Remixing and Convergence Culture

Finding an outside topic to write about for this blog was pretty easy for me because there was one topic from this quarter that has stood out to me and that is remix culture. I am a big fan of the many different genres of music that remixing has produced and I have even attempted to make my own mashup songs on remixing software (albeit not many were very good). The critiques of remix culture that we discussed in class (intellectual property arguments) do not outweigh the pros of this culture. Someone in class mentioned that through remixing different genres of music, an outsider could be introduced to a different genre of music (i.e. hip hop mashed-up with dubstep). I have been personally affected by remixes in this way. When I first heard dubstep I thought of it as loud noises mixed with an intense bass, but after I heard some dubstep hip-hop remixes by my favorite dubstep artist, Rusko, I began to like all kinds of dubstep music.

Before watching "RIP!: A Remix Manifesto" I gave absolutely no credit to the producers of mashups and I assumed that it was fairly simple to mix samples of different songs together(even though I'm no good at it), but I was very wrong! I couldn't keep up with any of the procedure GirlTalk was demonstrating on the documentary, and it seems like one has to have an ear for mixing the different beats together. After seeing how talented one actually has to be to produce good mashups, I am enraged that people out there do not consider mashup artists to be musicians. For my presentation in class I showed a video of a guy playing 32 songs in 8 minutes because I thought of it as an acoustic mashup. If someone wants to argue that fading between different songs the way he did does not require talent, then I’m all ears.

This entire year we have been talking about convergence culture and the impact technology is having on remixing old and new forms of media. Another key aspect of the technological age we are living in is participatory culture, and what better describes participatory culture than mashups? If we aren't blessed with a great voice or the hand-eye coordination necessary to play an instrument then there should be another way for the average music consumer to participate in music. That way is through remixing! If the individual wants to put out free mashups for the world to hear or download he/she shouldn't have to pay an outrageous amount of money to record companies in order to do it. Our generation is defined by remixing songs, books, movies etc. from already existing media, and soon intellectual property laws will have to be amended to take this into account while also protecting some of the rights artists have to the “original” music they produce. The battle between these two sides will be an interesting one, and hopefully the final result will be beneficial to mashup artists and “original” artists.