Dr. Dre and N.W.A captured part of the intro to Funkadelic’s “Get Off Your Ass and Jam” and incorporated it into their “1oo Miles and Runnin’”. Though the siren sounding three-chord guitar riff is the same as “Get Off Your Ass and Jam”, the context completely alters the sound and transforms it into a brand new song –completely unrelated to the original (5:11). Dr. Lawrence Ferrara states that those involved with “100 Miles and Runnin’” had a simple and strict sentence, “It said: If you sample, you license. Period.” I relate this moment as drawing inspiration from the past, which is something every artist does. An example of this is DJ Danger Mouse’s “The Grey Album”. He combined two albums to produce a compilation of dissimilar artists: Jay-Z and The Beatles (8:33). His work never reached the market because everything he did was [basically] illegal, yet it was an “instant classic” with all those who heard it. Why? Because the audience thought it was creative enough. Once again, I wonder if the government and big corporations have too much power in deciding what is and it not imaginative/artistic/inventive.
As Lawrence Lessig states at 23:20, he writes books and knows that students take is words and incorporate them into their own writings. He goes on to say, “But I don’t want to file a federal lawsuit and tell them, “Stop using my work”” – this goes hand in hand with understanding text(uality) as a dilemma. Lessig mentions, “We all understand in the context of text that you put the text out there, copyright protects you from somebody competing with you and selling the original book. But it ought to be free for people to use and reuse as they want.” Within my first paragraph of this blog post, I quote Ridolfo and Rife. Though I cite them, one can argue that I have infringed upon their creativity and taken what is not mine. Without a doubt, the power of sharing is continually developing users’ knowledge of just about everything, yet it also has the power to hinder the creativity that was once so easily attainable. No one knew what every artist in the world was creating, meaning that people were certainly unknowingly producing similar songs. So, how can today’s society be at fault for wanting to redefine creativity by taking what is and putting it in a completely unique context?
Kathryn,
ReplyDeleteBeing that we are both individuals from the "young generation" I think it's only normal that we are in favor of remixes. I, too, have a wonder/problem with big music industries accusing DJs and remixers of a lack of originality. Like you said, it's only natural that in creating our own ideas, we draw inspiration from those who came before us. Isn't that always how it's been? Whether we realize or not, it's inevitable that somewhat of what we create on our own has come from someone before us. For strict copyright enforcers to believe that remixes are not original is simply a dated concept. As they should, DJs should always give credit to the original music-makers whom they are borrowing samples from, yet, the mix they make is all their own. They own it. They don't own all the music they used in the song, but they own the original mix they made.
Obviously ownership is a slippery slope in this case, but it will be impossible to move forward and culturally progress if copyright enforcers are constantly finding problems in the remix culture. A theme that has been reoccurring for me throughout the readings and film this week has been agency. Who has the right, and why? An author of a college textbook was introduced in the film Good Copy Bad Copy and he expressed his feelings on students freely using and re-using his text, "it ought to be free." Although he confessed his concern that students not claim it as their own, he agreed that its purpose was for students to learn and for them to not be afraid to use it as a resource. I tend to agree with him. If music and film and entertainment cannot be shared, how will culture be created?
-Samantha Stamps