Israeli rock, or a study in the politics of ‘local authenticity’

Abstract

In recent years, pop/rock has ceased being an exclusive Anglo-American phenomenon. Local styles of rock might be found today in many countries, styles which merge local traditions with the rock aesthetic. Some products of these styles are distributed successfully in the USA and Britain under the large title of ‘ethnic pop’ (sometimes ‘world music’). The work on the emergence of these local styles tends to stress their ‘authenticity’ in one way or another: in the way they reflect political resistance, in the way they express cultural change (Szemere 1983; Fiori 1984; Vila 1987; Duran 1989; Siriyuvasak 1990; Bright 1986; Manuel 1988; Frith 1989). In addition, much of the work tends to be descriptive – there are hardly any attempts to theorise the emergence of pop/rock and its becoming ‘local authentic’ music. One salient exception is the work of Wallis and Malm (1984). They describe a two-way flow of musical elements, in which local or national music cultures both contribute to and pick up from an emerging body of music which they call transcultural. Anglo-American pop/rock is the nucleus of transcultural music. The simultaneous convergence of its influence, of access to music industry technologies, of local music culture and of the will to create something different explains, according to Wallis and Malm, the first stage of transculturation in the countries they studied.