Diedrich Diederichsen has inspired and galvanized entire generations of pop fans. Now the results of a lifetime of reflections on pop are being published – a clever, controversial book that will tear down everything you think you know about pop.
Pop music, says Diederichsen, isn’t music at all. Music is just the backdrop for pop’s much deeper and more radiant signals. Pop is a hybrid of ideas, wishes, promises. It is a space for posing and pacts, for totems and for breaking taboos. The author draws his arguments from semiotics and sociology, as well as the history and current state of pop culture and the neighboring fields of jazz, film and opera. It is the first book to take into account the full range of the phenomenon and the only one in which both Theodor W. Adorno and Congo Ashanti Roy make an appearance.
“The question with pop music is: What kind of guy is he? When the record spins and crackles to life. When the CD is turned on or the file is clicked. When the next video starts up after the last commercial break: What kind of people are they? What do they want? What are they like?” – Diedrich Diederichsen
