Pop Pagans: Paganism and Popular Music

Front Cover
Routledge, Oct 20, 2014 - Religion - 288 pages
Paganism is rapidly becoming a religious, creative, and political force internationally. It has found one of its most public expressions in popular music, where it is voiced by singers and musicians across rock, folk, techno, goth, metal, Celtic, world, and pop music. With essays ranging across the US, UK, continental Europe, Australia and Asia, 'Pop Pagans' assesses the histories, genres, performances, and communities of pagan popular music. Over time, paganism became associated with the counter culture, satanic and gothic culture, rave and festival culture, ecological consciousness and spirituality, and new ageism. Paganism has used music to express a powerful and even transgressive force in everyday life. 'Pop Pagans' examines the many artists and movements which have contributed to this growing phenomenon.
 

Contents

Contributors
Histories
Paganism and the counterculture
Paganism popular music and Stonehenge
popular music and sacred place
the emergence of Goth
Paganism and the British folk revival
Performance
Total solar eclipse festivals cosmic pilgrims and planetary culture
Technoshamanism and the economy of ecstasy as a religious experience
theological imagination in the religious music
the influence of the New Age
rise of industrial Paganism
Bibliography
Discography and filmography
Index

music dance and Pagan identity

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About the author (2014)

Donna Weston is Head of Popular Music at the Queensland Conservatorium, Griffith University, Australia. Andy Bennett is Professor in Cultural Sociology in the Centre for Public Culture and Ideas, Griffith University, Australia.

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