The Sweeter the Melody

Text from "Noise" by Jaques Attali:

"It has always been said that music releases or gratifies the emotions, but these emotions themselves have always been difficult to define. Their actual content seems to be only abstract opposition to prosaic existence. The greater the drabness of this existence, the sweeter the melody. The underlying need expressed by this inconsistency springs from the frustrations imposed on the masses of the people by social conditions. But this need itself is put into the service of commercialism. Because of its own rationality, so different from the way it is perceived, and its technical malleability, music can be made to serve regression 'psychotechnically' and in that role is more welcomed in proportion as it deceives its listeners in regard to the reality of everyday existence."