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Postmodern Meaning in Postmodern Songs
In search of postmodern meaning, musicians unaware of evolutionary biology and its implications often create postmodern songs—incomprehensible, inhuman music—in an attempt to come up with something original—musical equivalents of “Voice of Fire” or chimpanzee art or Marla Olmstead’s “abstract” paintings. “Surely,” the argument goes, “it’s time to move on from tonal music. We have to progress!”—without realizing that the notion of progress does not apply to the arts, including music (more on this in Chapter 2).
A postmodern chef would presumably create bold new original dishes by incorporating ingredients such as coal dust, Styrofoam, and plutonium. Not many humans eat inhuman food. And not many humans appreciate inhuman music and inhuman visual art. (Some do, though ... )
If you write and perform “postmodern” songs, you will probably have a problem making a living. Inhuman music means inaccessible music. Inaccessible music does not communicate emotionally (except to irritate the listener) because the human brain cannot find meaning in it on any level. It’s not because listeners aren’t sophisticated enough. It’s because the music itself amounts to pretentious, meaningless rubbish.