Influencing Others through Music

"Can we please turn that off?" said my father-in-law one Christmas as I was playing Angels We Have Heard on High by Bayside. To me, this was just a different version of a classic song set to punk rock. Nothing too strange about it. However, my father-in-law heard something disrespectful to the original song. This wasn't about the lyrics as they were the same for both, nor was it about style preference as he has enjoyed hearing this particular group sing in the past. It was something more for him, it was as if the band was rebelling against his more conservative view of a classic song. 

This is the first example that came to mind as Deanna Sellnow explained about nondiscursive symbols and nondiscursive rhetoric. That there is a realm of symbols that can't be seen with words or numbers. The study of these areas looks into how they persuade people when it comes to already-held beliefs. Understanding how music can be used as a rhetorical tool is just as important as film artifacts and video game texts. Music can impact a person deeply. This can be studied through the illusion of life perspective.

In a book that I'm reading, Filterworld by Kyle Chayka, he gives an example of a 1980s indie band that broke up by 1991. Since that time, the drummer has continued to manage the commercial rights to the band's songs on streaming services, such as Spotify. He has noticed one of the band's songs outperforming all their other songs. It is one called "Strange" and it was meant to be a spoof of other mainstream bands at the time. The indie band played music that sounded much different than what was popular at the time. The author uses that example for his main point, that algorithms used by Spotify are finding only similar music while ignoring the rest of the music the band plays. 

I see it as a way that people can listen to different bands and still enjoy the music. People might be passive in consuming music and not realize the influence it has on them. Even the music in the elevator has a way of influencing how you feel. Is that another way to look through a neo-Marxist perspective is by the music to keep the masses of people in line? How has music influenced you? Do you like rebellious music (as my father-in-law thought I did)?

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