Songs
Hide Your Children
The first song I sang is associated with the black television. It represents the evening newscast in which the anchor man is essentially repeating that there is a constant threat of a being attacked. The ideas I am attempting to express are two fold. One is a parody or satire of the fear mongering on television, represented by the TV head. The other concept is contained within the lyrics of the song. The idea of the song is about the absurd persistence of an “external threat” to rally the masses in support of a war they would not support otherwise.
This idea of an established "external threat" is well known and well documented among prominent political figures
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The second song I wrote is about the father of spin, Edward Bernays. This song is associated with the good television or the “straight talk” television. This TV is the opposite of the black one by attempting to disclose the ideas of propaganda rather than recite them in the case of the Hide Your Children song.
Most people are unaware of who Bernays is and how his ideas are the basis of propaganda.
Bernays believed that “The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society” and “Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country.”
View further quotes and information on Edward Bernays
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Concept
The theoretical ideas for my project are based on the study of mass psychology and the manipulation of reality and perception. In today’s world, reality is not based on what is real but on what is perceived to be real. I am interested how mass mediums, such as the television and programming can be used so efficiently in controlling the perception of whole societies.
The purpose of my project was to express these ideas through song by giving a newscast as a television anchor in song form. I wanted to experiment with the effects of poetry and music/art combined with social and political issues such as propaganda and fear mongering.
The idea I had originally in mind was to give a newscast, in which the newscaster would sing a song that was relayed to him by another person who was playing an instrument and the live newscast would be viewed on a television that was connected to a camera filming the news anchor. This would all be happening simultaneously on stage. (see illustration)
I quickly realized the technical difficulties in accomplishing the first idea. Then I figured I would just make a news cast and show a video in class, however this would take away from the performance aspect of the song.
Finally I settled on the idea of giving a performance with a TV set on my head, essentially becoming a “talking head”. I constructed the TV set out of materials I found in my room excluding the spray paint. The television that i constructed is two sided, with the black side representing the "fearmongering news" and the white side representing the ideas exposing the black side.
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Matt Dayton's Act Lab Website |
| Weird Science '07: Project One | |
| (Project One) (Project Two) (Project Three) | |
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