Nick Drake had a complicated life, complicated by mental health issues and commercial failure. At the age of 26 he died after ingesting a lethal amount of amitriptyline, one of his prescribed antidepressants. Following his death Fruit Tree was released, sparking interest in his earlier work, which sold poorly and was hardly performed. Today he is lauded by musicians and critics, something he might have not liked even though he might have sought it. His death, his illness, his lived career failures, and his postmortem success have influenced the way the music world has shaped his legacy.
Second hand, I have read about Pierre Bourdieu's The Rules of Art. One of the rules is that the artistic “loser wins,” where the art universe is an “economic world reversed”:“The artist can triumph on the symbolic terrain only to the extent that he loses on the economic one, and vice versa.” According to Bourdieu's rule, Drake has won in a weird, twisted, morbid way. Drake was inaccessible, physically and perhaps sonically[1]: his records did not sell; he did not want to tour. But, I believe, he did not want to be the losing winner. He probably did not want to be the cliched tormented artistic genius that was so connected to the world that he disconnected himself from everything, everyone else.
Drake's failures were likely a function of personal problems and technological limitations that could have been overcome in today's music landscape. Pre-internet, I imagine, marketing and distribution were vital to the commercial success of a musician. Drake, the quiet, introverted, melancholic acoustic guitarist was not the ideal poster boy to sell out venues and pack record stores. Other fringe artists suffered financially, but the persistent, talented ones gathered cult-like followings, fringe-critical acclaim, and inspired burgeoning artist. Now that music has transitioned to the virtual space, could Drake's shortcomings have been overcome by the blogosphere and online record stores?
Do talented-fringe musicians exist any more? People will listen to talent. People will find ways to have other people listen to talent. These days “good” “fringe,” “experimental” groups have audiences: their music is online (willingly or unwillingly); people will access their music (legally or illegally); devoted fans will support the music with (not a lot of) money. Groups like Animal Collective, who may have floundered in a parallel, techno-deficient universe, have found reasonable financial and critical success, performing at big stages at large festivals, having a music video played on MTV U, garnering glowing reviews from well-read blogs, etc., etc. Should Animal Collective renounce Merriweather Post Pavilion and start making some noise? No. They don't have to be losers to win.
[1] A lot of the qualifiers stem from the fact that I am too young to know. I'm a relative newcomer to Drake's work.
