Canadian Music and American Culture: Get Away From Me PDF
Preview Canadian Music and American Culture: Get Away From Me
Pop Music, Culture and Identity Series Editors Steve Clark Graduate School Humanities and Sociology University of Tokyo Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo, Japan Tristanne Connolly Department of English St Jerome’s University Waterloo, Ontario, Canada Jason Whittaker School of English & Journalism University of Lincoln Lincoln, Lincolnshire, United Kingdom Popmusiclasts.Aformalltoooftenassumedtobetransient,commercial and mass-cultural has proved itself durable, tenacious and continually evolving. As such, it has become a crucial component in defining various formsofidentity(individualandcollective)asinfluencedbynation,class, genderandhistoricalperiod.PopMusic,CultureandIdentityinvestigates howthisenhancedstatusshapestheiconographyofcelebrity,providesan ever-expanding archive for generational memory and accelerates the impactofnewtechnologiesonperforming,packagingandglobalmarket- ing. The series gives particular emphasis to interdisciplinary approaches that go beyond musicology and seeks to validate the informed testimony of thefan alongsideacademicmethodologies. More information aboutthisseries at http://www.springer.com/series/14537 TristanneConnolly(cid:129)TomoyukiIino Editors Canadian Music and American Culture Get Away From Me Editors TristanneConnolly TomoyukiIino DepartmentofEnglish DepartmentofEnglishLiterature StJerome’sUniversity SophiaUniversity Waterloo,Ontario,Canada Tokyo,Tokyo,Japan PopMusic,CultureandIdentity ISBN978-3-319-50022-5 ISBN978-3-319-50023-2(eBook) DOI10.1007/978-3-319-50023-2 LibraryofCongressControlNumber:2017941528 ©TheEditor(s)(ifapplicable)andTheAuthor(s)2017 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher,whetherthewholeorpartofthematerialisconcerned,specificallytherightsof translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval,electronicadaptation,computersoftware,orbysimilarordissimilarmethodology nowknownorhereafterdeveloped. Theuseofgeneraldescriptivenames,registerednames,trademarks,servicemarks,etc.inthis publicationdoesnotimply,evenintheabsenceofaspecificstatement,thatsuchnamesare exemptfromtherelevantprotectivelawsandregulationsandthereforefreeforgeneraluse. Thepublisher,theauthorsandtheeditorsaresafetoassumethattheadviceandinformation in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publishernortheauthorsortheeditorsgiveawarranty,expressorimplied,withrespectto thematerialcontainedhereinorforanyerrorsoromissionsthatmayhavebeenmade.The publisherremainsneutralwithregardtojurisdictionalclaimsinpublishedmapsandinstitutional affiliations. Coverillustration:Kim’sCabinbyKenRobinson(2016,acryliconcanvas) Printedonacid-freepaper ThisPalgraveMacmillanimprintispublishedbySpringerNature TheregisteredcompanyisSpringerInternationalPublishingAG Theregisteredcompanyaddressis:Gewerbestrasse11,6330Cham,Switzerland A CKNOWLEDGEMENTS The inception of this collection was a symposium (‘Get Away from Me’: CanadianPop MusicandAmericanCulture)at theInstituteofAmerican andCanadianStudiesatSophiaUniversity,Tokyo,on11June2011.The editors would like to thank the Institute – particularly Ms Mika Minoura andMsNaokoSuzukiwhowereinstrumentalinfinancingandorganizing the event – and everyone who participated. We are also grateful to St Jerome’s University in the University of Waterloo for research and travelsupport which aidedour collaboration. v C ONTENTS 1 Introduction:‘Get Away FromMe’: Anglo-Canadian Music andthe Globalizationof American Culture 1 Tristanne Connolly 2 ‘Something’sLost butSomething’sGained’: JoniMitchell and PostcolonialLyric 27 SteveClark 3 The View fromOutside: The BandSing America 47 TheodoreGoossen 4 Neil Young: SomeComplexities inHisSongs 61 HidetoshiTomiyama 5 ‘The UsualPanic inRed, White andBlue’: Bruce Cockburn’sAmerica 77 KevinHutchings 6 ‘Mean, Mean Pride’: Rush’s Critique ofAmerican Cool 97 Tristanne Connolly 7 The Max Webster Transfusion:A Little (Canadian)Blood for America’s Veins 121 MarkSpielmacher vii viii CONTENTS 8 ‘Outside Looking In’: Saga’sProgressiveProtest 145 DaveTaylor 9 Tactical Electronic Bodies:NoiseandMutation in Canadian IndustrialMusic 169 JasonWhittaker 10 Peace, Order andtheir Discontents: The Tragically Hip 185 C.E. J. Simons 11 ‘IfICanMakeitThere...’:JannArden’sAmericanDream 217 VeronicaJ. Austen 12 ‘Stick it tothe Pimp’: Peaches’ Penetrationof Postmodern America’sMainstream 241 AngusWhitehead Works Cited 269 Index 293 CHAPTER1 ‘ ’ Introduction: Get Away From Me : Anglo-Canadian Music and the Globalization of American Culture Tristanne Connolly This collection of essays examines the ways anglo-Canadian music, from the1960stothepresent,commentsonAmericancultureandpolitics,and onthehistoricalandongoingrelationshipbetweenthetwocountries.We explorehowCanadianmusicians’careers,theirpublicpersonae,andtheir relation to their fans, bring out, from their particular perspective of navigating fame and creativity in a US-dominated marketplace, the fasci- nating complexities of the relationship between Canada and its powerful neighbour. We consider Canadian music in both its indebtedness to and itscreativetransformationsofAmericanmusicaltraditions,andweponder the place of Canadian music in the North American and global scene. Writing about Canadian music has largely been by Canadians for Canadians, while globally, Canadian music (and Canadian identity alto- gether) is often subsumed in a rather undifferentiated (North) American I would like to thank Steve Clark, David Taylor and Ken Robinson for their valuableadviceonelementsofthisIntroducion. T.Connolly(*) DepartmentofEnglish,StJerome’sUniversityintheUniversityofWaterloo, Waterloo,Ontario,Canada ©TheAuthor(s)2017 1 T.Connolly,T.Iino(eds.),CanadianMusicandAmericanCulture, PopMusic,CultureandIdentity,DOI10.1007/978-3-319-50023-2_1 2 T.CONNOLLY culture.Thecollection,thus,offersinsightsnotonlyintoCanadianmusic and American culture, but into the cultural siblinghood of two nations, interdependent from early in their histories, yet always with subtle and crucial differences: a relation of interest in itself, and also for its illumina- tionof the dynamicsof globalizedculture. During the time period when much of the music considered here was created, Canadian cultural identity was a great preoccupation, largely for its perceived nonexistence. Northrop Frye famously summed up the pro- blemasaquestion,‘Whereishere?’(‘Conclusion’346).Spurredpartlyby the 1967 centennial of Confederation, the origination of Canada as a federally united country in 1867, concentrated efforts were made by Canadian writers, artists and performers, as well as the Canadian govern- ment, to develop a national mythology. The agonizing over lack of identity,andthecreationofone,wasoftendoneinrelationtotheempires whichplaced(post)colonialCanadainthisposition:Britain,asthehistor- ical colonial centre, and the United States, as the inheritor of imperial power. Canada, therefore, is an intimately involved but often overlooked partyintherelationbetweentheUSandtheUK,includingtheculturally momentous musical interchange that produced the British Invasion and reverberated through most of the rest of the world in roughly the same timeperiod, whenit wasasif the sun neverset onrock‘n’ roll. Sincethepostcolonialdebatesofthe1980sand90s,Canada’sidentity is less often beheld as a problem: it is either considered to have been successfully established, or its indefiniteness and hybridity have turned from discomforts to advantages. Yet postcolonial perspectives should also indicatethatidentityneverceasestobeaproblem,andthattherelationsof othercountrieswiththeUnitedStatesasa (cultural) superpowerremaina pressinginterest.Inparticular,theeffectsofAmericanmediaasadominant presence outside its borders, and of US-based multinationals playing a significantroleintherecordingindustry,arelongfamiliarontheCanadian scene. The detriments and benefits of proximity to the American culture machine are highlighted in the case of Canadian music. There are the protectiveCanadianContentlaws(requiringacertainamountofbroadcast timebegiven tocontent atleast partlymadebyCanadians);and thereare producers like Bob Ezrin and Daniel Lanois, and promoters like Arthur FogelofLiveNation,whohavebecomegiantsintheAmericanindustry. Canada, with its long-standing, close and fraught relationship to the UnitedStates,servesasaunique,yetrepresentative,casestudyfortheglobal repercussions of the American-ness of pop music. Rock ‘n’ roll is an
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