#bitter party

[mishthi]

Tonight, tonight, tonight! THE KOMINAS ROCK THERAPY TOUR IN LOS ANGELES.

Art by Susu Attar

[asianamsmakingmusic]

I recently participated in an interview conducted by Inkstone, a UVa-based, student-run magazine devoted to Asian Pacific American (APA) literary arts and culture. The coming issue will feature a few UVa scholars (faculty and graduate student) who research APA arts. The issue will be released in late Spring this year. Below are contents most relevant to Yellow Buzz:

excerpt:

In many ways, I think, we’re still struggling with the baggage that otherizes Asian (or Orientalizes) culture inherited from the historical structures of the U.S. music industry. Specifically, the oppressive black-and-white racial binary still to this day informs our commonsensical understanding of commercial musical genres. There are white music genres such as country (historically known as “hillbilly” records) and rock. And there are music categories associated with African American performers and listeners, for example, hip hop and R&B, or the historical genre of “race records.” The racial binary that governs music genre division leaves a conundrum or a dilemma with which Asian American musicians grapple in their everyday struggle to express themselves authentically through the idiom of music.

Contrasting the general lack of APA musical representation is the active presence of Asian American musical production (consumption) at the grass-roots level. The current musical heterogeneity in Asian America resonates with the social diversity of the community. This makes it difficult to derive any generalities about the sound or content of this music. I personally resist the notion of APA music because it has not had a prominent existence in practice. What’s undeniable is the presence of APA musicians, professional, amateur, performing in all musical genres. Part of my academic (and musical) effort is to conjure (however) truthful images and narratives about the lives – and music – of these below-visibility APA musicians. For now, my working definition of APA music is the music made and listened to by individuals of Asian descent in the U.S. The broadness of this definition marks the yet exploratory state of this research.

[asianamsmakingmusic]

The student presenter asked her peers: Is it enough (for a formerly silenced ethnic minority) to “simply be there” in the music industry? Or should the artists address aspects of race and ethnicity in their musical output and image?

excerpt:

What seems more useful in this example is perhaps the notion of musical passing – a form of aural expression that allows the sound-maker to be heard without being seen. Music allows the possibility of a colorblind reception: anyone can sound like anybody. Sound is not naturally bound to any race-related embodiment of phenotype, although artists make choices, deliberately or not, based on what they perceive as meaningful. While sound may be meaning-ful, it mediates meanings. This (moment of) semantic opacity is worthy of reflection.

I want to think deeply about this quality of opacity or mediation, allowing it develop into a theoretical apparatus that may help me articulate something that I’ve had a hard time conveying since the onset of my dissertation project: a (imagined) state of race-free liminality, or liberation, as described by many musicians that I’ve met in my field research. They often speak of their discomfort with the term “Asian American” as a designation for their music and/or ethnicity. In writing, I have interpreted it as a gesture of refusal to pigeonhole oneself. But I think there’s more to it than that.

A race-free sonority can be utopic for racial minorities. For minority artists, the cage built by racial meanings is still looming. This cage imprisons individuals of color in the reception of their image. To utilize this race-free sonority is to sell out. It is a worry-free presence in comfort. Perhaps this liminality suggests a moment of agency in face of a world where conversations about race mostly exist as a subtext – where people skirt around the topic of race, where people only talk about race in accusatory or threatening moments of outburst.

So, how progressive is this sonic race-free liminality? Is it liberatory for only the artists? How does this liberatory state translate itself in sonic reception? Is it merely a momentary state of self-indulgence considering the age-old fight for equality? Does an audio-scape create social change? I can’t answer these questions right now. But I think I will spend a long time trying to answer this question.

Rather than passing, maybe a more useful term is “covering,” as suggested by Kenji Yoshino, a law professor at Yale. In the preface of his book Covering, Yoshino writes “Everyone covers. To cover is to tone down a disfavored identity to fit into the mainstream.” Individuals cover their stigmatized traits in their daily life. “Covering is a hidden assault on our civil rights.”

The notion of passing seems insufficient in capturing the complexity of how my informing musician-colleagues relate to the world. Maybe they cover more so than pass. If that’s the case, then playing music is an ongoing struggle with the covering and dis-covering of one’s traits, construed as different or stigmatizing in this imperfect world.

[cerebrobullet]

i'm really sad for some yogs who care about their community, but totally not for others, who just want fanart done and that's it. like they deserve it unconditionally? like, no, dude, if you're being an arse, you don't get the love? but alas, some fans are desperate for attention and won't participate in such a riot (especially since the yogs would probs not care anyway) i'm really sad and bitter over this, yes.

Truly. Like, Good Yogs who immediately come to mind are people like Zoey and Nilesy who have always been so nice to us on here, and are just fantastic people all around. And that’s why I’ve ultimately written off the company and have just turned to focusing on doing art for specific yogs. 

I wish I could console you, but I’m just as bitter. 

[cerebrobullet]

Its funny, if the tumblr yogcommunity suddenly decided 'hey were not being treated kindly lets stop making art' theyd, and even fanbases on other sites Imho, would notice it, but I wonder if theyd even care enough to comment

who knows? I can’t tell anymore. You know, certain yogs I think would care, but as a company over all ??? Actually there were a number of us that didn’t draw anything for the rest of December, after they did that “read a fanfiction on the stream” during the streams.

[cerebrobullet]

I’m seein’ my follower count drop some but, you know, give it a year and you might find you feel the same way about this stuff. 

A year ago I was still holding on to the dream of working as an artist for the yogs, but three years of this poor management, communication, and interaction with the creative/tumblr community has erased any thought of that from my mind. 

[cerebrobullet]

@drakonia101 replied to your post:@drakonia101 replied to your post “I’m sorry if I...

The fucked up part is they “manage” by telling artist not to do shit with their characters. The amount of comics/stories I followed/heard about someone from yogscast (Heard itsTurps but not 100% sure) telling artist they cant do stuff with their characters. Like commissions ( drawings/commission comics ect) I’ve even heard of a few people being forced to stop drawing Yog related stuff, not because they were commissions, but because they had a donate button on their blog

I know they do not allow people to commission artists to draw yog characters which, fine, I understand that. A lot of their revenue comes from selling merch, so letting fan artists selling fan art/commissions of their characters makes them lose out on a lot. 

The comic you’re thinking of is probably Shadow of Israphel: Rebirth. I read an account of what happened in relation to that a while ago so my memory on it is fuzzy, so I can’t remember if the donate button issue was related to that comic, or to another fan artist. But I do know the donate button issue was something like “you’re popular because of the yog fan art you draw, therefore your donations are yog related”??? or something like that. 

[cerebrobullet]

@hinomial replied to your post:@drakonia101 replied to your post “I’m sorry if I...

95% of fan content is coming from tumblr but that FACT is commonly ignored because it’s easier to pretend that everybody here creams themselves over any little thing. I don’t appreciate being treated as a horny teen thank you, fuck. I’m not even around any more and I want them to get the fuck out of the yogscast tag so they can stop pulling all this garbage and be starved for content. god damn you’d think they’d give a shit about people buying merch but no.

And even for the people who do like make the mature posts and stuff, those things are incredibly well tagged and well hidden? Like, I’ve never seen a fandom successfully put more effort into keeping that kinda thing out of a tag/out of view? Sure as hell can’t tell that from how we’re talked about, though.

And I think there’s certainly been a big reduction in fan made content since I joined back in 2013, that’s for sure. If they don’t bother to change their attitude, they’re going to alienate their creative community altogether and end up with a ghost town on this website.