If, to paraphrase Beethoven, music should strike fire in men’s hearts and tears in women’s eyes, then what exactly does it have to do with politics?
We spoke to Professor of politics at the University of East Anglia John Street, whose book explores the link between the practice of organising public life and using sound to ask him just that. His take? Both inspire strong emotion, both can tell you a lot about a person, and both inspire one another.
What made you interested in link between music and politics?
We are typically a very visual culture and most classic moment in social sciences is so called enlightenment.
That to me, the idea when you open your eyes you see more clearly- it is the eyes that do all the work- comprehending the world and part of what I wanted to do is counter that and say we comprehend the world as much with our ears as our eyes.
If we think like that, ears are as important as the eyes we should take more notice to what music is and what it does.
Aristotle and Plato acknowledge the importance of music and we should not ignore their insight.
Does a desperate political situation inspire more creativity?
Conventional wisdom suggests hard times produce good art and comfortable times bland art.
Of course the high point in many people’s long term musical history is the 1960s and of course that was a time of affluence so I don’t think there is a neat causal relationship between economic and other social circumstances and the kind of music that is performed.
But often it is nice to tie the things together and it is certainly possible. One of the interesting things that someone made to me was that societies that sometimes have the most creative art are dictatorships.
An example would be Stalin who encouraged art of many kinds but there would not be an argument to which I would like to hang my own name but I know people have taken that view.
Is British music political now?
It may be significant that this year’s Mercury music prize went to PJ Harvey’s England will Shake which is probably the most political record of the year in its working over legacies of Iraq war.
It is a classic example of music engaging with the world but music that sold most was by Adele arguably not a record with an obvious political agenda so one has to be careful saying this.
And how do politicians use music?
Politics are acutely aware of choosing music from D;Ream’ things can only get better in 1997 and through to 2010 when the Conservatives went for ‘Everybody’s Changing’ by Keane. The Conservatives knew that if they had the right song it would help improve their image and lock themselves into peoples brains.
But it can go wrong, like when Gordon Brown said he liked the Arctic Monkeys.
If you are trying to pretend to like something you don’t like then you expose yourself as a fraud rather than as deeply cool or hip, or whatever you were trying to be. It is a highly risky strategy. In the States they do that a lot , identifying musical favourites are becomes almost as important as where you stand on debt reduction.
I am exaggerating obviously but it is true that our tastes are quite revealing. If you ask me what I like you think that is completely fraudulent taste or I could get on with that person.
See here for the top 5 political songs: