When someone says ‘remix’, I immediately think of a DJ in a club, holding an earphone to his head, scratching his deck and yelling into a microphone “reeeeemix!” I’ve come to learn that this isn’t the only kind of remixing…
Remixing is the activity of taking samples from pre-existing materials and reshaping it. We actually live in a remix culture where ideas are remixed, revised and remastered in order to create something new out of something old every day. This concept is so relevant because everyone has the ability to create a remix and change cultural landscapes. We have the capability to shape a song, video, image in a way we want it to be viewed and we are also able to share and interact with others.
‘The increasing availability of symmetrical media technologies… like the Internet afford their participants an equal chance to have their message heard’ (Bruns, 2010).
There have been many cases or arguments of people stealing lyrics or chord progressions from others and many mash up videos made to illustrate this. Mash up videos and songs are a large part of remix culture and were made popular through YouTube. These videos involve taking pieces from two or more songs to create a completely new one and it is apparent that most pop songs have taken this approach.
Remixing, mash ups, similarities, they are all unavoidable and this is not necessarily a bad thing. I believe that if something is similar but the intent behind its creation was completely different then it is an extension of the previous work, a different angle, a progression.
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