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Folk - a target for comedians
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Subject: Folk - a target for comedians From: Ian Fyvie Date: 14 Aug 11 - 03:25 PM A conributor raised this in a recent thread: Folk - how do you relate to it? Look back to when common currency for comedians were racist and homophobic jolkes. As humour based on these are now illegal, and unacceptable to all but a rump of racists / homophobes; they are now rare. But humour trades on riducule is still alive and kicking. They simply change their targets to groups who are not protected by any law. Examples? Trainspotters, anoraks (more general enthusiasts for an 'uncool' area of interest or study); Real Ale drinkers, Morris Dancers and of course FOLK singers. Similarly trendy it seems, is having a go at budget supermakets like Lidl and Aldi (UK ref) "Where the poor people go" ie: anyone who is 'right on' would obviously pay higher prices at big name supermarkets - so as not to brush with poor people perhaps? I buy nearly all of my food at Lidl or the Co-op. What would the trendy comedians make of a trainspotting Real Ale drinking folk singer who does this? Ask him in the wine bar where he's drinking the ltest Bubblfizz punterlager and listening to the 'Sounds' music industry is telling him are the gretest yet. Ian Fyvie The reasons, we can debate |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Ian Fyvie Date: 14 Aug 11 - 03:28 PM Apols for spelling mistakes etc above. Should have gone to.... |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Richard Bridge Date: 14 Aug 11 - 03:29 PM £ |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: TheSnail Date: 14 Aug 11 - 03:38 PM "Ask him in the wine bar where he's drinking the ltest Bubblfizz punterlager and listening to the 'Sounds' music industry is telling him are the gretest yet." Aren't you doing exactly the same there? |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: saulgoldie Date: 14 Aug 11 - 03:57 PM I dunno. Perhaps I don't have the right attitude. But one of the songs on my "learn this" list is "We Are The Folk Song Army" (...each and every one of us__cares....) by Tom Lehrer. I enthusiastically endorse the activist record of folk music and its practitioners. Yet, it is kinda funny. Why not laugh a little? Saul |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: GUEST,BobL Date: 14 Aug 11 - 04:05 PM Seems to me the folk world has never been short of its own brand of comedian to hit back with, e.g. - Sid Kipper - Les Barker - the late Fred Wedlock Further suggestions welcome! |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Jack the Sailor Date: 14 Aug 11 - 04:23 PM Smothers Brothers? |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: VirginiaTam Date: 14 Aug 11 - 04:24 PM anyone who is 'right on' would obviously pay higher prices at big name supermarkets - so as not to brush with poor people perhaps? Whoever thinks that certainly hasn't been shopping at our nearest Waitrose where I have been repeatedly rammed into from every direction by teen mothers with push chairs. I see all kinds in Aldi. Most laughable experience in Food Lion (think Lidl) where two well dressed women, apparently acquaintances bumped into each other and immediately started making excuses for shopping in Food Lion when they always only ever shop at Giant or Fresh Fields (think Marks and Spencers). I could not help laughing out loud at the blatant pretension. I think anything and anyone is ripe for ridicule given the circumstances. Based on the number of young people full on participating in the folk music scene at Sidmouth a couple of weeks ago, a little ribbing won't do the genre too much damage. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Tootler Date: 14 Aug 11 - 04:45 PM It's quite well known in Middlesbrough that many of the well-to-do descend on Lidl just before Christmas to buy their continental [European] specialities because not only do they have the real thing, but also at prices much lower than the fancy deli's for similar quality products. As a steam train loving folkie, I couldn't give a damn. If the comedians want to get cheap laughs out of us, let them. Cheap laughs at the expense of any group doesn't say much for their ability as comedians. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Gurney Date: 14 Aug 11 - 04:58 PM I just do what other 'picked-on' people have done before me; tell the jokes first. I do think they are often funny, if tongue-in-cheek. Ian, might I suggest you take up birdwatching and nudism next? Of course, in England, eccentricity may still attract a little less ridicule than elsewhere. It certainly used to, once. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Big Al Whittle Date: 14 Aug 11 - 05:19 PM sounds to me like something specific has upset you. Its not nice to have something that you value, disrespected. there are some people who think my sort of music doesn't even have the right to regard itself as folk music. I think those people are are a bit pitiable. They can only define themselves by negativity. I think if you feel there is real malevolence behind what you see as an attack on your values - speak up. It will upset some folks - but sod 'em. You've got a right to live by your own values. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Hovering Bob Date: 14 Aug 11 - 05:20 PM I find the fact that 'folk' in all its forms is the butt of so called trendy comedians to be a great sadness. We have an incredible folk heritage that deserves to be revered and appreciated not ridiculed and demeaned. I had the privilege and honour to represent the UK at both European and World Folklore festivals as a member of "Dorset Folk Dancers." At the first European Folklore festival we danced on a mountain top in Portugal in front of a live audience of over seven thousands. The concert which was televised live across the whole of Europe was taken by every country in Eurovision - except the UK. We don't deserve the rich folk heritage we have. Thank goodness there is a dedicated band of enthusiasts that protect and promote it. It was also a salutary discovery to find that after performing in front of an estimated audience of 250 million on the Sunday, back home in England on the Wednesday, we 'danced out' at a Dorset pub to a 'crowd' consisting, literally of two men and a dog. I just wish there were some way to reflect the denigration back at the comic perpetrators, but then, I've always been a dreamer. BobH |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 14 Aug 11 - 05:32 PM I wouldn't worry about it. There's not a stand-up "comedian" in the business who is on the same planet as Les Barker. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: GUEST,999 Date: 14 Aug 11 - 05:39 PM "What would the trendy comedians make of a trainspotting Real Ale drinking folk singer who does this?" I ain't no comedian, but first thing that came to my mind was "You'll have to decide which you want to do." See? I said I was no comedian. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: GUEST,999 Date: 14 Aug 11 - 05:41 PM "Ian, might I suggest you take up birdwatching and nudism next?" He'll have to. Ducks, turkeys and chickens love--well, you know. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Richard Bridge Date: 14 Aug 11 - 05:42 PM Your music is excellent Al - but it ain't "folk". Why do you want to call it that? |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Richard Bridge Date: 14 Aug 11 - 05:44 PM PS - although my band does mostly traddish stuff we are looking for something funny-ish adn USAian-ish. If we can get it off would you mind if we did "Buster the line-dancing dog"? |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: GUEST,999 Date: 14 Aug 11 - 05:53 PM "there are some people who think my sort of music doesn't even have the right to regard itself as folk music" The answer that poped into my head has to do with a story (untrue but purported to be true and believed by lots of people including me) about WC Fields on his deathbed. A close friend (Lionel B) was in with him and Fields said, in that Fields voice, "Lionel, when I think about the dogs and orphans I have snapped at, the children I've been mean to, well, Lionel, I'm sorry. Fields' head dropped to the pillow and he exhaled deeply and no air could be heard reentering, Mr Barrymore began to leave the room. As he was about to exit, he heard WC behind him say, "Lionel, on second thought, fuck 'em!" Whereupon WC Fields did expire. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Big Al Whittle Date: 14 Aug 11 - 06:16 PM My version of buster won the Lancashire Dialect Cup at Fylde won year. My version isn't USA is. I'll record you the present version - and send the words if you PM me your address. Its not USA -ish, I'm afraid. I think I do folk music. That's my opinion. Based on nearly a lifetime of careful observation. That's what I'm going to call it. Its clear in my mind, Richard. I'm an old man Richard, don't confuse me. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Will Fly Date: 14 Aug 11 - 06:23 PM To be honest, I've never heard any comedians really ridicule folk music to any extent that matters. To be sure, there have been parodies of folk singers and folk singing through the years, from the Two Ronnies to Reeves & Mortimer. But I don't think any of it sticks. And if it does, so what? There will always be someone who takes the piss out of what you do, or dislikes what you do, no matter what kind of music you make, simply because everyone has different tastes - and you can't please all the people all the time. Who gives a toss? I've never let it bother me in all the years I've been playing, and I don't intend to start now. As the great Fields (may have) said, "Fuck 'em!" |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Ian Fyvie Date: 18 Aug 11 - 03:28 PM We're all a bunch of resillient folkies. My concern is media trendies sublimimally dictate what is acceptable to be in to. Many youngsters would thoroughly enjoy our folk heritage if it were a credible option. These trendies (*perhaps not that trendy as they've been knocking things culturally grass roots English for years) are deciding that Folk is non cred. And what is cred? Probably something Corporate. Ian F |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Richard Bridge Date: 18 Aug 11 - 04:01 PM What he said |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Don(Wyziwyg)T Date: 17 Aug 11 - 05:29 PM Two things spring to mind immediately. 1. The jokes do at least let the world outside know there is such a thing as folk music, and some of the audiences will undoubtedly be intrigued enough to investigate, and even possibly like what they find. 2. Taking oneself too seriously is the certain road to becoming the butt of comedians. I too take the attitude of the worthy W.C.Fields, who never took himself too seriously. Being joked about is not so bad when you consider the alternative. Don T. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: dick greenhaus Date: 17 Aug 11 - 05:44 PM It's something like what Will Rogers said when he was criticized for telling jokes about Congress: "THey make the jokes, I just tell 'em" |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: GUEST,Bill S from Adelaide Date: 17 Aug 11 - 06:18 PM No mention of Rampling Sid Rumpo? The master of the genre |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Smokey. Date: 17 Aug 11 - 06:34 PM If you take yourself too seriously, it's inevitable that there will be people who take you less seriously. Being offended by the inevitable is worthy of not being taken seriously, and no-one has the right to be universally respected. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: CamiSu Date: 18 Aug 11 - 12:34 AM I seem to recall Stan Rogers making some pretty funny comments about Morris Dancers... If you don't laugh, what good is it all? |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Dave Hanson Date: 18 Aug 11 - 04:11 AM Comedians telling jokes can't damage or hurt folk music, I welcome it. Dave H |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: GUEST,Richard G Date: 18 Aug 11 - 09:29 AM I think it depends on the joke and how well researched it is. I remember when David Baddiel was a TV critic on the Mercury Awards the year Norma Waterson nearly won it. After she'd performed, all of the critics had their say. Baddiel made a comment along the lines of "the problem that I have with folk music is that it all sounds like the theme to Captain Pugwash". This annoyed me because of the sheer ignorance behind it, never mind the factual inaccuracy. However, if the comedian has done some level of research into folk music, or if they are laughing with us rather than laughing at us (as various comedians such as Billy Connolly, the Fast Show team, Reeves and Mortimer and a good few others have done over the years), then it is to be encouraged and enjoyed. The ability to laugh at yourself is a commendably British trait. Going back to the original points, folk music has probably never been cooler. Regardless of your opinions on the likes of Eliza, Mumford and Sons, Kate Rusby, the Unthanks, etc... what they have undeniably done is destroy the myth that folk music is the sole preserve of Aran sweater-wearing, tankard-swinging beard wearers. Any comedian trotting out that old cliché today would just look a bit foolish. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: alanabit Date: 18 Aug 11 - 11:39 AM Most folkies nowadays are a bit older - although there is no reason that folkies have to be. To some extent I see the jokes as being aimed at older people hanging on to older values. It does not really bother me at all. My twelve year old son - along with many other young people - can not stand to listen to anything which includes the backward and outdated convention of a tune. It does not bother me at all that other people find us ridiculous. What makes us look even more ridiculous is when we try to be hip. Fred Wedlock used to score a lot of good jokes off people trying to be trendy. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Herga Kitty Date: 18 Aug 11 - 04:23 PM Further to Richard G's post, I remember Alan Coren being disparaging on the News Quiz about Norma, the year she was a finalist for the Mercury prize. I'd always had a high regard for Alan Coren as a humorist until then, but it plummeted... of course, I never heard him sing.... Kitty |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Ref Date: 18 Aug 11 - 09:14 PM I was at a festival a few years ago when the crowd booed a mention of "A Mighty Wind." All I could think was that they were taking themselves WAY too seriously. Everyone is grist for a comedian and that kind of self-importance grinds particularly fine. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Darowyn Date: 19 Aug 11 - 04:35 AM Folk is funny. There are things things that folkies do which are ridiculous from an outside standpoint- such as wearing festival trousers, straw hats, beards, singing in funny accents, drinking ridiculously named brands of beer, etc. Pop music and music fans are funny. The artists are useless, and the fans go to gigs and scream so loud they can't hear them. Metal music is ridiculous- middle class boys pretending to be satanists! Rappers try to be streetwise, but actually live on Avenues and Groves in pleasant suburbs. Rappers is funny, man. Innit? Nobody who wants to seem normal would consider spending hours of precious time watching railway locomotives, collecting used postage stamps, singing boring old songs (Kipper family quote, not my opinion!). What sort of freak would want to get involved in any of this when they could be out having a laugh with their mates, wearing the same clothes and trainers as everyone else, drinking the same factory lager and alcopops, terrified of seeming different and maybe smashing the odd shop window and taking home a new mobile or a nice big telly? Cheers Dave |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Musket Date: 19 Aug 11 - 05:09 AM The folk scene has contributed to the stand up industry, and we all laugh and have laughed at their material. Comics who started in folk were perhaps the first mainstream stand ups who could spend a night without a single ending punchline. We might call that social observation, which means laughing at the differences in society. I laugh at anybody who is different to me, especially if it points out a large difference. That makes me... a human. Laughter can be for many reasons, some spontaneous. But planned laughter is through hearing a joke. Jokes are always at the expense if others. Always have been and always will be. A joke about a dog is all the funnier for giving it human traits. And jokes about people who live differently to you? Well, it's a hell of a lot better than making snide comments about them. If Darowyn found a funny angle about the "freaks" who wear the same clothes, drink the same lager, smash shop windows etc, I might laugh, but as his comments seem to show contempt, I find this worse, much worse than taking the piss. Especially the metal leap that drinking anything other than fusty bilge water made in a shed makes you break shop windows (!) I take the piss out of folk clubs and the sorts of people who go to folk clubs. I have people laughing their heads off on a good night. Where do I deliver this? In folk clubs mainly.... |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: paul vaughan Date: 19 Aug 11 - 12:03 PM I must admit I do like a bit of piss taking, I've had plenty of it aimed at me over the years and I'm still standing!! Regarding Lidl, one guy who often comes to the Ark on a wednesday does terrific parody of "Stuck in the middle with you" called "Shopping in Lidl with you" I'll see if he'll let me put the lyrics up, and maybe get him down to the Roung Georges some time! Seeya Paul |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: CamiSu Date: 19 Aug 11 - 06:56 PM T'was my daughter introduced me to the 'Cat, and all my kids (even the 19 year old) enjoy folk and trad music. They also like other stuff, but then again, so do I. Imagine my surprise when my youngest actually ENJOYED the opera! |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 25 Aug 11 - 09:38 AM People are funny, that's the truth of it. And "folk" is another word for "people". Maybe we should start calling it "people music"... |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray Date: 25 Aug 11 - 10:05 AM Even back in the day this seemed about right; still does really... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IC0uNnG-AI8 |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Ernest Date: 25 Aug 11 - 12:16 PM Ah come on, as folkies we should be friendly to the poor and the envoirement: there is no harm in poor second-class comedians recycling the banjo-jokes they found here.... ;0) |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Doug Chadwick Date: 25 Aug 11 - 12:50 PM Maybe we should start calling it "people music"... But the big question is:- What is the definition of "people music" ? ?;-) DC |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: RamblinStu Date: 25 Aug 11 - 12:51 PM Oh what a great thread for the Folk police to make noises. Folk is just music, like it or loath it, same as most things in life. Folk is prime for jokes and p*** takes, because there are so many very funny things going on within it, be it "op Noorrrth" or "Darn Sarfff" Music is just music so enjoy what you do. If you enjoy it, then all is well, but then remember, everybody is someone else's nutter. Stuart Pendrill |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Ian Fyvie Date: 16 Oct 11 - 10:08 PM Nice discussion! Apols for 2 months off mudcat and missing the later bits as they came in. Ian F |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Acorn4 Date: 17 Oct 11 - 04:11 AM I agree with a lot of the previous posts - the English have a great folk tradition but also a great tradition of taking the piss! And we all know that Sainsbury's only exists to keep the riff raff out of Waitrose. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: GUEST,999 Date: 17 Oct 11 - 04:22 AM May I ask, what has a comedian said about folk that's funny? |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray Date: 17 Oct 11 - 05:14 AM Folk is just music, like it or loath it, same as most things in life. Liking it or loathing it notwithstanding, since when has Folk ever been just music much less the same as most things in life? Maybe this begs another thread, but the last thing folk can be said to be is just music - as far as just music can be said to exist at all anyway. As for Folk and Comedians, we got a very lovely review by Stewart Lee in the Sunday Tikes the other week; still seems okay to mention this occasionally, especially as he called it The Ideal October Album |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Leadfingers Date: 17 Oct 11 - 05:23 AM Would you rather be a source of amusement or totally ignored ? |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Big Al Whittle Date: 17 Oct 11 - 05:29 AM Bruce its not folk that's funny...its us, the English. He we are earnestly discussing the class implications of which supermarket we use. can you imagine the Spanish making presumptions of which political party they support, which music they like, which lifestyle they support....based on which supermercardo they're seen going into? We are a classridden society. And it throws up some very funny (for us) conundrums and paradoxes. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Often Date: 17 Oct 11 - 05:45 AM Personally I think it's a good thing, at least in a broader sense.. as even if some comedian's acts bring a little bit of a sting at least it keeps Folk Music within the broader discussion. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray Date: 17 Oct 11 - 06:48 AM We are a classridden society. And it throws up some very funny (for us) conundrums and paradoxes. I don't find social-class funny in the slightest; it is a measure of entrenched systems of social apartheid and cultural oppression going back to the Normal Conquest, and possibly beyond, that barely conceals the civil unrest which is a requisite of the privileges enjoyed by a civilised elite. As a Working Class person I'm acutely aware of the inequalities that have effectively penalised my people for hundreds of years, and continue to do so today. On this level, the bourgeois concept of FOLK is interesting, because the whole thing was predicated on a notion that the vestiges of the rural working-classes A) no longer appreciated their own culture and therefore B) didn't understand it's true meaning or significance on account of their debased impoverishment thus necessitating C) The Folk Revival, which has always been a largely middle-class / bourgeois contruct for those with leftish/bohemian leanings who mistakenly believe that D) the British urban proletariat no longer have their own Folk Music because that which they do have (from Music Hall to Hip Hop) doesn't fit with the letter of the 1954 Definition which effectively turns Folk into an Academic Concept which can only be fully grasped a The Learned Elite, rather than the Unlettered Folk Masses themselves. Hilarious! As for Supermarkets: I like Booth's for Gleenhalgh's speciality bread; ALDI for tomato sauce, breakfast cereal, spring water, grape juice, and mushrooms; and ASDA for pretty much everything else. That said we couldn't resist the clock-work revolving musical-box Xmas Biscuit tins on sale in M&S because the musical component plays a version of Winter Wonderland that sounds like its been arranged by Les Dawson. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 17 Oct 11 - 08:20 AM Serious matters make more much of the best humour. Hence the saying "If you don't laugh you'd cry". |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Richard Bridge Date: 17 Oct 11 - 08:39 AM Sweeney, how come you have not grasped that the fact that a music is consumed by the proletariat does not make it folk music? Are the strange capitalisations and malapropisms in your post intended to betoken anything and if so what? What you seem to wish to be doing is to encourage the working class to abandon their historical cultural roots, which is in turn to disenfranchise them and leave them prey to consumerism - a thing that IMHO we have already seen and which appears to tend to get worse (aggravated by the Bozos of the world who conflate wealth with class). What you are doing, on a political level, is a parallel to the activities of the unknowing morons who mock folk arts of any type, and the consequence is that the working class are deprived of their roots. Why on earth is civil unrest "a requisite of the privileges enjoyed by a civilised elite"? Your wording makes no sense. Mind you, tangoed Essex girls in white stilettos performing a ritual mating display dance around their hambags (sic) - now that IS funny. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: banjoman Date: 17 Oct 11 - 09:22 AM As a dedicated banjo player, I have been subjected over many years to "Banjo " jokes. I have no problem with this and find most of them very funny. However, when I started turning the tables and making them into "Melodeon" Jokes I was met with all sorts of naff comments. The best jokes about folkies are the ones we make up ourselves. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray Date: 17 Oct 11 - 09:38 AM Sweeney, how come you have not grasped that the fact that a music is consumed by the proletariat does not make it folk music? Grasped, Richard? Grasped what exactly? Grasped that the primary purpose of any given Folk Music is its relevance to its Culture and Community, specifically those perceived to be of a lower social order which has unwittingly preserved such things? I would have thought that much was elementary even to someone (such as yourself) who abides by a very orthodox reading of the 1954 Definition - which doesn't tell us what sort of music Folk Music is in terms of its musicology or genre, but rather in its relation to its community. As an truism of Tradition Music, I'd say fair enough, but I'd also argue (as I have done on this forum) that the very term Traditional Music is tautologous, and that any given Folk Music is best understood in terms of musicology and genre - which of course it is by those involved with it. Are the strange capitalisations and malapropisms in your post intended to betoken anything and if so what? The capitalisations are simple emphasis, Richard - or else marks of a greater respect. I'd be interested to know what you think are malapropisms though. What you seem to wish to be doing is to encourage the working class to abandon their historical cultural roots, which is in turn to disenfranchise them and leave them prey to consumerism - a thing that IMHO we have already seen and which appears to tend to get worse (aggravated by the Bozos of the world who conflate wealth with class). I do not wish to be encouraging the working class to do anything other than to keep on doing exactly what they're doing. Observation is enough, and maybe a little respect thrown in by way of good measure. I'd say the role and meaning of any given music in any given community is more relevant than its musicological content - and that any given music which is adopted by any given community must be heard through the ears of that community, as far as it is humanly possible to do so. What you are doing, on a political level, is a parallel to the activities of the unknowing morons who mock folk arts of any type, and the consequence is that the working class are deprived of their roots. Unknowing morons? WTF sort of language is that? And since when are the Folk Arts integral to working class roots however they (i.e. the folk arts) may, or may not be derived? Are the working class truly deprived by not having access to their perceived roots? Of course not! How arrogant and patronising to suggest otherwise, or suggest that anyone who points this out is somehow a moron. The Folk Arts are very good things, but lets keep their general relevance to the vast & thriving culture of the UK (not just the working class) in perspective here. You'll be calling non-Folkies muggles next. Why on earth is civil unrest "a requisite of the privileges enjoyed by a civilised elite"? Your wording makes no sense. The wording makes perfect sense, Richard. Read it again. Disagree if you will, but it seems to me that the economic, educational and cultural deprivations of the urban proletariat has always existed as a deliberate policy on the part of successive governments to keep people in their place, whilst a relative few may enjoy the privileges on the back of it. The recent riots were a consequence of that policy - as much as similar riots going back across the centuries have been. The Myth of Pure Blood Collectivism and the Authenticity thereof is a fond one amongst exponents and enthusiasts of the so-called of Folk Arts, as oppose to the Arts of the Folk, which are generally held in derision by aforementioned exponents and enthusiasts. Mind you, tangoed Essex girls in white stilettos performing a ritual mating display dance around their hambags (sic) - now that IS funny. I rest my case. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: GUEST,Margaret Date: 17 Oct 11 - 12:22 PM I generally manage to blight the urine extractors by pointing out that trad music is *classical* popular music - so popular that it's still remembered and sung long past the time and far from the place it originated. That sometimes stops the brighter ones in their tracks while they work it out, and then we might have a discussion about what, if any, popular music from recent memory will similarly pass into the tradition and still be loved and sung a hundred years from now (if, of course, there's anyone left to sing it, a hundred years from now). |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: BTNG Date: 17 Oct 11 - 12:37 PM Folk music and folkies in general are just easy a targets, by anyone.... |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Big Al Whittle Date: 17 Oct 11 - 12:50 PM 'Sweeney, how come you have not grasped that the fact that a music is consumed by the proletariat does not make it folk music?' Why can't you grasp Richard, that unless its consumed by the proletariat - its not really folk music. Its an absurdity. Like the express train running into the fireplace in the Magritte painting. A dissociated sensibility. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: DMcG Date: 17 Oct 11 - 01:10 PM And here Alice began to get rather sleepy, and went on saying to herself "unless its consumed by the proletariat - its not really folk music, unless its consumed by the proletariat - its not really folk music" and sometimes, "that music is consumed by the proletariat does not make it folk music" for, you see, as she couldn't see a contradiction in the assertions, it didn't much matter which way she put it. With apologies to LC, RB, AW, SA and all. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray Date: 17 Oct 11 - 02:01 PM I believe in a contuinity of Popular Music from prehistoric times to the present day. It exists in an unbroken cross-fertilised border-breaching ocean-hopping tradition of musical creativity in which one genre seques and cross-polinates perfectly with the next giving rise to the myriad musical idioms & possibilities we know (& love) today with an infinite number still to come. I'm using Popular in a non-commercial sense, in the same sense Prof. Child used it (but never 'Folk' which means the same thing really). That said it would be folly to deny the essential role lively commerce has had to play by way of Industry and Celebrity to underwrite the tradition of creative process. Watching that Nowhere Boy film the other night about the early life of John Lennon brings you back to the very vivid notion of a musical continuity lining up with destiny, as it has done since the year dot, and has done again countless times since. Even as I write this some young human being near you will be having a Musical Epiphany after which things for him / her / us will never be same again - and on it goes. Deo Gratias. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 17 Oct 11 - 02:19 PM One test as to which popular music has a folk relationship with ordinary people would be whether it would be possible to get a bus trip singing it. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: GUEST Date: 17 Oct 11 - 02:26 PM As i tell people when we are out dancing, especially in the winter months when we do border with our faces painted, We arn't dressed funny it's everyone else. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Richard Bridge Date: 17 Oct 11 - 02:40 PM Music does not have a purpose. A composer may. Unrest does not create privilege of the few. Rather, it tends to disturb it. A dog has 4 legs (apart from Bonzo 3 legs). That does not make all things with 4 legs dogs. Muggle (disambiguation) From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Look up muggle in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. Muggle or muggles may refer to: "Muggle", a person without magical abilities in J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter fantasy books and films. The term was later adopted by various subcultures to identify those outside their group or lacking in a skill. "Muggle", the term used by participants of Geocaching, an outdoor sporting activity, to refer to those who do not Geocache, particularly when they inadvertently or deliberately interfere with a cache. "Muggle", a person who is studying intensively - based on a Singapore colloquial term for intensive studying - derived from British colloquial term to mug up. "Muggles", a slang term for marijuana in the 1920s and 1930s, associated with the jazz scene "Muggles" (recording), a 1928 recording by Louis Armstrong and His Orchestra, derived from the above cannabis usage "Muggles", a character from Carol Kendall's first Minnipins novel, The Gammage Cup (1959) "Muggle-Wumps", a family of monkeys in The Twits, a novel by Roald Dahl first published in 1980 "Muggles", a race in RAH (later retitled The Legend of Rah and the Muggles), a 1984 book by Nancy Stouffer "Mr. Muggles", the pet Pomeranian of the Bennet family in the NBC drama Heroes. It may also refer, in scriptwriting, to a character introduced to hold up to ridicule. I cannot be arsed to plough through the rest of the crap - most of it is no better informed than the parts I have addressed. Bah! |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray Date: 17 Oct 11 - 03:22 PM Music does not have a purpose. A composer may. Purpose is implied by music's universal significance to human culture & the individuals thereof for whom it most certainly does have a purpose; language, art, religion likewise (though there are significant overlaps). Unrest does not create privilege of the few. Rather, it tends to disturb it. The unrest is both an inevitability of privilege and means to further repression, both to justify it and disempower the revolutionary potential of the proletariat whilst given them the illusion of power. Unrest is a carefully controlled pressure valve that simultaneously placates and terrifies (and by implication pacifies) civilian populations who crave social stability. Thus do I say requisite, in the same sense that poverty is a requisite of wealth in a functionalist society. "Muggle", a person without magical abilities in J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter fantasy books and films. The term was later adopted by various subcultures to identify those outside their group or lacking in a skill. That's the one! In certain folk circles the term 'muggle' has come to used to refer to non-folkies. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: fat B****rd Date: 17 Oct 11 - 03:38 PM Anyway, the Charlbury Morris got vengeance for all folk persons by drowning out Mr. Cameron, didn't they? |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Big Al Whittle Date: 17 Oct 11 - 03:46 PM No it isn't back of the bus stuff. I doubt you could get the bus singing The Dowie Dens of Yarrow. But at sometime the proletariat must have related to this song. That's why its survived. Fpok is another thing though. Its meaning has changed somce 1954. Like Gay and mand many other words. Prior to that it was mainly the stuff of a few earnest traditionalists. before that decade was out - contemporary musicians had borrowed the sound of various folk forms and folksounds and were using them in contemporary creations. it was and is an artistic movement popularly called folk. And all users of the English language know exactly what it means - even if they pretend they don't. Doubtless there are still people who insist that Gay still only means joyful and carefree.The 1954 definition - no doubt. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Don(Wyziwyg)T Date: 17 Oct 11 - 07:18 PM ""I don't find social-class funny in the slightest; it is a measure of entrenched systems of social apartheid and cultural oppression going back to the Normal Conquest,"" Please elucidate. Exactly when did the Normals conquer Britain, where on Earth did they come from and how do we know they are normal and we aren't? Don T. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Rob Naylor Date: 17 Oct 11 - 08:32 PM Norman if you're Normal I intend to be a freak for the rest of my life and baffle you with cabbages and rhinoceroses in the kitchen, incessant quotations from "Now We Are Six" through the mouthpiece of Lord Snooty's giant, poisoned, electric head. So Theeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeere! |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Richard Bridge Date: 18 Oct 11 - 03:14 AM See what I mean? |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray Date: 18 Oct 11 - 04:22 AM Oh come on - when did we pick up on typos on Mudcat? We'd be on with little else! Though I have to admit the Normal Conquest is too good to let pass... |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Hamish Date: 18 Oct 11 - 04:31 AM It does seem a pity that folk music - or any niche interest - can be further marginalised by stupidity masquerading as humour. Too many people fall into the trap of ignorant prejudice. I think this is a long way of say "I agree with Ian Fyvie's earlier post about "sublimimally dictat[ing] what is acceptable" But, yes, Rambling Sid and Messers Kipper and Barker are all funny. Dave Taylor (acorn4) also takes the p1ss out of folkies and is a hoot. |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: MGM·Lion Date: 18 Oct 11 - 04:43 AM We had a thread not long since about the Morris, in which I recollect being something of a lone voice in the face of a whole lot of Morris people who appeared to rejoice in having the piss taken. ~~ I couldn't, and still can't, make out why this was so, and remain unrepentant about regarding it as regrettable. Which is not to say that folk, like anything else, can never provide a topic for wit or humour. It has its pretentious aspects which I suppose need deflating. But it the tone which is important: it should be affectionately witty, surely, rather than vindictively hostile? ~Michael~ |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: meself Date: 18 Oct 11 - 10:10 AM 'Exactly when did the Normals conquer Britain' Didn't they conquer the entire English-speaking world sometime in the early 1950s? |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray Date: 18 Oct 11 - 10:44 AM Around 1954 if Sir Richard is to believed... |
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Subject: RE: Folk - a target for comedians From: Richard from Liverpool Date: 18 Oct 11 - 11:33 AM It's true that a lot of people are dismissive of anything that's not absolutely mainstream, and populist comedians feed into that. However, I'm still a little bit surprised to see this thread for 3 reasons a) I haven't see any specific examples of comedians mocking folk b) Some comedians are quite into folk. Stewart Lee, for example, is a big fan of (some) folk music. I'm sure I've seen him on TV talking about Martin or Eliza Carthy, he chose Nic Jones' Penguin Eggs as one of his favourite albums in an interview, and he played an acoustic version of "Galway Girl" (almost folk?) in one of his shows. c) some comedians were folk musicians. Billy Conolly being a pretty famous example... |
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