For government-subsidised goregrind

The blog Invisible Oranges is always worth reading, not simply because Cosmo Lee listens to piles of bad metal records so we don't have to, but also because he is an intelligent and sophisticated writer capable of putting heavy music into a larger political, social, and economic context--without being a complete crashing bore--and so the blog features discussions of the sort that should be the envy of many so-called political blogs.

A case in point is found in a recent post about the Australian technical death metallers Psycroptic. Of course, the post isn't just about fretboard-scrubbing Aussies. Because Psycroptic received government funding to produce their debut album, Lee also discusses how Earache and Creation Records came about through assistance supplied by Maggie Thatcher's Enterprise Allowance Scheme, and works this into a discussion about the lack of arts funding in America and the "grievous misprioritization" of tax dollars. And, nearly unique among blogs, the comments on the piece actually form a worthwhile and interesting discussion.

I mention all of this not only to give Invisible Oranges a plug (because they really need some of my three daily readers), but also because a lot of this discussion ties into some recent posts I've made on this blog about funding for the arts in Canada.

The backlash over Conservative cuts to the arts was a divisive issue in the Canadian federal election earlier this month and was one of the main reasons why they were unable to win a majority government. It isn't so much that the Conservatives are against funding the arts generally--money going into culture actually increased under the Tories (though it's worth noting that the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics fall under the heading of "culture")--as it is about how the Conservatives allocate funds. Museums get more money. Bands with swear words in their name don't. Films that make God-botherers masturb--I mean, uncomfortable--don't get tax credits.

The impact that this will have on Canadian metal bands and Canadian heavy music in general is, as yet, unclear. I don't know how many people making this type of music even get funding from the Canadian government. "Adrien" in the Invisible Oranges comments box mentions that Cursed and Cancer Bats have, and I can't think of anybody to add to that list. I don't know if this is because there is any sort of discrimination against heavy bands among the bureaucrats of the Canada Council or if it has to do with a lack of heavy bands applying for grants. I did recently look at a list of recipients on the Canada Council website and didn't see any metal bands listed, but because the recipients of the grants are usually listed by their given names rather than their group's name, this doesn't mean much. There would be, in any case, massive outrage from all parties if a band like Anal Bleeding got government money.

Yet--hypothetically--should there be? The Anal Bleeding example is extreme, and is complicated by how willfully offensive the band is (I think this is of a different order than the Tory complaints against Young People Fucking and Holy Fuck), but that they are a "fringe" group shouldn't make any difference at all. Margaret Atwood, in an eloquent defence of the arts printed in The Globe and Mail before the election, raised the issue of the contribution the arts and artists make to the economy. She writes: "The Conference Board estimates Canada's cultural sector generated $46-billion, or 3.8 per cent of Canada's GDP, in 2007. And, according to the Canada Council, in 2003-2004, the sector accounted for an “estimated 600,000 jobs (roughly the same as agriculture, forestry, fishing, mining, oil & gas and utilities combined).”" This is a sturdy defence against the notion that government-subsidised artists are a money-sucking black hole, but it also misses the point. The arts should be supported for their own sake, and not simply because they are ultimately good for the economy. I don't have any statistics in front of me to prove this, but I assume that there's no money to be made in either writing or publishing Canadian poetry. Few people read it. Virtually all poetry books--no, make that virtually all books--published in Canada receive money from the Canada Council, and without this money there would be no Canadian publishing industry at all. Even if the poets only sell a handful of copies of their books to libraries, to friends, and to family, the money spent by the government to allow these people to write and to publish (note: and to not necessarily make a living from their writing) is worth it. Sales and readership shouldn't figure into it in a significant way, and Canadian culture would suffer a considerable loss if books were published only if they stood a chance of recouping their costs. Music is a slightly different case for obvious reasons such as distribution networks, touring, merchandising, and so on, but the general idea that grants for artists shouldn't be contingent on their appeal--at least as measured in dollars--stands.

In the comments of the original Invisible Oranges piece, Ian Christe, author of The Sound of the Beast, responds with a criticism of government-funded artists that is fairly common:

Anyway, I've thought about this funded arts question for years, too, and after scraping by myself envying Europe through many lean years I have to say at this point I'm happy the American system discourages creative pursuits. Necessity is the mother of invention, right? I don't think a comfortable safety net would have improved the music of Black Flag, Morbid Angel, Eyehategod, or Converge. Desperate circumstances have created some excellent desperate music in the USA. And in Brazil. And now in Afghanistan. There's an honesty in making music for survival. My 18-year old self is wrinkling up his nose at this, but he didn't know very much.

Also, the US doesn't exactly need government support of music -- this country already has an insanely over-developed music industry that supports every kind of recorded contrivance known to man. From blips to squawks, there's a huckster ready to take your tape to market.

He has a point here. Leaving aside that subsidies, at least in Canada, are hardly a "comfortable safety net", it's hard to see how financial assistance would have improved the music of the above-mentioned bands. Yet, it doesn't follow that they would have made worse music had they received artist grants. And while desperation appeals to a romantic notion of the artist starving and suffering for his or her art, it's really a bullshit notion. I can read about how grueling tours were with Black Flag in Get In The Van and about how they persisted and wrote ever more twisted music despite getting beaten up by skinheads or having their gear stolen; I can also recall how Death's Chuck Schuldiner signed over his royalties--likely a decent part of his income--to NYU's Tisch Hospital to finance a brain operation that had a chance of saving his life. Desperation is best for people who don't have to live it.

His point about America's "insanely over-developed music industry", however, is well-taken.