All this discussion of post-modernity and appropriation of style on ‘The Grain’ recently[1] has left me thinking about the ‘authenticity’, to use a musicological buzzword, of such musical practises. The criticism often levelled at post-modernity is that too often it appropriates style without concerning itself with content – or context. Thus we lambaste artists who seem to quick to jump on the latest stylistic bandwagon. Case in point, the recent 80’s pop revival for taking the sound but leaving the meaning. The reason being that we take it as read that the meaning of music stems from the context (social, economic, historical) of the musician, and that this inevitably shapes and creates the sound. To take the one without the other leads, all too often, to pastiche – that most wretched of musical traits. On the other hand, as AN demonstrates in the Beastie Boys essay, when genre styles are appropriated into a meaningful context, when they are not just taken on fashionable, but on representational, aesthetical considerations, then the ‘old’ can be re-told and re-evaluated as something contemporary and valid. In addressing this well documented subject, I’d like to step outside of the Anglo-American dialogue, and talk about a band who I have become very interested in of late; Porno Para Ricardo.
Right – introductions. Porno Para Ricardo (PPR) are a Spanish – language, hardcore punk band from Cuba. Formed in the late 90’s, they have become prolific since the mid-noughties, releasing several albums on a self-run record label. Ok, a hardcore punk band from Cuba – as niches go, this one is fairly… well, niche – but bear with me. For PPR have seemingly committed wholesale appropriation (genre robbery, if you like) of a totally alien style in hardcore punk. They have taken 80’s New York and transplanted it into contemporary Havana. It is interesting to note perhaps that NY-Havana was a particularly busy cultural tramline that fed both cities (Salsa, Latin Jazz, Afro-Cuban styles, Bolero all owe their origin to this inter-city dialogue). It has since been artificially (and, some would suggest, superficially) closed by political forces. But this aggressive re-opening by PPR is just part of the significant re-contextualisation of style to create a new, politically motivated, meaning. PPR have taken the punk aesthetic on board firstly because it speaks to them both politically and aesthetically and secondly because they can re-mould it – play with the nuances, tinker with the conventions, fine-tune the sentiments – to speak for them and their unique situation. Is this post-modern? I don’t know. But it’s what post modern and the appropriation of the past should be.
Let’s get down to brass tack then. How have PPR taken the punk aesthetic and fit it to their message? To address this, we need to examine (briefly) Cuba’s political situation. Looming like an ominous cloud over Cuba’s creative output (still) is the issue of oppression and political censorship. Perhaps the most liberal (or apologist, depending on your view) thing one might say of the Castro regime’s view of ‘foreign’ (read American; or ‘imperialist’ again, depending on your view) cultural materials is that they treat them with suspicion. In fact this isn’t even true – up until recently, all ‘imperialist’ material was outright banned! Listening to ‘The Beatles’ would get you thrown out of University, for example. Since the fall of Communism in the USSR, the cultural strangle hold has lessened to a certain degree, but it is still far from ‘free speech’. This concept of the politically (and culturally) oppressive, institutional, conservative, totalitarian government, and the push against it is a central spine of the punk aesthetic and as such, would ring true (at least truer that many of the seemingly a-political ‘traditional’ Cuban styles) with disillusioned young men like PPR. I’d like to bring in a comparison here between PPR and New York’s ‘Reagan Youth’ – a band who PPR must site as a huge influence. ‘Reagan Youth’ voice a dissatisfaction with the regime through taking the symbology of the very regime they despised and subverting it – displaying the hated as ridiculous, thus stripping them of their power. This is a technique that PPR have similarly utilised. Thus, ‘Reagan Youth’ (their name alone a play on ‘Hitler Youth’ calling into question the morals of their hate figurehead) use images of the Ku Klux Klan to emphasise the destructive, hate-filled side of the Christian far right in America. PPR use Soviet and Cuban Communist imagery, subverting it with ridicule:
Reagan Youth’s 1984 album ‘Youth Anthems for the New Order’ and PPR’s 2002 ‘Rock para las Masas… (carnicas)’
Whilst seeing a picture of the hammer and sickle logo transformed into a penis may seem facile, puerile even, when placed in the context of the oppressive climate of Cuba, it is easily as provocative and controversial as ‘Reagan Youth’s’ pictures of the KKK. Interestingly, the two bands respective outlooks couldn’t be further removed. Reagan Youth were socialist, and songs such as ‘Jesus was a Communist’ would be (lyrically speaking) anathema to PPR. But it doesn’t matter. It is the sentiment of pushing against a (seemingly) immovable political force, which PPR have adopted and it is this that makes for a valid musical expression. There are other issues at play here with PPR’s ‘choice’ of a deliberately ‘alien’ musical form to express their message. The rejection of Cuba’s instantly recognisable musical style is probably as pertinent as the adoption of an equally recognisably American one – but that’s another story!
So, what am I getting at? I’m not sure really. I suppose I’m trying to say that appropriation of generic traits isn’t always a vapid, self-serving exercise; that elements of post-modernity can, and still do, have a cutting edge that can carve out the meaningful from the pre-existent. Maybe I’m just trying to promote a band that I love – and what better reason for writing can there be?
TA
[1] See GE’s review of Madonna’s album, and AN’s cracking series on the very subject.
The Grain 