Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)While "Policing Pop" does provide some insight into the behind the scenes policing/censoring that occurs at record labels, overall the book is pretty week. Cloonan's "definition" of what actually constitutes policing/censorship is at best subjective. The pieces dealing with the internet and future of online music feel dated. The book attempts to tackle censorship on a global scale, but would be better served if it had focused on a single region. After reading the book you come away with a vague feeling about the nature of censorship and policing in various countries in relation to pop music. Because of this, a great deal of the conclusions are over generalized so that they apply globally. There must be better books out there.
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Fans and detractors of popular music tend to agree on one thing: popular music is a bellwether of an individual's political and cultural values. In the United States, for example, one cannot think of the counterculture apart from its music. For that reason, in virtually every country in the world, some group identifies popular music as a source of potential danger and wants to regulate it. "Policing Pop" looks into the many ways in which popular music and artists around the world are subjected to censorship, ranging from state control and repression to the efforts of special interest or religious groups to limit expression. The essays collected here focus on the forms of censorship as well as specific instances of how the state and other agencies have attempted to restrict the types of music produced, recorded and performed within a culture. Several show how even unsuccessful attempts to exert the power of the state can cause artists to self-censor. Others point to material that taxes even the most liberal defenders of free speech.Taken together, these essays demonstrate that censoring agents target popular music all over the world, and they raise questions about how artists and the public can resist the narrowing of cultural expression. Author note: Martin Cloonan teaches Popular Music Culture at the University of Glasgow and is the author of "Banned! Censorship of Popular Music in Britain, 1967-1992". Reebee Garofalo is Professor at the College of Public and Community Service and is affiliated with the American Studies Program at the University of Massachusetts, Boston; his most recent book is "Rockin' Out: Popular Music in the USA".
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