Song Interpretation in 21st-Century Pop Music

Appen, Ralf von; Doehring, André; Moore, Allan F.

doi:10.4324/9781315609881

Cited by 12 publications

(15 citation statements)

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“…The scope of popular music analysis has clearly expanded beyond its traditional focus, which used to be primarily the sounds of (classic and progressive) rock music and the Beatles, but ‘analyses of top 40 pop, hip-hop or electronic dance music […] are still hard to find’, as von Appen et al . note (2015a, p. 2; see also de Clercq 2020). In recent collections of popular music analysis, they also play a rather subordinate role (e.g.…”

Section: Mapping the Fieldmentioning

confidence: 96%

“…A broader production-focussed perspective is provided by Simon Zagorski-Thomas, whose musical analysis of Kings of Leon's 2008 international hit ‘Sex on Fire’ discusses how the production techniques foster specific perceptions of narrative structure, gestural activity and participants’ interaction (2015). In the same edited volume in which Zagorski-Thomas’ text was published, one can also find a rather experimental text from Ralf von Appen, who fictionally renarrates, ‘as a fly on the wall’ (2015, p. 46), how Ke$ha's ‘Tik Tok’ (2010) came into being and subsequently reflects on how the song fulfils functions such as, for instance, to ‘hijack listeners from their daily routines’, ‘positively influence the listeners’ mood’ and ‘reflect current developments in society’ (pp. 47–8) 19…”

Section: Mapping the Fieldmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…37–8; von Appen et al . 2015a, p. 1). It is somewhat remarkable, though, that in recent analyses particularly of mainstream popular music, some scholars take their personal aversions as a starting point for song examinations (of course, without making general value judgements; Helms 2015; Doehring 2015; von Appen 2017).…”

Section: Mapping the Fieldmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…After all, referring to the argument at the very beginning of this section, a listener-aware understanding of mainstream popular music's sounds might already be enhanced by a shared approach challenging scholars’ individual readings, for example, in the form of the group analysis method proposed by von Appen et al . (2015b, pp. 3–6 and pp.…”

Section: Mapping the Fieldmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Mainstream popular music research: a musical update

Steinbrecher

2021

Pop. Mus.

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This article reviews studies that examine internationally circulating music which has reached the upper echelon of all-genre single charts in the 21st century. The examinations will be used as examples for the analysis of sonic aesthetics that are embedded in a particular frame of cultural debate, which the article conceptualises as ‘mainstream popular music’. The research field is then mapped and discussed with regard to prevailing objectives, methods and findings, including elaborations on how future research might advance understanding of the aesthetics within the discourses of mainstream popular music and, thus, of contemporary culture at large. The literature review focuses on music- and listener-based analytical directions and critically reflects on the frequent absence of theoretically well-founded and empirically underpinned, context-sensitive music examinations, particularly with regard to quantitative and audience research. The concluding section calls for a more integrated perspective on mainstream popular music as a discourse and praxis formation.

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Section: Mapping the Fieldmentioning

confidence: 96%

Section: Mapping the Fieldmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Mapping the Fieldmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Mapping the Fieldmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Mainstream popular music research: a musical update

Steinbrecher

2021

Pop. Mus.

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“…Aside from identity politics, invoking the term Riot Grrrl politically counteracts what Danishta and Alex refer to as the “hyper‐machoism” of the heterosexual male‐driven genre of Reggaetón. The roots of Reggaetón are in various Latin American and Caribbean musics, especially in a soca rhythm known as “dembow” (von Appen, Doehring, & Moore, ), which strongly accentuates the offbeat in a four beat measure. Scholars have referred to it as the first truly transnational music given its status as a popular music with no discernable place or national setting of origin (Rivera, Marshall, & Hernandez, ).…”

Section: Genre Discourse In the Bay Area Undergroundmentioning

confidence: 99%

Commercial suicide: Negotiating genre in the San Francisco Bay Area underground

Skelchy

2017

Journal of Popular Music Studies

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Music genres shape our choices in consuming music. From shopping at record stores to downloading mp3's from internet sites, genres enable consumers to locate and select from artists with shared characteristics and commonalities. Genres also come with a series of boundaries, codes and expectations often constructed by communities of musicians and fans as well as the music industry and its mechanisms of marketing and distribution. As fixed as music genres appear to be, they are in practice quite fluid and dynamic. This is especially true for artists working outside of the industry structure—musicians responsible for creating music that is decidedly anti‐genre. This article focuses on unsigned artists from San Francisco Bay Area Noise and experimental rock scenes as case studies to explore how musicians contest genre boundaries aesthetically and in social and physical space in order to create identities outside of established genre conventions.

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The ‘System of National Cooperation’ hit factory: the aesthetic of Hungarian government-commissioned songs between 2010 and 2020

Barna¹,

Patakfalvi-Czirják²

2022

Pop. Mus.

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This article addresses the relationship between popular music and populism through three government-commissioned songs, produced for occasions of national remembering during the post-2010 Orbán regime in Hungary, namely ‘Barackfa’ (2013), ‘Egy szabad országért’ (2016) and ‘Hazám, hazám’ (2020). All three songs are one-off collaborations of artists representing various music genres. We ask, firstly, what aesthetic forms make these songs potentially suitable for the performance of national unity, solidarity and the ‘people’, and secondly, how the songs’ structure, production and dissemination can be interpreted as attempts by government commissioners and creators to gain popularity. Drawing on Ostiguy's performative approach to populism, combined with the notion of collective speculation and musical affordances, we identify three main strategies of constructing the ‘people’ in the songs: singing together as sound, legacy and practice; the pop ‘mega-event’; and the use of the folk music aesthetic as ‘mother tongue’.

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Song Interpretation in 21st-Century Pop Music

Cited by 12 publications

References 0 publications

Mainstream popular music research: a musical update

Mainstream popular music research: a musical update

Commercial suicide: Negotiating genre in the San Francisco Bay Area underground

The ‘System of National Cooperation’ hit factory: the aesthetic of Hungarian government-commissioned songs between 2010 and 2020

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