Pop- und Rockmusik als professionelle Arbeit und ihre Produktionsbedingungen
[aus: »Pop. Kultur und Kritik«, Heft 19, Herbst 2021, S. 113-119]
If one was to list major tropes of pop music, effortlessness would be a contender for the top spot. Pop is considered an irresistible force, rooted in experience, hardwired in bodies, or sparked by organic intellectuals who cannot help but represent anonymous collectives. As the »folklore of industrial society« (Lawrence Levine), it supposedly grows like grass on the plains; as a literal »pop!«, it results from experiments gone right, against all expectations. ›True‹ pop is contrasted with the polished product of a culture industry that choreographs spontaneity in a giant effort to control performers, product, and audiences.
The sharp distinction between effortless pop and laboured pap has made it difficult to look more closely at working in pop, including pay and conditions, careers, professional status, social standing, and work ethic. However, an adequate understanding of pop requires insights into its making, including the paid work of specialists who create goods and services that may be experienced as pop. Performing this work means holding together creativity and industry, the cultural and the economic side of pop that the idea of effortlessness keeps apart so neatly. The following article reviews three recent studies that address this issue in the music business. To situate them in the academic debate, I begin with a glance back at research they build on.
Even though the mundane topic of labour is removed from the limelight of pop, it has been frequently studied, albeit not under the term »creative labour«, which gained prominence only in the last two decades. To begin with, popular music scholars in Britain have researched not only stars, but also musicians trying to »make it« in the industry. Sara Cohen’s ethnography »Rock Culture in Liverpool« (1991) is an early example of research that aimed at bands at the threshold of a commercial breakthrough. Anthropologist Ruth Finnegan’s influential study of »The Hidden Musicians« (1989) in Milton Keynes encompasses musicians from church choir members to dance band musicians, acknowledging that the distinction between »amateurs« and »professionals« is tenuous. Keith Negus has, in »Producing Pop« (1992) and »Music Genres and Corporate Cultures« (1999), looked more closely at record company managers, showing that these gatekeepers are heavily invested in the creative aspects of the music they promote.
In US sociology, the interest in popular musicians’ work predates the rock ‘n’ roll era. A canonical study is Howard Becker’s article on »The Professional Dance Musician and his Audience« (1951), based on field notes Becker took while working as a jazz band pianist. Becker shows how his »hip« colleagues cultivated an outsider identity to solve the occupational dilemma of having to perform service work for »square« dancers who do not value or understand music. Using drugs, talking slang, and wearing extravagant clothes, they expressed disdain for societal norms – and, when opportune, tripped up their patrons with an intricate rhythm. Becker’s concern with the identity and the informal careers of musicians was taken up by, among others, H. Stith Bennett in his book »On Becoming a Rock Musician« (1980) as well as Michael Ramirez whose study I will discuss in a moment.
When governments at the turn of the millennium identified the creative industries as the source of future wealth, scholarly interest in creative labour grew. Concomitantly, labourers in the quintessential ›gig economy‹ were often regarded harbingers of post-industrial work and thus promising examples to study precarious, entrepreneurial labour in general. This interest has resulted in a growing number of ethnographic studies on precarious creatives in different industries, a trend that is likely to continue, given the impact of the Covid pandemic on live entertainment and its workforce.
Much recent research describes creative workers as »reluctant entrepreneurs« (Lee Marshall/Jo Haynes) who pursue their artistic vision while tackling the economic demands of their unstable careers. Thus, many creative workers trade economic self-exploitation for artistic self-realisation. They work for higher rewards than ›ordinary‹ wage labourers and are prepared to tolerate lower pay and poor conditions, at least for a time. This makes creative work appear to be a particular ›calling‹, more than just a job.
Ioannis Tsioulakis’s »Musicians in Crisis« offers an ethnography of professional music-making in Athens. It is based on participant observation and interviews with 63 musicians, three quarters of them men, conducted from 2005 to 2009 and from 2010 to 2017. The title refers to the sovereign debt crisis of 2010, when the Greek government introduced drastic austerity measures that affected every aspect of social life, including music.
To describe the »practices, rhetorics and imaginaries« of professional musicians, Tsioulakis uses the distinction between »work« and »play«. Through this analytical lens, he sees that professional musicians are neither defined by skills nor certificates, but by the fact that they »work the night«. Professional musicians are instrumentalists who regularly accompany popular singers at concerts in nightclubs (»magaziá«). These performances were the primary source of income for Greek musicians, more important than record sales or session work.
The fact that »working the night« defines professionalism ties this status firmly to music that the musicians themselves regard as less valuable. Conversely, they consider performing the music they rate highly as »play«. Tsioulakis’s interviewees face the same dilemma as Becker’s dance musicians: they are rewarded for music they dislike, while ›good‹ music is disregarded by audiences as well as decision-makers in the industry. Consequently, they develop strategies that allow them to work efficiently, while dissociating themselves from the music they perform. These strategies include taking pride in being versatile and reliable. An important means to integrate the community of professionals are »war stories« (Julian Orr), i.e. personal accounts of episodes where occupational challenges, preferably caused by others, are overcome against the odds. Such stories are not just meant to show that their narrator got the job done, but also invite colleagues to share similar experiences. Professional musicians bond over pranks too, which they play on outsiders and on each other, as when the rhythm section changes the pattern to throw off the keyboarder.
One of the effects of bonding over hardship and high jinks is that women musicians are kept at the margins. As musical labour is considered »too hard« for women by those who got those ›unpleasant‹ jobs, professional musicians are commonly men. Another function of mirth and toil is to signal that one does not identify with the popular »laïkó« genre. Lastly, marking »work« as hard labour and funny business delegates creativity to the domain of »play«, where it is shielded from the compromises of labour.
The Greek Crisis affected this social world differently than Tsioulakis himself had expected. Austerity did not put an end to ›live‹ music. On the contrary, upon his return to Athens in 2010, Tsioulakis witnessed solidarity concerts and the emergence of lively micro scenes. Apparently, the crisis had hit »a trained precariat«. »Musicians are always in crisis«, as some of them told him half-jokingly, giving the book’s title a second meaning. In the face of the acute crisis, some musicians pondered whether it may even bring about positive change. One interviewee went as far as to say that »›[t]he crisis is good for me, it motivates me. The moment you put some money in my pocket, I become idle.‹«
Austerity may not have stopped the music, but it blurred the boundary between professionalism and amateurism, as Tsioulakis notes. With the money being taken out, musicians could as well play the music they preferred. Indeed, the Greek Crisis brought aesthetic changes that remind the reviewer of the 1920s, another period when music venues lost funding due to the prohibition, inflation, and the 1929 crash. Large ensembles became rare in post-2010 Greece; small, improvising groups were on the rise; concerts turned into participatory affairs. Tsioulakis avoids the trope that the most exciting culture comes out of dire circumstances. However, he interprets the »musicking« of the new scene as »a conscious rejection of austerity as a moral impetus to postpone pleasure«. Countering austerity with symbolic resistance free of charge seems problematic though, because it means that performers give out of hand any leverage (however small) they may have to receive fair pay. These musicians protest, but they do not strike. When at »work«, they cultivated an occupational habitus that resembled that of wage labourers in other male-dominated industries – minus the labour militancy.
Whereas Tsioulakis studied musicians at their workplaces, Michael Ramirez asked them about how their musical aspirations affected their life course. His primary interest is to understand how musicians negotiate common expectations of adulthood – marriage, parenthood, career – while pursuing their dream of »making it« in rock music. To this end, he has interviewed 48 musicians living in Athens, Georgia, aged between 22 and 37.
With more than two thirds of his interview partners being men, Ramirez makes gender a central topic of his investigation and finds huge differences in the trajectories of men and women musicians. Men turn to rock music at a much younger age than women; they face fewer obstacles and receive greater encouragement along the way; they find it easier to develop a musician identity. Almost all men mention early music lessons or formative musical experiences. By the time they settled in high school, they had swapped their first instrument, commonly the piano, for a rock instrument, preferably guitar or drums. Integrated in peer groups of boys, they deepened their engagement with music and found collaborators to form bands. By the time they enrolled in college, they had already years of instrumental practice and band experience.
Most of the women Ramirez spoke with had entered rock music only when they were in college, often nudged by a musician boyfriend. Men musicians were certainly aware of the gender imbalance and explained it with the fact that rock culture offered few role models for girls. Ramirez instead highlights social factors such as parents’ greater skepsis and the absence of support networks for high-school girls with an interest in rock. Stressing the importance of social relations over cultural images, Ramirez argues that the gender awareness that men musicians display does nothing to rectify the structural imbalance. He consents that rock culture has changed since the heydays of ›cock rock‹. However, while men are now openly critical of dominant masculinity and show »strategic elements of femininity«, women musicians still feel out of place: either not feminine enough or in the band as ›eye candy‹.
The indie rock world Ramirez describes is not only gendered, but also classed. The early encouragement of musical interest that rock musicians received from their families marks them as middle-class. Moreover, future rock musicians negotiated with their parents to take up a rock instrument, indicating a relationship to parental authority that is characteristic of middle-class children. Ramirez’s musicians did not have to rebel, especially when they were boys. Their parents accepted rock music as legitimate, even if they did not regard it a sensible career option. None of the interviewees seemed to have parents in the music business, which distinguishes them from musicians in the ›classical‹ genre, where hereditary careers are common. Aspiring middle-class musicians almost naturally went to college, where they could reassure their parents that they were on the path to adulthood while exploring options in the music business. College gave middle-class musicians time that working-class aspirants did not have.
Eventually, however, Ramirez’s interviewees felt that their time to explore was running out. At this point, the cohort split into three groups, depending on how far they had become involved in the music business. The »lifers« continued to pursue music as an occupation, often progressing from a performer to a producer role. In doing so, they claimed to look at music »›just like any other job‹«, not even touching the guitar when they were »off the clock«. The therapeutic function that music once had for them vanished, turning it into a stress factor instead. A second group, the »provisionals«, tried to prolong the phase in which they could keep their options open, balancing jobs with musical gigs. The »hobbyists«, finally, expressed that they felt no bitterness of not having a professional career in music. Music still played a major role in their lives, they said, in a way that allowed for other interests and gave them satisfaction that the »lifers« had given up on.
Starting out from the problem of squaring an informal career with the norms of adulthood, Ramirez arrives at a surprisingly harmonious conclusion. The initial conflict dissipates, as those who had been confronted with the suspicion of being »pseudo-adults« at the end of the book were able to »reconstruct the meaning of adulthood« by using »[t]he primary latent function of music [which] is the possibility of securing a stable, music-centered self throughout life.« As a tool to »discover who they were and delve deeper into their psyches«, music saves »lifers«, »provisionals«, and »hobbyists« alike.
Ramirez’s book does a great job showing how gender and class shape careers in rock music. His important point that these structural constraints do not disappear in informal careers is well taken. However, his trust in the power of music to transcend generational tensions and the disappointment about unfulfilled dreams seems rather too optimistic. He may have too easily bought the stories of his interviewees who, as middle-class subjects, can be expected to narrate their life as a ›Bildungsroman‹, a story of progress through lessons learned.
If Ramirez may be taking some of his interviewees’ statements unduly at face value, David Arditi does not believe a word he hears from them. He already knows that musicians are »indoctrinated« with the ideology of »getting signed«, which he sets out to expose and critique. This ideology is entangled with the American Dream and results from »capitalism«, which Arditi frequently refers to as a prime mover.
The book is divided into two parts. The first one unveils the ideology in chapters on record contracts, copyright, the music business in the digital era, and musical competitions. The second part looks at bands, the televised talent contest »The Voice«, and a musical showcase where acts pay to play as instances where musicians perform the ideology of »getting signed«. Arditi’s material stems from ethnographic observations, from interviews with stakeholders, and from his first-hand experience as a musician and drum teacher.
Unfortunately, the book is much lighter on ethnographic observations than its author’s proximity to the phenomenon may suggest. What is more, Arditi tends to be satisfied with easy answers, and the invocation of sociological concepts does little to open up the little empirical material there is for deeper analysis. In paraphrasing thinkers from Marx to Bourdieu via Durkheim, Gramsci, and Adorno, Arditi passes over theoretical distinctions and ends up with findings that often lie comfortably within the limits of common sense. The picture of record companies taking advantage of naïve musicians who single-mindedly pursue their artistic vision is not a discovery, but a cliché. Many of the issues Arditi points to have been explored more convincingly by other scholars, above all by Matt Stahl in his excellent book »Unfree Masters« (2012).
Critiquing ideology, Arditi himself expresses views that can only be called ideological. As he laments the state of the music industry, he sides with musicians with ›real‹ talent who get overlooked by A&R managers in favour of performers who record »bland music« but are (allegedly) safe bets for record companies. To illustrate this, he refers to Britanny [sic] Spears, whose success with the »blond teenage girl market« inspired competing companies to sign Jessica Simpson, »who looked the same«, and Christina Aguilera, »who looked and sounded very similar to Spears and Simpson, but with a Latin musical flare« [sic]. This treatment of Britney Spears does not only betray ›rockist‹ ideology, but also disregards a particularly relevant case for a study of what it means for musicians to »get signed«.
Contradictions in Arditi’s argument culminate in his »conclusion«, where he suddenly presents the reader with the benefits of record contracts. Now the devices with which »capitalists« exploit musicians appear to be the only way to help new music to get exposure. What is more, the very contracts that had tied musicians to the whims of companies earlier in the book now give them »the space, time, and support to work full time playing music«. And while previously the pursuit of the coveted contract had lured musicians into a dead end, those who »get signed« now acquire skills that »easily convert to jobs in the music industry«. By this point, those who had been duped by the ideology of »getting signed« have in fact good reasons to put their signature to those agreements. In consequence, the discussion shifts from ideology to institution, and a problem of Adornian proportions shrinks to the practical challenge of negotiating fair remuneration. To be sure, this still is a considerable challenge, but at least it does not require the dismantling of capitalism.
Be that as it may, the question of fair contracts is still not the point where Arditi wants to land. In yet another about-turn, he presents his »plan« to reform the music industry, which boils down to musicians becoming full-time salaried employees. While this may be an interesting thought experiment, setting it up on the last two pages of the study does not result in deep insights, let alone a roadmap for how to achieve this transformation. Again, one may be advised to read Stahl’s book or his work on film stars during the Hollywood studio era to follow this line of argument and think about creative work as ›ordinary‹ labour.
That brings me to my short conclusion and the question if working in pop is indeed more than just a job. The fact that the musicians deemed most professional are also the ones least invested in seeking self-realisation through music suggests otherwise, as does the finding that the informality of music careers does not open up jobs to a greater pool of aspirants. While certificates may mean little, gender and class distinctions are remarkably pronounced on the labour market for rock musicians. (This is probably also the case for race, which is not prominently addressed in the three books reviewed here.) However, one important difference to ›ordinary‹ wage labour seems the fact that many musicians are legally and economically invested as authors in their creations, which makes their alienation from the fruit of their labour incomplete. Another particularity may be that, while they cultivate a labourer habitus, musicians find it difficult to try and improve their economic position collectively. In none of the books, musicians’ unions or other professional associations make more than a minor appearance.
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David Arditi: »Getting Signed«. Record Contracts, Musicians, and Power in Society. Cham 2020.
Michael Ramirez: Destined for Greatness. Passions, Dreams, and Aspirations in a College Music Town. New Brunswick 2018.
Ioannis Tsioulakis: Musicians in Crisis. Working and Playing in the Greek Music Industry. London 2021.