On Friday, I came close to drowning amid a sprawling sea of plaid with no foreseeable end in sight. In a moment of clarity, I realized I was surrounded by rows upon rows of grandpa-inspired sweaters, brown leather purses, ironically large black-rimmed glasses and upturned noses. It was, as advertised, the Sufjan Stevens concert of Nov. 11, but it was also the unspoken, unofficial Boston convention for indie music snobs.
Imagine innocently following a lone bee as it swerves and flies, not knowing of the impending threat, until you finally hit a hive of smug, cardigan-wearing bees all eager and impatient to see the queen bee, dressed in silver shiny pants and neon warrior face paint. It is as dangerous as it is pretentious.
Before I give the wrong impression, let me briefly explain. Sufjan Stevens is my favorite musical artist, a fact that I feel no shame in admitting. Watching him perform his most recent album, "Age of Adz," in full cosmic regalia was the absolute culmination of all my musical hopes and dreams. The largely reclusive artist has fascinated me since my freshman year of high school, and I love him as much as I could love a total stranger — which is a surprisingly large amount, but not as legally frightening as you are probably thinking.
That being said, he is no god. For all his musical genius, he possesses no powers ascribed to most deities (lightning bolts, plagues, etc.). The assertion by many of his fans — some of whom at his show were eager to denounce any other musician mentioned — that he is the pop artist to end all pop artists smells a little too strongly of a cult of personality fascination. The ugly look given from one concertgoer to another when the latter offered an offhand comparison of Stevens' performance to Lady Gaga's was unjustified and, frankly, a tad bit revolting. Snaggle-toothed sneers are never flattering, even on a bearded mountain man.
Herein lies the phenomenon of the week: the insistence of some sort of superiority in musical taste, otherwise labeled as "music snobbery."
We have all either tolerated friends or resented acquaintances that asserted some sort of supremacy in taste of music. In my first column, I referred to this tendency as an example of a greater trend in cultural disdain. The problem, however, has great implications. The root of all music snobbery lies in a deep, inconsolable fear of rejection.
Those who purport to be music snobs, cultivating tastes in whatever genre suits their fancy, generally listen to music that diverges from common conceptions of "cool" or "popular." These words are derived from an elementary-school mentality, but a sense of acceptance is always subconsciously pursued.
Though there are exceptions — hip-hop snobs, for example, end up promoting a genre that is more widely accepted by the masses of youth culture than, say, bluegrass — the music purported by snobs to be superior runs in a class less popular than the rest. A man like Stevens, who is musically inspired by such socially maladjusted individuals as John Wayne Gacy and Royal Robertson, is not likely to be very understood or widely accepted by the broader population of music listeners. His listeners, then, take on this mantle of defense, despite the fact that music should stand on its own and speak for itself.
This column serves as a futile but worthwhile open letter to all music snobs. I implore you to love the music you love, without apology, while understanding and respecting the same right in others. Lower those brows, unwrinkle your forehead and understand this much: Ke$ha will unfortunately be around for longer than we'd all like.
It's time to deal.
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Madeline Hall is a sophomore who has not yet declared a major. She can be reached at Madeline.Hall@tufts.edu.
