Books:
Bring the Noise, the title of a track by 1980s hip
hop giants Public Enemy, is the one chosen by
acclaimed music journalist Simon Reynolds
for a collection of articles which charts the
development of rock and hip hop over the last 20
years. Reynolds breaches the parameters of hip
hop and rock to explore the many permutations
of nominally black and white music, taking in dub,
jungle, garage and grime along with grunge, rave,
post-rock, electronica and various instances of the white liberal. Blistering and scattershot, black
cross-pollination. Reynolds’s writing combines street music continually refuses to be organised
adolescent excitement for new sounds with serious or articulated in support of white underground
critical enquiry: for him, music is a propulsive force concerns. And as Reynolds points out, once black
that should reflect, but also aspire to alter, the music is embraced (or appropriated) by white
socio-political landscape of a given period. He musicians and breaks into the mainstream, it
looks for the rallying cry, the driving rhythm: hence quickly retreats to create new, as yet un-usurped
the choice of title, with its active/imperative verb music.
and echo of 1980s black militancy. What is striking about Reynolds’s almanac
But his ideological leanings and his tastes of countless assorted, interlocking and opposed
are often incompatible: while he appreciates, musical genres is the absence of female voices.
for example, Manic Street Preachers’s social Barring an interview with rock singer PJ Harvey,
programme, he can’t help but note the band’s women are largely missing from the archive
mainly unimpressive discography. And though he – even Harvey herself admits that her influences
deplores the rampantly acquisitive and misogynist are male and that she prefers to socialise with
moxie of gangsta rap, Snoop Dogg’s Doggystyle men. Though Reynolds laments this absence,
(1993) proves too seductive a record to resist. his interviews with male artists and producers
Indeed, ‘the voice of resistance’ Reynolds searches (and especially Public Enemy) make for bleak
out is largely absent from recent mainstream reading on the subject of women. In underground
hip hop, with its increasing conservatism and and street music, women seemingly consume
commitment to capitalism. But he readily admits rather than produce, are reactive as opposed to
that the desire for black music to cleave to instigative. All of which begs the question: is it
revolutionary socialist principles is a fantasy of that women fundamentally don’t or aren’t allowed to bring the noise? In this excellent evaluation of
music borne of disenfranchisement, it’s dispiriting
to find women still marginalised from the frontline.
Laura Allsop
BRING THE NOISE
By Simon Reynolds
Faber & Faber, £16.99 (paperback)
ARTREVIEW one.linfour.linzero.lin
p140-142 Books AR May07.indd 140 3/4/07 04:14:20
Page 1 Page 2 Page 3 Page 4 Page 5 Page 6 Page 7 Page 8 Page 9 Page 10 Page 11 Page 12 Page 13 Page 14 Page 15 Page 16 Page 17 Page 18 Page 19 Page 20 Page 21 Page 22 Page 23 Page 24 Page 25 Page 26 Page 27 Page 28 Page 29 Page 30 Page 31 Page 32 Page 33 Page 34 Page 35 Page 36 Page 37 Page 38 Page 39 Page 40 Page 41 Page 42 Page 43 Page 44 Page 45 Page 46 Page 47 Page 48 Page 49 Page 50 Page 51 Page 52 Page 53 Page 54 Page 55 Page 56 Page 57 Page 58 Page 59 Page 60 Page 61 Page 62 Page 63 Page 64 Page 65 Page 66 Page 67 Page 68 Page 69 Page 70 Page 71 Page 72 Page 73 Page 74 Page 75 Page 76 Page 77 Page 78 Page 79 Page 80 Page 81 Page 82 Page 83 Page 84 Page 85 Page 86 Page 87 Page 88 Page 89 Page 90 Page 91 Page 92 Page 93 Page 94 Page 95 Page 96 Page 97 Page 98 Page 99 Page 100 Page 101 Page 102 Page 103 Page 104 Page 105 Page 106 Page 107 Page 108 Page 109 Page 110 Page 111 Page 112 Page 113 Page 114 Page 115 Page 116 Page 117 Page 118 Page 119 Page 120 Page 121 Page 122 Page 123 Page 124 Page 125 Page 126 Page 127 Page 128 Page 129 Page 130 Page 131 Page 132 Page 133 Page 134 Page 135 Page 136 Page 137 Page 138 Page 139 Page 140 Page 141 Page 142 Page 143 Page 144 Page 145 Page 146 Page 147 Page 148 Page 149 Page 150 Page 151 Page 152 Page 153 Page 154 Page 155 Page 156 Page 157 Page 158 Page 159 Page 160 Page 161 Page 162 Page 163 Page 164 Page 165