market strategy

i hate to beat a dead horse, here. i know this is something i've talked about extensively in the past, but it's so true and it's something i think about with great frequency. compelling art--great art--is about sucking the listener, the viewer, the reader, etc. into your own little world. it's almost entirely mythology--creating an entire universe that follows its own logic, its own set of rules, has its own feel, its own essential qualities.

a lot of times i'll hear a band and think: wow. these guys are really good. but they just don't have it--they don't have that all-elusive it factor that draws people in, that keeps people interested--that seemingly inexplicable quality that turns separates the important from the expendable. and i'm pretty sure what i mean by that is that they don't have that mythology--that idiosyncratic pull.

nirvana was a great band because they had that mythology. you know a nirvana song when you hear it. you've heard other songs that sound like nirvana songs but you'll always know the original when you hear it. they created their own little world--defined the seattle sound so that when people think of "grunge" they think of nirvana. they think of kurt cobain--the quintessential tormented artist--his cardigan--his addiction to heroin--his eventual suicide--all of these things add up to the nirvana mythology. they make the band stick out from the rest of the seattle musicians and subsequent imitators, so that they're able to stand entirely on their own.

the same can be said for any number of bands or artists i like. radiohead. the arcade fire. pixies. sigur ros. they all have that thing that people can point to and say (or perhaps not say because they don't think they can find the words): yeah, that's a sigur ros song. that sounds like radiohead. or: that is soooo the arcade fire. and this is ultimately what sets these bands apart from the pack. why it's so easy to get lost in the world of in the aeroplane over the sea vs. a spot-on imitation of neutral milk hotel. it's not just that these bands are innovators or that they're completely original. for one, i don't think that is entirely true. everything is derivative, in one way or another. these bands were just able to take different elements and reconfigure them into one exploitable and very definite sound or image.

at times, i think this is gimmicky or one-dimensional. but then--i'm not entirely convinced this is a bad thing. i mean, that's what people naturally gravitate towards--things they find accessible, relatable, easy to pinpoint. so why shouldn't art be the same way? it's nice when things make sense. when things come in a neat little package. the illusion of order is so damned alluring. it doesn't have to be shallow, necessarily. there's always something deeper under the surface, but it's nice to have an attractive exterior to barrel through. i'd say both are vital to any great piece of art. you need depth but the appearance, no matter how deceiving, of organization is also important. it's like the ideal person: relatively smart, relatively attractive. brains and beauty. a good balance of both.