Can you sing "Maggie's Farm" on the Grammy Awards without being completely ironic? In other words, can you say you ain't gonna work on Maggie's Farm no more while singing in Maggie's kitchen.
I can see some irony there when put into context, but the more I think of it the Grammy's are more of a life line than an oppressive force for the music industry. Just ask Arcade Fire.
I'd venture to say we could find some oppression "in" a theater/stadium named after a giant retail corporation... how about starting with aesthetic oppression.
I like this discussion... I guess the only thing to say (after having just watched the performance) is that sometimes you have to infiltrate the institutions.
you asked two different questions, but i think the irony you're commenting on has always voiced the song — sustaining both it and its author's relevance. i too, do not find the Grammy's oppressive, certainly not to a dependent 'industry,' such as the one so desperately latching itself to music. they're more of A Vacuuming Nothing whose 'farm' sustains no 'kitchen.' Dylan's observation is simply calming the dying beast . . . and better for us all to silence any further tantrum-ing, eh?
Interesting. It's fun to think of Arcade Fire in reference to 'farm' sustains no 'kitchen.'
I agree there is literal irony in singing such a song at an institution the song may rail against, but as alluded by McDan, the song is ironic anyway. "Look what we can do in here..." sort of a sentiment.
I guess it's not "oppressive" in the serious, social sense; I've just always thought of "Maggie's Farm" as a kind of "fuck you" to the traditional sense of musical critics and purists. And, I guess, in a lot of ways the way you legitimize yourself as a pure "artist" is by winning a Grammy.
So I just thought it was ironic for Dylan to be singing a song about moving beyond the industrial music machine - the farm - while standing in the middle of the field.
On a side note, I hate the Grammy Awards for a lot of reasons, but for sake of time, I'll give you a simple example. A woman wears meat dresses, arrives in a plastic egg, and they give her an award for being in some ways edgy and the zeitgeist of the current generation, as if she's some new Madonna. Her songs may be the worst thing I've ever heard in my life, and if anyone has a sense of the breadth of American music in the last hundred years they would pull that moron out of her egg shell and make her "scrub the floors"
8 comments:
i don't think the oppressive farm is the staples center
The Grammy Awards is not an oppressive force within the music industry?
Haha, that's a funny cartoon.
I can see some irony there when put into context, but the more I think of it the Grammy's are more of a life line than an oppressive force for the music industry. Just ask Arcade Fire.
I'd venture to say we could find some oppression "in" a theater/stadium named after a giant retail corporation... how about starting with aesthetic oppression.
I like this discussion... I guess the only thing to say (after having just watched the performance) is that sometimes you have to infiltrate the institutions.
you asked two different questions, but i think the irony you're commenting on has always voiced the song — sustaining both it and its author's relevance. i too, do not find the Grammy's oppressive, certainly not to a dependent 'industry,' such as the one so desperately latching itself to music. they're more of A Vacuuming Nothing whose 'farm' sustains no 'kitchen.' Dylan's observation is simply calming the dying beast . . . and better for us all to silence any further tantrum-ing, eh?
Interesting. It's fun to think of Arcade Fire in reference to 'farm' sustains no 'kitchen.'
I agree there is literal irony in singing such a song at an institution the song may rail against, but as alluded by McDan, the song is ironic anyway. "Look what we can do in here..." sort of a sentiment.
Bake - why do you find the Grammy's oppressive?
I guess it's not "oppressive" in the serious, social sense; I've just always thought of "Maggie's Farm" as a kind of "fuck you" to the traditional sense of musical critics and purists. And, I guess, in a lot of ways the way you legitimize yourself as a pure "artist" is by winning a Grammy.
So I just thought it was ironic for Dylan to be singing a song about moving beyond the industrial music machine - the farm - while standing in the middle of the field.
On a side note, I hate the Grammy Awards for a lot of reasons, but for sake of time, I'll give you a simple example. A woman wears meat dresses, arrives in a plastic egg, and they give her an award for being in some ways edgy and the zeitgeist of the current generation, as if she's some new Madonna. Her songs may be the worst thing I've ever heard in my life, and if anyone has a sense of the breadth of American music in the last hundred years they would pull that moron out of her egg shell and make her "scrub the floors"
haha, lotta quotation marks there my friend.
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