Consumer Authentication of Popular Music in the Global Postmodern

Determining if music and the artists who produce it belong in a particular popular music genre is accomplished socially, not musically, and this paper explores the role that consumers play in the process. It begins by reviewing theory and research on authenticating criteria and on the relationship of authentication to identity. It then explores the effects of globalization and postmodernity on popular music authentication through analyses of print and web consumer responses to two late 1990s recordings, Marc Ribot y Los Cubanos Postizos and Buena Vista Social Club. Results suggest that, even in the “global postmodern,” popular music authentication is likely to remain important to consumers in the formation and maintenance of group identity.