This post is about historical materialism. To what extent are the means of production determinative of the culture in which they are couched; that is to say to what degree does the base determine the superstructure, or are they in a perpetual state of dialectical play? That is the question Carles invites us yet again to ponder, picking up a debate that has long raged unsettled among Marxists and their fellow travelers.
In this particular instance, we are invited to consider the case of Ariel Pink, a "lo-fi" musician who has argued in print publications that the "presentation" of his music, dictated by the means of production he is able to seize control of, renders his art "something difficult for the money people to invest in." The artists asserts that he is "better now at producing," despite the limited means, which points to an uneven ideological development that has failed to harmonize aesthetic norms with commercial ones, as capitalism must do to underpin its superstructure and give weight to the notion that the markets can adjudicate and administer culture in a decentered, decentralized fashion. The "money people" must at once also be the most important critics, as Carles astutely recognizes: "A band’s product is just as important as how compelling they are to cover. When you are bloggable/buzzable/tweetable, the money people will come to your house with a truck full of money." Attention has become a convertible instrument in the libidinal economy.
But as Carles notes, this concatenation of attention, apperception, and commcercialization has created an ontological crisis, as being itself has become contingent on cultural categorization. "Rallying around Ariel Pink might be our last chance to turn our backs on the mainstreamication of indie," he explains -- a final problematization of the base-superstructure dialectic, recast as the collapsing mainstream-indie dichotomy. But note Carles's choice of words -- we may "turn our back" on it, but this means only that we have chosen to ignore the thorny question, not that we have resolved it by aestheticizing means. Also, Carles suggests we have reached a point when this base-superstructure will no longer be a concern merely for dogmatic theoreticians and fusty hair-splitters of the academic left. It will be a fundamental phenomenological concern with regard to subjectivity in its broadest possible conception. Our awareness of our own being may in the last analysis be determined by the means of production by which consciousness itself is produced, regardless of Kantian a prioris, which have been transformed into ideological propositions under a capitalist order that seizes upon the fundamental categories as a justification for its own given-ness. Carles notes that "the artist with minimal personal and cultural connections can focus on his art, and not have to excessively check the internet and worry about the impact of their work based on an undefined/evolving context." But these cultural connections are also prerequisites for creating art that can be self-sustaining, so a contradiction inheres. The energy to sustain artistic creation stems from the possibility of recognition, yet at the same time, contempt for recognition also fuels ambition recognized to be "authentic". Commercial success at once validates an invalidates cultural achievement and self-actualization. As a result, we are "pointlessly acclaimed" and then "forgotten" -- not merely by a social formation addicted to novelty but by ourselves, as we reject one identity after another in search of renewed surges of valuable attention.
Rather than a given dasein, being has appeared to take the form of a taxonomizing quest, seeking the cultural artifacts that can authorize and underwrite our pretensions to transcendence: "2k10 has led us on a ‘wild goose chase’ for relevant mp3s. We aren’t even looking for life-changing mp3s any more, like in the pre-Garden State/pre-Postal Service era. We are searching for MP3s that make us feel like we are at the pinnacle of human and artistic development." Can we really articulate our species being through commodified modes of expression, though? Capitalism has staked its survival on this audacious proposition.
Accordingly, it is incumbent upon commercial artists -- straddling the constituitive boundary between being for itself and being in itelf -- to establish their own ineffability, to belong to the category that is beyond categorization: "you need a lot of people asking you what genre you fit into in order to be successful. In depth ‘journalists’ will ask you if your genre even exists, then ‘connect’ with you by laughing about how silly ‘genres’ are." Consumers can then acquire this reified ineffability as a product that can be consumed by way of substantiating their claims to transcendence. They can listen to the uncategorizable music and vicariously assume uncategorizability themselves. One can then have a soul by association: one can "stand at the front of the show, already familiarized with his extensive discography, ready to smile with a shit eating grin that says, “Yes, I get it.”" What is "it"? Exactly.
why can't i be me?
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