Britpop and the English Music TraditionBritpop and the English Music Tradition is the first study devoted exclusively to the Britpop phenomenon and its contexts. The genre of Britpop, with its assertion of Englishness, evolved at the same time that devolution was striking deep into the hegemonic claims of English culture to represent Britain. It is usually argued that Britpop, with its strident declarations of Englishness, was a response to the dominance of grunge. The contributors in this volume take a different point of view: that Britpop celebrated Englishness at a time when British culture, with its English hegemonic core, was being challenged and dismantled. It is now timely to look back on Britpop as a cultural phenomenon of the 1990s that can be set into the political context of its time, and into the cultural context of the last fifty years - a time of fundamental revision of what it means to be British and English. The book examines issues such as the historical antecedents of Britpop, the subjectivities governing the performative conventions of Britpop, the cultural context within which Britpop unfolded, and its influence on the post-Britpop music scene in the UK. While Britpop is central to the volume, discussion of this phenomenon is used as an opportunity to examine the particularities of English popular music since the turn of the twentieth century. |
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Britpop and the English Music Tradition Professor Andy Bennett,Professor Jon Stratton Limited preview - 2013 |
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accessed aesthetic Arctic Monkeys artists audience authenticity band’s bass beat beat bands Beatles Blair Bloc Party Blur Blur’s Boys Britain British music British pop Britpop Britpop bands century chapter chart chorus Cockney contemporary Cool Britannia critical Damon Albarn dance dave dizzee rascal Donegan early Elastica England english music english popular music English Rock example gender genre girls glasgow groups guitarist herman’s hermits humour ibid indie influence journalist Kaiser Chiefs Kinks labour lad culture laddism London mainstream Manic street preachers masculinity melody Mogwai multiculturalism music hall music-hall music-hall song musical style musicians national identity noel nostalgia nostalgic oasis oasis’s party’s performance played political pop music popular culture popular music punk radio record released rhythm rock’n’roll Rolling Stones scene scotland scottish sexual singalong singer singing skiffle Small Faces social sound stereophonics Super Furry Animals travis variety vocal Wales Welsh What’s Wonderwall working-class