Gear Acquisition Syndrome
As Gear Acquisition Syndrome ( acronym : GAS ; “equipment acquisition syndrome”, spoken like English, gas' / ' gas ',' flatulence '), accumulation has been mostly jokingly used since the 1990s, especially in Internet forums and in the specialist press for creative professions of musical instruments and equipment from the fields of music production , audio technology and photography . It is used as a means of self-irony to comment on the purchase of equipment for which there is no immediate need.
History of the acronym
The term goes back to a satirical column by Steely-Dan co- founder Walter Becker in the American magazine Guitar Player in 1994. Under the heading "The Dreaded GAS" ("The dreaded GAS") he referred to the mass buying and modification of guitars as "Guitar Acquisition Syndrome" and "Guitar Modification Syndrome". Becker first describes the living room of a session guitarist friend from Los Angeles and then formulates his joking diagnosis:
The gent in question is a devoted husband and a doting father, but right now there is no family in the family room; there's no room for the family in the family room. All horizontal surfaces are covered by guitars - acoustics, electrics, lap steels , old ones, new ones, weird little ukulelelike things with no proper names […] It's called GAS - Guitar Acquisition Syndrome. You undoubtedly know someone who has it. Reading this rag, you probably have it yourself. Or will have it someday soon or would like to have it. You may think it's cool. But it's not cool. Not anymore. How many Strats do you need to be happy? How many Strat copies, each extensively modified to be able to produce the variations in tone that once would have required maybe four different guitars? How many knobs and switches does that Strat need?
The acronym GAS alludes to the colloquial formulation for "to have gas". Becker's column argues that "guitar buying syndrome" is not about playing, just consuming instruments, and points out that the advertising-funded musicians' magazine the article is printed in is from depends on appearance.
The term was then received in newsgroups and discussion forums and the abbreviation from "guitar" to "gear" was expanded. The word comes when users acoustic and electric instruments as well as analog synthesizers - modules and cameras are used.
Research on the phenomenon
As a phenomenon of internet jargon or as a pseudo syndrome, GAS should not be confused with the psychological disorder of the compulsive purchase . It was examined sporadically by studies from the fields of musicology , music sociology and sound studies . A study from 2017 evaluated 418 questionnaires from electric guitarists (97% of them male). She sees the motives for GAS above all in the fact that musicians expect to expand their stylistic diversity by buying a variety of instruments, amplifiers and effects units . A study on media and online forums for music production from 2012 describes the English-language audio and studio technology forum "Gearslutz" ("equipment sluts"), which has existed since 2002, as the most important example of the phenomenon of "gear porn", the quasi- pornographic interaction with Images of equipment on the internet. In the forum there are popular threads with the titles “Gear porn thread - pics of your slutty setups” and “A little x rated audio porn”. The study explains the phenomenon with, among other things, Karl Marx 's concept of the commodity fetish . A dissertation on hegemonic masculinity in audio technology community in the year 2015 used Marx's concept regarding the "gear fetish" ( "Device Fetish "), the outer is about GAS, also.
See also
literature
- Alex Annetts: Masculinity and gear fetishism in audio technology community discourse. PhD thesis , Anglia Ruskin University, 2015.
- Samantha Bennett: Revisiting the 'double production industry': advertising, consumption and 'technoporn' surrounding the music technology press, in: Kärjä, AV, Marshall, L. and Brusila, J. (Ed.) Music, business and law: essays on contemporary trends in the music industry , Helsinki IASPM, Norden & Turku: International Institute for Popular Culture, 2012, pp. 117–145 .
- Jan-Peter Herbst: "'Gear Acquisition Syndrome': A Survey of Electric Guitar Players", in: Julia Merill (ed.): Popular Music Studies Today. Proceedings of the International Association for the Study of Popular Music 2017 , Wiesbaden: Springer 2017, pp. 139–148.
- Paul Théberge: Any Sound You Can Imagine: Making Music / Consuming Technology , Hanover: Wesleyan University Press, 1997.
- Simon Zagorski-Thomas / Andrew Bourbon (eds.): The Bloomsbury Handbook of Music Production . Bloomsbury Publishing USA, 2020.
Individual evidence
- ↑ The Science of GAS.Retrieved July 14, 2020 .
- ↑ Are Modular Synth Abbreviations and Acronyms Getting The Better of You? @LearningModular. Retrieved July 14, 2020 .
- ↑ Walter Becker: "The Dreaded GAS", in: Guitar Player , April 1994, p. 15.
- ↑ GAS attack. Retrieved July 13, 2020 .
- ↑ Google Groups. Retrieved July 14, 2020 .
- ^ GAS - Gear Acquisition Syndrome, Equipment Addiction. In: AMAZONA.de. June 1, 2018, accessed on July 13, 2020 (German).
- ↑ Jan-Peter Herbst: "'Gear Acquisition Syndrome': A Survey of Electric Guitar Players", in: Julia Merill (ed.): Popular Music Studies Today. Proceedings of the International Association for the Study of Popular Music 2017 , Wiesbaden: Springer 2017, pp. 139–148.
- ↑ gearslutz • A brief history ??? - Gearslutz. Retrieved July 15, 2020 .
- ↑ Samantha Bennett: Revisiting the 'double production industry': advertising, consumption and 'technoporn' surrounding the music technology press, in: Kärjä, AV, Marshall, L. and Brusila, J. (Ed.) Music, business and law: essays on contemporary trends in the music industry Helsinki IASPM Norden & Turku: International Institute for Popular Culture, 2012, p. 125 f.
- ↑ Alex Annetts: Masculinity and gear fetishism in audio technology community discourse. PhD thesis, Anglia Ruskin University, 2015, p. 5.