Filling in Holes : Television Music as a Recuperation of Popular Music on Television

Abstract

When it comes to the scholarly study of popular music, television, in its various global, historical, and industrial manifestations, has a bad reputation. For example, in a 2002 Popular Music article, Simon Frith, after documenting rock music's debt to British television for spreading and popularizing it, determines that 'TV, for all its influence on rock performance, was never really part of its culture.' (Frith 2002, p. 288) That academic critics and journalists believe this to be true is indicated by the scant amount of engaging and potentially productive work about the combination of the two media and their industries.1 This critical lacuna may just speak to the newness of the discipline of popular music studies, although I fear that it emanates from the effect of the ideology of authenticity that, like it or not, continues to inform scholarship in the field.The study of popular music on television now faces challenges from another front, as what media historian Michele Hilmes describes as the 'always emerging, never emerged' field of sound studies may have finally surfaced (Hilmes 2005). Sound studies conferences, interest groups within larger scholarly organizations, and anthologies proliferate. This is a welcome development. Of concern is the possible submergence of the specificity and materiality of popular music under the more abstract notion of 'sound', and the potential development of a scholarly hierarchy in which film sound will once again trump television sound. In this scenario, it is possible if not likely that the study of popular music and television runs the risk of further marginalization. More optimistically, the institutionalization of sound studies could open the door for greater legitimization of popular music as an object of study within and through fields that study visual culture in all of its incarnations, including television, film, and new media. It could also, as will be discussed toward the conclusion, solidify popular music's status as media.The nature of audience engagement with both television and music is changing, as both are at the same time more portable and bigger than ever. Television viewing is no longer an 'event' that requires participation and attention at a particular time in a particular place. Digital technology makes television programming mobile and frees it more than ever from synchronous time. As television hardware and transmission technology advances, so does its sound quality. Devices such as the iPod miniaturize video programming as well as music, and store them both on the same piece of hardware that governs their use and access with the same metaphors (e.g. playlists). Concurrently, television is more an event than ever, and sound is very much invited to the party. High-definition television technology spawns high-definition sound technology, and both meet at the 50 LCD or plasma screen connected to a state of the art surroundsound system, all in the comfort of one's home. New media, which I interpret to mean digital or digitally-enhanced technologies, therefore threaten to render the boundary between popular music and television meaningless. The time is right to approach the study of music and television with fresh ideas and without ideological baggage. Changing the terms of analysis is a move in the right direction.For example, much qualitative research about the intersection of popular music and television focuses upon music video or music television, or uses them as reference points. Often this leads to work that is the scholarly equivalent of comparing apples to oranges by de-historicizing both popular music and television in the service of making them conform to a current model of their relationship.2 Music video usually refers to what are essentially commercials for new radio-friendly releases by bands signed to major labels. Music television refers to the cable television networks that (used to) air these commercials, but the two terms are often used interchangeably. …