Fashion Is Danger

Too funny/relevant to ignore.
Bret and Jemaine channel Bowie, Duran Duran, Peter Gabriel, and much of the SynthPop scene.

It's a well-captured satire of the substance of fashion and the 'cool factor' of rock musicians.

Methinks my friend, Liam, of the West-based band Calico, will concur.

Also, to read a previous piece I wrote over a year ago on the 'text' of the scene and scensters, check this out. Tip of the hat to Liam for his continued discursive presence.

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Making it Out of the Conventional Scene

Awhile back I contributed a blog on the meaning of the word 'scene.' I was prompted to do so after frequent discussions with Liam on the subject. Checking out the scene or being in the scene reveals much not just about what goes on around artists but also how they concretely influence their physical environment.
Just what is it about artists wanting to reconvene in a setting with other artists? Most artists tend to say that it's the creative energy among other creatives that encourages them to work more on their respective craft.
So, the scene ends up determining much in the life of an artist. It makes an impact on where one chooses to live, which places to frequent locally, which businesses to support and so forth. The scene comes with a healthy dollar sign attached to it and, let's face it, when the bottom dollar makes an appearance, things have more than just an abstract meaning.
However, when the 'scene' gets bigger than the art it is supposed to support, it becomes problematic and nothing more than a hub of narcissism and self-sabotage. The scene should help inspire the artist to not take over the creative life of one, supposedly. And it is regarding this very idea that I truly enjoyed this most interesting piece today. It's an interview from the AV Club (AVC) with Jack White (JW) and Brendan Bensen (BB) of The Raconteurs. The Raconteurs' Myspace page is here.
Here are some gripping bits from the interview:

JW: I'm extremely anti-hipster now, and I really hate the thought of it, being surrounding by them, and Nashville definitely is not in that neighborhood of their relation to music. In Nashville, those people want to sell songs, and they want to make hit records, and I don't see anything wrong with that. I'm so tired of playing the cool game with all those people, and just trying to go and have lunch and having to play that cool game with everybody, about what you're supposed to do, what's cool and what's not.... It's not healthy to write music that way, and I'd rather be in a town where they want to write hits.

BB: That's just not a nurturing environment. As an artist, I think it's really important to surround yourself with other artists—

JW: In Nashville, self-sabotage is not on the menu, and in hipster culture, self-sabotage is definitely one of the entrées.

JL: And that stuff is a virus, too—it's easy to hate something.

AVC: Did the adverse recording conditions affect Broken Boy Soldiers?

BB: Very much.

JW: Every album I've done pretty much has been not in a pleasant, quote-unquote, environment—it's freezing cold, or it was somebody's house with not-that-great equipment. It's always something that spurs on to get the job done. At ToeRag, we did Elephant—you couldn't even stand up, and it was freezing cold. And this one, blistering hot. We had to turn the fans off between takes to record. [Laughs.]

BB: There's something about working in adverse conditions. It keeps it interesting. I always notice if I ever sit down with a pen and piece of paper and a guitar, and I have a beverage and an ashtray and I'm comfortable on the couch, I fall asleep.

What Is the Scene?

On New Year's Eve I asked my musician friend Liam, who plays with the West-based band Calico, to explain to me how he understands the term 'scene.' Liam is one of the regular Gesprächsparter who provides me with much helpful musical and cultural information. He often says things like, 'it's the scene, you know?' or 'it's in the scene,' 'I know her/him from the scene, and so forth.'

Other young professional friends of mine employ the same term when they discuss their respective job markets, their decisions regarding moving to certain urban areas, and so forth.

Many of them morph statements like, 'The scene is quite good there, so I'm considering the job.' 'Ah, yes, and I year the scene's something else there, so will have to check it out.' 'So, how's the scene there?'

Like other folk out there, I am of the general belief that where the artists gather comfortably, there I would want to be also.

The scene seems to reveal much about the urban setting itself.

Richard Florida has much work on the concept of the city and what urban development says about the quality of life. He has also written on the 'scene' and what the 'creative class' has in mind when talking about the scene. He is of the opinion that geographic place is of primary importance and that it is one of the factors that determines how happy a person can actually be. He ventures as much as to say that ultimately picking a scene is as important as picking a partner/spouse and career.

So, just why does the 'scene' matter? Because if one is especially in the creative business, one needs constant stimulation from other fellow creatives. A place that welcomes and supports creatives tends to be a more tolerant, boundary-shattering type of place, and most artists tend to flock to areas where they are promoted and seen as important commodities in the immediate culture.

It makes sense to me why my lawyer, medical doctor, engineer, musician friends first investigate the scene of a place before deciding to join said place. And while technology and WiFi enables us much by bringing it closer virtually, geographic proximity is of the utmost importance. There is no price for real artistic support engendered by the community in which one lives.

This is what my musician friend, Liam of Calico, observed re: the question of what the scene is.

'The scene as it exists everywhere i know of contains its own
fragments of sub-scenes, if you will. Within the music scene there's
the various genres and sub-genres. I've even heard us referred to as
a "third south" band more than once. Naturally that geographic label
means more than just our locale of practice space, many of our
residences and oft-played venues, but it seems that third south as a
whole has created its own identity in the last year.'