I’ve been writing a lot
about how the logic of biopolitical neoliberalism manifests in musical
practices. For example, here is post about the contrast between classically
liberal tonal harmony and contemporary EDM-influenced pop structures. I want to
pick up where I ended this post. I said:
Foucault’s neoliberal subject “is never called upon
to relinquish his interest” (BOB 275); instead, he ought to “directly multiply”
it “without any transcendence” (ibid) or telos. This subject is not regulated
by prohibitions (which require renunciation and domestication of desire), but
by “the principle of maximum/minimum” (Foucault BOB 17). This subject tries to
keep his experiences “at the border between the too much and the to little, between the maximum and the minimum
fixed for me by the nature of things” (Foucault BOB 19). The minimum is a
valley, the maximum, a peak; once I hit either of these, I change course,
cycling back to the alternate limit.
If,
as I argued there, neoliberalism creates tension by building rhythmic and
timbral intensity toward an upper limit or asymptote, then it frames musical,
aesthetic, and other pleasure as a matter of “pushing it to the limit,” as the
cliché goes. Jeffery Nealon calls this “the logic of intensity.” Stuck between
a predefined maximum and minimum (amplitude, frequency), “in a world that
contains no ‘new’ territory—no new experiences, no new markets—any system that
seeks to expand must by definition intensify its existing resources,
modulate them in some way” (Nealon 82).[i]
To modulate a relationship means to “speed it up or slow it down” (Nealon
82)—i.e., to push it to the minimum or maximum threshold. This modulation is
both how neoliberal power enforces itself, and how it might be subverted. There
is nothing inherently hegemonic or counter-hegemonic about the form or logic itself; the political effects depend on a
number of factors, and are often mixed anyway. Here I want to think about how
this form or logic manifests in contemporary music, especially at the level of
compositional form, and how contemporary music might suggest counter-hegemonic
uses of this logic—sort of meta-modulations that don’t just work on the effects
of a specific manifestation of the logic of intensity, but that modulate the
logic itself.
To
that end, I examine two Taio Cruz songs: one, because it literalizes this
musical structure in its lyrical content (and thus might clarify some things
for the less musically literate among us), and the other because it might
indicate one tactic for subverting the logic of neoliberal/biopolitical power.
In other words, it might be an example of how to use this logic in
counter-hegemonic ways; even though it doesn’t meta-modulate the song’s logic,
it suggests one way we might go about such a meta-modulation.
Push It
Tonal
harmony and classical liberalism are both conquest narratives: they’re about
“eating the other,” the overcoming of difference and its assimilation to a more
firmly and resolutely centered identity/subject. Conquest involves overwhelming
the border between the proper and the foreign, and resistance involves
disobeying the prohibitions that keep you on the margins, questioning your
constitutive exclusion (or abjection) from the political. In the neoliberal
logic of intensity, however, “you are offered experiences for doing work on
yourself rather than opportunities for confronting, overcoming, or otherwise
consuming some ‘other’” (Nealon 82). It’s not a matter of flouting, breaking,
or crossing boundaries, but of mining the resources you already have. You push
yourself to your utmost limit: you try to be as efficient, as smart, as
wealthy, as healthy, as happy, etc. Or, as Taio Cruz says in his song
“Troublemaker,” you have to “put that thing on full throttle” and “do it all
for the now.”
The
lyrical content of this song talks about the logic of intensity: like the
production of the track, it’s about maximalism. As the lyrics in the bridge
say, “Let’s take it to the top/push it to the limit.”
The
bridge, beginning around 2:22, also demonstrates the logic of intensity at a
musical level.
2:22-2:25 First
iteration of the phrase
2:25-2:29 Second
iteration of the phrase
2:30-2:33 Second
half of phrase (“to the limit) is repeated double time: “to the limit/to the
limit/to the limit/limit/limit/limit”
2:34-2:36 Silence
2:36 Return
to chorus
2:50-2:54 If
you listen to the snare part here, it also exponentializes in rhythmic intensity to effect a build-to-climax.
So,
instead of creating forward motion and musical excitement by conquering
secondary key areas (as in the Clarkson song I discuss in the post I cited
above), this song creates musical interest by dividing the measure into
increasingly smaller rhythmic fractions: first there’s “take it to the top,
push it to the limit,” then there’s “to the limit,” then there’s “limit”. The
snare part at 2:50 does the same sort of rhythmic subdivision. The number of
repetitions is increased, as though it were being driven to the point at which
our ears could no longer perceive any separation between rhythmic events (sort
of like how we see images projected at a rate of about 24 frames per second as
a continuous moving image). Instead of crossing this asymptote, the song drops
out entirely into a measure of (more or less) silence. Then we return back the
regularly programmed schedule of peaks and valleys. This is the normal, regular
use of the logic of intensity, the one neoliberalism uses to maintain specific
intensities of life for specific groups.
In
the next section, I discuss how another of Taio Cruz’s songs might suggest
irregular uses of the logic of intensity.
Hangover
At
the level of musical organization, this song is a pretty regular example of the
logic of intensity.[ii] However, at the level of lyrical
content it suggests a metaphor for meta-modulating the logic of intensity. A
hangover is the effect of pushing oneself beyond one’s limits: too much
alcohol, too fast, not enough water, etc. It’s evidence that one was too
intense in one’s drinking and partying. Being strung out or burnt out might
be additional versions of this same general metaphor. You are hungover because
you were immoderately intense. Because you are hungover, you cannot be
intense enough today—you’re not as productive at work, or even at having fun,
as you could be, because you are stuck with a headache, or nausea, or worse. A
hangover is where last night’s excessive intensity impedes your ability to
maximize the intensity of whatever you do today. In a way, hangover is like
sonic feedback, where past sounds return to effect and distort the current
process of sound-making.
Hangovers
suck. This is another reason they are, I think, a productive example of
subverting or meta-modulating the neoliberal logic of intensity. It’s not like
this subversion liberates you, makes you feel better, more free, more
empowered, or whatever. Actually, it’s a huge pain in the ass (or head, or
stomach, etc.). This meta-modulation comes at a cost, and it may not be the
case that this cost is sustainable; it may even be counter-productive for
counter-hegemonic work. So the most effective strategies for subverting
hegemonic logics of intensity may not actually involve the explicit crossing of
a limit/asymptote. It may be about combining a number of regular signals (that
stay within the defined min and max) so they interact in irregular ways. (I’ve
referred to this before as “crossing the streams”).
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