Form and Function

Without beating around the bush too much, there is something of a scene coagulated around jambands -- the genre, not this web site. The definitions of terms are, as usual, up for much debate. Questions of what a scene is and what a jamband is are, of course, a slippery topic. Somewhat surprisingly, the latter is almost easier to come up with a working definition for than the former. With that, my working definition for the term "jamband" is such: a musical group with either a focus on collective improvisation or the intent to combine established styles - however nebulous - into something else, therefore jamming them together... or both.

So far as scenes go, how about this: when activities auxiliary to the music itself occur parallel (as well as perpendicular) to the existence of the bands? There are some loopholes in there, but I think it'll do. Regarding this scene, a word that gets bandied about on quite a regular basis is "community". This, for me, is significantly different. In a nutshell, the function of a scene is, like I said, auxiliary. It doesn't need to exist. It depends solely on the bands at the center for survival. A community, to me, is something that exists, on some level, to help perpetuate itself while feeding off of multiple sources to keep its energy going. In this regard, the music is the catalyst, though not the core.

In the beginning of civilization, communities evolved out of need for sheer survival; that was the basic core at the center of things. Everybody had their own, individual functions within that sphere. As society has evolved, so have the roles that people occupy. At this point in time, the idea of a community - in the broad sense of the term - is one that is foreign to a lot of society. It is not a vital concept simply because it doesn't need to be. Survival isn't the issue anymore. Likewise, people have attempted to redefine the way they relate to the world around them. Beyond survival-related occupations - those who maintain the infrastructure of everything from food to energy to production of goods - everybody else is moreless expendable... at least in the original scheme of things. What do people do now?

The world of jambands has evolved somewhat similarly, albeit working on different levels at varying times. In the broadest sense of the word, jambands have evolved past the need for a community. For the moment, as a whole, the genre is flourishing. For individual bands, it's just as hard as it ever was -- if not harder. There are, quite bluntly, a whole shitload of jambands out there right now. It's the genre-du-jour, in some sense. Whether or not all of them will be able to survive is another question entirely. The answer - again, quite bluntly - is probably not. At least, not in the form presently existing.

The form presently existing dictates a certain status of success. This success is measured by, when it comes down to it, money earned. The goal of every jamband, it seems, is to be able to make enough cash to settle down, raise a family, join the PTA, buy some sensible shoes and a Chevrolet... and still be able to be as artistically free as they ever were. This isn't the stock answer, of course -- that's something along the lines of "make enough money to be able to survive by playing music", but it derives down into something like the preceding. This is quite admirable, but unattainable by most -- the American Dream transferred wholly to hippie music. A gold rush. The model for a successful jamband is, in many ways, rooted in what success for a traditional rock and roll band should be.

This doesn't have to be so. In a scene, a band is an object at the center with a strong gravitational pull. In a community, a band is one of many objects rotating around the same point. There are many jamband listeners out there, but there also many jambands. Many fine institutions boast of small faculty-to-student ratios. That is, they brag of having say "one instructor for every two-point-five" students. That's the direction the jamband scene is going. A moderately recent headline in the Onion read "Audience Outnumbers Ska Band". It isn't quite so bad as that, but that's something along the lines of what it's moving towards.

Well... what, exactly, is wrong with that? Okay, there's plenty wrong - all artistic matters pushed blissfully aside for the moment - with not being able to attract more people to the show than there are in the band... but what's wrong with not having a huge following? What if a band has one hundred really core followers - ones who would go to the ends of the earth to see them - but absolutely no more than that. Sure, that's a pretty small band-member-to-head ratio, but so what? I've been on countless listservs where, after experiencing a show by a certain band, a fan will exult to the list "wow! In ten years, I'll be able to say that I saw these guys while they were still playing bars!"

A phrase spoken often after encounters with musicians at gigs is "he's just a regular guy!". Why, then, does it so surprise people when they hear of a band who regularly hangs out with their listeners? It's because they still expect - somewhere in their hearts - the traditional rock star model: bars make way to clubs to theaters to arenas, while regular guys are replaced by untouchables. What if that was the musician's place? Playing small venues and hanging out with his listeners as if they were - gasp - just friends?

In African society, the musician is placed on the same level as everybody else. There is no star system. A musician is just as important as a carpenter. That does not degrade the musician in any way, shape, or form. At the same time, a carpenter is just as important as a musician. The function of a musician is completely different than it is in the United States. It is recognized that music is a functional part of society, not extraneous in any way. In the United States, music is considered - in some senses - auxiliary to society. It is filed under "entertainment" -- or, more accurately, distraction; sonic wallpaper. In the general perception of American society, there is a core of what makes up the "real" world. Music is firmly on the outside of that... looking out, at that.

People need magic in their lives. Or beauty. Or... or just something plain ol' mysterious. In that, music is essential, because it can provide that. There's no reason why it can't develop like that in places -- a small culture existing parallel, and within the confines (somewhat) of what already exists. Many bands complain that they hate the road. A solution: don't tour for most of the year. Why not bring Mohammed to the mountain? The Dead toyed with that idea, though never saw it through. Shloads of dollars need not be put up to mount a tour -- just enough to cover the cost of renting out the hall.

If, say, a thousand people could be consistently guaranteed once a week at a nice locale, then each musician could take home what essentially amounted to a regular salary. No, he wouldn't be a rock star by any means. He would be a functioning member of society. Likewise, it would almost eliminate the idea that people have to give up their lives to follow a band -- they, too, can settle. They can fulfill their jobs in the local and broader communities -- painting tapestries or backdrops for the halls, organizing shows, or by simply existing in the smaller community; getting a job that somehow reverberates positively and actively in the broader picture. Feeling somehow vital is an important part of a happy existence.

Jesse Jarnow is full of shit.