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Playing with medium: Intertextuality and phonomatic transformation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 April 2022

Jeff Wragg Open the ORCID record for Jeff Wragg [Opens in a new window]
Jeff Wragg*
Affiliation:
Southern Institute of Technology, 133 Tay St, Invercargill, New Zealand E-mail: jeffswragg@gmail.com
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Abstract

In ‘Intertextuality and hypertextuality in recorded popular music’, S. Lacasse (in M. Talbot (ed.) The Musical Work: Reality or Invention?, Liverpool University Press, 2000) proposes a model for understanding intertextuality in recorded popular music. His model provides different ways one text may reference another, while simultaneously transforming the style and/or subject of the original text. Style and subject are two of the integral elements that make up a work, yet what is missing from Lacasse's model is the medium through which these elements are presented. This article addresses that gap by introducing three phonomatic referential practices (retronormativity, vinyl aesthetics and analogue allusion) that transform the medium of a referenced work alongside transformations of style and/or subject. It further expands the model by discussing self-quotation as a referential practice. The applicability of the expanded model is demonstrated using the music of Portishead, one of the bands that pioneered the trip hop genre in the 1990s.

Type
Article
Information
Popular Music , Volume 41 , Issue 1 , February 2022 , pp. 97 - 111
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Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press

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References

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