This contribution documents the vibrant DIY scene in Leeds (UK) over the last few years and exposes the inherent tensions between widespread cultural ambivalence towards engaging with corporate media today and a group of historically unambivalent actors.
DIY scenes have long been synonymous with advancing causes of social justice (Chapter 2); the stand-out case examined in the historical discussion presents analysis of the Riot Grrrl scene which proves definitive in Jones’ reframing of DIY's purpose today. The scene, which emerged from Washington, DC in the early 1990s, grew notorious for its female-only performances. It proved controversial for many, often considered provocatively exclusionary by those on the outside. What the Riot Grrrls sought, however, was not only to draw attention to the historical exclusion of women from rock/punk music cultures but equally to build a safe, inclusive space where the traditionally excluded could congregate and create away from the leering male chauvinism of existing (niche) performance cultures.
Taking this particular notion of resistance forward, Jones addresses problematic aesthetic-political considerations in the cultural study of scene(s):
In my view, an over-emphasis on conceptualising DIY as social movement, or as political praxis, significantly neglects one of its defining features: namely, its close emulation of popular music culture and the organisational forms of the commercial music industries. Even if we accept that DIY is perhaps ‘resistant’, the specific character of its resistance cannot be understood without accounting for this ambivalent relationship to popular music, which is consistent throughout DIY's various manifestations. (p. 35, emphasis in original).
If the notion of resistance in DIY (exhibited throughout the case studies) is not necessarily resisting the aesthetic and practice of popular music and corporate media, then what is it resisting? Jones’ research locates this resistance instead within the causes of social justice promoted through DIY music scenes, a trend which continues through to the present (i.e. the Leeds DIY scene which serves as grounding for this study). The relationship that DIY music has with the mainstream is therefore less antagonistic and more pragmatic in mediatising socio-political narratives via the (independent) mobilisation of popular aesthetics and organisational forms.
Jones’ analysis of DIY draws upon Nancy Fraser's notion of participatory parity as theoretical means of linking the strands of intersectional DIY scenes, from the feminist Riot Grrrl movement to the latent anarchism of post-punk (Indie) in the UK and USA. Jones (p. 12) highlights ‘a sense of shared, politicised identity’ as the defining characteristic which we can see beyond genre.
Jones’ conceptualisation of the Leeds scene (and of contemporary DIY more generally) places inclusiveness, as expressed through the notion of safe space, at the heart of DIY today. We can see the general ambivalence towards popular music aesthetic and organisational forms also expressed through the relationship that DIY practitioners have with social media platforms. In contrast, however, Jones finds that many DIY practitioners make use of alternative websites such as Bandcamp and Soundcloud, as opposed to Spotify, for distributing music. Nevertheless, popular social media sites remain the primary means of digital promotion, communication and marketing.
In mapping a theoretical safe space onto complex, empiric reality, Jones’ research delves bravely into the defining issues which surround contemporary identity politics discourse. Analysis presented in Chapter 5, for example, illustrates the way social media echo chambers can serve to amplify the notion of safe space, promoted by DIY music, but also how platform architecture works counter-productively in conflict resolution. The case study details a ‘rare’ instance of inter-scene interaction which demonstrates the problems of social media as a setting for inter-scene deliberation (p.97).
It transpires that two bands local to the Leeds DIY scene were scheduled to perform at a pub venue in nearby West Midlands. A third band, local to the scene where the gig was set to take place, and whose name allegedly contained an anti-traveller slur, was added to the bill without this information being communicated to the Leeds bands directly. The change was later revealed online (through the Facebook event page) and initial objections to the supposed politics of the third band predictably snowballed into a wider inter-scene disagreement over meaning and intent, before petering out over the next few days. In resolution, the online attention generated in the wake of this (unresolved) disagreement facilitated contact between the Leeds bands and a DIY promoter, local to the West Midlands, who organised a new venue for the original show to go ahead.
Further adding to the intrigue of this contribution, the author experienced personal alienation from the DIY scene after winning a professional recording contract. Jones notes how ‘the imposition of third-parties’ gifted insight into how artist ‘autonomy is “negotiated” within industry management structures’ (p.17). The author's reflexive positioning as researcher-practitioner allows him to tease out cogent assessments of the nature of DIY music today:
Even though social media has assisted in creating a situation in which many music practitioners are ‘DIY by default’, DIY music scenes do remain ethically and practically distinct. However, that distinctiveness is placed under significant architectural pressure by specific platforms, in terms of the way that metrics and algorithmic news feeds encourage and reward individualistic competition. It is placed under a broader pressure by the cultural and economic logic of platform capitalism, which calls into question the political meaning of independence and ‘doing it yourself’. (p. 137)
Jones believes that we can find this political meaning by taking a more general approach to openness, one that goes beyond representative, inter-sectional (demographic) inclusivity, to incorporate redistributive calls for common ownership. Resistance here would come in the form of open-source alternatives (FLOSS) to existing platform monopolies, as well as by embracing the collaborative and co-operative affordances of existing ICT. Jones’ research contributes not only to music industry discourse considering the impact of digital technologies in music-making, but also to the wider contemporary political discourse by positioning DIY as a socially necessary space – an inclusive alternative which bridges musical cultures and social justice.
