Rihanna and Katy Perry shaping the society
Theodor Adorno, a founder of Frankfurt school of thought in the first part of the 20th century, analyzed the contemporary popular music and compared it to live, or as he called it, serious music. Adorno s main argument was that popular music was standardized and repetitive; it was pre-digested for the listener by the music industry. I believe that Adorno’s theory is relevant today.
Many songs that belong to mainstream music sound very similar. Producers from record companies make sure that the music hits are composed in such a way that listeners will replay these songs in their minds over and over.A large number of modern hits use the standardized structure that Adorno described. For example, Rihanna’s song Umbrella, Katy Perry’s song I Kissed a Girl, and Justin Timberlake’s song I m bringing sexy back all have similar rhythm and repetitive lyrics. Therefore, we could argue that, in a way, songs and singers like Katy Perry are shaping our society and the way we view the world. Is that good or bad? I think there is no certain answer.
Some songs bring us the information that we were not aware of before. There are many artists that tell the story in their music: the story of people’s lives and struggles. Lots of songs talk about war and what consequences it has. Other songs give us information that is not that much informative. But in the end it is without a doubt that music industry has a strong influence on us. Songs also set a lot of stereotypes that people adopt and then treat them as “that is the way it is supposed to be”. For example, how the vast majority of the Rap singers use the word “gangster” in their lyrics and by that they create a stereotype that all the people related to Rap are somehow related to gangsters. . If the same lyrics are repeated in your head over and over again through out the day it is more than certain that it will mark your conscious and change the perception of certain things.
