Research in Professional Writing, Games, and Design

Ryan Moore (no dates)

I spent more than an hour hunting for anything on Ryan Moore. I found a pro golfer, a NASCAR driver, a software developer, a motorcycle stunt rider, and some kid’s MySpace page. Unless our man is the modern day Buckaroo Banzai, I’m thinking none of these are him.

Finally, I found his page for the Department of Sociology at Florida Atlantic University, where he’s an assistant professor.

I found no picture to prove it, but apparently, his students love him and think he’s pretty hot [link].

And Sells like Teen Spirit (2009) has a Facebook page.

“Anarchy in the USA”

Pivoting on the emergence of punk and hip-hop as reactions to the collapsed attempts at social change spurred on by earlier forms of music, Moore situates the evolution of these musical scenes against a backdrop of postmodern critiques of meaning and culture, as well as a Marxist critique of their contemporary economic contexts. He states that “such changes cannot merely be described as ‘economic,’ for they have given rise to a whole way of life where time and space are compressed, social relations are more fluid and ephemeral, and the commodity form infiltrates every aspect of everyday life” (p. 7). All of three are necessarily bound to each other if he is to form a full sociological examination of music as a line of cultural force in late 20th century western capitalist societies.

The central gist of his argument is that the postmodern rupture of meaning and the economic downturn of the late 1970s combined to demolish the idealized social transformations of the 1950s and 60s counter-cultural revolution under the weight of the pressures those changes created. In effect, the sociological pressures of increasing poverty led to a cynicism that is both producer of and created by the semiological deconstruction of meaning. Punk and hip-hop stood as localized expressions of this tension while they remained largely hidden away within their respective communities. Briefly, Moore traces a quick narrative of rock music’s evolution through the 1980s and into the late 1990s, along with its simultaneous demise as a force for cultural critique and change.

Several key ideas emerge in Moore’s framework as a basis for cultural analysis, among the most interesting his distinctions between “noise” and “rhythm” as auditory semiotic structures that denote potentially different emotional resonances to given situations (p. 21). As a musician, especially one steeped in Grunge, I find this idea fascinating as an analytical tool. Where Moore admits he doesn’t have the knowledge to examine music as a structural system, I can point to some observations that empower his analysis.

Below are four videos for songs from the four commercially successful bands that emerged from the Seattle Grunge scene. All four feature the same instrument tunings (Dropped D, specifically), extremely similar main guitar riffs, but are couched in different sounds and styles that draw from different moments in rock’s past.

Nirvana — “Heart-shaped Box” (1993) — often compared to punk predecessors

Soundgarden — “Outshined” (1990) — often compared to black metal, like Black Sabbath

Pearl Jam — “Go” (1993) — sometimes compared to 1960s rock, like The Yardbirds

Alice in Chains — “Would” (1992) — started as a speed metal band

What’s interesting is that each could evoke something of a territorial pissing match about who had the most authentic “Seattle sound,” at least among those not from the Seattle area (like me). To Grunge enthusiasts like me, there are radical differences in the sound and emotional uptake from each song, despite their structural and musical similarities.

What do you think?