Music and the City: Normalisation, Marginalisation, and Resistance in Birmingham’s Musicscape BY DARREN ROBERTS A thesis submitted to the University of Birmingham for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences College of Life and Environmental Sciences University of Birmingham July 2014 University of Birmingham Research Archive e-theses repository This unpublished thesis/dissertation is copyright of the author and/or third parties. The intellectual property rights of the author or third parties in respect of this work are as defined by The Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988 or as modified by any successor legislation. Any use made of information contained in this thesis/dissertation must be in accordance with that legislation and must be properly acknowledged. Further distribution or reproduction in any format is prohibited without the permission of the copyright holder. Abstract Drawing on qualitative research conducted in Birmingham (2009-2014), the thesis explores the role music plays in shaping and producing the urban environment via a focus on three specific processes; normalisation, marginalisation, and resistance. The contemporary city’s relationship with music has undergone substantial change in recent years within the UK, including significant growth in the live music industry and the increased targeting of musical activities within urban policy. The thesis examines the implications of these changes in the context of Birmingham. Chapter One introduces the research aims and objectives. Chapter Two positions the thesis within the current geographies of music field and grounds the thesis in an anti-essentialist approach to geography and cultural politics. Chapter Three provides an overview of the research location and methodology. Chapter Four explores ‘normalisation’ by examining the role of public bodies in shaping local musical activities. Chapter Five explores ‘marginalisation’ by examining the exclusion of local rap music from the mainstream live musicscape, and rap music’s place in shaping marginal geographies. Chapter Six explores ‘resistance’ through three in-depth examples of how different individuals use music as a tool of resistance against dominant power relations and the production of uneven urban geographies. I Dedication To Bryony II Acknowledgements I would like to thank everyone who has contributed to this research and has helped me to get here. First, I would like to thank all those individuals who I interviewed as part of my research. I thank them for their time and generosity in agreeing to allow me to use their voices in my research. I would add special thanks to those individuals who also became ‘gate-keepers’ in the research, those individuals who allowed to me get that bit further into the field. In particular, I would like to thank Mark Sampson who organises the Birmingham Music Network monthly meeting; my time spent at the meetings and the contacts I made through the network were invaluable. I would also like to offer particular thanks to Andy Hitchings for the time and effort he offered in introducing me to different parts of Birmingham’s rap community. Second, I would like to thank all those who helped me in an academic capacity. This includes, above all, the supervisory team that has been with me in different parts of my PhD. Particular thanks goes to Dr. John Round for his help in getting me on to the PhD course and for his help throughout. I would like to offer particular and heartfelt thanks to Dr. Jon Oldfield for coming on board at a late stage in my research process. Your help, advice, and feedback have been truly enabling. I would extend a more general thanks to those individuals who have, at different points, offered me advice and guidance during my PhD. Third, I would like to thank the geography department at the University of Birmingham. Special thanks are offered to Gretchel Coldicott and Jamie Peart for their behind the scenes support during the course of my PhD. Of course, my warmest and sincerest thanks go to all those other PhD students whom I have shared this process with (aka Room 225). I wish you all the very best luck in your PhD related endeavours and in your life beyond the PhD. III Fourth, I would like to thank my family and friends without whom very little fun would have come my way. I consider myself lucky to have a caring and supporting family who I have turned to for help, care, and advice throughout this PhD. In particular, I would like to thank my Parents for their unending support and love. I want to say a special thank you to Andrea; you have shown me what it means to be strong. I would also like to thank Bryony’s parents for their support which they have so kindly given me. Thank you also to Abby and Matt, your presence in mine and Bryony’s life is extremely precious. My dear friends, Flynn and Cat, Tom, Sam, Dan, and Rick, you are all very special people and I am grateful for you being there. I know that my PhD has largely been a source of confusion, so I thank all my family and friends for humouring me for this long. Finally, above all, and with all the hope and love and care in the world, I thank Bryony. You have shared every single moment of this PhD with me and for that I am eternally grateful. All I can say is Thank You and I Love You. IV Contents 1. 1 Introduction: Music and Uneven Urban Geographies 1 Introduction 1 The place of music in geographical enquiry 4 Changing cities: music’s augmenting place in urban life 6 Cities of live music 6 Targeting music in new urban policy 7 Conducting research in Birmingham’s Musicscape 9 Music in the ‘creative city’ 9 Rap music and the urban ‘other’ 10 Music to change the city 11 Chapter layout 13 Conclusion 15 2. 17 Literature Review: The Geographies of Music 17 Introduction 17 Making Geographies of Music 19 Taking music seriously 19 Spatial agendas beyond ocularcentricism 22 Hegemony, Spatial Norms, and Music 27 Geographies of Normalisation 27 Soundtracks of place 29 Music and spatial controls 31 Music and creativity: changing instruments of urban capital 33 Music at the Margins 37 Musical transgressions 38 Who let the dogs out? Get them back in! 39 Silencing ‘noise’ 43 Resistance Through Music 45 New geographies of resistance 46 V Connecting music into political change 47 Finding the right place for music and resistance 49 Conclusion: Revealing Music’s ‘Hidden’ Stories 52 3. 54 Methodology: Narrativising Birmingham's Musicscape 54 Introduction 54 Research Location: Birmingham’s Musicscape 55 The ‘Musicscape’ 65 Multi-method qualitative research 66 Musical methodologies 66 Research techniques 68 Positionality 72 The Fieldwork 73 Researching Normalisation 73 Researching Marginalisation 78 Researching Resistance 82 Conclusion 85 4. 88 Music and Normalisation: Spacing the ‘Creative City’ 88 Introduction 88 Section One: Tensions in the ‘Tick-Box’ City 91 “It’s the wrong way round” 91 Lack of trust in public bodies 98 Out of reach 102 Section Two: Making Birmingham ‘Creative’ 105 Contradictions in the creative city 106 Spacing the creative city 112 Section Three: The band-centric musicscape 117 ‘Meet Birmingham’: A soundtrack to the city 120 Headlining the city 127 Conclusion 133 VI 5. 135 The Place of Rap Music: Marginalisation and Music as Threat 135 Introduction 135 Section One: “Turning the spotlight on rap culture” 138 Meeting One: “Trouble in the clubs” 138 Musical desires and an explosive scene 142 Rap’s Dark Emotions 149 Meeting Two: ‘Gangland violence in the city’ 152 Where’s the threat? 154 Narrativising Gangs in the City: “Summer of Gun Violence in Birmingham” 157 “No Garage Allowed” 161 Section Two: “Out on the block with my glock” 164 A backdrop of violence 166 The geographies of street violence and fear 169 Section Three: “There’s a type of music you have to listen to” 174 Negotiating the margins: Rap as emotional weapon 175 Producing rap as a space of confrontation 177 Re-Territorialising the margins: Rap as Spatial Conquest 187 Conclusion 190 6. 193 Music and Resistance: Reframing, Rereading, and Creating Birmingham’s Musicscape 193 Introduction 193 Chapter layout: Framing resistance 196 Section One: Reframing the Musicscape 198 The Birmingham Music Network: Demystifying the musicscape 201 De-territorialising the musicscape 206 Iron Man Records: Increasing the ‘room to move’ 208 Section Two: Rereading the Musicscape 215 Rereading people and places 219 The Flyover Show: A positive rereading 221 VII Jazz is Gangster 224 Re-narrativising the place of music 231 Section Three: Creativity and the Musicscape 235 Rapping-Thinking: Rap on struggle and hope 237 Creativity, Experiments, and a Movement 245 Conclusion 251 7. 253 Conclusion 253 Introduction 253 What this research has brought together 254 1. Understanding the place of music 255 2. Urban geography 256 3. Anti-essentialist cultural politics 257 4. The analytical scheme of normalisation, marginalisation, and resistance 258 Key Findings 260 Music and Normalisation 260 Music and Marginalisation 262 Music and Resistance 264 Where next? 265 References 269 VIII List of Figures Figure 1: Deprivation and ethnicity in Birmingham (Source: Cangiano, 2007) ...................... 57 Figure 2: Mapping Birmingham's Musicscape (Source: Author) ......................................... 59 Figure 3: Birmingham Progress (Source, Marketing Birmingham 2014) ............................... 106 Figure 4: ‘Meet Birmingham’ promotional video (Source: Marketing Birmingham, 2014) ....... 121 Figure 5: ‘Meet Birmingham’ promotional video (Source: Marketing Birmingham, 2014) ...... 123 Figure 6: ‘Meet Birmingham’ promotional video (Source: Marketing Birmingham, 2014) ...... 123 Figure 7: Headline Acts at ArtsFest 2007-2012 (Source: Author) ...................................... 129 Figure 8 – Map of violent crimes at music events in Birmingham ....................................... 156 Figure 9: Map of violent incidents at rap music events in Birmingham (Source: Author) ........