Nothing Has Been Done Before: Seeking the New in 21st-Century American Popular Music

Description

Is there such a thing today as music that's meaningfully new? In our contemporary era of remixing and retro styles, cynics and romantics alike cry "It's all been done before" while record labels and media outlets proclaim that everything is new. Coded into our daily conversations about popular music, newness as an artistic and cultural value is too often taken for granted. Nothing Has Been Done Before instigates a fresh debate about newness in American pop, rock 'n' roll, rap, folk, and R&B made since the turn of the millennium. Utilizing an interdisciplinary approach that combines music criticism, philosophy, and the literary essay, Robert Loss follows the stories of a diverse cast of musicians who seek the new by wrestling with the past, navigating the market, and speaking politically. The transgressions of Bob Dylan's "Love and Theft". The pop spectacle of Katy Perry's 2015 Super Bowl halftime show. Protest songs against the war in Iraq. Nothing Has Been Done Before argues that performance heard in a historical context always creates a possibility for newness, whether it's Kendrick Lamar's multi-layered To Pimp a Butterfly, the Afrofuturist visions of Janelle Monae, or even a Guided By Voices tribute concert in a local dive bar. Provocative and engaging, Nothing Has Been Done Before challenges nothing less than how we hear and think about popular music-its power and its potential.

Robert Loss is an assistant professor in Writing, Literature, and Philosophy at Columbus College of Art and Design, USA.

The ever prized prospect of the 'new' excites and nourishes the commercial music industry as much as it does the desire of musicians to shape their own space within its leaky borders. In Nothing Has Been Done Before Robert Loss cuts an idiosyncratic path through late 20th and 21st century popular music, tipping its hat to the renowned and the obscure along the way. Wearing his musical proclivities and political beliefs on his sleeve, Loss visits amongst others the familiar subjects of race, gender, protest song, and the role of technology to frame his hunt for the elusive signs of newness in popular music. His witty, characterful, and occasionally provocative style simultaneously draws you into the conversation of newness and invites critical response. * Jack Harbord, Senior Lecturer, Leeds College of Music, UK * Utterly original and erudite, Loss has written a book for music lovers that will inspire and instigate in equal measure. * Ed Whitelock, co-author of Apocalypse Jukebox: The End of the World in American Popular Music * Robert Loss's writing is characterized by unstoppable historical curiosity, true storytelling, and the unusual combination of intellectual ambition and modesty--all qualities that play out with incisive strength in Nothing Has Been Done Before. -- Greil Marcus