Platinum and Canadian Music Industry

The implications of knowing or recognizing Canadian popular culture would be having a knowledge of the history of Canada and of knowing the Canadian symbols. If you grow in Canada, you’re going to be able to recognize popular culture texts that have Canadian content because you’ve lived it and been surrounded by it. If you travel elsewhere, you’re going to notice differences in the culture. When pop culture is reflected back to you in text form, you’re going to recognize it because its all around you. However, there are concerns that Canadian culture is not that different from American culture-that we’ve assimilated a lot from the States. As a result, our own culture, a more individual Canadian culture, might become lost in all the American content seen in TV, film, magazines and music. Platinum functions as metaphor for these concerns because it centers around a small recording label struggling to succeed next to bigger labels. The larger labels are more commercialized, more mainstream and have more American content because the US has a greater recording industry. Thus, a small Canadian label is likely to struggle, especially since it is not as mainstream and carries artists that are more individual. Also, the setting in Platinum, Montreal, is an urban setting. In urban cities, the risk for assimilation is greater because that is where major businesses and corporations are likely to reside. Cities serve as the major sites of production for pop culture, where everything is finalized and completed.