Demode
"'Imagine' is a bad, bad song."
If I can preach from my own choir, one of my aphorisms is "You should never blame someone for being from their generation, or for what their generation produced, even your own."
I'm reminded of Frank Lloyd Wright's book When Democracy Builds. It was hard to get through parts of that book. Wright’s writing (at least at that particular point in his life) was overly florid, frequently confounding, and sometimes sentimental. But if you read between the lines you get an interesting view of American history immediately post-war (both Civil and WWII), particularly the rise of suburbia, through the eyes of its pioneer in the early 20th century.
What makes a work interesting is precisely what gets filled in between the lines over time. And the "lines" can ramify in different directions.
Stravinsky in his 20s, right around the time he composed the ballets, visited Rodin's studio. By that point, Rodin was very old. Stravinsky made the comment the he felt the style was "demode".
Le Corbusier made similar comments about Victorian styles--a quote I just love for its arrogance:
"...why then, on the pretty villas all around, these big useless roofs? Why the scant windows with small pains, why these large houses with so many locked rooms? Why the mirrored armoires, the washstands, the chest of drawers? And why these bookcases decorated with acanthus, these consoles, these vitrines, these China cabinets, the dressers, these sideboards? Why these enormous chandeliers? Why these mantelpieces? Why these draped curtains? Why this wallpaper full of colors, of damask, of motley vignettes? Why is there's no light in your houses? Your windows are hard to open. There are no ventilators like those in any dining car. Your chandeliers hurt my eyes. Your stuccos and your colored wallpaper are as impudent as valets, and I'll take home the picture by Picasso that I came to give you, for no one will see it in the bazaar of your interior."
A lot of what we react to in the work of other generations is the production. In many cases, old 2 and 4-track machines were sufficient for a good production, but sometimes they weren't and what we're stuck with is a bad snapshot of a zeitgeist, which is what "Imagine" might be an exemplar of. But we don't hate Victorian styles anymore, and even want to live in those houses with interiors like a bazaar, demode and all.
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