ABSTRACT
This chapter explores popular music fandom as a form of complex cultural engagement. While all fandom is nuanced, so far popular music fans have tended to be considered in only relatively simple terms, almost exclusively in terms of musical approval. However a large part of engagement with popular music is the ability to critically assess music that is not approved of – music that audiences judge as somehow substandard in terms of its skill, expression or artistry. Many of these assessments come down to questions of taste (and in popular music in particular, assessments of success and proficiency are much more subject to this than they are in, say, Western art music), however there is a significant gap in the existing literature about popular music fandom. This gap is anti-fan shaped, that is, where fandom in popular music exists, I argue, there is also room to consider anti-fandom – processes of engagement and participation with music that is not just positive endorsement. This chapter seeks to address this problem, showing that anti-fandom is a fundamental piece of the popular music fan puzzle that is not defined often or clearly enough. Without an acknowledgement of anti-fandom, the conventional, approving fan has no point of reference.
