The background noise, audience included, is the entire point of the piece. There's a reason it's taken somewhat seriously.

Taken seriously? Nobody in the audience is making a god damn sound. It was an art piece taking a snapshot of people when they're uncomfortable and confused. When john cage wasn't doing this, he was putting on shows for ridiculous amounts of money where he'd show up 30 minutes late, dump an entire toolbox into a piano, play three notes and walk off the stage. There's supposed to be vitriolic tension, but it's completely absent here in the face of fundamentalist fanboyism.

This whole thing was just a waste of time in my opinion. If this was a video of 4:33 done correctly it would have needed the "also his balls are huge" tag.

The thing is is that there are other interpretations besides the certainly valid "The Audience Is the Music" version. Some people also believe that the music is in the expectation of sound. By expecting a sound, each audience member effectively imagines a sound, and to a greater extent, music.

And yes, John Cage's music is taken seriously. Especially this piece.

(although to be fair the tags on that used to suck, since I was being an artfag and leaving everything blank)

Sorry I missed it, C'MON everybody its a dupe! 1 star me and look at the original posting! Fluffy posted this with a vision, I posted it cause I thought everyone would comment "faaaaart"

I kind of look at this the way I look at a lot of Andy Warhol's work. Yeah, pretty much anybody could have come up with it, but this guy did it first.