Blind Spots
March 23, 2011 7:22 AM
What supposedly 'great' albums or indeed bands do you not get at all?
Major Dundee just confided that he never really connected with ASTRAL WEEKS (neither did I) or most of Radiohead's output (there we differ).
However, I will freely confess that I do not love THE WHITE ALBUM, can only bear to listen to about two Stones songs, and am unable to hear Elvis except as a sort of kitsch. FOOLS GOLD leaves me cold, as does everything by Oasis, Zappa, Blur, Modest Mouse, and a hundred other indie faves. I am bored senseless by the Aphex Twin. I never got the love for the Clash either, with the exception of London Calling (the song not the album).
Frankly, and it pains me to admit it, I could do without ever listening to another BB King record, and if Mozart were stricken from the musical record I would not shed a tear.
On the other hand I will suggest that Glen Campbell is massively under-rated.
posted by unSane (102 comments total)
Major Dundee just confided that he never really connected with ASTRAL WEEKS (neither did I) or most of Radiohead's output (there we differ).
However, I will freely confess that I do not love THE WHITE ALBUM, can only bear to listen to about two Stones songs, and am unable to hear Elvis except as a sort of kitsch. FOOLS GOLD leaves me cold, as does everything by Oasis, Zappa, Blur, Modest Mouse, and a hundred other indie faves. I am bored senseless by the Aphex Twin. I never got the love for the Clash either, with the exception of London Calling (the song not the album).
Frankly, and it pains me to admit it, I could do without ever listening to another BB King record, and if Mozart were stricken from the musical record I would not shed a tear.
On the other hand I will suggest that Glen Campbell is massively under-rated.
I'm mostly with you on the E Street Band, Choco, although I think Bruce solo lobo sometimes totally cuts it.
Dylan, though. Fuck. Right. Over. My. Head. I find him completely obnoxious.
posted by unSane at 9:01 AM on March 23, 2011
Dylan, though. Fuck. Right. Over. My. Head. I find him completely obnoxious.
posted by unSane at 9:01 AM on March 23, 2011
Neutral Milk Hotel - In The Aeroplane Over The Sea
I kept hearing that it was a classic album. I specifically put it into my heavy music rotation so that it could grow on me. I've probably heard it 50 times.
Meh.
posted by chillmost at 10:29 AM on March 23, 2011 [1 favorite]
I kept hearing that it was a classic album. I specifically put it into my heavy music rotation so that it could grow on me. I've probably heard it 50 times.
Meh.
posted by chillmost at 10:29 AM on March 23, 2011 [1 favorite]
Yep, they were going to be on my list too but it was getting ranty.
Also, Chococat, after you mentioned the Magnetic Fields a while back, I listened to everything I could find.
Oh well.
posted by unSane at 10:35 AM on March 23, 2011
Also, Chococat, after you mentioned the Magnetic Fields a while back, I listened to everything I could find.
Oh well.
posted by unSane at 10:35 AM on March 23, 2011
Heh. Great question.
Dylan has to be tops here.
The Doors come a close second.
Guns 'n Roses and REM need to be queezed in somewhere.
Methinks I'll stop there for now.
posted by Zenabi at 11:13 AM on March 23, 2011
Dylan has to be tops here.
The Doors come a close second.
Guns 'n Roses and REM need to be queezed in somewhere.
Methinks I'll stop there for now.
posted by Zenabi at 11:13 AM on March 23, 2011
Other than saying, "Queezed?"
I love the sound of the word, although I'm fairly sure I meant, "Squeezed."
posted by Zenabi at 11:19 AM on March 23, 2011
I love the sound of the word, although I'm fairly sure I meant, "Squeezed."
posted by Zenabi at 11:19 AM on March 23, 2011
Can I just step right in it and say - The Beatles?
That's only partially true, actually. I like some of their songs, and historically respect some of the ways they broke some new ground in pop/rock music. But in general I do not feel the overwhelming awe and reverence for them that many others clearly do.
(And in particular, for example, I'm always baffled at why "Dear Prudence" seems to be one of the most often covered songs by others. I don't find that song at all interesting, in any version, and don't know why people think it's so great. Is it just to get a giggle at using an odd name like "Prudence" in a song?)
posted by dnash at 11:39 AM on March 23, 2011
That's only partially true, actually. I like some of their songs, and historically respect some of the ways they broke some new ground in pop/rock music. But in general I do not feel the overwhelming awe and reverence for them that many others clearly do.
(And in particular, for example, I'm always baffled at why "Dear Prudence" seems to be one of the most often covered songs by others. I don't find that song at all interesting, in any version, and don't know why people think it's so great. Is it just to get a giggle at using an odd name like "Prudence" in a song?)
posted by dnash at 11:39 AM on March 23, 2011
'Queezed' is a great word. "When I saw the cook picking his nose as he made the pizza, fucking queezed me right out, man".
posted by unSane at 11:39 AM on March 23, 2011
posted by unSane at 11:39 AM on March 23, 2011
Dear Prudence is a fave to cover because of the chromatically descending bass line, that whole baroque pop thing that was big for about five years. It's fun to play in that respect.
I agree re Beatles. The only thing that has begun to change my mind a little is listening to my 11 yr old pounding out the drums on Beatles Rock Band. He's completely addicted to the Beatles but mostly the heavier stuff, some of which I have to admit is pretty darn heavy.
posted by unSane at 11:42 AM on March 23, 2011
I agree re Beatles. The only thing that has begun to change my mind a little is listening to my 11 yr old pounding out the drums on Beatles Rock Band. He's completely addicted to the Beatles but mostly the heavier stuff, some of which I have to admit is pretty darn heavy.
posted by unSane at 11:42 AM on March 23, 2011
Chococat: I understand the Springsteen phoney Americana that you speak of.
He might have been included in my list other than the fact that he came up with the song "Born to Run", which I love, dearly.
posted by Zenabi at 12:31 PM on March 23, 2011
He might have been included in my list other than the fact that he came up with the song "Born to Run", which I love, dearly.
posted by Zenabi at 12:31 PM on March 23, 2011
The Clash
Bruce Springsteen
ELO
Meatloaf
Spandau Ballet
Oasis
Chris De Burgh
Radiohead
Coldplay
Pink Floyd - except DSOTM and when Sid was on board
Cream
Andrew Lloyd Webber- uuuuggghh
US pop-rock like Guns 'n' Ropey, Kansas, Nebraska, Alasaka, Iaskya (I made a few of them up, but you know who I mean)
Most heavy metal - except bands that don't take themselves too seriously (Van Halen are my weak spot here - love 'em)
Airbrushed "rock" sung by teenage girls and/or boys with winsome smiles and perfect teeth
Singers with vocal diarrhoea - the ones that can't sing a song straight and true, but have to fucking warble and tweet and generally do anything but sing. the. fucking. tune.
to be continued (when I've had more of a think...)
posted by MajorDundee at 12:45 PM on March 23, 2011
Bruce Springsteen
ELO
Meatloaf
Spandau Ballet
Oasis
Chris De Burgh
Radiohead
Coldplay
Pink Floyd - except DSOTM and when Sid was on board
Cream
Andrew Lloyd Webber- uuuuggghh
US pop-rock like Guns 'n' Ropey, Kansas, Nebraska, Alasaka, Iaskya (I made a few of them up, but you know who I mean)
Most heavy metal - except bands that don't take themselves too seriously (Van Halen are my weak spot here - love 'em)
Airbrushed "rock" sung by teenage girls and/or boys with winsome smiles and perfect teeth
Singers with vocal diarrhoea - the ones that can't sing a song straight and true, but have to fucking warble and tweet and generally do anything but sing. the. fucking. tune.
to be continued (when I've had more of a think...)
posted by MajorDundee at 12:45 PM on March 23, 2011
Yep, they were going to be on my list too but it was getting ranty.
Hey, we like a rant unS. Or at least I do. Nothing wrong with a good rant well presented. Something I rather pride myself on actually (looks modestly at shoes, kicks small rock away). The one I could really go the whole ranting hog on is the "vocal diarrhoea" issue. That turns me into a swivel-eyed, spittle-flecked monster.....
posted by MajorDundee at 1:00 PM on March 23, 2011
Hey, we like a rant unS. Or at least I do. Nothing wrong with a good rant well presented. Something I rather pride myself on actually (looks modestly at shoes, kicks small rock away). The one I could really go the whole ranting hog on is the "vocal diarrhoea" issue. That turns me into a swivel-eyed, spittle-flecked monster.....
posted by MajorDundee at 1:00 PM on March 23, 2011
ELO
Ooh, I love 'em. Love 'em, I tells ya.
AAAAAAaaaarrrrgggggghhhhhh - KA-BOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMM!!!!! I think I just exploded with rant-induced rage.....
posted by MajorDundee at 1:01 PM on March 23, 2011
Ooh, I love 'em. Love 'em, I tells ya.
AAAAAAaaaarrrrgggggghhhhhh - KA-BOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMM!!!!! I think I just exploded with rant-induced rage.....
posted by MajorDundee at 1:01 PM on March 23, 2011
unSane: I'm with you on this one.
I really cannot imagine ELO inducing any form of rage whatsoever.
posted by Zenabi at 1:28 PM on March 23, 2011
I really cannot imagine ELO inducing any form of rage whatsoever.
posted by Zenabi at 1:28 PM on March 23, 2011
I'd kill to have written something as popgasmic as this.
posted by unSane at 1:30 PM on March 23, 2011
posted by unSane at 1:30 PM on March 23, 2011
Bruce Springsteen, definitely. Elliot Smith would be on my list. I've tried, I really have, but I think he's overrated (definitely a few good songs, though). Bjork (but I haven't put as much effort in to her, and should). That band Girls (that Lust for Life song is pretty good).
As for underrated, I would list The Music Tapes. I'll have to post more later.
posted by Corduroy at 1:30 PM on March 23, 2011
As for underrated, I would list The Music Tapes. I'll have to post more later.
posted by Corduroy at 1:30 PM on March 23, 2011
Dylan
Led Zepplin
Nirvana
REM
Modest Mouse
Pink Floyd (also excepting Dark Side of the Moon and the Syd Barrett days)
Weezer
Grateful Dead
Bjork
Sigur Ros
posted by The Great Big Mulp at 1:33 PM on March 23, 2011
Led Zepplin
Nirvana
REM
Modest Mouse
Pink Floyd (also excepting Dark Side of the Moon and the Syd Barrett days)
Weezer
Grateful Dead
Bjork
Sigur Ros
posted by The Great Big Mulp at 1:33 PM on March 23, 2011
Mr Blue Sky is just a gorgeous, gorgeous song.
posted by Zenabi at 2:12 PM on March 23, 2011 [1 favorite]
posted by Zenabi at 2:12 PM on March 23, 2011 [1 favorite]
Yep, and I'm a sucker for that F/Em7/A/Dm progression.
posted by unSane at 2:19 PM on March 23, 2011
posted by unSane at 2:19 PM on March 23, 2011
I like a lot of ELO but I have a beef with Jeff Lynne. Everything he touches, be it Roy Orbison or Travelling Wilburys or Tom Petty or even the Beatles, turns into ELO. Very rigid production style. It's something about the heavily compressed, gated, snarey drums. Which were great on ELO, but c'mon. Be a bit creative.
He was really great in the Concert for George though.
posted by chococat at 2:34 PM on March 23, 2011 [1 favorite]
He was really great in the Concert for George though.
posted by chococat at 2:34 PM on March 23, 2011 [1 favorite]
That's the game, though, isn't it, Chococat? You hire a name producer like Jeff Lynne or Chris Lord-Alge or Butch Vig or even Jack White or Steve Albini because you want *that* sound. Most of them have an exceptionally limited bag of tricks when it comes down to it -- but they're exceptionally *good* tricks, in their own way. Lord-Alge, for example, I know simply has a bunch of analog compressors and outboard reverbs with different settings on them which he never touches. If it's a guitar it goes into #1, and so on.
posted by unSane at 5:39 PM on March 23, 2011
posted by unSane at 5:39 PM on March 23, 2011
vanilla fudge - oh, i suppose "you keep me hanging on" was passable as long as you forget to compare it to the supremes, but the rest of it - ick
the buzzcocks - didn't like them - a lot of english punk bands from that era don't grab me, although some do
styx - a couple of passable songs here and there - but how is the constant ba-ba-ba-bump ba-ba-ba-bump of lady even close to romantic?
elo - it was all downhill from roll over beethoven
anything joni mitchell did after mingus - god knows i respect her and want to like those albums, but no - it's just not getting me - and the stuff before blue doesn't exactly get me either
a lot of early beatles - some of it was undeniably great - and some of it sounds pretty callow to me - on revolver, they kicked it into gear and stayed there until they broke up
sigur ros, godspeed you black emperor and a lot of other bands like them - someone PLEASE take a solo
modern indie bands that rely too much on thin - or overloud - guitars playing 8th notes constantly - in fact, there's a lot of modern music i don't get, including much electronica - where's the song? - nice track, but no one's singing or playing over it - there's a peculiar affectlessness to much of today's music, as if one isn't supposed to feel anything or notice anything about it - (i do like a lot of the drum and bass and dubstep i hear, though)
oh and today's country music - not alt-country - the commercial stuff - it sounds compulsively clever, compulsively code-worded, extremely well played to formula, even if the formula's 70s classic rock with fiddles, utterly stereotypical, ruthlessly commercial and grates on my sensibilities something awful - it's just so phony sounding
a lot of today's hip hop doesn't get it for me - i always like the old school, where people were really mashing up all sorts of things in the mix and pushing the beat with words - now, it's kind of stale sounding
and KIDS WHO WON'T GET OFF MY LAWN!!
posted by pyramid termite at 10:48 PM on March 23, 2011
the buzzcocks - didn't like them - a lot of english punk bands from that era don't grab me, although some do
styx - a couple of passable songs here and there - but how is the constant ba-ba-ba-bump ba-ba-ba-bump of lady even close to romantic?
elo - it was all downhill from roll over beethoven
anything joni mitchell did after mingus - god knows i respect her and want to like those albums, but no - it's just not getting me - and the stuff before blue doesn't exactly get me either
a lot of early beatles - some of it was undeniably great - and some of it sounds pretty callow to me - on revolver, they kicked it into gear and stayed there until they broke up
sigur ros, godspeed you black emperor and a lot of other bands like them - someone PLEASE take a solo
modern indie bands that rely too much on thin - or overloud - guitars playing 8th notes constantly - in fact, there's a lot of modern music i don't get, including much electronica - where's the song? - nice track, but no one's singing or playing over it - there's a peculiar affectlessness to much of today's music, as if one isn't supposed to feel anything or notice anything about it - (i do like a lot of the drum and bass and dubstep i hear, though)
oh and today's country music - not alt-country - the commercial stuff - it sounds compulsively clever, compulsively code-worded, extremely well played to formula, even if the formula's 70s classic rock with fiddles, utterly stereotypical, ruthlessly commercial and grates on my sensibilities something awful - it's just so phony sounding
a lot of today's hip hop doesn't get it for me - i always like the old school, where people were really mashing up all sorts of things in the mix and pushing the beat with words - now, it's kind of stale sounding
and KIDS WHO WON'T GET OFF MY LAWN!!
posted by pyramid termite at 10:48 PM on March 23, 2011
ELO are/were ghastly - plastic, over-produced Beatles rip-offs. Oddly enough, I was in a band years ago that was offered a contract with Jet Records (ELO's label). Fortunately we had a shrewd manager who advised us to turn it down, unless we wanted to be part of the foundations of the next motorway flyover (Don Arden, MD of Jet, was a notorious Brit music industry thug - father of Sharon Osborne, Ozzy's missus, btw). Close shave.
Don't know why really, but I just have an intense dislike of Jeff Lyne's music - there's a sort of whining, over-written, emotionally empty, superficiality about it that just turns me completley off.
In terms of bands that should be more widely appreciated may I nominate Glasgow's very own, the truly wonderful Belle & Sebastian.
Oh and I don't get most rap or hip-hop or whatever it's called. Heard one, heard 'em all. I have absolutely no interest in hearing some sportswear bedecked overweight kid from Detroit talking in an unintelligable urban patois about smacking his bitch up or whatever his label thinks will sell this month.
And precisely when did the venerated (in my book) abbreviation R&B change from indispensible, seminal, rootsy black music (Chess, Stax, Motown et al) to horrible, over-produced, emotion-free, tuneless, bling-festooned, often misogynistic pop chart fodder whose only tenuous connection with real R&B appears to be that the majority of the "artists" are of African descent?
AAahhhhh that's better. I do enjoy a good, bracing rant of a morning. Sets one up for the day.
posted by MajorDundee at 2:29 AM on March 24, 2011
Don't know why really, but I just have an intense dislike of Jeff Lyne's music - there's a sort of whining, over-written, emotionally empty, superficiality about it that just turns me completley off.
In terms of bands that should be more widely appreciated may I nominate Glasgow's very own, the truly wonderful Belle & Sebastian.
Oh and I don't get most rap or hip-hop or whatever it's called. Heard one, heard 'em all. I have absolutely no interest in hearing some sportswear bedecked overweight kid from Detroit talking in an unintelligable urban patois about smacking his bitch up or whatever his label thinks will sell this month.
And precisely when did the venerated (in my book) abbreviation R&B change from indispensible, seminal, rootsy black music (Chess, Stax, Motown et al) to horrible, over-produced, emotion-free, tuneless, bling-festooned, often misogynistic pop chart fodder whose only tenuous connection with real R&B appears to be that the majority of the "artists" are of African descent?
AAahhhhh that's better. I do enjoy a good, bracing rant of a morning. Sets one up for the day.
posted by MajorDundee at 2:29 AM on March 24, 2011
I'm glad there are others who don't "get" Dylan. Just holds absolutely no interest for me at all. I'd rather hear "Stuck in the Middle" than actual Dylan any day.
I also really don't get the modern "indie" aesthetic of underproduced records. Spending money to sound like you recorded in a garage lined with coffee cans full of nails strikes me as silly. Not everybody needs to be ELO in the studio, but I do think that records should be something more than a live performance, something unique to the medium. Which is not to say I don't dig the truly live old records, but that's a different kettle of fish entirely.
posted by uncleozzy at 9:11 AM on March 24, 2011
I also really don't get the modern "indie" aesthetic of underproduced records. Spending money to sound like you recorded in a garage lined with coffee cans full of nails strikes me as silly. Not everybody needs to be ELO in the studio, but I do think that records should be something more than a live performance, something unique to the medium. Which is not to say I don't dig the truly live old records, but that's a different kettle of fish entirely.
posted by uncleozzy at 9:11 AM on March 24, 2011
My big problem with Dylan is that I really, really, really don't like his voice at all (and I like plenty of vocalists who can't sing). I have the same issue with Smashing Pumpkins.
Oh, right, I don't like Smashing Pumpkins, either.
That should've been on the list.
posted by The Great Big Mulp at 9:52 AM on March 24, 2011
Oh, right, I don't like Smashing Pumpkins, either.
That should've been on the list.
posted by The Great Big Mulp at 9:52 AM on March 24, 2011
Oh yeah, I can't stand Billy Corgan's voice, either, but I can deal with it on Siamese Dream. I really love that album.
posted by uncleozzy at 10:57 AM on March 24, 2011
posted by uncleozzy at 10:57 AM on March 24, 2011
I'm not on a rant this time, but you guys are missing out big time re Dylan. I don't particularly like his 60's stuff - all that nasal protesty whining doesn't float my boat at all, and the stuff he did with The Band only occasionally catches fire imho.
BUT.........Blood On The Tracks and Love & Theft are in my top 10 all-time-favourite albums. Dylan's good stuff comes in clusters - so you get identifiable peaks and troughs. There are usually one or two albums around a peak that are worthwhile too. For example Blood On The Tracks is around the same period as Street Legal and Desire, whereas Love & Theft is around the same period as Time Out Of Mind. I won't go into the troughs - but there are periods when he really does seem to churn out one stiff after another.
Dylan's voice changes all the time too - he's a master of disguise and caricature, he plays parts in all these albums. He's an actor or an escape artist or a magician - or all three rolled into one. And his vocal on Love & Theft, with its worldweary, weatherbeated patina, is in my view one of the best performances I've ever heard on record. All the wisdom, joy and misery of the world is in that cracked, parched voice. Utterly, utterly fantastic. The only vocal I've ever heard that comes close is Billie Holiday's performance on Lady In Satin (which is another of my top 10).
And because when he hits the bullseye, her really hits that fucker hard, I forgive him all his stinkers, his misery-guts stage persona and any other indiscretion you care to mention.
So - each to his own, but don't dismiss His Bobness because he's popular or because you've only heard some of his early work. Listening with open ears will richly reward you. Come in and get some shelter from the storm......
posted by MajorDundee at 12:47 PM on March 24, 2011 [1 favorite]
BUT.........Blood On The Tracks and Love & Theft are in my top 10 all-time-favourite albums. Dylan's good stuff comes in clusters - so you get identifiable peaks and troughs. There are usually one or two albums around a peak that are worthwhile too. For example Blood On The Tracks is around the same period as Street Legal and Desire, whereas Love & Theft is around the same period as Time Out Of Mind. I won't go into the troughs - but there are periods when he really does seem to churn out one stiff after another.
Dylan's voice changes all the time too - he's a master of disguise and caricature, he plays parts in all these albums. He's an actor or an escape artist or a magician - or all three rolled into one. And his vocal on Love & Theft, with its worldweary, weatherbeated patina, is in my view one of the best performances I've ever heard on record. All the wisdom, joy and misery of the world is in that cracked, parched voice. Utterly, utterly fantastic. The only vocal I've ever heard that comes close is Billie Holiday's performance on Lady In Satin (which is another of my top 10).
And because when he hits the bullseye, her really hits that fucker hard, I forgive him all his stinkers, his misery-guts stage persona and any other indiscretion you care to mention.
So - each to his own, but don't dismiss His Bobness because he's popular or because you've only heard some of his early work. Listening with open ears will richly reward you. Come in and get some shelter from the storm......
posted by MajorDundee at 12:47 PM on March 24, 2011 [1 favorite]
At one point I downloaded the complete works of His Bobness in an attempt to figure out what the fuss was about -- since so many musicians I admire admire him. I listened to it all. I even put it on rotation on the iPod. But it turned out that whenever a Dylan song came on I hit NEXT as fast as I could.
One of the biggest things I can't get past is the depiction and attitude towards women in his songs. It's just... yuk. You'll have to mark me down as a lost cause I'm afraid.
don't dismiss His Bobness because he's popular or because you've only heard some of his early work.
Equally, don't assume that people can only dislike someone you like out of ignorance of shallowness. Maybe we, you know, just don't like him.
posted by unSane at 1:57 PM on March 24, 2011 [1 favorite]
One of the biggest things I can't get past is the depiction and attitude towards women in his songs. It's just... yuk. You'll have to mark me down as a lost cause I'm afraid.
don't dismiss His Bobness because he's popular or because you've only heard some of his early work.
Equally, don't assume that people can only dislike someone you like out of ignorance of shallowness. Maybe we, you know, just don't like him.
posted by unSane at 1:57 PM on March 24, 2011 [1 favorite]
Mine is Miles Davis. Seriously, I've tried every era, every type of music he's done – and his output is quite diverse – and none of it has really meant much to me. I can kind of groove around the middle of In A Silent Way, but other than that I can't do it. And I've tried a bunch of times. But I've aired that laundry here - heh.
I also loathe the band Spoon with deep, deep derision. I've tried several times to explain why, but it always turns into this all-encompassing rant about soulless indie music of today. Suffice it to say that I just can't stand them.
Also, MajorDundee is absolutely right on Dylan. I know lots of people hate his voice, but I think everyone should hear Blood On The Tracks at least once before casting judgment; it's sort of a complete game-changer, in my opinion.
posted by koeselitz at 2:02 PM on March 24, 2011
I also loathe the band Spoon with deep, deep derision. I've tried several times to explain why, but it always turns into this all-encompassing rant about soulless indie music of today. Suffice it to say that I just can't stand them.
Also, MajorDundee is absolutely right on Dylan. I know lots of people hate his voice, but I think everyone should hear Blood On The Tracks at least once before casting judgment; it's sort of a complete game-changer, in my opinion.
posted by koeselitz at 2:02 PM on March 24, 2011
Heh, Koeselitz, I love both Miles and Spoon!
Bitches Brew is my absolute fave of Miles but really I can listen to almost anything.
posted by unSane at 2:05 PM on March 24, 2011
Bitches Brew is my absolute fave of Miles but really I can listen to almost anything.
posted by unSane at 2:05 PM on March 24, 2011
Hey unS - I don't mean to be at all patronising re Dylan (sure, maybe you just don't like him) but koeselitz nailed it really. I wasn't much of a fan UNTIL Blood On The Tracks. I "got it" then, and some. I guess I'm just trying to turn people on to Dylan because that experience was such a revelation for me - a real Damscian moment. Mind you, I was very stoned at the time. But I've been hooked ever since...
Anyway - we share more likes than dislikes I reckon. I'm a huge Miles fan too. I just picked up a boxset of the 60's outfit with Shorter, Hancock et al for pennies. I have most of the albums anyway (ESP being my favourite from this period), but what a feast........!
posted by MajorDundee at 2:17 PM on March 24, 2011
Anyway - we share more likes than dislikes I reckon. I'm a huge Miles fan too. I just picked up a boxset of the 60's outfit with Shorter, Hancock et al for pennies. I have most of the albums anyway (ESP being my favourite from this period), but what a feast........!
posted by MajorDundee at 2:17 PM on March 24, 2011
koeselitsz - if you want to get into Miles, try Kind Of Blue. If that doesn't do it for you with him, nothing will. That album was for me the same re Miles as Blood On The Tracks was re Dylan. All the lights went on. No kidding - it's a total killer. And you get a free intro to John Coltrane, Bill Evans and Cannonball Adderley too.
posted by MajorDundee at 2:21 PM on March 24, 2011 [1 favorite]
posted by MajorDundee at 2:21 PM on March 24, 2011 [1 favorite]
Dylan tops my list. His voice makes me want to punch a baby, and I just don't think he's that great of a songwriter. I get crap of the "What are you talking about?! He's a genius! You're STUPID for not liking Dylan!" variety for this opinion all the time. *shrug*
Connor Oberst is a very close second for me. When I hear that man 'sing' I want to punch his baby. Ooh, I can't stand it.
I can't stand most things that Brock Isaac has put his hand to, either. Chant something awkward, shout it, babble at the top of your lungs, repeat; and his harmonic + trem bar trick got old a long time ago.
And then there's Clapton. WTF, everyone in the known universe - what did that guy ever do to deserve such adulation? He's far form the best guitar player out there, even among his contemporaries, his songwriting skills are not so top-of-the-heap, and he's boring to watch play. I don't get this one. At. All.
Metalica used to be pretty good, I feel, but they seemed to take a big left turn at the Black Album. Everything after that is a goofy ballad, and Lars Ulrich is hands-down the least creative drummer I've ever heard. Single stroke rolls with a quarter note rest on the first beat of the second measure? Lazy, ugly drumming, Lars.
posted by Pecinpah at 3:34 PM on March 24, 2011
Connor Oberst is a very close second for me. When I hear that man 'sing' I want to punch his baby. Ooh, I can't stand it.
I can't stand most things that Brock Isaac has put his hand to, either. Chant something awkward, shout it, babble at the top of your lungs, repeat; and his harmonic + trem bar trick got old a long time ago.
And then there's Clapton. WTF, everyone in the known universe - what did that guy ever do to deserve such adulation? He's far form the best guitar player out there, even among his contemporaries, his songwriting skills are not so top-of-the-heap, and he's boring to watch play. I don't get this one. At. All.
Metalica used to be pretty good, I feel, but they seemed to take a big left turn at the Black Album. Everything after that is a goofy ballad, and Lars Ulrich is hands-down the least creative drummer I've ever heard. Single stroke rolls with a quarter note rest on the first beat of the second measure? Lazy, ugly drumming, Lars.
posted by Pecinpah at 3:34 PM on March 24, 2011
Huh, I love Miles, but I just love jazz anyway. He is kinda hyped, but he certainly ain't bad at what he does.
There's one thing I love about Dylan...most of everyone else's covers of his songs. Dylan seems to me like the Andy Warhol of music. He came to the big city with a brand to sell and he made it work. Perhaps popular more for being different or unique than for huge talent.
Green Day and Social Distortion make me want to stab someone.
Hair Bands make me want to stab myself.
Modern Country, as mentioned above, makes me stabby. I recently saw a "country artist" wearing nothing but skin tight jeans and a cowboy hat rapping a section of his song. "I like to fish, I like to hunt, I drink Jack Daniels under the sun!" I'm thinking that in the Southern U.S. there is a huge "crossover" audience. Ufa.
posted by snsranch at 3:43 PM on March 24, 2011
There's one thing I love about Dylan...most of everyone else's covers of his songs. Dylan seems to me like the Andy Warhol of music. He came to the big city with a brand to sell and he made it work. Perhaps popular more for being different or unique than for huge talent.
Green Day and Social Distortion make me want to stab someone.
Hair Bands make me want to stab myself.
Modern Country, as mentioned above, makes me stabby. I recently saw a "country artist" wearing nothing but skin tight jeans and a cowboy hat rapping a section of his song. "I like to fish, I like to hunt, I drink Jack Daniels under the sun!" I'm thinking that in the Southern U.S. there is a huge "crossover" audience. Ufa.
posted by snsranch at 3:43 PM on March 24, 2011
MajorDundee: “koeselitsz - if you want to get into Miles, try Kind Of Blue. If that doesn't do it for you with him, nothing will. That album was for me the same re Miles as Blood On The Tracks was re Dylan. All the lights went on. No kidding - it's a total killer. And you get a free intro to John Coltrane, Bill Evans and Cannonball Adderley too.”
Oh man, yes. I totally should have mentioned that – I love that record. Bill Evans is almost an object of worship for me; the stuff he did on So What and Blue In Green where he built chords with fourths instead of thirds revolutionized jazz piano entirely. And there's stuff on that record that is just riveting – I used to have Coltrane's solo from Blue In Green memorized when I had a band back in college. (Probably still do... hrm.) Just an incredible album, that, and it's kind of silly I didn't mention how much I love it.
So I guess I can't say I really hate Miles. Heh.
snsranch: “Green Day and Social Distortion make me want to stab someone.”
I don't really like them, but I guess I don't feel that way.
It's funny, actually; my carpool buddy feels that way about Red Hot Chili Peppers. Every time they come on the radio, without fail, he'll change the channel and then proceed to rant about how awful they are. Whereas I hate to confess it, but I have an odd affection for their awfulness, in the same way that I kind of like LA even though it's really terrible and I couldn't live there I don't think.
posted by koeselitz at 4:01 PM on March 24, 2011
Oh man, yes. I totally should have mentioned that – I love that record. Bill Evans is almost an object of worship for me; the stuff he did on So What and Blue In Green where he built chords with fourths instead of thirds revolutionized jazz piano entirely. And there's stuff on that record that is just riveting – I used to have Coltrane's solo from Blue In Green memorized when I had a band back in college. (Probably still do... hrm.) Just an incredible album, that, and it's kind of silly I didn't mention how much I love it.
So I guess I can't say I really hate Miles. Heh.
snsranch: “Green Day and Social Distortion make me want to stab someone.”
I don't really like them, but I guess I don't feel that way.
It's funny, actually; my carpool buddy feels that way about Red Hot Chili Peppers. Every time they come on the radio, without fail, he'll change the channel and then proceed to rant about how awful they are. Whereas I hate to confess it, but I have an odd affection for their awfulness, in the same way that I kind of like LA even though it's really terrible and I couldn't live there I don't think.
posted by koeselitz at 4:01 PM on March 24, 2011
The real reason bands like Green Day and Social D bug me is because they are so "punk-lite". They so often use little licks and progressions from like the Sex Pistols even, and the Pistols were already contrived.
That's interesting about the Chili Peppers. They're a good example of a band that starts off on fire and just gets mellower over time. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but it's like the Clapton comments above; early X and later X are often just totally different things and end up appealing to totally different audiences.
posted by snsranch at 4:50 PM on March 24, 2011
That's interesting about the Chili Peppers. They're a good example of a band that starts off on fire and just gets mellower over time. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but it's like the Clapton comments above; early X and later X are often just totally different things and end up appealing to totally different audiences.
posted by snsranch at 4:50 PM on March 24, 2011
I don't understand what you mean by that. [Clapton] doesn't jump around enough or something? His phrasing is interesting and, to the extent that the camera stays on his hands, I think he's interesting to watch play.
I'm not talking about pyrotechnics or doing backflips off a Marshall stack, he just lacks any kind if discernible stage presence at all (to me). He looks like someone's bar-band uncle up there, just hazily noodling through a few hackneyed blues phrases like he's not really paying attention. I find him soporific and uninspired - both to hear and to watch - and that includes his work with Cream and Derek and the Dominoes (though I haven't listened to a great deal of the latter, I'll admit, and I've never seen any video of them. Maybe he was on fire back in the day; I couldn't say). To my ear he's a dull, listless player, and an even less engaging performer.
Contrast him with George Clinton, who I've only ever seen play once, and you have a clearer picture about what I'm talking about. That guy hardly moves at all; when I saw him he just walked casually out onto the stage, took his time getting to the microphone, and mumbled something into it before beginning to sing; but you could practically feel him up there just taking over. It was really effecting, totally amazing. I don't even really like P-Funk, but that was one of the best shows I've ever seen, solely for the show itself (though the music was amazing too, of course).
posted by Pecinpah at 6:32 PM on March 24, 2011 [1 favorite]
I'm not talking about pyrotechnics or doing backflips off a Marshall stack, he just lacks any kind if discernible stage presence at all (to me). He looks like someone's bar-band uncle up there, just hazily noodling through a few hackneyed blues phrases like he's not really paying attention. I find him soporific and uninspired - both to hear and to watch - and that includes his work with Cream and Derek and the Dominoes (though I haven't listened to a great deal of the latter, I'll admit, and I've never seen any video of them. Maybe he was on fire back in the day; I couldn't say). To my ear he's a dull, listless player, and an even less engaging performer.
Contrast him with George Clinton, who I've only ever seen play once, and you have a clearer picture about what I'm talking about. That guy hardly moves at all; when I saw him he just walked casually out onto the stage, took his time getting to the microphone, and mumbled something into it before beginning to sing; but you could practically feel him up there just taking over. It was really effecting, totally amazing. I don't even really like P-Funk, but that was one of the best shows I've ever seen, solely for the show itself (though the music was amazing too, of course).
posted by Pecinpah at 6:32 PM on March 24, 2011 [1 favorite]
I'm a pretty (ok, TOTALLY) confirmed Clapton-hater but I gotta admit that his solo on Creams's CROSSROADS is the shit.
Is Robert Quine under-rated? Because the man is God.
posted by unSane at 7:54 PM on March 24, 2011
Is Robert Quine under-rated? Because the man is God.
posted by unSane at 7:54 PM on March 24, 2011
I wasn't much of a fan UNTIL Blood On The Tracks. I "got it" then, and some.
me, too, right when it came out - although i did love like a rolling stone - oddly enough, i was really stoned at the time, too ...
---
koeselitsz - if you want to get into Miles, try Kind Of Blue.
2nd this - it's got coltrane - what can i say?
on preview, you do get that - good
---
And then there's Clapton. WTF, everyone in the known universe - what did that guy ever do to deserve such adulation?
that solo on crossroads - just perfect - and a great deal of layla - although mr duane allman had a good deal to do with that
his solo career? - once in awhile he gets a fire under his ass and plays something - the rest of the time? - nope
posted by pyramid termite at 8:53 PM on March 24, 2011
me, too, right when it came out - although i did love like a rolling stone - oddly enough, i was really stoned at the time, too ...
---
koeselitsz - if you want to get into Miles, try Kind Of Blue.
2nd this - it's got coltrane - what can i say?
on preview, you do get that - good
---
And then there's Clapton. WTF, everyone in the known universe - what did that guy ever do to deserve such adulation?
that solo on crossroads - just perfect - and a great deal of layla - although mr duane allman had a good deal to do with that
his solo career? - once in awhile he gets a fire under his ass and plays something - the rest of the time? - nope
posted by pyramid termite at 8:53 PM on March 24, 2011
i forgot last night - my no 1 blind spot of all time, irreparable and unrelenting - opera singing
nope, people just shouldn't sing like that - i can't get past it - and i know very well from a compositional and arrangement viewpoint that there is much fantastic music there
but they SING - like THAT
posted by pyramid termite at 8:57 PM on March 24, 2011
nope, people just shouldn't sing like that - i can't get past it - and i know very well from a compositional and arrangement viewpoint that there is much fantastic music there
but they SING - like THAT
posted by pyramid termite at 8:57 PM on March 24, 2011
Chillmost, I don't know what your music tastes are in general, but I actually find myself listening to Neutral Milk Hotel's first album, On Avery Island, and Jeff's solo live recording Live at Jittery Joe's, even more than In The Aeroplane Over the Sea ( though I really, really love their most famous album).
posted by Corduroy at 11:28 PM on March 24, 2011
posted by Corduroy at 11:28 PM on March 24, 2011
Meant to have another sentence on the comment above. All three albums have totally different aesthetics and recording styles, one reveling in fuzz, and another just an okay-quality live recording of Jeff with his guitar (and the occasional baby crying). Of course, they are all inherently similar and held together by his distinct voice.
posted by Corduroy at 11:32 PM on March 24, 2011
posted by Corduroy at 11:32 PM on March 24, 2011
Steely Dan. I've tried several times, but it's horrible.
posted by sleepy pete at 12:00 AM on March 25, 2011 [1 favorite]
posted by sleepy pete at 12:00 AM on March 25, 2011 [1 favorite]
Polly Harvey and The White Stripes. I really should like them. I really should. But I don't.
posted by unSane at 2:23 AM on March 25, 2011
posted by unSane at 2:23 AM on March 25, 2011
The thing with Clapton is, I guess, that you have to put him into context. When he came to the fore in the mid '60's there weren't that many people playing like that with that sound. For a lot of Brits (and I'd say a lot of white Americans too perhaps) no-one had heard a guitar played like that before. And they liked it. A lot. Now, you could say that the guy has traded on that "shock of the new" thing ever since. I used to diss Clapton for most of the reasons given above, but in fairness to him he does deserve some respect for popularising blues guitar playing. He's the reason a lot of us sound the way we do.
I thought he'd lost it all years ago until I saw the Cream reunion gig at the Royal Albert Hall on TV a few years back. I was half watching it - mainly to see whether Jack Bruce or Ginger Baker would make it through the whole gig without medical assistance - and suddenly Clapton just got in the zone and started to cook. And I remember thinking "Fair dues to EC - that's shit hot playing by anyone's standards". I was very impressed. And I remembered then the experience of seeing him live way back in 1976 at the Glasgow Apollo when I was a teenager and not especially a fan (I was more interested in Yvonne Elliman who I thought was a babe at the time). But when the band did Stormy Monday Blues all the hairs on the back of my neck stood on end - it was inspirational. And, if nothing else, I thank him for that moment when I felt for the first time the sheer visceral power of the blues.
posted by MajorDundee at 2:29 AM on March 25, 2011 [1 favorite]
I thought he'd lost it all years ago until I saw the Cream reunion gig at the Royal Albert Hall on TV a few years back. I was half watching it - mainly to see whether Jack Bruce or Ginger Baker would make it through the whole gig without medical assistance - and suddenly Clapton just got in the zone and started to cook. And I remember thinking "Fair dues to EC - that's shit hot playing by anyone's standards". I was very impressed. And I remembered then the experience of seeing him live way back in 1976 at the Glasgow Apollo when I was a teenager and not especially a fan (I was more interested in Yvonne Elliman who I thought was a babe at the time). But when the band did Stormy Monday Blues all the hairs on the back of my neck stood on end - it was inspirational. And, if nothing else, I thank him for that moment when I felt for the first time the sheer visceral power of the blues.
posted by MajorDundee at 2:29 AM on March 25, 2011 [1 favorite]
I know what you mean about Clapton, Major, and in that Cream stuff he really did seem like he was trailblazing something new. But to me he ultimately took blues in a terrible direction -- he made it technical and clean. His bends were all about hitting the note he was aiming at, as opposed to the bend itself. He started slipping in those diatonic melody notes -- literally the white notes -- that made it all slip down a bit more easily. It really did become a diluted white boy blues kind of thing. See also SRV I'm afraid. Spawned a thousand bar bands. It's always shocking to go back to the source material -- Wolf, Waters, Diddley et al -- and realize how utterly different it sounds to the British re-interpretation. I think the only one who really got it was Keith Richards.
With Clapton, most times it seems the song is simply a vehicle for the solo. It's like eating a meal which is total stodge and the only important thing is the sauce. When you see him launch into a solo with his little round glasses on, it's like watching a math professor work through a proof which was difficult once but which they've now done a thousand times. He never breaks a sweat or hits a wrong note -- and what the hell is blues about if it's not sweat and wrong notes?
posted by unSane at 6:26 AM on March 25, 2011 [1 favorite]
With Clapton, most times it seems the song is simply a vehicle for the solo. It's like eating a meal which is total stodge and the only important thing is the sauce. When you see him launch into a solo with his little round glasses on, it's like watching a math professor work through a proof which was difficult once but which they've now done a thousand times. He never breaks a sweat or hits a wrong note -- and what the hell is blues about if it's not sweat and wrong notes?
posted by unSane at 6:26 AM on March 25, 2011 [1 favorite]
Hhhhmmmmm (sits back, takes off wire-rimmed glasses, steeples fingers). Nah. Disagree profoundly with that analysis. Tends to suggest that the the blues is merely a technical matter - about harmony and technique. No. The blues is a feeling. You can play the blues and it doesn't have to have anything to do with 12-bar or 3-string guitars or what have you. And it's a feeling that isn't limited by race or how poor/rich you are or how technically limited/advanced your playing or harmonic palette is. The problem with Clapton is that he's going through the motions most of the time and not really feeling what he's playing - a contented late-middle-aged geezer just pottering about in his twilight years. But it's the lack of real feeling that makes it sound bad, not the notes or the bends. And to imply that any harmonic extension to the standard blues repertoire is wrong or inauthentic is.....well...........bollocks :-)) (imagine we're just discussing this over a pint or two after a gig mate - no offence on either side huh?)
posted by MajorDundee at 7:39 AM on March 25, 2011
posted by MajorDundee at 7:39 AM on March 25, 2011
Eh, well [sips third pint], I always find that 'blues is all about the feeling' stuff to be handwavy bullshit to be honest. Ditto whether stuff is inauthentic or authentic. I don't even know what those terms mean. There are specific technical things that differentiate blues-rock from blues, including some I mentioned, but many others. I mean, just to take an example, if you're playing in E and you bend the D up to E, there are lots of ways of doing it, but the only one that sounds really blue, really fucking RUDE, is to take your bloody time about doing it and never really actually get there.
It's not because Clapton and his chums are white per se -- that's just shorthand. It's that they came from a musical background which tempted them to make the music they loved less rude and raw. To clean it up. To make it all in tune. To tighten up the groove. To introduce a bunch of diatonic melodies rather than the five basic notes. To pretty much eradicate all the microtonal and quartertone stuff that is all over the original stuff they are riffing off. To formalize everything.
I'll give you another example -- Hubert Sumlin's rhythm work and those strange fractured seventh chords he played over everything, all dirty and sloppy. Blues rock took the same chords and tightened them up, prettied them up, and often simply dropped them completely. You can say it's feel but actually it's a specific physical way of playing the instrument.
Blues rock also became massively about pattern playing. About a repertoire of riffs which could be nailed together in different ways and played at lickety spit speed. But when you listen to -- for example -- Freddie King, or even more so Albert King -- they're working with a far more limited bag of tricks but squeezing way more out of it -- the playing is much more like singing than anything else. Again you can call it feel but actually there's a vast technical difference in what's going on.
I'll go back to my original point -- Clapton and his pals always chunter on about how inspired they were by Waters, Wolf, Robert Johnson, Blind Lemon et al but they sound absolutely nothing like them. Not even close. A mile off. Even in the early days. They took what those guys did, and peeled it like a potato, not realizing the goodness was in the skin.
Which is fine, because they weren't them. And that sort of cargo-cult playing -- combined with the backbeat of rock'n'roll -- led to the entirety of rock music. But Clapton and his ilk got stuck in one tiny shallow pool of faux-blues. We both seem to agree that Cream and (to a certain extent Derek and the Dominoes) worked musically. I think this is because they felt like they transcended their influences, in two totally different directions.
Anyway [begins fourth pint] I'll tell you who I think is a good white blues player, and you're going to laugh at me. Billy Gibbons. There, I said it.
Shit, I'm drunk.
posted by unSane at 8:09 AM on March 25, 2011
It's not because Clapton and his chums are white per se -- that's just shorthand. It's that they came from a musical background which tempted them to make the music they loved less rude and raw. To clean it up. To make it all in tune. To tighten up the groove. To introduce a bunch of diatonic melodies rather than the five basic notes. To pretty much eradicate all the microtonal and quartertone stuff that is all over the original stuff they are riffing off. To formalize everything.
I'll give you another example -- Hubert Sumlin's rhythm work and those strange fractured seventh chords he played over everything, all dirty and sloppy. Blues rock took the same chords and tightened them up, prettied them up, and often simply dropped them completely. You can say it's feel but actually it's a specific physical way of playing the instrument.
Blues rock also became massively about pattern playing. About a repertoire of riffs which could be nailed together in different ways and played at lickety spit speed. But when you listen to -- for example -- Freddie King, or even more so Albert King -- they're working with a far more limited bag of tricks but squeezing way more out of it -- the playing is much more like singing than anything else. Again you can call it feel but actually there's a vast technical difference in what's going on.
I'll go back to my original point -- Clapton and his pals always chunter on about how inspired they were by Waters, Wolf, Robert Johnson, Blind Lemon et al but they sound absolutely nothing like them. Not even close. A mile off. Even in the early days. They took what those guys did, and peeled it like a potato, not realizing the goodness was in the skin.
Which is fine, because they weren't them. And that sort of cargo-cult playing -- combined with the backbeat of rock'n'roll -- led to the entirety of rock music. But Clapton and his ilk got stuck in one tiny shallow pool of faux-blues. We both seem to agree that Cream and (to a certain extent Derek and the Dominoes) worked musically. I think this is because they felt like they transcended their influences, in two totally different directions.
Anyway [begins fourth pint] I'll tell you who I think is a good white blues player, and you're going to laugh at me. Billy Gibbons. There, I said it.
Shit, I'm drunk.
posted by unSane at 8:09 AM on March 25, 2011
To introduce a bunch of diatonic melodies rather than the five basic notes.
no, there's a lot of blues players who play more than 5 notes
It's not because Clapton and his chums are white per se -- that's just shorthand. It's that they came from a musical background which tempted them to make the music they loved less rude and raw.
but we all do, including many of the later people who are considered "real" blues players - it's the musical environment we live in and the technology we use - and when you've got time to do another take to get things just right, or to set up the recording just right, it's a rare musician who isn't going to do that, even at the expense of sounding a little slick
But Clapton and his ilk got stuck in one tiny shallow pool of faux-blues.
well, no - clapton tends to play everything but the blues a lot of the time - which is not such a great thing for him to do
I'll tell you who I think is a good white blues player, and you're going to laugh at me. Billy Gibbons.
sure - and when they got popular, they started using synths and click tracks and slicked it up
posted by pyramid termite at 10:25 AM on March 25, 2011
no, there's a lot of blues players who play more than 5 notes
It's not because Clapton and his chums are white per se -- that's just shorthand. It's that they came from a musical background which tempted them to make the music they loved less rude and raw.
but we all do, including many of the later people who are considered "real" blues players - it's the musical environment we live in and the technology we use - and when you've got time to do another take to get things just right, or to set up the recording just right, it's a rare musician who isn't going to do that, even at the expense of sounding a little slick
But Clapton and his ilk got stuck in one tiny shallow pool of faux-blues.
well, no - clapton tends to play everything but the blues a lot of the time - which is not such a great thing for him to do
I'll tell you who I think is a good white blues player, and you're going to laugh at me. Billy Gibbons.
sure - and when they got popular, they started using synths and click tracks and slicked it up
posted by pyramid termite at 10:25 AM on March 25, 2011
also, i'd suggest you take a look at elijah wald's, escaping the delta, robert johnson and the invention of the blues - slick, un-raw blues is not a british or white invention; it's been a part of the scene for a long time - and what you think of being blues music from a certain period isn't necessarily what the blues music audience was into hearing
posted by pyramid termite at 10:33 AM on March 25, 2011 [1 favorite]
posted by pyramid termite at 10:33 AM on March 25, 2011 [1 favorite]
The greatest blues song I know of is Charles Mingus' "Goodbye Pork Pie Hat." That song is a freaking treatise on what it means to sharp the second and flat the sixth.
posted by koeselitz at 11:04 AM on March 25, 2011 [1 favorite]
posted by koeselitz at 11:04 AM on March 25, 2011 [1 favorite]
nowjussfuckinlishenameeaminuteunfuckinSane...(reaches for Bell's bottle, misses, falls on floor).......
(cue drunken offended dignity and slight tearfulness) I will never, never everrrr, be pershuaded that the Bluesh can be reduced to shome kind of technical formula about flattened whatsits or bending things or all that auld mince. hic. The bluesh, yesh the bloooooooooze, is a feeling that comes out in what you play, whatever you play. hic. So youse can all jus' fuck off an' fuckin' die.......barman........BARMAN!!! gimme another here....
ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
posted by MajorDundee at 12:50 PM on March 25, 2011 [1 favorite]
(cue drunken offended dignity and slight tearfulness) I will never, never everrrr, be pershuaded that the Bluesh can be reduced to shome kind of technical formula about flattened whatsits or bending things or all that auld mince. hic. The bluesh, yesh the bloooooooooze, is a feeling that comes out in what you play, whatever you play. hic. So youse can all jus' fuck off an' fuckin' die.......barman........BARMAN!!! gimme another here....
ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
posted by MajorDundee at 12:50 PM on March 25, 2011 [1 favorite]
tl;dr.
posted by askmeaboutLOOM at 1:12 PM on March 25, 2011
posted by askmeaboutLOOM at 1:12 PM on March 25, 2011
Just re-reading comments by the Major and unSane about Clapton. Both of those comments are pretty eloquent in describing why he should be credited and what eventually happened to his playing. I may be talking completely out of my ass, but it seems that by the mid '70s (?) Clapton was a superstar and may have become a little (a lot) more mainstream as a result. He STILL get massive amounts of airplay with those 70's hits.
Here's a little thing about Keith Richards and Ronnie wood; I saw some backstage footage of them sitting on a couch smoking, playing and talking. It was amazing. They were totally having a regular conversation seemingly not paying any attention to what they were playing but the stuff they were playing was like two flamenco guitarists throwing down the show of a lifetime, like the guitar were having their own very deep conversation. Amazing.
posted by snsranch at 1:45 PM on March 25, 2011 [1 favorite]
Here's a little thing about Keith Richards and Ronnie wood; I saw some backstage footage of them sitting on a couch smoking, playing and talking. It was amazing. They were totally having a regular conversation seemingly not paying any attention to what they were playing but the stuff they were playing was like two flamenco guitarists throwing down the show of a lifetime, like the guitar were having their own very deep conversation. Amazing.
posted by snsranch at 1:45 PM on March 25, 2011 [1 favorite]
Heh.
Well, it's an interesting question. I think the blues has an irreducibility about it, and I don't want to make it seem as though there's a right way to think about what the blues means. I mean, there have been thousands and thousands of great musicians over the past century that have done huge things with blues.
And obviously the end of music isn't a technical thing; the purpose of music certainly isn't to say something about math, I mean. What's more, technicality has really been a major issue in the past century, I think; it's been fetishized and turned around so many times, from the days before recording when black musicians had to pretend they weren't reading music so the white folks could enjoy the "raw" feel of their tunes up to the halcyon days of punk, that I think there are a fruitful number of lessons we can say we've learned about it now.
This is complicated, of course, by the fact that blues itself defies or extends the technical status quo, depending on your perspective of it; blues is in large part the realization of a whole alternate tonality behind or above the chromatic. That alternate space is always shocking to the ear, and naturally brings with it social and political implications. Blues is a way of playing instruments wrong that sounds very, very right. I guess I'm thinking mostly here of what I consider my own musical heritage: the beginnings of what we know as jazz in New Orleans a little over hundred years ago. Now of course blues is older than that; but in that scene it was already something spread around, something people aspired to. Black musicians took special pride in their ability to bend notes, to work outside the conventional lines, to play harmony that was not harmonic. Those glory days in New Orleans were characterized by bands and musicians that reveled in the sheer pleasure of shocking those expectations, of breaking the established harmonic regime and creating something new.
This is the thread of jazz, in fact; it's part of the central meaning of jazz in America, I think. It continued with the bebop revolutionaries in the early 40s, who in turn were trying to break the calcified tradition of swing that held them captive. Thelonious Monk's famous and iconic early statement of the mission of bop – "we're going to create something that they can't steal, because they can't play it!" – was really in many ways a restatement of the old New Orleans strain of nobility and pride in being a 'musicianer' that had given birth to jazz in the first place.
Not that blues is limited to jazz, of course; jazz is just how I come to it. But I think these things are true of blues in other contexts, too. If I had to characterize blues, I'd say it's an aggregation of contrary and subversive impulses gathered around a music of sadness; it's characterized by many apparent contradictions to that sadness of which it is a celebration: defiance, musical excellence, and joy.
So, in sum, my own sense is that the technical and the sociopolitical and the musical are (or at least ought to be) different ways of talking about the same thing. Of course, I am biased (as a jazz-bug) and I have a vested interest in seeing the technical aspect as important or at least a viable approach to blues. See, 'pure blues' may be important to a lot of people; but in my mind, blues has always been an essential part of what jazz is, too. And whatever you think of them, a whole host of brilliant musicians who happened to play the blues very well contributed a lot to jazz by deconstructing the technical aspects of the blues and thinking long and hard about what those technical aspects meant and how they came together. When I call Mingus' "Goodbye Pork Pie Hat" a "treatise" about this, I mean that: there are lessons in that progress and that melody about the harmonic implications trans-harmonic tones that I'll be learning until the day I die. And that's a fantastic thing, I think. But the point, at the end of the day, is that the song is beautiful, and it's a meditation on lots of things besides how the blues works technically. That is: it's a song for the great Lester Young.
Anyway, that's probably enough said for now.
Mostly I just wanted to share my favorite player of the blues with you. Yeah, he's a 'jazz' guy; but he's one that's beyond category. Seriously, anyone interested in the blues should listen to the magnificent Sidney Bechet play "Blue Horizon." There are few things in this world that make me happier.
posted by koeselitz at 1:57 PM on March 25, 2011 [1 favorite]
Well, it's an interesting question. I think the blues has an irreducibility about it, and I don't want to make it seem as though there's a right way to think about what the blues means. I mean, there have been thousands and thousands of great musicians over the past century that have done huge things with blues.
And obviously the end of music isn't a technical thing; the purpose of music certainly isn't to say something about math, I mean. What's more, technicality has really been a major issue in the past century, I think; it's been fetishized and turned around so many times, from the days before recording when black musicians had to pretend they weren't reading music so the white folks could enjoy the "raw" feel of their tunes up to the halcyon days of punk, that I think there are a fruitful number of lessons we can say we've learned about it now.
This is complicated, of course, by the fact that blues itself defies or extends the technical status quo, depending on your perspective of it; blues is in large part the realization of a whole alternate tonality behind or above the chromatic. That alternate space is always shocking to the ear, and naturally brings with it social and political implications. Blues is a way of playing instruments wrong that sounds very, very right. I guess I'm thinking mostly here of what I consider my own musical heritage: the beginnings of what we know as jazz in New Orleans a little over hundred years ago. Now of course blues is older than that; but in that scene it was already something spread around, something people aspired to. Black musicians took special pride in their ability to bend notes, to work outside the conventional lines, to play harmony that was not harmonic. Those glory days in New Orleans were characterized by bands and musicians that reveled in the sheer pleasure of shocking those expectations, of breaking the established harmonic regime and creating something new.
This is the thread of jazz, in fact; it's part of the central meaning of jazz in America, I think. It continued with the bebop revolutionaries in the early 40s, who in turn were trying to break the calcified tradition of swing that held them captive. Thelonious Monk's famous and iconic early statement of the mission of bop – "we're going to create something that they can't steal, because they can't play it!" – was really in many ways a restatement of the old New Orleans strain of nobility and pride in being a 'musicianer' that had given birth to jazz in the first place.
Not that blues is limited to jazz, of course; jazz is just how I come to it. But I think these things are true of blues in other contexts, too. If I had to characterize blues, I'd say it's an aggregation of contrary and subversive impulses gathered around a music of sadness; it's characterized by many apparent contradictions to that sadness of which it is a celebration: defiance, musical excellence, and joy.
So, in sum, my own sense is that the technical and the sociopolitical and the musical are (or at least ought to be) different ways of talking about the same thing. Of course, I am biased (as a jazz-bug) and I have a vested interest in seeing the technical aspect as important or at least a viable approach to blues. See, 'pure blues' may be important to a lot of people; but in my mind, blues has always been an essential part of what jazz is, too. And whatever you think of them, a whole host of brilliant musicians who happened to play the blues very well contributed a lot to jazz by deconstructing the technical aspects of the blues and thinking long and hard about what those technical aspects meant and how they came together. When I call Mingus' "Goodbye Pork Pie Hat" a "treatise" about this, I mean that: there are lessons in that progress and that melody about the harmonic implications trans-harmonic tones that I'll be learning until the day I die. And that's a fantastic thing, I think. But the point, at the end of the day, is that the song is beautiful, and it's a meditation on lots of things besides how the blues works technically. That is: it's a song for the great Lester Young.
Anyway, that's probably enough said for now.
Mostly I just wanted to share my favorite player of the blues with you. Yeah, he's a 'jazz' guy; but he's one that's beyond category. Seriously, anyone interested in the blues should listen to the magnificent Sidney Bechet play "Blue Horizon." There are few things in this world that make me happier.
posted by koeselitz at 1:57 PM on March 25, 2011 [1 favorite]
Thanks for that, K, some deep truths in there. Especially
Blues is a way of playing instruments wrong that sounds very, very right.
Also, the fact that jazz is always in some ways 'about' jazz... I've always found that aspect of it ferociously intimidating because it's hard to find a way in. I think the thing I love best about the jazz I like is that it manages to be staggeringly technical, forbiddingly intellectual, and resolutely musical all at the same time.
posted by unSane at 2:11 PM on March 25, 2011
Blues is a way of playing instruments wrong that sounds very, very right.
Also, the fact that jazz is always in some ways 'about' jazz... I've always found that aspect of it ferociously intimidating because it's hard to find a way in. I think the thing I love best about the jazz I like is that it manages to be staggeringly technical, forbiddingly intellectual, and resolutely musical all at the same time.
posted by unSane at 2:11 PM on March 25, 2011
(Also I can't resist mentioning that every time I read the thread title here I think about this song.)
posted by koeselitz at 2:20 PM on March 25, 2011
posted by koeselitz at 2:20 PM on March 25, 2011
Thanks for the Sidney Bechet, koeselitz, that is right on and I really enjoyed your comment about jazz and blues, my favorite music next to (cough) punk rock.
I think the reason jazz has become so staggeringly technical is because its foundation, the African root music that was distilled on plantations in the form of work songs, is so solidly simple but unique, opening endless variation and expression. Even in that Bechet song it's very easy to imagine a "work" song over the rhythm section.
posted by snsranch at 3:33 PM on March 25, 2011 [1 favorite]
I think the reason jazz has become so staggeringly technical is because its foundation, the African root music that was distilled on plantations in the form of work songs, is so solidly simple but unique, opening endless variation and expression. Even in that Bechet song it's very easy to imagine a "work" song over the rhythm section.
posted by snsranch at 3:33 PM on March 25, 2011 [1 favorite]
But when the same thing happened with rock -- prog -- it disappeared up its own arse. But jazz has made a series of wild and breathtaking leaps forward without, for the most part, disappearing into vapid musology. I mean, I've been to some um, very very ODD free jazz improv nights* but then you go and listen to Bitches Brew and or some Ornette Coleman and it manages to be out there and utterly entertaining at the same time.
*My favorite memory is from the Vortex in Stoke Newington, London. Mrs unSane and I were scouting locations for our wedding reception and dropped in to check it out. Great place, don't know if it's still there. Anyway, there was a Dutch free jazz ensemble playing, and they were like a cartoon of a European beatnik ensemble, all black turtle necks, lennon glasses and furrowed brows, and the sound they made was like a full dishwasher being thrown down the stairs with a backing of strangled cats.
There were about three other people in the audience, and at one point the trombonist took a solo. It was obviously a big deal and a hush fell over the room. He took a huge deep breath and unleashed the most enormous farting sound, like a bull elephant who had been feasting on beans for the past week. It went on and on.
By this point Mrs unSane and I were quite literally weeping with laughter (we'd had a few beers, I will admit), and a woman with a very severe blond bob in front of us turned angrily, put her finger to her lips, and went SSSSHHHHH!!
We left, almost unable to walk for hilarity.
posted by unSane at 5:47 AM on March 26, 2011 [1 favorite]
*My favorite memory is from the Vortex in Stoke Newington, London. Mrs unSane and I were scouting locations for our wedding reception and dropped in to check it out. Great place, don't know if it's still there. Anyway, there was a Dutch free jazz ensemble playing, and they were like a cartoon of a European beatnik ensemble, all black turtle necks, lennon glasses and furrowed brows, and the sound they made was like a full dishwasher being thrown down the stairs with a backing of strangled cats.
There were about three other people in the audience, and at one point the trombonist took a solo. It was obviously a big deal and a hush fell over the room. He took a huge deep breath and unleashed the most enormous farting sound, like a bull elephant who had been feasting on beans for the past week. It went on and on.
By this point Mrs unSane and I were quite literally weeping with laughter (we'd had a few beers, I will admit), and a woman with a very severe blond bob in front of us turned angrily, put her finger to her lips, and went SSSSHHHHH!!
We left, almost unable to walk for hilarity.
posted by unSane at 5:47 AM on March 26, 2011 [1 favorite]
Neil Young? Neil Yuck.
Broken Social Scene is one of those bands where I can appreciate the artfulness and musicality of what they do but I don't enjoy it much at all. Like watching some who is really good at heroin shoot up, or something.
I've made a weird peace with The Smiths on a sort of "I can imagine myself being someone who genuinely gets into this" basis, but that's all. Cf. The Cure whenever Robert Smith's mouth is open.
Bonus fact: did you know that Leonard Cohen has done a bunch of unlistenably cornball originals of songs that other people covered well?
posted by cortex at 1:21 PM on March 26, 2011
Broken Social Scene is one of those bands where I can appreciate the artfulness and musicality of what they do but I don't enjoy it much at all. Like watching some who is really good at heroin shoot up, or something.
I've made a weird peace with The Smiths on a sort of "I can imagine myself being someone who genuinely gets into this" basis, but that's all. Cf. The Cure whenever Robert Smith's mouth is open.
Bonus fact: did you know that Leonard Cohen has done a bunch of unlistenably cornball originals of songs that other people covered well?
posted by cortex at 1:21 PM on March 26, 2011
Neil Young? Neil Yuck.
/head asplodes
The Smiths are one of those bands I used to be a massive fan of... you know, turning up at the record store at 8am on Monday morning to get the new single of Charming Man before anybody else. I still sort of appreciate them but I've no desire to listen to them. See also: James.
It's interesting to consider which bands you used-to-love have stood the test of time. From my back pages, Echo and the Bunnymen still do it for me, ditto the Go-Betweens, Velvet Underground, Joy Division, New Order (mostly), Pixies, Talking Heads, Teenage Fanclub,
posted by unSane at 4:22 PM on March 26, 2011
/head asplodes
The Smiths are one of those bands I used to be a massive fan of... you know, turning up at the record store at 8am on Monday morning to get the new single of Charming Man before anybody else. I still sort of appreciate them but I've no desire to listen to them. See also: James.
It's interesting to consider which bands you used-to-love have stood the test of time. From my back pages, Echo and the Bunnymen still do it for me, ditto the Go-Betweens, Velvet Underground, Joy Division, New Order (mostly), Pixies, Talking Heads, Teenage Fanclub,
posted by unSane at 4:22 PM on March 26, 2011
ha great thread: bands I really can't stand and never understand why they are 'huge'
Peal Jam = whiny annoying singer with medicore Nirvana-ish band. the Bland Nirvana.
Oasis = why anyone cares about these melodramtic beatles rip-offs..
Bruce Springsteen = the man's man's Celine Dion. horrible.
Beyonce -style / warbly 'soul' singers = won't you just shut the hell up with that nonsense.
Coldplay = oh so MOR
posted by mary8nne at 3:14 AM on March 28, 2011 [1 favorite]
Peal Jam = whiny annoying singer with medicore Nirvana-ish band. the Bland Nirvana.
Oasis = why anyone cares about these melodramtic beatles rip-offs..
Bruce Springsteen = the man's man's Celine Dion. horrible.
Beyonce -style / warbly 'soul' singers = won't you just shut the hell up with that nonsense.
Coldplay = oh so MOR
posted by mary8nne at 3:14 AM on March 28, 2011 [1 favorite]
He is kinda hyped, but he certainly ain't bad at what he does.
tell me you're being ironic here, please.
posted by peterkins at 5:13 AM on March 28, 2011
tell me you're being ironic here, please.
posted by peterkins at 5:13 AM on March 28, 2011
hey unsane, the Vortex is still operating and now in sunny Dalston.
and yeah, though some free improv is pretty funny (and usually with the Dutch guys, it's intentional), my sympathy would have been with the blonde with the severe bob (i presume with your focus on her appearance you're trying to tell us something, no?).
posted by peterkins at 5:51 AM on March 28, 2011
and yeah, though some free improv is pretty funny (and usually with the Dutch guys, it's intentional), my sympathy would have been with the blonde with the severe bob (i presume with your focus on her appearance you're trying to tell us something, no?).
posted by peterkins at 5:51 AM on March 28, 2011
Indeed! I was trying to tell you she had a severe blonde bob.
posted by unSane at 6:03 AM on March 28, 2011 [1 favorite]
posted by unSane at 6:03 AM on March 28, 2011 [1 favorite]
Bruce Springsteen = the man's man's Celine Dion.
Haha - that's awesome.
posted by Pecinpah at 9:33 AM on March 28, 2011
Haha - that's awesome.
posted by Pecinpah at 9:33 AM on March 28, 2011
ok. heh. ok. I have the veritable nadir, the pits, yeah verily the clinker-festooned arsehole of all MeFiMu challenges: you have to cover a song by the band/artist you hate the most.
So, for instance, unSane gets to cover, oh let's see, let's see, All Along The Watchtower by His Bobness while cortex is allocated, wait for it, "Cortex The Killer" by Neil Yuck. mmmmmmMMMMMMMMHHHHAAAAAHHHHAAAHHHHHHHAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Naturally, I will serve up a fetid slice of something deeply unpleasant by ELO or perhaps, if you're very lucky, Oasis.
posted by MajorDundee at 11:33 AM on March 28, 2011 [1 favorite]
So, for instance, unSane gets to cover, oh let's see, let's see, All Along The Watchtower by His Bobness while cortex is allocated, wait for it, "Cortex The Killer" by Neil Yuck. mmmmmmMMMMMMMMHHHHAAAAAHHHHAAAHHHHHHHAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Naturally, I will serve up a fetid slice of something deeply unpleasant by ELO or perhaps, if you're very lucky, Oasis.
posted by MajorDundee at 11:33 AM on March 28, 2011 [1 favorite]
I like the sound of that. Or like hating the sound of it? Whatever, would probably be a fun challenge.
posted by cortex at 11:38 AM on March 28, 2011
posted by cortex at 11:38 AM on March 28, 2011
Well, for the record, I don't hate Bob the most. That particular laurel crown probably goes to, um, this.
posted by unSane at 12:35 PM on March 28, 2011 [1 favorite]
posted by unSane at 12:35 PM on March 28, 2011 [1 favorite]
Well......go to it my man, go to it. Given the ghastliness of the task before you, you have special dispensation to employ such poetic license as you see fit e.g. you can call it "You Make Me Feel Like Barfing" or any other euphemism for vomiting.
posted by MajorDundee at 1:47 PM on March 28, 2011
posted by MajorDundee at 1:47 PM on March 28, 2011
Also, it's not really Leo Sayer, or the song. It's the Wiggles.
posted by unSane at 2:12 PM on March 28, 2011
posted by unSane at 2:12 PM on March 28, 2011
I would like to believe that all who take part shall learn a thing or two.
posted by Zenabi at 2:31 PM on March 28, 2011
posted by Zenabi at 2:31 PM on March 28, 2011
All my friends were metalheads at one point or another, but I just never got into the whole Metallica/Iron Maiden/Slayer/Megadeth/Pantera thing. I like the pre-cursor metal - Black Sabbath, Deep Purple etc, and newer heavy stuff like At The Drive In/Mars Volta/but something about that 1980's metal that just never got its hooks into me.
Also, Blues. I can appreciate the historical significance, the importance of the structure, but just can't listen to the old school stuff.
posted by robotot at 3:43 PM on March 28, 2011
Also, Blues. I can appreciate the historical significance, the importance of the structure, but just can't listen to the old school stuff.
posted by robotot at 3:43 PM on March 28, 2011
Is Robert Quine under-rated? Because the man is God.
seconded. not sure he's underrated - everyone who knows him likes him i suspect - there just aren't that many of them (us)...
posted by peterkins at 4:12 PM on March 28, 2011
seconded. not sure he's underrated - everyone who knows him likes him i suspect - there just aren't that many of them (us)...
posted by peterkins at 4:12 PM on March 28, 2011
tell me you're being ironic here, please.
posted by peterkins at 5:13 AM on March 28 [+] [!] Ha! You soooo caught me being a jerk-off! (I can't believe I don't get called out more often for being a goof/dumbass.)
Major Dundee, that is a great idea!
posted by snsranch at 4:15 PM on March 28, 2011
posted by peterkins at 5:13 AM on March 28 [+] [!] Ha! You soooo caught me being a jerk-off! (I can't believe I don't get called out more often for being a goof/dumbass.)
Major Dundee, that is a great idea!
posted by snsranch at 4:15 PM on March 28, 2011
Ha! You soooo caught me being a jerk-off!
not at all...i thought maybe you were understating for comic effect!
posted by peterkins at 4:25 PM on March 28, 2011
not at all...i thought maybe you were understating for comic effect!
posted by peterkins at 4:25 PM on March 28, 2011
I'd love to hear a song called "Mr Purple-(faced Spittle-flecked) Sky." :-)
posted by Zenabi at 4:31 PM on March 28, 2011
posted by Zenabi at 4:31 PM on March 28, 2011
Is Robert Quine under-rated? Because the man is God.
Wow! I always thought God was called Jehova or Bhagwaan or Yahweh or something, I'd never have guessed it was Robert Quine. Do his close associates (Gabriel etc) get to call him Bob I wonder - 'cos that would explain a lot. "In the beginning was the word, and the word was with Bob, and the word was Bob" - note how a small typo in a dusty old scroll can mislead us all for a couple of millennia.
Joking apart, I'm slightly ashamed to say I've never heard of Robert Quine. Mind you, there are a lot of bands/artists that get mentioned at MeFi (and even some in this thread) that I've never heard or heard of either. Don't know about you guys but I find I rarely listen to other people's music nowadays - I mean really listen rather than just ambient stuff going on in the background. I think this is a mix of consciously not wanting to pick up influences or inadvertently rip stuff and basically spending so much time on my own material that my ears need a rest when I have some down time.
posted by MajorDundee at 1:34 AM on March 29, 2011
Wow! I always thought God was called Jehova or Bhagwaan or Yahweh or something, I'd never have guessed it was Robert Quine. Do his close associates (Gabriel etc) get to call him Bob I wonder - 'cos that would explain a lot. "In the beginning was the word, and the word was with Bob, and the word was Bob" - note how a small typo in a dusty old scroll can mislead us all for a couple of millennia.
Joking apart, I'm slightly ashamed to say I've never heard of Robert Quine. Mind you, there are a lot of bands/artists that get mentioned at MeFi (and even some in this thread) that I've never heard or heard of either. Don't know about you guys but I find I rarely listen to other people's music nowadays - I mean really listen rather than just ambient stuff going on in the background. I think this is a mix of consciously not wanting to pick up influences or inadvertently rip stuff and basically spending so much time on my own material that my ears need a rest when I have some down time.
posted by MajorDundee at 1:34 AM on March 29, 2011
One of my fave bits of Robert Quine. He's the miserable bald coot playing the solos. Almost all that fractured guitar on Matthew Sweet's best stuff is Quine.
posted by unSane at 2:01 AM on March 29, 2011 [1 favorite]
posted by unSane at 2:01 AM on March 29, 2011 [1 favorite]
MajorDundee: “ok. heh. ok. I have the veritable nadir, the pits, yeah verily the clinker-festooned arsehole of all MeFiMu challenges: you have to cover a song by the band/artist you hate the most.”
Ha! I actually suggested this a few weeks ago, or something like it – a challenge where we have to cover a song we've always hated in an un-ironic way. But this is almost better, frankly, since a whole artist, you'd have to find a song you can actually dig, or decide you're going to go for the gusto on a song you think you hate, or anywhere in between.
I think we should totally do this.
posted by koeselitz at 8:45 AM on March 29, 2011
Ha! I actually suggested this a few weeks ago, or something like it – a challenge where we have to cover a song we've always hated in an un-ironic way. But this is almost better, frankly, since a whole artist, you'd have to find a song you can actually dig, or decide you're going to go for the gusto on a song you think you hate, or anywhere in between.
I think we should totally do this.
posted by koeselitz at 8:45 AM on March 29, 2011
You're absolutely right, koeselitz, it's right there in my MeMail. I hope you don't feel overlooked. I only revisit memail submitted ideas a day or two before the post deadline.
posted by snsranch at 3:30 PM on March 29, 2011
posted by snsranch at 3:30 PM on March 29, 2011
you have to cover a song by the band/artist you hate the most.
Done.
posted by askmeaboutLOOM at 4:08 PM on March 29, 2011 [1 favorite]
Done.
posted by askmeaboutLOOM at 4:08 PM on March 29, 2011 [1 favorite]
I've already done an Elliot Smith cover. Hey cortex, whatever happened with that?
posted by malocchio at 6:02 PM on March 29, 2011
posted by malocchio at 6:02 PM on March 29, 2011
50,000,000 Elvis fans are completely wrong - that dude is unlistenable.
posted by mintcake! at 10:48 PM on March 29, 2011
posted by mintcake! at 10:48 PM on March 29, 2011
50,000,000 Elvis fans are completely wrong - that dude is unlistenable.
Don't be cruel.
I've already done an Elliot Smith cover. Hey cortex, whatever happened with that?
The story on the Waltzes Number Two.
posted by cortex at 7:07 AM on March 30, 2011
Don't be cruel.
I've already done an Elliot Smith cover. Hey cortex, whatever happened with that?
The story on the Waltzes Number Two.
posted by cortex at 7:07 AM on March 30, 2011
Never been able to get into Husker Du, all their songs just seem to run together for me. I really like the Copper Blue album Mould did as Sugar though, that has some great songs on it.
Same goes for Ministry and pretty much all that industrial scene-- I gotta have a good melody, and those bands all seem to pass on that.
posted by InfidelZombie at 7:23 AM on March 30, 2011
Same goes for Ministry and pretty much all that industrial scene-- I gotta have a good melody, and those bands all seem to pass on that.
posted by InfidelZombie at 7:23 AM on March 30, 2011
Here's a twist on this thread (heh) - which bands/artists did you once dislike but now think are cool?
Examples for me are Blur (didn't get it at all, then heard The Universal and fell for them hook, line and sinker) and Tom Waits (thought he was a novelty act, but then heard Swordfishtrombones) and John Coltrane (thought it was a series of recordings of a fire at the zoo but then heard "Blues Minor" and, when I picked myself up off the floor, decided he was a prophet).
posted by MajorDundee at 12:02 PM on March 30, 2011
Examples for me are Blur (didn't get it at all, then heard The Universal and fell for them hook, line and sinker) and Tom Waits (thought he was a novelty act, but then heard Swordfishtrombones) and John Coltrane (thought it was a series of recordings of a fire at the zoo but then heard "Blues Minor" and, when I picked myself up off the floor, decided he was a prophet).
posted by MajorDundee at 12:02 PM on March 30, 2011
Man, I hated REM so much in college. "The lyrics don't mean anything!" I'd say. "His voice is so whiny! I'd say. Then I listened to "Harborcoat," and it changed my life.
I thought techno and dance music were stupid back then, too. So repetitive! So boring and lame! No authenticity! That's changed; among other things, this made it impossible for me ever to feel that way again.
Used to think Alice Cooper was hokey and cheeseball, too. Nope.
Hrm... used to think metal was awful; Judas Priest et al cured me of that. Disco, too; but disco can actually be pretty great.
I've actually had a lot of stupid music prejudices. Heh. Makes me feel like I must still have some lying around somewhere.
posted by koeselitz at 3:13 PM on March 30, 2011
I thought techno and dance music were stupid back then, too. So repetitive! So boring and lame! No authenticity! That's changed; among other things, this made it impossible for me ever to feel that way again.
Used to think Alice Cooper was hokey and cheeseball, too. Nope.
Hrm... used to think metal was awful; Judas Priest et al cured me of that. Disco, too; but disco can actually be pretty great.
I've actually had a lot of stupid music prejudices. Heh. Makes me feel like I must still have some lying around somewhere.
posted by koeselitz at 3:13 PM on March 30, 2011
It's great how perceptions change over time. I had two "disco queen" gay uncles who used to embarrass the hell out of me in front of my friends. "Come on little sns, dance, DANCE!!!!" Hated disco until a few years later in the '80s watching the movie Car Wash. Various disco, R&B...ISAAC HAYES, baby, is on frequent play around here now.
One guy who I love but don't quite get is Prince. He's a brilliant guy, but man sometimes he just seems really vapid and soulless. Pointless? I don't he's someone I want to like but can't quite get there.
posted by snsranch at 5:28 PM on March 30, 2011
One guy who I love but don't quite get is Prince. He's a brilliant guy, but man sometimes he just seems really vapid and soulless. Pointless? I don't he's someone I want to like but can't quite get there.
posted by snsranch at 5:28 PM on March 30, 2011
The Major sayeth - Tom Waits (thought he was a novelty act, but then heard Swordfishtrombones)
just shows how perceptions differ - i'd say that album marks the point that Waits started to turn into a novelty act.
posted by peterkins at 5:23 AM on March 31, 2011
just shows how perceptions differ - i'd say that album marks the point that Waits started to turn into a novelty act.
posted by peterkins at 5:23 AM on March 31, 2011
Yeah, color me deaf on Tom Waits.
I'm sort of constitutionally inclined towards liking electronica, including Techno, but it almost never lives up to my hopes. I find almost all of it skull-crushingly dull, despite having made huge efforts to investigate it. The biggest counter example was that Field album From Here We Go Sublime which is probably the most repetitive album I own but which I do find compelling.
I've been thoroughly enjoying Battles and similar bands recently.
posted by unSane at 5:56 AM on March 31, 2011
I'm sort of constitutionally inclined towards liking electronica, including Techno, but it almost never lives up to my hopes. I find almost all of it skull-crushingly dull, despite having made huge efforts to investigate it. The biggest counter example was that Field album From Here We Go Sublime which is probably the most repetitive album I own but which I do find compelling.
I've been thoroughly enjoying Battles and similar bands recently.
posted by unSane at 5:56 AM on March 31, 2011
very nearly forgot to mention one of my all-time-favourites: The Coctea Twins. There are umpteen options, but for starters tryhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j65v7Oql orhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mjRalBi9z_8or http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j65v7OqlW6I
posted by MajorDundee at 4:47 PM on April 1, 2011
posted by MajorDundee at 4:47 PM on April 1, 2011
unSane: “The biggest counter example was that Field album From Here We Go Sublime which is probably the most repetitive album I own but which I do find compelling.”
Wow, that record – very few things I love as much as I love The Field, and that record in particular. It's just – it does things that it's hard to describe. When it came out, Resident Advisor's review said: "This record will make you a better person." Strange to say, but I think that's true; it's certainly been good for me.
posted by koeselitz at 11:40 PM on April 1, 2011 [1 favorite]
Wow, that record – very few things I love as much as I love The Field, and that record in particular. It's just – it does things that it's hard to describe. When it came out, Resident Advisor's review said: "This record will make you a better person." Strange to say, but I think that's true; it's certainly been good for me.
posted by koeselitz at 11:40 PM on April 1, 2011 [1 favorite]
I like some Elvis.
On topic, I think Pavement is not a good band at all.
posted by dobie at 11:08 PM on April 3, 2011
On topic, I think Pavement is not a good band at all.
posted by dobie at 11:08 PM on April 3, 2011
The Major and I have obviously been paralleling each other for years. I used to be a HUGE fan of the Cocteaus... lost count of how many times I saw them. It sort of leaves me cold now along with a lot of things I loved from the 80s. They were a surprisingly terrific live band, though... Liz had an amazing set of pipes and her intensity live was absolutely ferocious. I read somewhere how Rob Guthrie picked her out at a nightclub having no idea at all if she could sing or not.
I've been rightly torn a new one by various people over the years for not really liking female rock vocals but Liz is/was definitely an exception, along with post-Tuesday Aimee Mann, Patti Smith, and 10,000 Maniacs era Natalie Merchant (who I had the hugest crush on, for ever). And Corin Tucker of Sleater-Kinney pretty much blows every other rock vocalist who has ever lived out of the water although I'm never really sure who's singing what with that band.
posted by unSane at 8:04 PM on April 4, 2011
I've been rightly torn a new one by various people over the years for not really liking female rock vocals but Liz is/was definitely an exception, along with post-Tuesday Aimee Mann, Patti Smith, and 10,000 Maniacs era Natalie Merchant (who I had the hugest crush on, for ever). And Corin Tucker of Sleater-Kinney pretty much blows every other rock vocalist who has ever lived out of the water although I'm never really sure who's singing what with that band.
posted by unSane at 8:04 PM on April 4, 2011
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That whole phoney Americana, my trusty ole' Chevy, Mary's-dress-waves-in-the-wind-as-the-screen-door-slams trip; E street band always seemed kind of obnoxious; he always seemed like a wannabe Dylan while simultaneously ripping off Phil Spector. The Boss! Just never liked him. I will say, however, that the new/old song they've just released and are playing the hell out of on CBC Radio 3 is pretty catchy.
Duran Duran. Hated them when they were huge when I was 15. Hated them in the 90's when they came back and everyone sort of liked them ironically. Hate them now as 80's nostalgia.
posted by chococat at 8:04 AM on March 23, 2011