Popular Music (2005) Volume 24/3. Copyright © 2005 Cambridge University Press, pp. 357–367doi:10.1017/S0261143005000565 Printed in the United Kingdom

Elvis Costello, the empire of theE chord, and a magic moment ortwo

DAVID BRACKETT

AbstractThe phrase ‘this magic moment’ recurs throughout Elvis Costello’s ‘It’s Time’ (1996). Anallusion to pop history – the Drifter’s ‘This Magic Moment’ (1960) – is thus used in the serviceof a fatalistic narrative that manages to evoke both the ‘revenge and guilt’ famously associatedwith Costello’s early career and the early 1960’s romanticism of Brill Building pop. The musical‘magic moment’ of the song arrives in a ringing E major chord at the end of the chorus, playedin open position on the electric guitar. The use of this E major chord references another line of popmusic history, one that stretches back to the formation of ‘folk-rock’ in the mid-1960s. This paperserves as an example of how one song creates a series of magic moments that resonate densely withsimultaneous histories.

To think of magic moments in music is to emphasise the temporal, albeit in at least twodifferent ways. The arrival of a magic moment focuses our attention on the present,creating one of the few instances in life when we are not reflecting on the past orfuture. Yet, reflecting on magic moments creates the opposite effect, plunging one intothe world of memory. Writing about magic moments thus raises a paradox, in that onescrutinises a past experience that eclipsed a sense of past and future when it initiallyoccurred. The heightened narrativity of such a re-telling initially limits the possibilityof external verification of the magic moment in question, forcing the reader to accepton faith the implied distinction between magical and non-magical moments. Inother words, the act of recounting one’s memories makes no claims to approach ‘thereal’, instead adopting a rhetorical posture closer to that of storytelling, and thus, offiction (de Certeau 1984, p. 79). These distinctions – between an experience ofpresent-ness and of dwelling on the past, between magical and mundane moments –collapse as experiences of the present come to be understood as already inflected bycondensations of memory.1

The choice of a magic moment for this essay was sparked by the proximity of onesuch moment to the words ‘this magic moment’, as they occur in the followingpassage of Elvis Costello’s ‘It’s Time’ (shown in Example 1). This passage transportsme from the present to 1996 when I first heard Elvis Costello sing it, initiating aparadigmatic swirl of associations that leads to the Drifters’ 1960 recording of ‘ThisMagic Moment’ (see Example 2).2 The lyrics of both of these songs reflect on thecomplex sense of multiple temporalities implied by the notion of a ‘magic moment’.The phrase, ‘this magic moment’, occurs twice in the lyrics of the Drifters’ recording:the first of these moments, the singer tells us, is ‘so different and so new’ because ‘Ikissed you’; the second occurs ‘while your lips are close to mine’ – suggesting that

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repeating the kiss is enough to make that magic feel like the first time. Both of theselines are set to a classic doo-wop I-vi-IV-V harmonic progression, but are updatedwith the ‘uptown’ sound of swirling strings inaugurated by the Drifters’ releasefrom the previous year, ‘There Goes My Baby’, and modified by ‘the Latin tinge’permeating popular music during the period.

The magic moments in the lyrics of ‘It’s Time’, on the other hand, feel more likethey may be the last time such moments occur. In the latter song, ‘this magic moment’,first ‘concludes when that cigarette ends’; then in successive verses, it ‘concludeswhen they turn out the light’; and finally it ‘conclud[es] our mutual fate’. Thus, theDrifters’ magic moments evoke beginnings, kisses and eternity, while Costello’sconjure up ‘conclusions’ marked by burning cigarettes and extinguished lights. Themagic moments in both songs become metonyms, evoking the past in the present, butthey differ in their relationship to a notion of originary pleasure: the Drifters, byperpetuating the belief that it can be recovered and last forever; Costello, by doubtingthat it ever existed in the first place.

Costello’s fatalistic narrative, so reminiscent of what he termed the ‘revenge andguilt’ that saturated his early approach to lyrics, refers us to the earlier, sweetermagical moment of the Drifters through the use of a borrowed verbal phrase. But oneother aspect of ‘It’s Time’ evokes the pop music world of the 1950s and early-1960s,another possibly, yet possibly not, accidental instance of quotation or near-quotation,this time occurring in the succession of sonic events. I already mentioned the so-calleddoo-wop harmonic progression employed in ‘This Magic Moment’, a series of chordsalmost as common in early rock ‘n’ roll as the twelve-bar blues progression. In thepassage following the words ‘This Magic Moment’ in ‘It’s Time’, it’s possible to hearshards of this doo-wop progression, broken up and extended, with other chordsoccasionally interpolated; a progression never played straight through, but nonethe-less clear enough to form patterns to which the song keeps returning. In fact, from thewords ‘this magic moment’ on, the doo-wop progression forms a reference point forthe harmonic progression of ‘It’s Time’, even though it is never stated in its pure form.

Example 3 illustrates how ‘This Magic Moment’ uses the I-vi-IV-V progressionin unadulterated form twice (three times if one includes the introduction) beforeintroducing a contrasting harmonic progression (see Example 2 for a more detailedview of the first half of the first of these repetitions). The situation with ‘It’s Time’ ismore complex: the progression represented in Example 3 begins on the words ‘thismagic moment’ (shown in more detail in Example 1) in the middle of the progression,

Example 1. Elvis Costello, ‘It’s Time’ (0:32–0:42).

Example 2. The Drifters, ‘This Magic Moment’ (0:13–0:20).

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on the ‘IV’ chord. The song then cycles through variants of the I-vi-IV-V progressionfour times, altering it each time, while avoiding one of the most defining features ofthe progression (certainly in terms of Western music theory) – the movement from Vto I that clearly marks the beginning of a new repetition. The only ‘authentic’, V-Icadence occurs after the words ‘well I suppose that depends’, with the arrival on thetonic chord (I), which coincides with the words ‘if you go’ (the movement from theend of statement 2 to the beginning of statement 3 in example 3). This section of ‘It’sTime’, beginning with the words ‘if you go’, is further emphasised by a dramaticchange of texture with the entry of bass guitar and ‘real’ drums.

Yet my interest in ‘It’s Time’ does not stem entirely, or even mostly, from itsreference to a song released some thirty-six years earlier: to my ears, the magicmoment of the song occurs neither with the mention of ever-deferred and displacedmagic moments in the lyrics, nor in the evocation of chord progressions from daysgone by, but rather in the musical gesture that concludes each verse of the song – aringing open A chord that resolves to an open E (see Example 4), what in musictheoretical terminology would be called a plagal cadence (also termed an ‘amen’cadence because it is sung at the conclusion of Protestant hymns). The arrival at thesechords is carefully set up by several factors: the harmonic progression discussedearlier, the arch of the long vocal line, and a gradual build-up of texture.3 Thisparticular way of using the open E chord recalls other similar uses, usually involvinga movement from A to GY on the third string of the guitar. This use of the E majorchord, a kind of ‘sonic emblem’ involving the specific timbre of the highly amplified(though not particularly distorted) electric guitar, references another line of popmusic history, one that stretches back to the ‘classic rock’ of the mid-1960s.4

For guitarists, the E major chord in open position provides a particular kind ofsatisfaction (in fact, Henry Rollins linked the pleasures of playing this chordto male-oriented auto-eroticism); and traces of this visceral pleasure undoubtedly

Example 3. Use of ‘doo-wop’ progression in ‘This Magic Moment’ and ‘It’s Time’.

Example 4. Thunderous movement of A to E at 1:42 of ‘It’s Time’.

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resonate with listeners, whether or not they are guitarists.5 It has a uniquely, full,bright sound, resulting from several factors: the root of the chord is played on thelowest open string of the instrument in its conventional tuning; it uses all six stringsof the guitar; the highest note is also the root and is also played on an open string;and, the spacing of the pitches of the chord almost perfectly conform to themusic-theoretical ideal (see Example 5). This correspondence by itself may not helpexplain its effect, except that this ideal bears a strong relationship to the arrangementof pitches in the overtone series (a series of faint pitches sounding above everypitch – termed the fundamental – that we actually hear): low pitches further apart,high pitches closer together. Thus the upper five pitches of the open E chord arein a relationship to the lower pitch that reinforces the overtones of that lowerpitch – music theorists may yet debate whether the open E is the real chord of nature.6

By way of comparison (see Example 5), other commonly used open, majorchords available on the guitar have their root on an open string, but not on E (A major,D major), or the root is on the E string but the string isn’t open (G), or the root isneither on low E, nor open (C major). G major is probably the closest competitor to Ein terms of its sonorous quality, but both its highest and lowest pitches are stopped(i.e. not open), and the spacing of pitches does not correspond to the overtone seriesin the manner of the E chord. The G chord, therefore, while much beloved by folkguitarists, and very versatile, lacks the brilliant ring of E, and, because of where theopen and stopped strings are situated, is not as easy to control on the electric guitar.However, as I will discuss later, songs using these other chords as their tonic chordalso derive a distinctive overall sonority.

The use of the E chord that I have been discussing, the one featuring themovement from A to GY on the G-string, did not arise out of the ether. Rather, Costello,in employing this usage, links ‘It’s Time’ with other recordings dating back to themid-1960s, creating a fairly consistent line of intra-generic reference. Examples 6through 8 all rely on a similar use of the E chord.

In all three of these recordings (all four if we include ‘It’s Time’), the sound of theopen E chord is an essential ingredient, equal, I would argue, to the impact of melody,chord progression, rhythm, timbral nuances of the voice, etc. Because of the centralityof this sound to the effect of the recordings, if one were to attempt to capture theflavour of these arrangements in a cover version, it would not really be possible totranspose the song to another key. Dylan, in fact, originally recorded the last example,‘I Don’t Believe You’, in a solo version two years earlier in the key of D. Transposingthe song to E was among the many extensive and significant changes made betweenthe two versions, yet one of the most audible benefits of this change was to makeavailable the particular sound of that key on the guitar.7

Similarly, the demo version of ‘It’s Time’ reveals that Costello also originallyconceived the song in a different key. The change of key from F in the demo down to

Example 5. Comparison of the spacing of open chords on the guitar.

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E, in addition to giving Costello a bit more room at the top of his voice, makes thebrilliance of the E chord available on the guitar, which then becomes a major ingredi-ent in the sonic re-conception of the song. A further interesting point about the demois that it highlights the genre connections between ‘It’s Time’ and gospel/rhythm andblues (and, hence, the genre world of the Drifters) more than the official version,largely through the use in the demo of 6/8 metre, and a slower, more lilting tempo(the quarter-note triplets in the official version survive as vestiges of the metre used inthe demo – see Example 1).

Arraying these examples together raises several questions. First, what is theexpressive use to which the ‘sonic emblem’ of the open E is put? In other words, what,if anything, do the verbal/semantic worlds implied by the words of these songs havein common that makes the use of the open E with 4-3 suspension (or ‘Esus4’ in guitarnomenclature) particularly well suited to projecting their meaning? The lyrics of ‘It’sTime’, ‘Barstool Blues’ and ‘I Don’t Believe You’ all deal with relationships that are inthe process of ending or have already ended, while ‘Nowhere Man’ describes some-one lost in uncertainty. If we were to assume that musical gestures were completelyneutral, then we could quickly move to the idea that our E chord straightforwardlyreflects or translates the quality of ‘ending, loss, romantic despair, depression’ heardin the lyrics. Yet while words may give us a key to the ‘human universe’ inhabited bythe music, the music (and especially the singing voice) inflects the words, as the

Example 6. Neil Young, ‘Barstool Blues’ (1975) (0:43–0:46).

Example 7. The Beatles, ‘Nowhere Man’ (1965) (0:14–0:17) .

Example 8. Bob Dylan and the Hawks, ‘I Don’t Believe You’ (1966) (0:02–0:15) (schematictranscription, omitting improvised guitar fills).

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different versions of ‘I Don’t Believe You’ and ‘It’s Time’ well illustrate.8 The qualitiesthat I hear in these recordings – ‘defiance, strength, resolution in the face of adversity,yearning, sneering’ – illustrate the ambiguous, yet not completely open-endedquality of musical meaning. The brilliant ring of the open E chord with a 4–3suspension stresses certain potential interpretations of the lyrics, calls our attention tolatent aspects of voices and personae, while softening or downplaying others.9

Yet this chain of specific word-music linkages, while compelling, addresses onlyone aspect of connotative meaning. Another telling aspect may be found along thetranslucent and shifting borders that mark genres and the socio-cultural associationsattached to them.10 The use of a musical device such as this gesture involving the openE chord, evokes historical associations with (what we are calling here for lack of abetter name) ‘folk-rock’, a genre which became meaningful in relation to other genresduring the mid-1960s (or the summer of 1965, to be more precise), and which becamethe prototype for later constructions of classic rock. In all three periods under con-sideration here, 1966, 1975, and 1996, the E-chord gesture evokes (something like)folk-rock through its contrast with other genres that would be unlikely to include sucha gesture. This particular E-chord references folk-rock partly through its differencefrom other usages of the open E that may refer to other genres, most notably, to thosederived from the blues. In order to accept this distinction, one would have to examinethe very different way in which the E chord is used in blues and blues-derived genres;one of the most striking differences, for example, is how, in blues-related genres (butnot in folk-rock) the third (GY on the first fret of the G string) alternates ambiguouslywith the open G, creating a ‘blues third’ effect (see example 9). This bluesy usage ofthe open E characterises recordings, such as Link Wray’s 1958 ‘Rumble’ (where theresounding E chord that dominates the soundscape of the song is clearly situatedin a blues tonal context), which otherwise might seem to be prime examples ofantecedents for the open E as heard in ‘It’s Time’.11

The move towards excision of blues tonality in folk-rock creates a momentaryboundary, and distinguishes it from two historical genres usually considered to beimportant influences on rock ‘n’ roll: blues and country. Rather than the ‘lowdown’funkiness of blues tonality, the ‘purity’ of the major thirds in folk-rock evokes musicsoutside the American vernacular, the most obvious examples being either British Islestraditional music or European classical music. One effect of this move is to create aform of rock ‘n’ roll derived popular music – in the process of being christened ‘rock’circa 1965 – with the seemingly paradoxical connotations of middle-class whiteness,and urban, bohemian hipness, associations not as evident in blues, rhythm and blues,or country.12

Folk-rock thus fulfilled the need for a genre that was distinctively white. It alsosimultaneously created a genre that was distinctively hip, achieving this hipnessthrough an insistence on artistic autonomy and an invocation of bohemian discoursesaround alternative practices of accreditation – or, in other words, around the idea thatvalue emanates from the approval of other artists rather than from economic success

Example 9. Stereotypical blues guitar lick in the key of E.

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or established academic/critical criteria. These factors helped differentiate folk-rockfrom less hip, white-associated genres such as teen pop, and pre-rock ‘n’ roll-styledpop.13 While other hip styles performed by white musicians co-existed at this timewith folk-rock, these genres, such as blues-rock and hard rock, all maintained obviousties to historical and contemporaneous genres that were strongly associated withAfrican Americans. These white musicians therefore always ran the risk of being seenas derivative, at a remove of one step from the ‘real thing’, or as somewhat devaluedcopies of an original that remained beyond reach. Folk-rock seemed to satisfy thedesire for the newly expanded mass of white, middle-class, post-secondary schoolproducers and consumers for a music that did not reek of an earnest duplicate,however skilfully delivered.14 Costello’s transformation of ‘It’s Time’ from gospel/doo-wop to a song with closer ties to folk- (or classic-) rock, thereby obscures, througha process of generic ‘whitening’, the connection of its magic moments with those in theDrifters’ recording of that name.

This is not to say that the work of all artists associated with folk-rock avoidsblues tonality, although the recordings of archetypal folk-rockers, the Byrds, comefairly close. Blues inflections are rarely far away in Dylan’s work – even in ‘I Don’tBelieve You’, the opening guitar riff resembles that of Chuck Berry’s ‘Memphis’, andRobbie Robertson’s guitar fills make frequent use of blues-based phrases – and theBeatles recorded several blues- and country-derived songs on Rubber Soul, the albumon which ‘Nowhere Man’ appeared. The point here is that one of the clearest definingdifferences between folk-rock and earlier rock ‘n’ roll, contemporaneous rhythm andblues, and country is the use of these ringing, non-bluesy, folk-based, open guitarchords, of which the E with a suspension is a prime example.

Similar to how the folk-rock of ‘Nowhere Man’ and ‘I Don’t Believe You’distinguished itself from other genres coexisting in the mid-1960s, so did the allusionsto folk-rock in ‘Barstool Blues’ and ‘It’s Time’ mark their identity within the popularmusic field of their eras. ‘Barstool Blues’, appearing on Neil Young’s Zuma in 1975,contrasted with other ‘hard rock’ songs on the same album, such as ‘Drive Back’, orthe out-and-out ‘folk’ of ‘Through My Sails’. A glance at the top-ranked albums inBillboard’s charts of that year reveals contrasts between Young’s album and the funk ofEarth, Wind and Fire’s That’s the Way of the World, the pop-rock of Elton John’s CaptainFantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy, and the hard rock cum heavy-metal of LedZeppelin’s Physical Graffiti ( though the eclecticism of Physical Graffiti probably re-sembles that of Zuma more closely than the others). Costello’s ‘It’s Time’ findscompanionship on his album All This Useless Beauty with his folk-rock Byrds tributesong, ‘You Bowed Down’, but contrasts elsewhere with numerous ballads, the neo-soul ‘Why Can’t a Man Stand Alone’, or the country-ish ‘Starting to Come to Me’.Looking across the pop music spectrum of 1996, Costello’s work has less in commonwith the best-sellers of the day than the examples from 1966 or 1975, differing mightilyfrom hip-hop albums such as the Fugees’ Score, or from Céline Dion’s retro-pop,Falling Into You, though sharing certain models in ‘classic rock’ ( if little else) withFairweather Johnson by Hootie and the Blowfish.

One could say, in a guitar-o-centric world, that ‘It’s Time’, ‘Nowhere Man’, ‘IDon’t Believe You’ et al. are ‘about’ the E chord in the same way that songs by theByrds, like ‘Tambourine Man’ and ‘Turn, Turn, Turn’, are about the D chord, and liketheir ‘I’ll Feel a Whole Lot Better’ is about the A chord. The Byrds don’t (to myknowledge) have an E chord song of the type I have been describing. D and A,while not possessing the resounding ring of E, have other properties that, we might

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speculate, are better suited to the Byrds’ purposes. These chords enable a 4-3-2-3melodic motion, a type of movement that is not possible with E, because the 3rd of theE chord is only a half-step above the open string (see Example 10 and compare withExample 5). Costello’s aforementioned tribute to the Byrds’ mid-1960s oeuvre, ‘YouBowed Down’, written originally for Byrds’ leader Roger McGuinn (and recorded byhim in 1991) is, not surprisingly, in D, and uses ringing open D and A chordswhenever possible.

* * *

The interface between performance practice, the technology of musical instru-ments, and the social history of genres contributes to the paradigmatic depth of themagical moment I have been describing. But I would argue that the particularity ofthis moment is not unique. My choice of what may seem to many to be an obscuretrack on an obscure album is thus not driven by the desire to bestow artistic legitimacyon ‘It’s Time’, but rather by the almost random coincidence of a conference theme witha line in that song. The contingent nature of song selection suggests that suchperformances of personal and socio-historical excavation should be possible with awide range of cultural artefacts.

Magic moments trigger memories that strive to connect chains of otherwise dis-connected associations and events. What is ephemeral, an instance that disappears in ablink of an eye, may in later instances be organised, framed in a narrative. Such isfrequently the fate of not only magic moments, but, one might argue, of unmagicalmoments as well, of communication in general, of the experience of symbolic forms intime, and thus, of music in particular. These chains of memories lead listeners todifferent positions in social spaces located at different points in history: on the onehand, to an African-American rhythm and blues group going ‘uptown’ and crossingover to new audiences, new sounds, rhythms and instruments, as new possibilities forcombining pop, rhythm and blues, and rock ‘n’ roll were being explored; or, on theother hand, to white bohemians betokening countercultural movements and the insti-tution of cultural capital within the popular music field. Beyond the personal signifi-cance of my ruminations, ‘It’s Time’ serves as an example of how multiple socialworlds and historical trajectories are evoked by the fragile, momentary magic of music.

Endnotes

1. Simon Frith concludes his discussion of musicand the experience of time by arguing for theability of music to focus our attention on thepresent moment (Frith 1996, p. 157). SeeKramer (1988) for an extended study of therelationship between music and the experienceof time.

2. This train of associations illustrates what can beunderstood as the intensely connotative qualityof listening/hearing music, especially ‘song’with its multiple semiotic axes. Even this briefexcerpt of ‘It’s Time’ contains another verbalphrase, ‘concludes when this cigarette ends’,that sparks off another chain of associations, in

Example 10. Typical folk-rock melodic movements of open A and D chords.

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this case leading to songs such as ‘A Good Yearfor the Roses’ and ‘These Foolish Things’ inwhich discarded cigarettes evoke dying rela-tionships or absent loved ones. For more onconnotative processes in popular music, seePhilip Tagg (1979; 1991; 2003); and for an over-view of semiotic processes in popular music ingeneral see Richard Middleton (1990, pp. 172–246).

3. In fact, I would argue that the deviations fromthe doo-wop progression in ‘It’s Time’ do con-tribute, in good functional-harmonic fashion, tothe impact of the ‘big E chord’ by delaying reso-lution of the harmonic-melodic motion of thesong in order to heighten tension.

4. Due to the capacity of this musical gestureto elicit corresponding physical movements(especially among guitarists – see Frith 1996,pp. 141–2), its meaning could arguably lie in therealm of ‘primary signification’ as well as inthe field of connotations explored here (seeMiddleton 1990, pp. 224–7, 264–7; and Keil[1966] 1994).

5. The pleasures of the E chord are also illustratedby a scene in the middle of School of Rock (2003),in which Jack Black teaches one of his students,a solemn classical guitarist, how to play an Echord, ‘rock’ style.

6. The term ‘chord of nature’ has been used bytheorists of Western art music such asJean-Philippe Rameau and Heinrich Schenkerin reference to the major triad; both theoristsused the overtone series to support this claim.The overtone series has also been pressed intothe service of other systems to support claims ofnaturalness, as in, for example, the creation of aforty-three-note scale by twentieth-centurycomposer Harry Partch. See also RobertPalmer’s discussion of the impact of guitarovertones, amplifier distortion and reverb, andrecording studio effects on the history of rock‘n’ roll (Palmer 1991).

7. Another motivating factor was undoubtedlythat it places Dylan’s voice in a slightly higherregister, making it easier for his voice to ‘cutthrough’ the amplified accompaniment.

8. The idea that lyrics refer to the ‘human uni-verse’ evoked by the music comes from Laing(1969, p. 99) (quoted in Middleton 1990, p. 228).I am aware that, strictly speaking in music-theoretical terms, the use of A resolving toG-sharp in an E major chord may not always bea ‘suspension’. I am here merging music-theoretical terminology with the guitarists’ ver-nacular use of the term as would be typicallylearned through reading chord symbols,although I will note that in all of these examples,strong-weak rhythmic placement of the A andG-sharp mimics the pattern of the suspension/appoggiatura in functional tonal music.

9. The suspension/appoggiatura also has conno-tative properties in Western art music in theperiod ca 1600–1900, where it is frequentlyused to evoke longing/yearning or, to use acontextually appropriate term, sehnsucht.

10. An unproblematic evocation of the concept ofgenre certainly risks presenting the popularmusical field as a static, spatialised arrange-ment, with different kinds of music clearlydemarcated from one another. The mostthoroughgoing problematisation of the conceptof genre may be found in Derrida (1980). Forwork that argues for a carefully qualified use ofgenre in relation to popular music, see Fabbri(1982), Walser (1993), Frith (1996), Negus(1999), Toynbee (2000), Brackett (2002) andBrackett (2005).

11. See Palmer (1991) for a discussion of manyother blues-based examples from the 1950s and1960s.

12. I want to stress here the difference between‘folk-rock’ and ‘folk’, which, even in its late-1950s, early-1960s guise as the ‘urban folkrevival’ was remarkably more inclusive in termsof race and gender; this held true for the per-formers associated with it as well as its morewidespread social connotations. Folk-rock, andhence rock, succeeded in presenting itself as ananti-mass, mass form that followed in the foot-steps of the urban folk revival, but with theimportant addition of a modernist, ‘art for art’ssake’ mode of ‘authenticity’ (see Keightley2002).

13. By invoking ‘whiteness’ in this context, I am notreferring to a racial essence, but rather the wayin which a genre would have been likely to beassociated with a social group identified as‘white’ at a particular historical conjuncture, i.e.‘whiteness’ becomes meaningful as a tendencywithin a field of social relationships that isre-constituted from moment to moment. Ihave tackled this issue at greater length else-where; see Brackett (2002; 2003; 2005). BernardGendron succinctly sums up the importance ofthe issue of racial distinctiveness and its role incultural accreditation in a certain strain of earlyrock criticism (Gendron 2002, pp. 186–7, 219–21). For more on alternative discourses of cul-tural accreditation, see Bourdieu (1993) and,again, Gendron (2002).

14. See Bakhtin (1986, pp. 60–102, esp. 95–100) onhow distinctions between genres (in this case,what Bakhtin terms ‘speech genres’) dependon different implied audiences, what he calls‘addressivity’; and see Bourdieu (1993, pp. 29–73) for a discussion of how positions in thecultural field may correspond to positions insocial space through variable logics of artisticprestige and economic success. By ‘producers’, Iam referring to both ‘producers’ in the musicindustry sense, as well as to musicians whoproduce the sounds heard on recordings. Tounderstand the expanded sense of artistic posi-tions available to baby boomers, which was amajor factor in the development of an auton-omous mode of legitimation within the sphereof commercial music, it is interesting to readTom Wolfe’s account of the conflict betweenPhil Spector ca 1964, and the representatives ofthe old-guard music industry (Wolfe 1965). A

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Billboard article from the summer of 1965, whenthe folk-rock boom was at its peak, supports theidea of shared values between producers, con-sumers, and industry gatekeepers, as producer

Lou Adler notes that ‘many of radio’s youngdisk jockeys have beliefs which coincide with’those of the folk-rock songwriters (Billboard1965).

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Farrar, Straus and Giroux) pp. 47–61, reprinted in Brackett (2005), pp. 111–17

DiscographyBeatles, ‘Nowhere Man’, Rubber Soul. Parlophone PCS 3075. 1965Byrds, ‘I’ll Feel a Whole Lot Better’, Mr. Tambourine Man. Columbia 2372. 1965

‘Mr. Tambourine Man’, Mr. Tambourine Man. Columbia 2372. 1965‘Turn! Turn! Turn! (To Everything There Is a Season)’, Turn! Turn! Turn! Columbia 2454. 1965

Elvis Costello, ‘It’s Time’, All This Useless Beauty. Warner 46198. 1996‘It’s Time’ (demo), All This Useless Beauty, expanded edition, re-release. Rhino R2 74284. 2001‘You Bowed Down’, All This Useless Beauty. Warner 46198. 1996

Céline Dion, Falling Into You. 550 Music 67541. 1996Drifters, ‘This Magic Moment’. Atlantic 2050. 1960. Re-released on The Very Best of the Drifters. Rhino R2

71211. 1993Bob Dylan, ‘I Don’t Believe You’, Another Side of Bob Dylan. Columbia 2193/8993. 1964

366 David Brackett

‘I Don’t Believe You’, The Bootleg Series, Vol. 4: Bob Dylan Live 1966: The ‘Royal Albert Hall’ Concert.Columbia/Legacy 68556. 1998

Earth, Wind, and Fire, That’s the Way of the World. Columbia 33280. 1975Fugees, The Score. Ruffhouse 67147. 1996Hootie and the Blowfish, Fairweather Johnson. Atlantic 82886. 1996Elton John, Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy. MCA 2142. 1975Led Zeppelin, Physical Graffiti. Swan Song 200 [2]. 1975Roger McGuinn, ‘You Bowed Down’, Back from Rio. Arista 8648. 1991Link Wray, ‘Rumble’. Cadence 1347. 1958Neil Young, ‘Barstool Blues’, Zuma. Reprise 2242. 1975

Elvis Costello 367