Modern Life is Rubbish - discuss (not the album)

Mexicola · Post by **Mexicola** » Sat Jul 06, 2013 11:08 am

Just read this and it struck a chord. We're all guilty of it to some degree, but are the likes of BOC turning the tide, at least a little?

Thoughts?

GH · Post by GH » Sat Jul 06, 2013 11:29 am

Could not help but notice during BBCs coverage of Glastonbury last weekend, that when a lucky few audience members were invited onto the stage by Nile Rogers to dance for Chic's final number, most of them spent the majority of their time on stage holding iPhones aloft filming an experience they were in fact missing. One of them even had an ipad.

(ps. ^ I didn't add that link for the apple product above in my text)

Mexicola · Post by **Mexicola** » Sat Jul 06, 2013 1:55 pm

Yeah, the 'iPad-at-gig' thing. When did that become ok? Did I miss a meeting or something??

Seriously...

Treefingers · Post by **Treefingers** » Sat Jul 06, 2013 2:05 pm

I'm fine with taking a couple of photos / videos during a gig (not for the entirety), but on an iPad? Fuck right off, or go the whole hog and bring an Alienware PC down with you.

Treefingers · Post by **Treefingers** » Sat Jul 06, 2013 2:05 pm

It links to ebay when I type iP*d? FUUUUUUCK

Lens Larque · Post by **Lens Larque** » Sat Jul 06, 2013 2:13 pm

This idea is addressed in many underground comix from the 70's throughout the 90's. Crumb and Clowes have always painted the correct picture of what is basically today. Pretty amazing. I'm sourcing these comics because they informed me in my formative years.

fujee · Post by **fujee** » Sat Jul 06, 2013 3:38 pm

This guys comment on the facebook replies section, seems to resonate with me most:

It's a typical phenomenon of our modern society. You don't really take the picture of the band to remind yourself that you were there - you take the picture to remind OTHER PEOPLE that you were there. The pictures themselves are of little value, the important thing is to have your own mark on it. "I DID THIS! It is I who was here, see!" Age of individualism, no doubt.
Enjoyed this article. I've been thinking about the same subject for a while now. All these iPhones blocking my view in so many concerts have annoyed me quite a bit. I agree with the writer - put away your iPhones for a while! They DO in fact distract your concentration on the music! Don't be so concerned with having some kind of proof in the future that you went to the concert - instead, enjoy the present!

fujee · Post by **fujee** » Sat Jul 06, 2013 3:40 pm

That said, BoC are virtually unique in the sense their online activity is mostly down to fans and not their own activity. To be honest, even BoC aren't exempt from this because they have always moved with the times, be it myspace, facebook and now twitter.. even if they do seldom use it.

Basefree · Post by **Basefree** » Sat Jul 06, 2013 4:07 pm

Yes, I hate this, and it's not only gigs.. There was an article at a local newspaper about how people are blocking the view with their cameras and phones at art galleries. I especially like the point fujee quoted above about just proving everyone else that they were present when something happened.

Then again.. If Boards did a gig now and you were there, would you take videos and pictures, for yourself and otherwise? What to us might be "just another gig" can be the most important one to the guy in front of us with the camera.

Lens Larque · Post by **Lens Larque** » Sat Jul 06, 2013 4:54 pm

Human experience appears to be a commodity for a Social Market. People, it seems, are trading on their lives in this market. Glamorous experiences have a higher value. The internet is the platform for this.

Currency is friends, likes, follows etc..

Cupz · Post by **Cupz** » Sat Jul 06, 2013 9:16 pm

I hope the worldwide facebook boycott is imminent soon. We could do for something better. If only anonymous social networks where a thing...

jcnporter · Post by **jcnporter** » Sat Jul 06, 2013 10:41 pm

Forsaking the moment, the actual real experience in the here and now, for a recording....I just don't get it....I just can't identify with it on any level. Maybe I'm just getting old, or maybe that line in High Fidelity was correct - we are not what we are, but what we like. Is it all about demonstrating our experience and our 'taste' to others?

pianoforte · Post by **pianoforte** » Sun Jul 07, 2013 2:48 am

Cupz wrote:If only anonymous social networks where a thing...

https://joindiaspora.com/
http://mediagoblin.org/

pianoforte · Post by **pianoforte** » Sun Jul 07, 2013 3:38 pm

But to return to the topic at hand...

I meant to start a thread about this idea a long time ago. I listen to a lot of obscure 'screamo' bands from the late 90s and early 00s. These bands tended to play in basements and various other cramped spaces, often as part of a larger 'fest' featuring sometimes as many as four or five different bands.

Every now and then, video footage of these shows surfaces on on YouTube. I'm always struck by how much more attentive those in attendance are than at, say, a One Direction Show. I mean, look at this. Yes, there is one person filming, but everyone else in that room is entirely focused on being 'in the moment' and enjoying the music, which is what they came for in the first place. No shitty cameraphones being held aloft.

Same with this and this and this and this. Both the band and the attendees are ABSOLUTELY FOCUSED on the music.

zeitgeist · Post by **zeitgeist** » Mon Jul 08, 2013 12:25 am

I cancelled my FB account in 2006. Twoism, gmail, and my own photography website makes up my entire online presence. If I could, I would burn all social networks to the ground with fire. I have an extreme aversion to the concept that makes me kind of sick to my stomach. My main co-worker, who I spend more time with than my girlfriend (unfortunately), has his face glued to his phone literally 24 /7. He's 350 pounds, totally connected with all of his friend's every move, and completely fucking miserable. Evidence enough for me.

*shudder*

P.S. - pianoforte--I'm totally for you using whatever the fuck you want for an avatar, but I will say that your current one of the nekkid french horner almost provided me with one of the most awkward experiences of my life meeting my GF's boss for the first time. Especially considering it loads at first about 1000 pixels wide...

mono · Post by **mono** » Mon Jul 08, 2013 2:01 am

Lens Larque wrote:Human experience appears to be a commodity for a Social Market. People, it seems, are trading on their lives in this market. Glamorous experiences have a higher value. The internet is the platform for this.

Currency is friends, likes, follows etc..

Are you into Bourdieu? There are a couple of easier books where he introduces this idea. They're pretty good.

Besides the social network thing, sometimes I wonder about gigs themselves. Most of the time they don't seem to offer much besides hero worship and hero making itself, which I'm not interested in at all. I don't really get what's the point.

edit: don't mean to offend anyone, but what do you think of the "your Boards of Canada collection" thread with respect to "modern life is rubbish"? some pretty extreme stuff there.

2020k · Post by **2020k** » Mon Jul 08, 2013 3:23 am

This article is spot on. The generation of social media is weird one. There's the good - I love it when Twitter is used to bring voices to important political or sociological subjects and of course the websites can be fun in moderation, but it's horrible when individuals are using it for their own personal fame of sorts. They're looking for likes from everyone when in fact the likes will be irrelevant in 45 minutes when someone else posts something new, looking for the same thing, and there's an endless cycle where there is no fame, no real likes, just narcissism and desperation in posting their experiences when they aren't experiencing what they're there to experience at all.

I normally take a couple grainy pictures and half a song to a song's worth of video, then I watch the show. I want concerts embedded into my skull - I want the experience, I want to look around at the band, the venue, the audience. I want to know the energy. The problem with this is that there is no energy in the audience. To my left, an instagram application is open and a fan is flicking passed filters through the next two songs and the one to my right is taking selfies with her back turned to the band so it looks like they're part of some mountain scenic picture. Me? I'm standing stiff because I don't want to disturb anyone...but I wonder why I bother because everyone is in their own disconnected social media mind anyhow.

It's a mess. I liked what the Yeah Yeah Yeah's did, when they politely told their fans not to watch the show through their cameras <-- I put that link there.

iPad <-- I did not put that link there.

mono · Post by **mono** » Mon Jul 08, 2013 3:43 am

The Social Dead

IanRedpoint · Post by **IanRedpoint** » Mon Jul 08, 2013 8:20 am

I can honestly say that I didn't miss connectivity to the outside world once while camping in Dorset this weekend.

I think memory and forgetting is a natural part of being human. We've evolved to process information in that way for our survival. I fear that the constant recording and archiving of everything we do could break our mental process of keeping/remembering what is important and discarding/forgetting what is trivial when everything is given equal status.

I've been to hundreds of gigs in the past 30 years and I can still remember the sensation and emotion of being at the greatest ones, while I've forgotten almost all the bad ones. If I need a reminder of these times, I have a box of ticket stubs. I prefer to remember how these potentially recordable events affected me personally, not how my camera or phone saw them. Even the highest quality bootleg can't capture that.

Torn n Frayed · Post by **Torn n Frayed** » Mon Jul 08, 2013 12:36 pm

I refuse to get a smart-phone or I-phone; for me it's the very definition of disappearing up ones own arse!