Anybody else tired of Sabbath comparisons?

Meddle · #1 08-07-2010, 08:19 AM

Hello all.

I'm a bit annoyed guys. I've been reading music reviews recently and it seems the easiest and biggest catchall to use is to describe any band as sounding like Black Sabbath. The two worst offences I have seen have been:

1) A Dead Meadow album. Dead Meadow are more like Cream if anything, have a tendency to use standard tuning and have a lot of psychedelic clean/acoustic songs. They use some pretty cool riffs, but to call them Sabbath-like imho is incorrect. No part of their sound reminds me of Sabbath in the slightest.

2) Earth's Sunn Amps and Smashed Guitars album. I think even the 30 minute Ripped on Facist Ideas track was compared to Sabbath somehow, once again because riffs are present.

Does this annoy anybody else? I'm a little bit concerned about the whole stoner genre, as the original bands that inspired it were not trying to be stoner and just ended up sounding that way. To me trying to sound like a stoner band is counter-intuitive.

Thoughts?

nutso42 · #2 08-07-2010, 08:23 AM

Nobody sounds like Black Sabbath. Nobody CAN sound like Black Sabbath.

hdracer · #3 08-07-2010, 08:26 AM

I am just sick of Black Sabbath. I thought they were cool 30 years ago.

Meddle · #4 08-07-2010, 08:27 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by nutso42

Nobody sounds like Black Sabbath. Nobody CAN sound like Black Sabbath.

Its true. Unless you took a time machine back to Birmingham in 1969 and cut some guys fingers off!

tehbassist · #5 08-07-2010, 08:49 AM

Ya I get what you're saying I've seen one to many band that are noting like sabbath compared to sabbath...

I do dig dead meadow though they give me hope for stoner rock, and to the untrained eye some of their riffs do bring to mind black sabbath.

Deluge Of Sound · #6 08-07-2010, 09:25 AM

Dead Meadow don't really sound like Cream either.

I love 'em, but if you can't see why the Sabbath comparison is valid, maybe you haven't listened to enough of both bands?

Mr wiggl3s · #7 08-07-2010, 06:58 PM

Sabbath started it all and they did it all. That's why they're gods.

Meddle · #8 08-08-2010, 05:18 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Deluge Of Sound

Dead Meadow don't really sound like Cream either.

That warm fuzz the guitarist has is much more like Clapton's Cream tone than it is like Iommi's tone.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Deluge Of Sound

I love 'em, but if you can't see why the Sabbath comparison is valid, maybe you haven't listened to enough of both bands?

I have all of Dead Meadow's albums (including the dodgy Got Live If you Want It) and most of the Sabbath albums including all the early ones. I think there is a minimal link between the two bands, but Dead Meadow to me are much closer to other bands before Black Sabbath. Sabbath to me is as much about the lyrics (DM's lyrics are all pretty hippy trippy) and general darker image.

Eater_of_Birds · #9 08-08-2010, 05:47 AM

this is maybe less about music and more about lazy journalism. however i can see why sabbath get invoked a lot in these reviews, anything slow 'n' low inevitably gets some sabbath comparison as they simply are the forefathers of that kind of style, it going to happen (i like Electric Wizards attitude on this: 'we're not trying to be Sabbath, we want to be BETTER than sabbath'). however if the band in question does not at all sound like sabbath, then the guys full of it anyway ^ ^

Deluge Of Sound · #10 08-08-2010, 11:32 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Meddle

That warm fuzz the guitarist has is much more like Clapton's Cream tone than it is like Iommi's tone.

But the riffs aren't similar, at all. Dead Meadow tended toward the Sabbath Plod™ much more so than anything Cream ever did (with the exception of maybe Politician). Shivering Kings is the best example of them rocking the plod-Babbling Flower, Good Moanin' and that album's version of Everything's Going On in particular.

Quote:

I have all of Dead Meadow's albums (including the dodgy Got Live If you Want It) and most of the Sabbath albums including all the early ones. I think there is a minimal link between the two bands, but Dead Meadow to me are much closer to other bands before Black Sabbath. Sabbath to me is as much about the lyrics (DM's lyrics are all pretty hippy trippy) and general darker image.

I think that now Dead Meadow's showing their Zep influence more unabashedly than before (Don't know if you've picked up Three Kings yet, but the new studio material sounds like a whole lotta Zep).

Time Monkey · #11 08-08-2010, 03:56 PM

Its about as annoying as Led Zeppelin, AC/DC, and other blues rock bands being included in "best of" metal lists.