When does Technology Substitute Stardom?
When The Beatles ran onto the field of the Shea Stadium in 1965, they were in shock and awe at what they heard: the high-pitched screams of 50,000 teenyboppers. The din was so loud and so constant that the band members couldn’t hear what they were playing, let alone anyone in the crowd (Roesnner, 2015, p.25). Yet this wasn’t a particularly happy moment for the Birmingham musicians, as it marked a significant shift in their world fame. As John Lennon recalls, “They are not in awe of you, they are in awe of the thing they think you’ve become” (Lennon, 2000, p.185).
Today, the internet gives performers the potential to rise to even headier heights; to become worldwide superstars beamed into the AirPods of millions. Artists like Beyoncé, Taylor Swift and Drake are no longer just performers. They are cultural icons, role models, ‘Queen B’. So it’s a unique challenge when these artists are tasked with putting on a live performance that lives up to their near-mythical status.
And delivering an underwhelming performance can have significant repercussions on a performer’s reputation, exacerbated by an internet culture that feeds on humiliation and failure. Fergie’s bizarre rendition of U.S. National Anthem at the NBA All-Stars remains perfectly preserved on the internet for millions to ridicule and parody, adding a new line to the singer’s digital narrative helpfully recorded by Wikipedia. With digital streaming revenues not making up for the loss in physical album sales, artists are relying more on ticket sales from live concerts, adding more pressure to put on a good show (Wacholtz, 2016, ch.11).
Therefore artists turn to technology to enhance their performance. At the 2011 Billboard Awards Beyoncé employed a screen several stories high to virtually duplicate herself, and even choreographed a doppelgänger fight scene. Michael Jackson emphasised a sense of being ‘other worldly’ by emerging from a spaceship in one concert, and flying away on a jet pack in another, both accompanied by strobe lights, lasers and smoke.
Technology need not be the only way to enhance a concert performance. To perpetuate their image as sex icons, artists like Madonna and Rhianna choreograph provocative dances on stage. Hans Zimmer creates intimacy by telling personal, touching stories.
But at what point does technology turn from enhancing to substituting star power? When does technology eclipse the artist? Arguably this already happened with the resurrection of Michael Jackson in Slave to the Rhythm, reanimated as a singing dancing hologram that had tech journalists weeping with joy. While impressive, would a 3D hologram be worth the hours waiting in line, the crowded conditions, the obscured view and extortionate ticket price of a concert? Or do we put up with these inconveniences to see something real?
Lennon, J. (2000) The Beatles Anthology. San Francisco: Chronicle Books.
Roesner, J. (2015) ‘From ‘Mach Schau’ to Mock Show: The Beatles, Shea Stadium and Rock Spectacle’, in Haligan, B. et al. (ed.) The Arena Concert: Music, Media and Mass Entertainment. New York: Bloomsbury USA.
Wacholtz, L. (2016) Monetizing Entertainment: An Insider’s Handbook for Careers in the Entertainment & Music Industry. London: Routledge, ch.11, section: Statistics.
