ABSTRACT
It should surprise no one that, in the determinedly one-track mind of the music industry, myth, like everything else, is merely something to be marketed. The hipster point of view would argue that, of course, that’s true about Whitney Houston but certainly not about Pavement. But the fact is it’s true across all genres and styles, regardless of whether the myth is “DIY” or “classic rock,” “the year of the woman,” or “keeping it real.” It was true back in the hallowed sixties, when record companies would run campaigns with slogans like “The Man Can’t Bust Our Music,” and it is even more true today, when most consumers do not require or appreciate ad slogans that distance them from “the Man.” In fact, the very idea of myth has been drained of its significance. Essentially at this point myth is, at best, inseparable from a celeb-addled notion like “charisma” or a tossaway word like “legend.” At worst, it is synonymous with “image”—and synonymous as well with all that term implies about the calculated re-creation of the self for the marketplace.
