Mercy Mercy Me (The Media Ecology): Technology, Agency, and "Cleavage" of the Musical Text
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University of Denver Digital Commons @ DU Electronic Theses and Dissertations Graduate Studies 6-1-2010 Mercy Mercy Me (the Media Ecology): Technology, Agency, and "Cleavage" of the Musical Text Arthur J. Bamford University of Denver Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.du.edu/etd Part of the Mass Communication Commons, and the Other Music Commons Recommended Citation Bamford, Arthur J., "Mercy Mercy Me (the Media Ecology): Technology, Agency, and "Cleavage" of the Musical Text" (2010). Electronic Theses and Dissertations. 51. https://digitalcommons.du.edu/etd/51 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate Studies at Digital Commons @ DU. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electronic Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of Digital Commons @ DU. For more information, please contact [email protected],[email protected]. MERCY MERCY ME (T HE MEDIA ECOLOGY ): TECHNOLOGY , AGENCY , AND “C LEAVAGE ” OF THE MUSICAL TEXT __________ A Thesis Presented to the Faculty of Arts and Humanities University of Denver __________ In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Arts __________ by Arthur J. Bamford June 2010 Advisor: Lynn Schofield Clark ©Copyright by Arthur J. Bamford 2010 All Rights Reserved Author: Arthur J. Bamford Title: MERCY MERCY ME (T HE MEDIA ECOLOGY ): TECHNOLOGY , AGENCY , AND “C LEAVAGE ” OF THE MUSICAL TEXT Advisor: Lynn Schofield Clark Degree Date: June 2010 ABSTRACT This thesis explores changes that occurred in popular music during the 1960s and early 1970s through case studies involving three significant albums released in 1971 and 1972: Marvin Gaye’s What’s Going On , Sly and the Family Stone’s There’s a Riot Goin’ On , and Stevie Wonder’s Talking Book . These albums deserve attention particularly because, as this thesis argues, existing research on the cultural significance of popular music has focused largely on the periods before or after the 1970s and research on music-making technologies has focused largely on white artists or groups from the late 1960s. Addressing this blind spot, the thesis seeks to illuminate this time period and its place as a significant bridge to the digital era that followed. Moreover, by employing media ecology and practice theory as a framework, the thesis argues that these albums exemplify a cleavage of the recorded musical text from live performance, akin to that of the written text from oral-styled manuscripts to closed literary works. Drawing upon the tradition of the history and phenomenology of recorded sound, this thesis therefore aims to contribute to media ecological understandings of how human agency, industry structures, and technological affordances worked together to redefine the structures and the relationships with which they were associated. ii Table of Contents Introduction .................................................................................................................…..1 Orality and Literacy, and Media Ecology as Theoretical Framework…………...3 Literature Review………………………………………………………………...9 Prior Research…………………………………………………………………...13 Institutional Practices and Changes in the Recording Industry ......................................25 Long Playing Records .........................................................................................25 Heard it Through the Hi-Fi .................................................................................29 This Magic Moment ............................................................................................30 Hitsville USA ......................................................................................................33 From Disc to Tape ..............................................................................................35 Marvin Gaye: What’s Going On .....................................................................................39 Ain’t Nothing Like the Real Thing .....................................................................40 Right On ..............................................................................................................48 What’s Going On ................................................................................................55 Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology) ........................................................................64 Sly and the Family Stone: There’s a Riot Goin’ On .......................................................67 Sing a Simple Song .............................................................................................68 I Want to Take you Higher .................................................................................74 Don’t Call Me Nigger, Whitey ...........................................................................76 Sex Machine........................................................................................................80 Runnin’ Away .....................................................................................................83 Thank You (Falletin Me Be Mice Elf Agin) .......................................................87 There’s a Riot Goin’ On .....................................................................................88 Poet .....................................................................................................................96 Stevie Wonder: Talking Book ........................................................................................98 The 12 Year Old Genius ...................................................................................100 Switched-On: Sonorous Objects .......................................................................107 Music Of My Mind ...........................................................................................111 iii Innervisions .......................................................................................................115 Songs in the Key of Life ...................................................................................119 Conclusion ....................................................................................................................125 Limitations of the Current Research .................................................................131 Suggestions for Future Research ......................................................................135 Bibliography .................................................................................................................137 iv INTRODUCTION Applying Timothy Taylor’s (2001) practice theory to the analysis of music and technology, and employing media ecology as a theoretical framework, this thesis will compare the evolution of the written word/text from orality to literacy, to changes that occurred in the development of recorded music. In particular, this thesis will focus on one turning point in the history of sound recording, from the late 1960’s to early 1970’s, during which multi-track tape recording and synthesizer technologies were introduced. Analysis of this time period will be conducted via case studies involving three significant albums released in 1971 and ‘72: Marvin Gaye’s What’s Going On , Sly and the Family Stone’s There’s a Riot Goin’ On , and Stevie Wonder’s Talking Book . By highlighting the affordances of the then-new technologies including magnetic tape, multi-track recording, and synthesizers, as well as changes within the music industry, including record label-owned studios, and the emergence of format-free FM radio stations, I will argue that, in terms of both production processes, and content, these albums exemplify a cleavage of the recorded musical text from live performance, akin to that of the written text from oral-styled manuscripts to closed literary works. Furthermore I will argue that the mathematical theory of stochastic processes— which relates to probabilities, and involves studying the relationships between variables as part of a process as it unfolds in time—may be usefully applied to the study of media, 1 technology, and social change. However, unlike the theory of stochastic processes, this thesis will consider certain variables as malleable, but not altogether random. Ultimately, this thesis will explore the following question: how did changing variables in the structure of the recording industry provide the cultural space for Marvin Gaye, Sly Stone, and Stevie Wonder to exert their own agency and express their own creativity in unique ways? It will do so by specifically analyzing seminal albums by each of these artists; first, Marvin Gaye’s What’s Going On , then Sly and the Family Stone’s There’s a Riot Goin’ On , both released in 1971, and finally Stevie Wonder’s 1972 release Talking Book , which will serve as a kind of centerpiece among the six albums that Wonder put out in the early 1970s. The reasons why these particular albums have been selected will be explained in greater detail in the following sections, but to summarize I feel these are prime candidates for a close analysis because they have fallen into several overlapping blind spots that exist in the literature that is currently available. Most research dealing with the music- making technologies that will be discussed here tends to focus on work produced by white artists or groups from the late 1960s. Similarly, there seems to be a break in the literature on both music technology, and the cultural significance of popular music from about 1970 to 1980. One of the great advantages to studying Gaye, Stone,