What Is ‘Selling Out’?
Wikipedia defines ‘selling out’ as “the compromising of one's integrity, morality and principles in exchange for money, 'success’, or other personal gain”. But still what exactly is ‘selling out’? You probably have heard people before talking about how their favorite band has ‘sold out’. Their top reasons most likely along the lines of how they went on MTV, or that there are ‘poser’ fans following them, or there are too many people at the shows only there because they think the band is good looking.
Referring back to the definition stated above, do any of those reasons match the supposed definition of ‘selling out’? Sure MTV pays the artists who appear on their shows and specials, but are they really compromising their integrity or morality to go on a television channel to push their newest album? The main goal for most musicians is to gain as many fans as possible and to spread their music to anyone who is willing to listen. A great example is this quote from the band Rage Against the Machine after they signed to a major record label. “We're not interested in preaching to just the converted. It's great to play abandoned squats run by anarchists, but it's also great to be able to reach people with a revolutionary message, people from Granada Hills to Stuttgart”. Sure many bands are quoted as saying that they ‘don’t care how many people listen just as long as they all get to play together’, but the truth is, they chose making music as a career, most likely, and they plan to live off of their earnings from their music, which could include a performance on MTV.
The issue of the ‘poser’ fan seems to really come from the perspective of exactly that, a fan. Knowing from firsthand experience, if you’re a fan of an artist you want to think you’re the most committed to that artist, the one who knows the most about them and the one who can recite all the lyrics by heart. But if you lack in one of those, it’s almost automatic criticism that ‘you’re just a poser, you don’t really want to be here, you just like them because everyone else likes them’.
Thus the notion of the person only there because the band looks good comes forward. Sure, you’ll hear the occasional girl in the crowd swoon over the lead singer or guitarist, but that person may show some interest in the music because it’s obviously catchy enough to stand and hour or so through, not including opening acts.
The next time you see your favorite band on MTV trying to promote their new album, think to yourself, are they really ‘selling out’? By wanting to be successful are they really giving up their morality? Is their life goal to get a pretty penny from millions of lame posers who just think their cute? Maybe the new definition of ‘selling out’ is “the feeling of a fan towards their favorite band when they become more successful and gain a larger audience of fans.”
