It’s odd to think back on the time—not so long ago—when there were distinct stylistic trends, such as “this season’s colour” or “abstract expressionism” or “psychedelic music.” It seems we don’t think like that any more. There are just too many styles around, and they keep mutating too fast to assume that kind of dominance.
As an example, go into a record shop and look at the dividers used to separate music into different categories. There used to be about a dozen: rock, jazz, ethnic, and so on. Now there are almost as many dividers as there are records, and they keep proliferating. The category I had a hand in starting—ambient music—has split into a host of subcategories called things like “black ambient,” “ambient dub,” “ambient industrial,” “organic ambient” and 20 others last time I looked. A similar bifurcation has been happening in every other living musical genre (except for “classical” which remains, so far, simply “classical”), and it’s going on in painting, sculpture, cinema and dance.
We’re living in a stylistic tropics. There’s a whole generation of people able to access almost anything from almost anywhere, and they don’t have the same localised stylistic sense that my generation grew up with. It’s all alive, all “now,” in an ever-expanding present, be it Hildegard of Bingen or a Bollywood soundtrack. The idea that something is uncool because it’s old or foreign has left the collective consciousness.
I think this is good news. As people become increasingly comfortable with drawing their culture from a rich range of sources—cherry-picking whatever makes sense to them—it becomes more natural to do the same thing with their social, political and other cultural ideas. The sharing of art is a precursor to the sharing of other human experiences, for what is pleasurable in art becomes thinkable in life.
This article first appeared in the December edition of Prospect magazine
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One aspect along those lines, because it’s a great point you’re making here, but it’s that I’ve often felt that part of the great appeal of the internet, internet chat and message boards, and downloading of mp3’s, is that it’s there when you want it and you are not under much of an obligation. You can change pull off a chunk whenever you feel like it. The key being that these are types of things that if you had to put too much effort into them, in some extent, then it would diminish you’re broader enjoyment of them. It’s the access methods that are a big part of changing the role of the art in our culture and allowing forward movement in our art/culture.
Under the new technology my entire world changed, not just because of the technology, but to a large extent it was due to the fact that one of my largest problems was lack of a way to casually absorb a large quantity of stuff, and in effect to cull through that stuff easily enough in order to meet with my own creative inclinations/changing ways of living/thinking. Expansiveness without many barriers and need to have easy, broad access. Acting in a multi-tasking high pressure situation until something springs forth.
I don’t know which record stores Brian Eno shops in, but in my experience, the “genre dividers” in the racks have become less specific rather than more so. So in my local HMV for instance the “Pop” category now seems to include rock, soul, reggae, blues etc. which seems to me to be a symptom of the shrinking CD back catalogue range on offer – so much for the “long tail”! It’s also a reason why more and more people are turning to Amazon to find deep catalogue.
I cannot agree more. In my opinion, the different categories referred above are created since the boundaries between cultures, countries, people around the world keep blurring and allowing for creation of even more unique styles. “Cherry-picking whatever makes sense to them”! Daily I observe this to be true in my generation (late 20s these days). It’s fascinating, because we can no longer categorize people as we “used to”. Such a relief!
[...] Interessant liten kommentar av Brian Eno i Prospect Magazine. [...]
Dear Brian,
Love your article.
I agree in principle, that that is all good news. But don’t you think we see alack of core, style in many creative products – music, fashion, art ? Culture principally consists of mixes of influences, ideas, inspiration. Has it not become over-mixed, diluted ?
I wonder also about the following. Technology permits so many things – that were hard even to imagine before – that we could ask what older \masters\ would be able to do with these new tools. Would they not show more core, more style ?
Looking forward to know your opinion,
with my best regards,
Philip Houtekier
[...] | In a brief essay in the British magazine Prospect, the musician and producer Brian Eno says gone are the days of distinct stylistic trends –“this season’s color” or “abstract [...]
Cool is relative. It used to take a little effort to be cool. But thanks to the internet and social networking nothing is obsure anymore and everyone can be in the loop. I remember when Brian Eno’s music was hard to find on the radio dial. These days all you need to do is ‘google’ him and you can purchase his songs or watch him on “You Tube.’
I think Brian is totally right (when has he been wrong?) but while the uncool dissappears and art, relationships, ideologies etc become more free flowing, syncretic and open to all, there is a flipside to this, which is increasing fragmentation also risks increasing alienation. The shared experience of the group becomes less common and people begin to lose many of the identifiers they may have had between them. So the goth kid, stops talking to the hip hop kid, while ignoring the fact their similarities are greater than their differences. Greater individualism in art etc is definitly a benefit to most people, but loneliness can still rise. I think thats why big mass cultural events, like American Idol or the XFactor see the huge popularity they do, outside of being fluff, its common ground that everyone else is still on and people still seek it out.
I agree completely with Brian Eno. This is why it no longer makes sense to have “pure” ideologies such as capitalism, communism, democracy , socialism, etc. running the world. Instead we need to study each one, choose the best feautures and come up with something that works!
[...] / a world of hits, economist.com / Twitter Japan to introduce payment model, media.asia / the death of uncool, prospectmagazine.co.uk / AutocompleteMe, autocompleteme.com Possibly related posts: (automatically [...]
I just wanted to comment on a particular aspect of your introduction. I think it’s funny that ‘Classical’ music isn’t sub-categorized as it probably has as clearly distinguishable sub classifications – if not more so – than some of the styles mentioned above.
First, let’s forget that ‘classical’ is a term used that only really refers to west European art music (a pretentious mouthful of a label, but a bit more accurate) written from about the 1750’s to the 1820’s and only encompasses widely known composers such as Mozart, Haydn, and early Beethoven.
There are enduring classifications such as solo, chamber (like string quartet), orchestra, choral, and opera that if billed as such, might draw more interest due to their similarity to today’s ‘long tail,’ cherry-picking preferences. I know that if I am much more likely to walk past the ‘classical’ section without looking, than if I see “J.S. Bach: Solo Cello Suites” listed. Like most people, I know what a cello is, I know what ’solo’ means and (if your high school music program did a decent job like mine, you do too), I know a bit about who Bach is. I DON’T know what ‘classical’ means!
BTW, nice Hildegard of Bingen reference!
What means this \record store\?
Dunno if I can go with this as being anything really new or even being indicative of what he thinks it means. For one thing, there are distinct factions of classical (neo-classical, Baroque, etc.). But what is being discussed here is the fractioning of labels into smaller more distinct subsets. Most of this is a matter of form; as there is more data to filter through now, these more compartmentalized labels serve to narrow down the streams of information into pockets that are digestible while still being able to find new media that we may like based on our preferences. This has more to do with machine intelligence and design than with our own personal need to associate ourselves with a style or a trend. As it stands, we still tend to like to lump ourselves into Left or Right, This or That, and blend several of those extreme labels together to form ‘identity.’ But now that there are more choices (new styles are emerging, after all), it does indeed become fuzzier to decry one as the main era-defining trend, because that will vary based on your specific worldview & vantage point.
[...] The death of uncool « Prospect Magazine – [...]
I think there’s a whole new uncool breeding in those who’ve left themselves behind in some frustrated isolation, clinging to media ownership and self-promotion.
I like that genres have deprecated in general. I’m not sure they ever served us well.
[...] all of that is a long way to say Brian Eno’s comments on the death of uncool struck me as part of the same [...]
Thus begins the end of copyright.
Very insightful, Brian. I think it goes hand in hand with the democratization of the creation of art, especially music. People can create almost anything almost anywhere, all it takes is a laptop.
Someday we will look back on this era as the beginning of musical democracy.
It’s always has been that fashion repeated several years later, but maybe now it is several seconds later so old and renewing the old doesn’t mean much. Classical music per VH1 is the hits of 2 weeks ago by now.
A funny example of what you say regarding hipsterdom: http://www.pandalous.com/topic/the_impossibility_of
nice post — and while I do enjoy the blurring of the cultures and being able to access music and art from all over — I am starting to see a problem with it: there is no local anymore.
You can’t travel to a different place, and go into a record shop there and find a plethora of unheard of artists and different music that you’ve never seen before — because you can access that information from home via the net. So that kind of ‘different’ is being lost rapidly …for better or worse. I realize that I thought that was always kind of c00l that people in different places had different tastes…but if we’re all listening to the same thing, the rush we’re all getting from the ‘blurring’ isn’t going to be happening much longer and that’ll be a loss. Think Glocal. hehe
[...] Brian Eno says uncool is dead, then it’s dead. [...]
[...] November 28, 2009 at 11:49 am · Filed under Ideas, Music “The idea that something is uncool because it’s old or foreign has left the collective consc… [...]
Well, come into the provinces, come to Seattle, they may think they are hip because they drink lattes – bigger hicks have never drunk lattes than these!
[...] The death of uncool, by Brian Eno (via Rick [...]
If there was a genre that might even remotely become dominant it would just as quickly be mocked and ridiculed, besides what recored shops?
[...] Eno pontificates (I mean that non-ironically—he’s earned it!) on fashion trends in The Death of the Uncool. Here’s a clip: It’s odd to think back on the time—not so long ago—when there were [...]
Hello.
I think the word you meant instead of “bifurcation” is “splintering”.
The phenomenon you are refering to is casued by a great many things coming together at once, but mainly the “democratisation” of the means of producing usic and distributing it.
Interesting you point out classical, which still needs years of training on old, analog instruments, rehersals with lots of other people and lots of group organisation, not to mention the culture of the institutions involved in the production, promotion and distribution of this genre. Wonder when they’ll wake up. I mean afterall there are many contemporary composers doign very modern things in what one might still call “classical”…
But I digress.
Also, you may want to google Momus’ insightful statement, made over a decade ago, that “in the future, everyone will be famous for 15 people.” This speaks directly to this phenomena.
[...] Interesting thoughts from Brian Eno on the impact art and culture diversity and availability is having on society. I share his hope that this will translate into advances in politics and other attitudes as well. We’re living in a stylistic tropics. There’s a whole generation of people able to access almost anything from almost anywhere, and they don’t have the same localised stylistic sense that my generation grew up with. It’s all alive, all “now,” in an ever-expanding present, be it Hildegard of Bingen or a Bollywood soundtrack. The idea that something is uncool because it’s old or foreign has left the collective consciousness. [...]
Ha, I kind of agree. But also I’d say that: “Oh man that’s SO last year.” has now become: “Whoa, SOMEone hasn’t been online since this afternoon”
[...] 29, 2009 in Uncategorized Brian Eno writes in Prospect Magazine that the idea that something is “uncool” is dead. I think Brian Eno is really cool, [...]
[...] Prospect – The Death of the Uncool, by Brian Eno [...]
Record stores? You got to be kidding? Even the second hand shops are disappearing faster than the American dollar. . .
[...] Eno, The Death of Uncool http://www.fimoculous.com/archive/post-6596.cfm November 28th, [...]
We are all cultural magpies, and devoid of any sense of time and place, our references become diverse and challenging. This will ultimately lead to a more creative society.
This is generally a good thing, though it has interesting implications for an individuals sense of self. Having generational references in common is in direct conflict from the first law of growing up. I.e, You hate whatever your parents like – whether it be music films, art, or fashion.
Where to now for the bobbysoxers, teen rebels, mods, rockers, punks, rude boys, indie kids, ravers or goths? are they all to be merged together in one unedifying mix?
In a time of cultural soupifying, where everything references everything else and a mish-mash is seen a a thing to aspire to – spare a thought for originality.
There is something to be said for standing out, being different, being the first and not joining the stew.
[...] In Prospect schreibt Eno einen kleinen Artikel: ?The death of uncool [...]
While in one sense “uncool” has died thanks to the Internet. If you really like the “Macarena” yet all of your friends think it is lame – simply search the Internet and I am sure you can find some niche group of likeminded Macarena enthusiasts who deem it the “coolest”!
But there still is a difference between experiencing the birth of the “dark ambient” genre at some London club’s open deck night versus listening to it online. It still has to be “done” by someone and that someone is the confident creator aka the arbiter of cool in this case. And it has to be experienced by another who highlights and follows the new genre. And the rest of the world merely wows at the cool new genre divider at their record shop.
Wrong. There is still such a thing as “uncool,” it’s just not based on the criteria used here. If something is “old” or “foreign,” it has the capacity for hidden value that has gone unappreciated by one’s peers, which makes it more cool.
Shopping for CDs is uncool, because what are you doing buying CDs? Why do you even own a CD player? CD collections are a 90s relic. Shopping for records is cool, because records are timeless treasures. Shopping for music on iTunes is neither cool nor uncool, it’s just mainstream.
[...] a brief essay in the British magazine Prospect, Brian Eno tells us like it [...]
[...] The death of uncool"We’re living in a stylistic tropics. There’s a whole generation of people able to access almost anything from almost anywhere, and they don’t have the same localised stylistic sense that my generation grew up with. It’s all alive, all “now,” in an ever-expanding present, be it Hildegard of Bingen or a Bollywood soundtrack. The idea that something is uncool because it’s old or foreign has left the collective consciousness." [...]
Dear Brian,
I think it is bad form, or “uncool”, when a reader’s comment is longer than the article.
[...] Brian Eno writes on the death of uncool. [...]
[...] Brian Eno, from an essay about how if everything has its own sub-genre, nothing is uncool. (via Prospect, via The New York [...]
Personally, I disagree with Mr. Eno.
I agree that the many sub catagories are difficult to keep up with and constantly becoming more minimal (pun intended), but all in all, I believe uncool..is still uncool. Sure the borders of style keep changing and in many cases are enriched, but in many cases I believe they are degraded as well. Today people are afraid to say what is uncool because it might be politically incorrect, and the media wants to support every two bit tramp to sell media exposure (Paris, Brittany, etc.) but cool remains cool and uncool is still uncool. Can anyone convince me that Reba McEntire or country rock rehash tenth generation originality is cool? (just for an example) I am sure some people will think otherwise, but once upon a time there were standards and people had to live up to higher or lower standards. People used to be allowed to even have opinions (can you believe that?) There used to be clear directions and trends in music and not just mish mosh commercialism. There used to be standards that made things and people cool. Now a ton of money and a good press agent can make any dope cool or anything cool. Just not in my book. Ten million followers on facebook does not qualify them as cool. I can still have an opinion.
[...] December 2009 in My general observations, Spotted in the news Brian Eno in Prospect magazine, on the death of uncool… “There’s a whole generation of people able to access almost anything from almost [...]
[...] Eno: “There used to be about a dozen: rock, jazz, ethnic, and so on. Now there are almost as many dividers as there are [...]
[...] Link: The Death of Uncool (Prospect Magazine) [...]
actually mr eno is mistaken with his thoughts on classical music. the classical period was 1750 to 1825 but is seems that a orchestral music from all periods gets grouped in “classical”.
u2 is the only uncool thing i can think of. oh wait. coldplay. you used to be cool brian. you must have enough money. how about finding someone prolific to work with.
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[...] Brian Eno, The Death of Uncool. [...]