Don’t pipe down: an essay in defense of muzak

By Emily Baxter

I love discovering music in unexpected places. The internet is a treasure trove for musical exploration, but there’s something that feels more authentic when you discover it in the real world, be it in a random supermarket or from the speaker of a rowdy teenager who definitely should not be blasting their music at midnight on Market Street. The last time I discovered music this way was over the summer, after visiting the aquarium. Saints Sizzle was right beside the exit, and their chips are hands down the best in town. Not only were the chips phenomenal as per, but the music was also captivating - it sounded like some long-forgotten jazz standards with an incredible saxophonist soloing over the top. Shazam failed me, and I had to build up the courage to ask the chef what I’d been enjoying so thoroughly. He chuckled slightly as he told me that it was, in fact, a lo-fi-beats-to-study-and-relax-to-esque playlist that a Starbucks in Taiwan used. I was baffled, to say the least. Why the fuck did I just sit and enjoy listening to twenty-odd minutes of muzak? 

By definition, muzak is not meant to be listened to - just heard. Listening implies involvement, something you’re doing with intent - observing each instrument as it comes in, noting the interplay between melodies, feeling the foundations that the rhythm section lays down. Hearing is passive. You hear somebody rustling a crisp packet as quietly as they can in the library, you hear the air conditioning’s constant hum in any room you’re in, and you hear muzak. You don’t go out of your way to hear things, you merely do. Hearing is a prerequisite for listening - you could hear the faint sound of music in the distance and stop to focus and listen to find the source. Still, you’re actively tuning into that music after you hear it. If you’d been in a rush, you might have had just enough time to hear the music and jog down the street. Muzak is a genre that wants you to pass it by, engineered to wash over you without a second thought. Purpose-built to be the most neutral, non-offensive, enjoyable (but not too enjoyable) genre, muzak’s intent is to exist as mere ambiance in any given setting. Most commonly you’ll hear it in shops, elevators, or any communal space where people are likely to gather or pass through without the intent of staying in that location for any longer than they have to. It contradicts itself somewhat by filling an awkward, empty silence with an awkward, empty gesture of what music might be if humanity had never found a creative bone in its collective body. Knowing all of this, why should we even bother trying to enjoy muzak? I’d like to argue that muzak is not all bad, and should be considered and listened to like any other genre might be.

The term ‘Muzak’ itself can refer to either the genre at large (a.k.a. elevator or pipe music) or the American brand from which the genre originates. Muzak the brand came about as an interesting workaround for listening to music in the early 1920s without the need for what was at the time incredibly expensive radio equipment. Major General George Owen Squier, prolific scientist and inventor, was able to transmit music via electrical wire for residents of Staten Island, though the technology was quickly outdated as radios became more accessible. Muzak’s business model further commercialised in response: the company worked to record, produce, and provide relaxed backdrop music for communal spaces such as barbershops and doctor’s offices. The 1950s saw the first major backlash to Muzak, in response to it being played at workplaces in fifteen-minute blocks at increasing tempo in pursuit of maximising labour output, the idea being that workers would match the pace of the music. This led to accusations of attempted brainwashing, and a few supposed court cases against the company.¹

The backlash hasn’t just been against the brand of Muzak; one UK based campaign has been raining condemnation upon piped music since its foundation in 1992:

‘DO YOU HATE UNWANTED PIPED BACKGROUND MUSIC?

(also called piped music, canned music, elevator music, muzac etc)

Do you loathe its incessant jingle?

Do you detest the way you can’t escape it?

(in pubs, restaurants and hotels; in the plane, train or bus; down the phone; ruining decent television programmes; adding to the overall levels of noise pollution in public places)

If, like tens of millions of others around the world you do,

JOIN PIPEDOWN, THE CAMPAIGN FOR FREEDOM FROM UNWANTED PIPED MUSIC in public places’²

Pipedown takes great pride in its celebrity endorsements, including those from Stephen Fry, Andrew Lloyd Webber, and Joanna Lumley, to name a few. Members of the Pipedown movement don’t just find muzak incessantly annoying: they believe it poses multiple genuine health risks. As can be noted in this partially-sourced fact sheet found on their website, ‘[...] unwanted noise raises the blood pressure and depresses the immune system, as has long been recognised.’ There are some genuine accessibility concerns regarding individuals with autism, hearing loss, and tinnitus, and the argument that muzak excludes certain groups from participating fully and comfortably in society is fair, implying that muzak cannot always achieve its goal of being universally neutral. Their point that muzak is so deeply ingrained in consumerism is very fair, implying that muzak doesn’t come ‘free’ to anyone - rather, you pay for it with any product that you buy in that particular muzak-playing location. You could argue that as a consumer, you’re also paying for the other necessities a store needs to stay open - electricity, heating, rent, etc.- muzak isn’t quite as necessary as those previously listed, but I’d venture that some business owners consider it absolutely key to their business model. The unsubstantiated claim that many musicians despise muzak might seem reasonable, but I feel that most people would lean towards a slight dislike rather than a full-on hatred of a vapid, reprehensible thing that can barely be considered ‘music’.

With all that said, it’s hard to disagree with certain, less data-dependent aspects of Pipedown’s concerns: muzak can be really, really annoying. If you’ve ever had to call NHS24, you’ll be familiar with the masterfully crafted, 16 bar loop of a song that sounds as if it was recorded by a toddler left unsupervised in a construction site with a novelty microphone. It’s only made better by each loop ending with a crackle that’s five times louder than the rest of the song, which I can tell you from experience does not help when you’re already a little panicked about your medical problems. All this to say, I can see where they’re coming from, to an extent. At the very least, it’s a little irritating, and at most its presence and impact are genuinely harmful to society at large.

Despite these issues, I’d like to act as perhaps one of the first vehement defenders of muzak. Firstly, I think it’s reductive and simplistic to call muzak unimagined or uninspired. Looking into it, things that we consider ‘muzak’ encompass multiple genres: classical, jazz, bossa nova, even pop. Even if you think muzak is a simplification of all of these genres, you’d still be correct in placing any given piece of muzak into these other genre categories. Take the track Samba Novo by Eumir Deodato. It’s easy to listen to, and it’s the sort of track that you might miss if you weren’t intently listening - perfect for any location that might want some muzak on in the background. But I’d argue it is still an interesting piece of music. The way the keys take the lead for the most part but still allow a solo from the pianist, the way the bass moves up and down the neck, the trills and dynamics from the horn section - there’s a lot you can get into. Jazz in and of itself is widely regarded to be one of the most complex genres anyway, so the fact we can place a lot of muzak in the jazz camp helps give this argument some extra weight.

If you’re still firmly in the camp that muzak is just a dumbing down of pre-existing genres with all of the creativity sapped out of it, then try to at least consider it as more of a diving board into a deeper pool of ‘better’ music. If you have no prior knowledge of it, hearing some bossa nova-adjacent music in a shopping centre might turn your ear a little. It’s easy enough to Google ‘elevator music’ and find hundreds of thousands of results that can lead to you discovering a genre through its huge hits and its biggest artists, which could culminate in a burgeoning record collection of bossa nova rarities. Being something heard in areas of large footfalls works to muzak’s advantage: millions of people will hear muzak in passing, and any one of those people could decide they’ve taken a liking to it and dig a little deeper. Of course, this seems to go against my initial idea that muzak is meant to be heard, rather than listened to. I think this works to my advantage, though. If muzak is simply meant to be heard, that’s fine. Everyone can hear it. But you can make the active decision to listen; hearing is a prerequisite for listening. For most, actively taking the time to listen to piped music is an opt-in situation. You can’t opt out of hearing it necessarily, but you don’t have to pay it too much heed if you don’t want to. 

Thinking back to Muzak the brand, I’m a little conflicted on what to feel. The capitalisation of music (or really any art) as a product meant to appease the masses is a wholly unappealing and frustrating concept for me to consider. I do still believe that corporate art can be enjoyed, even if the intentions of it can’t be considered to be of any artistic merit. And I think that that is the be all and end all of it - the enjoyment. If muzak is something that some people enjoy (and most blissfully ignore), why get so hung up on getting rid of it? You can’t stop hearing muzak, however much you want to, but you have the choice of listening.

Notes

1 ‘Muzak’, Wikipedia, <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muzak>.

2  ‘About Pipedown’, Pipedown <https://pipedown.org.uk/about-pipedown/>