Sonic City

I've long had a deep interest in popular music, as many of you know.  Someday, I plan to write a book on its role and impact in the 20th and 21st centuries. In my view, music is a fruit fly industry from which we can learn a great deal about the nature of organization, location, technological change and many other factors that shape creative, technology based industries. In any event, here is my first real research foray into the area. It's a paper with George Mason doctoral student Scott Jackson.  Enjoy. And do comment.

Comments

[Michael Wells]

Great study. I did a little fun with maps, comparing the music concentrations with your Where the Brains Are study of college graduates. Without doing a detailed analysis, it looks like a close correlation -- West of the Mississippi. East of the Mississippi, there's a better correlation with Kevin's Creative Class Heat Map. The heat map didn't make any sense to me before, but maybe its influenced in the South by musicians and artisans?

And what's with that little New Mexico county on page 31?

[Bert Sperling]

The paper asks -
...The question to ask is (regarding Jack White's recent move): why Nashville?
One line of reasoning says costs. Perhaps Nashville is less expensive to live and to work. Or maybe the answer might lie in what geographers and social scientists identify as a more general shift of population and ecoomic activity to the Sunbelt. Or perhaps Nashville offered the combined benefits a better overall professional environment for making and selling music. Indeed, White himself had gotten familiar with Nashville’s musical talent pool and infrastructure when he produced and performed on country-legend, Loretta Lynn’s highly regarded Van Lear Rose album recorded in Nashville drawing on talent from the region. Or there may well be other reasons.
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Maybe, perhaps, whatever.
Last I heard, Jack is still alive and kicking it.
Anybody pick up a phone and give him a call?

Here's part of an interview he did with a website, the A.V. Club. (JL and BB are fellow bandmembers)...

AVC: You're all living in Nashville now—was moving there a band decision?

JW: No—we all trickled down there one by one somehow.

BB: It's definitely convenient, but for me, there were bigger things at play. I really didn't like where I was living. I got robbed a couple times. I was visiting Jack down in Nashville quite a bit, and I really started to like it. Sort of fell in love with it—

JW: Neither of us could function in the Detroit music scene any more. It was just not healthy.

BB: The music or any other scene. It's really negative in so many ways.

AVC: So are you guys gone for good? JW: Oh yeah. Because of our involvement, even The Greenhornes' involvement in the Detroit garage-rock scene—or whatever you want to call it—I don't think we want to be involved in any more scenes ever again. We've had that experience, and it was a good one, and we've learned a lot from it, and I don't have any need to join into that ever again. It's too counterproductive to writing music and performing to the best of your abilities. It's okay when you're 20 years old—you're getting out there and you're learning—but not when you're 30 years old.

AVC: And Nashville is giving you that freedom?

JW: I'm extremely anti-hipster now, and I really hate the thought of it, being surrounding by them, and Nashville definitely is not in that neighborhood of their relation to music. In Nashville, those people want to sell songs, and they want to make hit records, and I don't see anything wrong with that. I'm so tired of playing the cool game with all those people, and just trying to go and have lunch and having to play that cool game with everybody, about what you're supposed to do, what's cool and what's not. It's a fucking minefield, you know? [Laughs.] You can't keep up. It's not healthy to write music that way, and I'd rather be in a town where they want to write hits.

BB: That's just not a nurturing environment. As an artist, I think it's really important to surround yourself with other artists—

JW: In Nashville, self-sabotage is not on the menu, and in hipster culture, self-sabotage is definitely one of the entrées.

JL: And that stuff is a virus, too—it's easy to hate something.
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Interesting stuff, and insightful.
Regarding Nashville, I know lots of great country musicians have left decent gigs in Nashville because of the stifling emphasis on over-processed pop pablum.
They'd rather sacrifice financial security for an environment like Austin which puts a premium on musicianship and creativity rather than putting out 'nice' music for the masses.

[Bert Sperling]

Michael,
Looks like Roosevelt County, NM - population 18,300 and home to no significant city (Portales, Pep, Dora, Floyd?).
I sometimes find the Census data regarding counts of professions and business establishments to be, well, mystifying and inexplicable.
This may be one of those cases.

[RF]

Bert - Thanks for that interview. The new book quotes White, from another source, something that to effect. Boy, I also hate to hear that about Detroit, but so it goes. Scenes especially those in communities like Detroit can get so inbred. Austin is great. But I've come to conclude that Toronto may be even better. Even though Toronto doesn't promote it, the talent cluster here is unbelievable. Here's one for you. I did an event yesterday in Niagara-on-the-Lake. At lunch we had Ron Sexsmith perform. It was mind-blowing. Leslie Feist, Broken Social Scene, Ron Sexsmith, Sarah Harmer from Kingston ... I could go on and on. But it is talent cluster second to none. Plus, it's even closer to Detroit. Of course, one line is telling and I think helps understand White's move. There are three major commercial centers for music. NY, LA and Nashville. "I'd rather be in a town where they want to write hits." With Nashville's talent base and professionalism, that says it all.

[RF]

Michael - Our next paper is going to look at just these factors. Kevin Stolarick and Charlotta Mellander are doing the analysis now. So big giant thank you!

[Michael Wells]

Bert,

Maybe the aliens from Roswell get together with off-season trippers down from Burning Man and jam.

[Jason Rentfrow]

Richard and Scott, very interesting paper. While reading it, I couldn't help but think about the variables that contribute to the growth and success of burgeoning music scenes. I agree that college towns are important places for new music scenes, but another variable that strikes me as potentially more important is the availability of service jobs. Having lived in Austin, I know that the majority of people who work at the local cafes, clubs, bars, bookstores, music shops, and video stores are in bands. The flexible work schedules and minimal responsibilities that service jobs afford make it easy for aspiring musicians to pursue their dreams. Just a thought…

[Michael Wells]

Jason,

Yes, and the flip side is that in creative class/music cities you get good service in cafes, restaurants, etc. The artists working restaurant jobs have a sense that they're supporting something and an idea of what quality service is. In book, music, video stores they know the merchandise. I notice that in rural resorts, restaurants, hotels, etc. the service is generally mediocre even if the owners are trying for upscale. The locals often would rather be in working class jobs in the woods, fields or mines and see service work as a step down.

[RF]

Jason and Michael - AGREED. This is the next step in the project. In fact, we already have some simple factor/ cluster analysis which distill scene types. I agree wholeheartedly. After I wrote Rise, a critic wrote in the Austin City paper that what really drives Austin's creative economy is the availability of high-paying low stress service jobs like at Whole Foods.

[David in Nashville]

Just a comment or two on what makes Nashville work. It really is an *industry* town, and the emphasis on "product" can turn a lot of creative types off. But the industrial character of the place also allows Nashville the chance to offer musicians something other places can't: actual music jobs. Since session work is basically part-time, one needn't sell one's soul to do it; quite a few bluegrass musicians, for instance, find session work to be good supplemental income to their [poorly compensated] touring and recording takes. I have indie musician friends here who like it just fine, because there are so many good people to play off of, and because it's possible to keep the suits at arm's length.

The availability of session work also helps a genre not normally associated with Nashville: classical music. The Nashville Symphony has surged to national prominence in recent years, with a slew of highly regarded recordings of contemporary American music and a near-sweep of this year's classical Grammies. Part of this has to do with a snazzy new concert hall, part of it with its recording contract with the highly-regarded Naxos label [a story in itself: Naxos North America is headed by an old Nashville music-industry hand, who after a disastrous experience in New Jersey opted to move the label to the Nashville 'burbs]. But a lot of it has to do with the NSO's ability to attract top-drawer musicians with the promise of access to session work. The agglomeration effect works the other way as well. Nashville has *another* fine ensemble, the Nashville Chamber Orchestra, which has made a mark with its innovative, genre-crossing programming and has also issued enthusiastically-reviewed recordings; the NCO is staffed with moonlighting session musicians.