Have I the right? Legitimacy, authenticity and community in folk's politics

Abstract

In the last few years, in Britain, one of pop's cycles has turned again and folk has come back into fashion. It can be seen in the success of the Pogues, in the reformation of Fairport Convention, in the revamping of the magazine Folk Roots, in the content of Andy Kershaw's Radio One show, and perhaps most dramatically in the celebration of ‘world music’. The revival of folk entails more than a revival of old names and sounds, it also contains a redefinition of the idea of ‘folk’ itself. This shift takes its clearest form in Folk Roots where the editor, Ian Anderson, displays equal enthusiasm for examples of almost every musical genre, from country to pop to ‘world music’ to traditional folk to soul to ‘roots rock’ (Ry Cooder, The Bhundu Boys, Kathryn Tickell, Paul Simon and the Voix Bulgares are all included). Folk no longer means ‘beards and Fair Isle jumpers’; it includes punk-influenced groups like the Mekons who see folk as an approach in which ‘the ineptitude of the playing becomes stylised and eventually becomes part of the music’ (Hurst 1986, p. 17). The musical eclecticism is linked by an underlying theory of the way good music is identified.