Rocket Fuel

I have a confession to make. I wrote about the Elton John film Rocket Man before having seen it. Back in August I was stating, ‘if you want to see a movie that conveys the musical impact of Elton John, you would be better off watching the bus scene in Almost Famous than digesting Rocket Man’.

            I’ve now seen Rocket Man. For me it is a game of two halves. I like the coverage of the pre-fame years, particularly the scenes of Elton John as a boy in suburban Pinner. When he becomes famous, though, the film becomes dull. It’s not that stardom or drug addiction are inherently boring, it’s more that this film doesn’t really capture their highs, lows and weirdnesses. Interviewed by Graham Norton this week, Elton John had far more engaging things to say about the megalomania and depravity of rock stars, as well as about the oddities of fame. In particular, I enjoyed the story about introducing his partner, David Furnish, to his mother for the first time, only to have Michael Jackson turn up and come along to the dinner date as well.

            And what of the music? I think my hunch was right. Almost Famous is the more effective film when it comes to illustrating Elton John’s brilliance. There is one scene in Rocket Man that cuts through musically, however. It depicts the composition of ‘Your Song’. What I liked about this scene is its relationship with ‘truth’. It could be considered false in relation to music making, but true in terms of illustrating what it feels like to write a break-through hit. You capture lightning in a bottle.

            It takes place at Elton John’s childhood home, where he has returned to live with his mother and stepfather, bringing his lyricist partner, Bernie Taupin, along with him. Taupin hands John the lyrics to ‘Your Song’. John goes to the piano and writes the tune in real time. This brought to my mind Oliver Stone’s film, The Doors, in which the band similarly create their breakthrough hit, ‘Light My Fire’, in a spontaneous jam session.

Looking at the scene in The Doors again, the guitarist Robbie Krieger has scribbled down the chords and lyrics to ‘Light My Fire’ beforehand, and there is some tinkering around by the keyboard player, Ray Manzarek, before he stumbles across the Bach-inspired introduction to the song. The fully realized version that follows takes place in a different context: it soundtracks a montage sequence in which we witness the band’s escalating fame. In contrast, in the film Rocket Man, Elton John finds the tune to ‘Your Song’ immediately.

Why then does the naturalistic setting in The Doors feel corny, while the theatrical scene in Rocket Man rings true? Part of it comes down to this staging: naturalism can sabotage itself if the detail is not perfect. Melodrama, on the other hand, can capture a truth to feeling without having to concern itself with historical accuracy.

            Another reason is that The Doors scene surely is false. ‘Light My Fire’ may well have emerged from the scribbled notes, been worked up in rehearsal, and had a quickly realised intro because, in  Manzarek’s words, ‘It just came out of, you know, fifteen or twenty years of music practice’. Yet there is still the feeling that the whole process would have taken longer than this.

            Elton John, on the other hand, really does take the words of Taupin and create fully-realized songs off the bat. ‘I put my hands on the keyboard and away we go’, as John stated to Norton this week. As one example, he composed the music for the double album, Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, in three days. Lest we forget, this is an album that includes ‘Candle in the Wind’, ‘Bennie and the Jets’, ‘Saturday Night’s Alright for Fighting’ as well as the title track. ‘Your Song’ was written just as quickly. John talked with Norton about its staging in Rocket Man. For him, the film gives ‘a pretty accurate description of how it was done’.

            Even though it is ‘true’, this remains a remarkable means of creating successful music. Other composers, in contrast, can toil for months. I’m not sure how widely known it is that John writes in this way. Yet my guess is, even amongst viewers who do not know about this process, the ‘Your Song’ sequence would still appear honest. Could it be that there something in the music that is letting us know?

From Bohemian Rhapsody to the Buddy Holly Story

I was recently interviewed for an article about the factual accuracy of musical biopics, written by Tom Fordy for the Telegraph. Following on from last year’s Queen film, Bohemian Rhapsody, which was criticised for manufacturing and being loose with the truth (notably in relation to Freddie Mercury’s diagnosis and disclosure that he had AIDs), there was a rash of articles that explored the printing of musical legends. With the recent release of the Rocket Man about Elton John, similar thought pieces have made a return.

            Fordy asked me to talk about the ‘truth’ of the Sex Pistols-related film Sid and Nancy and the Joy Division films Control and 24 Hour Party People. One thing that I wanted to get across, which is in the piece, is that music films rarely do a good job of dealing accurately with bands. They are oriented towards star turns by individuals, including the ability of an actor to assume the persona of a lead singer or musician. What they do not manage to capture is intra-band politics. Hence, Gary Oldham delivers an astonishing performance in Sid and Nancy, where he embodies the spirit of Sid Vicious. Andrew Schofield’s limp turn as Johnny Rotten could hardly be called nuanced, however. Similarly, the various Joy Division films have worked hard at capturing the tics of lead singer Ian Curtis, but have spent far less time on the other members of the band (this seems particularly unjust, as Joy Division are one of the rare bands in which each member’s contribution is equally vital). Bohemian Rhapsody offers a partial exception to this rule, with its attention to detail spreading beyond the lead singer. The fact that Queen members Brian May and Roger Taylor acted as consultants to the film presumably helped here, as did the fact that the group had already developed ways of portraying themselves on screen, notably in the video for ‘The Miracle’, in which four young children do a great job of being Queen.

            Another thing that I talked about with Fordy, but which did not make it into the article, is that this analysis of historical accuracy should be extended to documentaries. It is presumed that they get closer to the reality of singers and musicians than acted portrayals, but I’m not sure this is always the case. On the one hand, musical biopics such as 24 Hour Party People or the Todd Haynes’ Bob Dylan film I’m Not There have done a better job of capturing musicians and scenes than most parades of talking heads could ever do. On the other hand, a documentary can be just as partial as a biopic. They will be oriented towards one version of the truth or one member of a band. Take, for example, the three attempts that director Julien Temple has made to tell the Sex Pistols’ story. He has spoken of the Rotten-oriented The Filth and the Fury (2000) as being a ‘corrective’ to his earlier film, the Malcolm McLaren-instigated Great Rock ‘n’ Roll Swindle (1980). This did not stop him from having another crack at the Pistols, however, providing a more London-based setting in The Knowledge (2008). Each film has its moments, but they are also indicative of the fact that the Sex Pistols’ story is too rich and diverse to be contained. A further point about documentaries is that their tendency to place social context around music can be just as falsifying and mythologizing as the manufacture of narrative events in biopics. About ten years ago I heard a great talk by Richard Witts, in which he took apart the documentary Factory: Manchester from Joy Division to Happy Mondays, indicating that its scene-setting footage of Salford, which was supposed to visualise the milieu in which the members of Joy Division emerged, was in fact taken from an era prior to their births. It had originally been employed to illustrate ‘before’ and ‘after’ images of slum clearance, but the film implied that those slums were still there.

And there’s a final thing that I didn’t mention to Fordy at all. When analysing the ‘reality’ of music films, the focus tends to be on truth to history, truth to personality or truth to sociology. There is less discussion about truth to music. But which films best manage to capture the spirit of a song? Musical biopics are not the place to look. With their orientation towards narrative and character they lose the ability to deliver a good tune. Documentaries can edge closer to the marvels of music. As I have written elsewhere, there is something exciting about hearing music talked about. It sets up a thrill of anticipation for the moment that the song in question finally arrives. Ultimately, however, the films that best communicate what music feels like for us – the fans - are not the ones that concentrate on its makers. It is the reception of music that comes across most effectively. Therefore, if you want to see a movie that conveys the musical impact of Elton John, you would be better off watching the bus scene in Almost Famous than digesting Rocket Man.

And which moment of film best captures the essence of Queen? It’s ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ in Wayne’s World of course. 
 

         

Name that Timbre

Name that Tune was a quiz that had a long life on radio and television. It first began as a show on NBC radio in America in 1952. In Britain, it was first known as Spot that Tune, which ran between 1956 and 1962 on Granada Television. It was next seen between 1976 and 1983 as ‘Name that Tune’, a segment of the Thames Television show London Night Out, hosted by Tom O’Connor. After that, it became a standalone quiz, hosted by Lionel Blair from 1983 to 1988.  It was then revived on Channel 5 for a show hosted by Jools Holland in 1997 and 1998. The most recent version was witnessed in 2007, as part of ITV’s Gameshow Marathon, helmed by Vernon Kay.

            The premise was simple. Contestants would compete to name popular tunes in as few notes as possible (‘I’ll name that tune in seven’, ‘I’ll name that tune in five’ etc.). Rather than playing a record, the tune would be played live by musicians in the broadcasting studio. If singers were featured, they would replace the words to the song with ‘la la las’. The show was dependent on a shared knowledge of popular hit songs. It would not work effectively unless the contestants’ musical expertise found an echo in that of the viewers and listeners at home. The quick familiarity of melodies could be startling.

            Melody is not our speediest musical recall, however. We’re much faster with timbre, particularly the timbre of recordings. If I switch on the radio and a record I know is playing, I can name that sound within microseconds. The same is true if I’m in a club or a bar, and the DJ has cued up a familiar record. I will know it and I can name it immediately. I’m not alone in this ability. Most of us are startlingly fast.

            One of the few times that this ability has been captured on screen is in T2: Trainspotting. Early in the movie, the main character, Renton, returns to his childhood home and puts a record on the turntable. From the label we can guess that it is Iggy Pop’s ‘Lust for Life’. He plays a tiny burst of the record before snatching it from the turntable as he is haunted by the memories it conjures.

What is brilliant about this scene is that the filmmakers have the confidence, not only that the cinemagoers will recognize ‘Lust for Life’ from this brief excerpt, but also that it will take them back to the more extended use of the same record in the original Trainspotting movie, where it soundtracks a scene in which Renton is chased through the streets of Edinburgh. (There is also a neat joke. In the first film the use of ‘Lust for Life’ is non-diegetic, meaning that Renton will not have heard it himself. Somehow, though, the record and its associations have seeped into his consciousness by the time of the second film.)

            We need more of these moments on screen. How about a very brief quiz show called Name that Timbre? And how about pitting it against Name that Tune? The timbral contestants would surely be quicker than the tuneful ones.

As well as being entertaining, this could help us think again about musical hierarchies. Melody is prioritised in the law and in value judgements generally. One of the reasons why classical music maintains its elevated status is because it is melodically and harmonically rich in comparison with much popular music. But popular music wins on timbre. What then, if it is revealed that timbre is the fastest, most resonant and deeply penetrating musical quality of all?

Recording Bias

Music copyright is elitist. Many theorists have made this claim. They have pointed to the fact that copyright law tends to equate music with its notated form. It therefore over-privileges aspects that can be written down - principally melody and harmony – while it deals unfairly with those elements that can only be loosely captured in a score, such as rhythm and timbre. It is suited to classical music; it is not suited to popular music.

There is evidence of this bias in case law. The Spandau Ballet case, for example, stemmed from a dispute between guitarist Gary Kemp, who claimed that he was the sole author of the group’s songs because he initiated them, and the other members of the band, who argued that they should be regarded as co-authors because they fleshed out Kemp’s compositions with their musical arrangements. Park J found in Kemp’s favour, noting that

A composer can ‘hear’ the sound of his composition in his mind before he ever hears it played. Beethoven could hear his music in this sense even when he was deaf. When Mr. Kemp was devising his songs the sound which he had in his musical consciousness must surely have been the sound they would have when performed by Spandau Ballet, not the sound they would have when sung by Mr. Kemp alone to the accompaniment just of his own guitar.

This decision rested on the conception of the genius romantic composer.

            It should nevertheless be remembered that most songwriting agreements do not come to court. In addition, songwriters are free to make their own decisions about musical worth. They can credit groove and timbre if they want to. In fact, common practice amongst hip-hop and R&B composers is to give 50% of the compositional credits to the author(s) of the rhythm track. If there is an elitist bias, it is at a judicial level; it is not enforced by the legislation itself.

            There is a classical music bias that has been overlooked, however. Academics have focused on the copyright in songs. They have not addressed the elitism of sound recording copyright, which it could be argued has had more profound effects. It is in this area that the bias is legislatively embedded.

Sound recordings have regularly been equated with film in copyright law. There is a fundamental difference, nonetheless. Films have the possibility of two copyrights. There is one that recognises financial and organisational skills, which is awarded to the producer, and another that recognises the original creativity in films, which is usually awarded to the director. In contrast, there is usually only one copyright in sound recordings. It recognises financial input and organisational skills, and is commonly claimed by the record company.

Why is there no creative copyright in sound recordings? Classical music can take some of the blame. Film directors have been awarded a copyright because of their genius. These auteurs take the base material of the film script and convert it into a new artistic work (this conception of directors is itself a reflection of the romantic bias of copyright law). If sound recording were to receive a similar copyright, evidence would need to be provided of creative individuals who take the musical composition and by virtue of their ‘personal and original character’ create a new work, which can be judged to have artistic merit of its own.

If we look at popular music, we can see this happening all the time. Records are valued as much for their production values and the recording ability of the musicians as they are for the underlying song. The producer and the musicians are not following the written instructions of a score; they are making musical and sonic decisions of their own. In contrast, when we turn to classical music, we are not meant to hear the recording studio as a compositional tool. Instead, classical music production is dominated by the ‘concert hall ideal’. The recording is supposed to sound as close to a live performance as possible. The job of the record producer is to be unobtrusive. Similarly, the job of the performers is to follow the score. Their creative genius should be submerged; they are obeying the instructions of the musical composer.

Sound recording copyright has been legislated with classical music in mind. Recording activity has been deemed to be passive at best and damaging at worst. As such, it is not considered worthy of a creative copyright of its own. It is beyond the bounds of the Berne Convention, the international agreement that assesses the creative rights of authors in literary and artistic works. In 1908, British delegates to the Convention suggested an author’s copyright in sound recordings, similar to the one that was being created for films. Their proposal was rejected. Other delegates believed that sound recording was a ‘travesty’, stating:

the composer suffers at present moral injury, from the fact that his work is usually deformed by the necessities of adaptation to the instrument [the gramophone]; the orchestration is re-arranged, melodies are modified because certain notes register badly; ‘scenas’ are cut, and arranged to suit the length of playing of the disc.

In Britain in the early 1950s, members of Gregory Committee assessed the legislation of sound recording copyright by attending the recording of a Mozart symphony. They reported that there was a ‘very high degree of skill (in part technical, in part musical) called into play in recording music’, but concluded that recordings ‘approximate more closely to industrial products than to original literary or musical works’. As such, in the consequent 1956 Copyright Act there was only one copyright in sound recordings, which was awarded to the manufacturer. This remains the case in current British legislation. The Copyright, Designs and Patents Act recognises the director and the producer as separate authors of a film. When it comes to sound recording, however, there is a solitary recipient of copyright: ‘the person by whom the arrangements necessary for the making of the recording ... are undertaken’.

Brazil, Chile, China, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, Iceland, Peru, Turkey, Uruguay, Zaire and the countries of the European Union all recognise two copyrights in film. They have one that recognises creative skill, while the other recognises the producer’s duties. In contrast, Ghana is the only country that recognises two sound recording copyrights.

It could be argued that this issue crosses the lines of the copyright in sound recordings and the copyright in songs. If recorded performances and record production were recognised as composition, then this artistry could be absorbed into songwriting credits. In many instances, in fact, this already happens. For example, the majority of hit songs in the UK charts last year were co-authored by professional songwriters, recording artists and (sometimes) record producers. Nevertheless, it can be argued conversely that these credits are the result of a defect in copyright law. In many instances composition, performance and production continue to be separate skills. Musicians and record producers are only documenting their artistic practice as composition because the law gives them insufficient recognition elsewhere. If there were a creative copyright for sound recording it would enable this artistic practice to be recognised appropriately. The elitist bias of legislation would be properly located and addressed.

That's Me in the Spotlight: Audiences and Musicians on Screen

I have recently had a chapter published in the book Musicians and their Audiences, which is edited by Ioannis Tsioulakis and Elina Hytönen-Ng.

My argument is that musicians learn to perform by watching other musicians on television, film and video, and that audiences similarly learn how to perform by watching the screening of audiences. I suggest that there have been various relationships between the screening of fans and musicians. At times, as with Elvis Presley’s first performances, audiences have provided an act of interpretation: their reactions help to attach meaning to the music. Later, with the British invasion and other examples of teen ‘hysteria’, the actions of artists and audiences are not always aligned. Here, the audience can be viewed as causing interference. The rock years of the 1960s and 1970s offer another model. Here fan behaviour can be frowned up. As such, there has been incompatibility between the rock aesthetic and previous form of audience representation. Finally, I look at the video era, which has brought interaction between fans and artists: everyone is filming each other. To buy the book costs loads of pounds, but you can access an earlier version of the chapter here.

Anticipation Is So Much Better

We live in an era of music documentaries. This year sees the release of films about Kurt Cobain, Amy Winehouse, the Backstreet Boys, NWA, Tower Records, Wilko Johnson, Danny Fields, and the Grateful Dead. There are also more music documentaries on television than before (while other forms of music broadcasting have declined). Recently I’ve watched programmes about James Brown, Dave Clark, Culture Club and Kenny Rogers.

            I’ve fallen under the spell of these films. Documentaries are now at the centre of my musical enjoyment. They can trigger off a new phase of obsessive listening: the James Brown documentary, for example, has made me think again that he might be the single most astonishing figure in all of popular music. Documentaries also provide one of my favourite ways of experiencing music. Oddly, not all of this is related to hearing the music itself.

            It is the build up that I enjoy. I like to hear people talk about records, particularly when they are describing a song I know and love. Hearing someone rhapsodise eloquently about it brings me out in goosebumps before they even play the track. I’m also hearing the track in my head before it comes on. Recent examples of this include Pete Waterman talking about ‘The Winner Takes it All’ and ‘The Day Before You Came’ in The Joy of ABBA and various DJs talk about ‘I Feel Love’ in Electric Dreams: The Gorgio Moroder Story. In the latter, I wanted them to delay the track for as long as possible, as I knew it was going to slay me when it was finally played. Just as it has done every time I’ve heard since 1977.

            And there was another one today. This wasn’t in a documentary, but in the latest edition of Desert Island Discs. The castaway was Paul Millar, producer of Sade’s Diamond Life and Everything But the Girl’s Eden. He had this to say about ‘Gimme Shelter’ by the Rolling Stones:

‘Gimme Shelter’ has the best 45-second intro of any rock record ever made. Beautiful guitar riff with a vibrato on the guitar, giving it a sort of shiver. And then the producer, Jimmy Miller, plays a little South American fishbone with a stick: chk, chk chk chk. Then a couple of notes on the piano from Nicky Hopkins. A second guitar. Then, a little, strange, haunting harmonica from Mick Jagger. And then, Charlie Watts: BAP! BAP! BOOM! A perfectly timed riff from Keith – ba, ba, badada. And then Mick Jagger comes in – screaming his head off. And they mix it way back in the mix. And then the producer says, ‘I think we should get a woman to sing on the chorus’. And it was the end of the sixties. And it is an incredible piece of apocalyptic music. But more than anything else, if you don’t want to play air rhythm guitar and be Keith Richard when you’re playing this, there’s no hope for you.

Then they play the song. And it is, of course, one of the greatest pieces of music ever recorded. Obviously, when asked which of his selections he would take with him if he was only allowed to keep one, it was this record that Millar chose.