–21.Google Scholar
Vale, V. ‘Records’. Musics 14 (October 1977), 23–5.Google Scholar
Vale, V. ‘Singing not the Song’. Musics 23 (November 1979), 10–11.Google Scholar
White, Noel. ‘Olivier Messiaen’. Impetus 8 (1978), 338–44.Google Scholar
Wishart, Trevor. ‘Report on York Musicians’ Collective’. Musics 23 (November 1979), 23.Google Scholar
Wood, Anthony. ‘Editorial’. The Wire 1 (Summer 1982), 2.Google Scholar
Wright, Seymour. ‘Group Learning of an Original Creative Practice: 1960s Emergent-AMM’. DPhil diss., Open University, Milton Keynes, 2013.Google Scholar