When is the artist no longer really the artist?
 

I've been enjoying Kanye West's most recent album lately, and as I usually do with albums I like, I went and read the Wikipedia entry on it. In doing so I discovered that, like his previous overblown album, this current streamlined minimalistic one also involved dozens of co-producers, co-writers and other assorted collaborators. I wasn't really surprised but it did make wonder if I'm really enjoying Kanye West here or if I'm enjoying some of the other people involved. I realize this type of massive group collaboration is common in pop music, but Kanye West isn't a Britney Spears where everyone assumes the performer isn't really the mastermind. He's definitely considered the creator of his releases, and often praised for the things he does with music.

I'm bringing that up as an example, I'm not intending to talk about him specifically. My question, about artists in general, is when are they no longer really the artist? If you didn't do the majority of the writing or performing, if your primary role was simply getting a bunch of talented people in a room together, does it make any kind of sense to give you full credit as the artist?

What do you guys think?

Yeah it's pretty hard to deconstruct. A perfect example is Nico's Chelsea Girl album. It's my favourite Nico album but I read that she hated what producers had done to it. It seems that much of what I liked about the album was not only not the artists idea but was rabidly rejected by her.

It reminds me of Primal Scream's Screamadelica album.
The number of people who made that album is incredible. I remember Bobby Gillespie saying that in one song they wants a bassline that would be the sort of thing Jah Wobble would do so they thought 'F*ck it, let's just get Jah Wobble in to do it' and they did.

A lot of critics at the time said is this a Primal Scream album produced by Andrew Weatherall or is it an Andrew Weatherall album as played by Primal Scream.

I guess what I would put it down to is that I suppose you need the original artist's vision of how it will turn out otherwise it would just come out sounding like some great big clusterf*ck.
And that's they key to it, you need a good artist to stop it from becoming one.

Although sometimes the artist with the vision isn't the one listed on the album cover. I know this especially applies to those older soul lables where the producer would be known for a particular sound and have a bunch of session musicians that appeared on many of the records. I think in many instances the artists were just puppets or represented a particular image the producer was going for.

What if there's no singular vision or concept behind it though? To use Kanye West as the example again: from what I understand the creation of the songs on the album were committee decisions made by many of the people involved, not his singular vision. Can he still be considered the artist, simply by being the one who got everyone working together? If so, does that mean someone like Malcolm McLaren is worthy of solo credit for a band they got together?

That's true, but I think that's more in the category of the Britney Spears example I gave. I don't think, generally speaking, those pop start types are viewed as the creative genius behind their music.

Miles Davis is probably a good example of an artist in strict control of his vision. While I have never really marvelled at his skills on the trumpet he certainly had a talent for selecting great musicians and obsessively demanding perfection from them.

Interesting point, I guess it depends on the artist even if everything was done by committee, who put that committee together? who had the final say? were the people on it thinking what they would like or what they think he would like?
I think you would literally have to take every single album individually and look at all the different circumstances around it.

I find it interesting you bring up Malcolm McLaren because he had zero input into the Pistols song writing. I remember Lydon saying that his only idea was writing a song about Submission so they wrong a song about a submarine mission just to piss him off and after that he left them to it.

It's also interesting that Bernie Rhodes had a much bigger input into The Clash's songwriting yet he's forgotten about and it's always McLaren that gets bought up.

That's why I used McLaren as an example actually, because he wasn't involved in writing the songs, just vaguely "getting the people in the room together".

I posted a really good response, but unfortunately, it didn't go through for whatever reason.

I heard an interview with r. Kelly mentioning that it's great to collab because you basically learn things you didn't know. Things are always changing, so it's awesome to collab with people who can make a song amazing that would otherwise be outdated!

I don't really think of McLaren that way, I think his best attribute was he was a bullsh*tter and could bluff his way through anything and then hype up whatever they had done.

When I think of "getting the people in the room together" type people my first thought is the super producers of the 60s like Joe Meek & Phil Spector. Or more up to date Rick Rubin doing those albums with Johnny Cash or Mark Ronson.
People like that.

Kanye West could definitely be described the same way.

I thought of using Rick Rubin/Johnny Cash as an example, but they don't really fit because Cash really is responsible for the core performance elements on those albums even if Rubin was making a lot of the decisions.

He doesn't have Malcolm McLarens charm

:o:

:laughing:

I've somehow managed to go a whole decade only hearing one Kanye West song ever and that was a totally butched version of some Curtis Mayfield song that he ruined, and I'm rather proud of that fact.

He can go f*ck himself.

Well, it might be his executive vision. Directors or CEOs don't do it all, either. But at the end of the day, its their name on the label. I think its harder to determine when the album is well received.

If Yeezus sucked, everyone would have no problem saying "Jesus, Kanye **** the bed on this album, huh?" And that would be justified (in my mind).

Another one who is, or was, great at selecting the right group of musicians to realise his vision was Alan Parsons. Although he did write and produce, so perhaps not the best example. Nevertheless, with the likes of Ian Bairnson, David Paton and even Eric Woolfson it was still always under Parsons' name, first as the Alan Parsons Project and later then just as his own name, although by then Woolfson had split with him.

He's also produced a lot of music that people may not know about. You may even be a fan of some of the songs without knowing!!

Well I'm willing to be proved wrong :)

I would say when an artists start to copy other artists which has become a sad pattern. When that happens, you know the artist has lost his or her identity.

Look at artists (dead and alive) like Mariah Carey, Michael Jackson, Usher, Prince, and others. I mean they have done this and it led to some downhill of their careers somewhat.

Or when the artist try to do too much with their music and tries to pretend that they can do all music when it simply does not work. That is when you know the artists is the ARTIST anymore.

I got more in mind but when I do, I will explain later.

Here's a list page!
Kanye West production discography - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

There are actually a lot of amazing songs on here that are some old faves of mine.

"You don't know my name" by Alicia Keys? COME ON, YOU HAVE TO LOVE THAT SONG.

I LOVE this album.

Nahh just kidding

Don't lie. I know you love Justin Bieber.

lol
But there are a lot of other songs on there, you didn't like ANY?

I don't think I've heard any of them.
Me & Hip Hop sort of parted ways sometime around 2003.

I do love that song. I also really like the John Legend song Used to love You. I can even appreciate the Kweli song Get By. I've never understood the super stardom of KW I think his downfall at least to my ears is Overproduction. I feel like his sound is artificial and seemingly lifeless. His Rhymes bore me also.

With regard to the artist not being the artist any longer, It really boils down to the factors that Urban and Jansz were discussing. I don't believe major labels will allow the freedom they used to with artists and almost invite the collaboration aspect because they see dollar signs. I can't really fault their reasoning, but I think its more of a major act problem then it is an indie problem.

Hey there im new to all this but i also love kanyes music, it is aparant that even big producers like kanye have co prod etc but i think he has the creation of piecing it all together.

I am an artist myself and i dont produce my beats but look for the connection when i hear them then fully implement what i need to put across as i am recording.

I think that when it gets to the point where the songs were written, produced, whatever by a whole range of different people and the "artist" credited for the song is merely performing it, they are no longer truly an artist. I have a lot of issues with this. A few artists I used to really love have become quite mainstream and have all of their songs written for them, all they really do is perform them. In which case I would identify them as a performer, rather than an artist.

Rod Stewart is a hall-of-famer, yet I think his 'solo' albums are Rod Stewart & Friends. Many of his hits have been written by or with others, and many of them wouldn't have been hits without the excellent backing musicians. I don't know if Rod even plays any instruments in-studio or on tour (which Justin Bieber has done).

Another example: Carlos Santana is a true artist via his guitar-playing, but his chart career is built around collaborations, like Parsons did it.

good question in this topic


hmmmm

well i guess its always the artist for me because if i am willing to lay blame and criticize the artist for a bad album or song even though many others had a part in it then i think i should be willing to credit them when its good.

as for kanye, he went under the radar producing for years so if a lot of people are helping him now and hes getting over credited then i think its only right

I think legally songwriting credits are given to the writer of the melody and lyrics...I might be wrong, as I can't actually remember where I read that, but if that's true then the artist is always the artist no matter how many people are involved, at least legally-speaking.

I don't listen to Kanye, so I can't really speak for this album you brought up in the OP, but it sounds like a pretty extreme example of having outside influence on an album's creative direction. Kinda reminds me of the early days of Scritti Politti in the 70s, how they'd have about a legion of people writing songs under the Scritti Politti credit, many of whom didn't actually play a note on the song they were writing.

But often I think of an artist making his/her/their album as being like a director making a movie. For all the other people you have to rely on to get things from A to B, all the people who might have ideas of their own about the project, all the external pressure that you might be under from producers, execs, members of your own band or even yourself, it's still someone's creative vision that's driving the project to completion, and as such it'll pretty much always end up as something like that initial vision (at least under ideal circumstances...doesn't always quite work like that, of course). Even if that creative vision of the individual artist involved having gazillions of producers and co-writers chip in to proceedings themselves.

...and for give the disjointed nature of the above text...hungover...bleh :p:

I will give you credit and say yes his rhymes are boring for the most part but how can you say that overproduction is lifeless? When something is stripped down and minimal is when it sounds lifeless imo. I love overproduced material so maybe I'm biased but the more that's going on in the background the more I tend to like it. I love picking out little sounds here and there from either samples or instruments. This applies to all music, not just Kayne and his production techniques.

I agree with this! Cut Kanye some slack and quit dick riding him. He deserves to get help from others. He's such a control freak that I know he has a vision of what he wants and how he wants it then has the producers help him create that vision so even if you feel like a certain track being producer by a certain person might sound more like that person's work than Kanye's it was still his vision for what he wanted for the overall project.

My question, about artists in general, is when are they no longer really the artist? If you didn't do the majority of the writing or performing, if your primary role was simply getting a bunch of talented people in a room together, does it make any kind of sense to give you full credit as the artist?

What do you guys think?


To me, an artist is someone who is the true mastermind behind their music regardless if they are doing everything by themself or not. They are heavily involved in the arrangement, production, writing and overall direction of their music. They come up with concepts, themes, melodies and are very involved in the creation of their music.

On songwriting credits- Anybody can get a songwriting credit for changing or contributing to the melody or the lyrics. For example, if the ONLY thing the artist did was change one word or decided to extend the melody a little longer towards the end of the song. They are legally suppose to get a writing credit which I completely disagree with because changing one word around doesnt really showcase whether or not the artist contributed in the writing process or the making of the song. To me, I think it is really stealing a "credit" that was not rightfully deserved.The artist could have received the full song completely written and then decided to change one word for the credit. Alot of pop singers do this on purpose just to have their name in the credits and for royalties.

I think songwriting credits should only be given out to the actual writers who came up with the lyrics and creation of the song.