Punk Aesthetics And New Folk: Way Down The Old Plank Road (ashgate Popular And Folk Music Series)
by John Encarnacao /
2013 / English / PDF
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Joanna Newsom, Will Oldham (a.k.a 'Bonnie Prince Billy'), and
Devendra Banhart are perhaps the best known of a generation of
independent artists who use elements of folk music in contexts that
are far from traditional. These (and other) so called "new folk"
artists challenge our notions of 'finished product' through their
recordings, intrinsically guided by practices and rhetoric
inherited from punk. This book traces a fractured trajectory that
includes Harry Smith's Anthology of American Folk Music, Bob Dylan,
psych-folk of the sixties (from Vashti Bunyan to The Incredible
String Band), and lo-fi and outsider recordings (from Captain
Beefheart and The Residents to Jandek and Daniel Johnston) to
contextualise the first substantial consideration of new folk. In
the process, Encarnacao reviews the literature on folk and punk to
argue that tropes of authenticity, though constructions, carry
considerable power in the creation and reception of recorded works.
New approaches to music require new analytical tools, and through
the analysis of some 50 albums, Encarnacao introduces the
categories of labyrinth, immersive and montage forms. This book
makes a compelling argument for a reconsideration of popular music
history that highlights the eternal compulsion for spontaneous,
imperfect and performative recorded artefacts.
Joanna Newsom, Will Oldham (a.k.a 'Bonnie Prince Billy'), and
Devendra Banhart are perhaps the best known of a generation of
independent artists who use elements of folk music in contexts that
are far from traditional. These (and other) so called "new folk"
artists challenge our notions of 'finished product' through their
recordings, intrinsically guided by practices and rhetoric
inherited from punk. This book traces a fractured trajectory that
includes Harry Smith's Anthology of American Folk Music, Bob Dylan,
psych-folk of the sixties (from Vashti Bunyan to The Incredible
String Band), and lo-fi and outsider recordings (from Captain
Beefheart and The Residents to Jandek and Daniel Johnston) to
contextualise the first substantial consideration of new folk. In
the process, Encarnacao reviews the literature on folk and punk to
argue that tropes of authenticity, though constructions, carry
considerable power in the creation and reception of recorded works.
New approaches to music require new analytical tools, and through
the analysis of some 50 albums, Encarnacao introduces the
categories of labyrinth, immersive and montage forms. This book
makes a compelling argument for a reconsideration of popular music
history that highlights the eternal compulsion for spontaneous,
imperfect and performative recorded artefacts.
