The only people who seem to be enjoying the "music" in the video must be the band's friends. As must be the 125 thumb-uppers.
Enjoy the benefits of a premium membership!
Upgrade Account
-
TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
Join free Log in
Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.
I Must Be Getting Old
- Thread starter Stewie26
- Start date
I got the same impression. I'm thinking that 'RainFest 2010' in Tacoma WA was an all-ages show. People up front were friends of the band. It reminded me of when I was 17 and went to my friend's band practice (my first time seeing a 'real' band). I was estatic.
Unrepresented
Something Borderline Offensive
Being a fan of music that was relatively mainstream three decades ago and was released during your youth doesn't give you impeccable credit for being open minded.This thread reminded me of this because there's been a lot of mention of punk rock here. Like many of you, I lived through that. And if you go back and listen to the early releases by The Clash, Sex Pistols, Black Flag et al, what really jumps out is the quality of the songwriting. The musicianship may not have been stellar, but man, these bands could write a song... like, a song you could SING to yourself when you weren't listening to the record.
The stuff in this video? Not so much.
Yeah, I'm fifty-something. But I don't think being a fan of songcraft makes me "old."
The act here is not mainstream, has not had decades of exposure to lessen its atypical sounds to our ears, nor are you hearing it as part of a larger movement.
Not saying you have to like it, but the discredit it's receiving makes a lot of people here sound very out of touch.
father of fires
Commercial User
Totally agree.
To me, music is like food. It's not bad just because I don't like it. There are some dishes I will never like, no matter how well prepared. Just as there are some styles I don't really care for, no matter who's playing them.
I don't really like the sound of this band, but mainly because it's just not my style. Not all music is made for me.
Lots of grumpy old people in this thread who despite their advanced age, never grew past the adolescent mentality of "if I don't like it, it's objectively bad!"
I like your simile. My friends think it's the most abhorrent thing in the world when I eat canned smoked oysters on saltines, but I can personally tell you they are good.
Luckily, my friends don't rant about how hamburgers and pizza and other common fares are the only foods worth eating.
Way off topic; did you take your user name from a Clive Barker book? I've wondered that for a while now....
How can old guys ask if they're getting old because they don't like a new band that sounds like 30 year old thrash music? Does not compute.
ROFLMAO
Hell, that's nothing. You should hear Agoraphobic Nosebleed's "PCP Torpedo / ANbRX" double album. Good stuff!
Yeah, I've been wondering that too. This style of punk was big in the eighties. Extreme music has gotten way crazier than Punch (even though they're new at it) since then......
I like your simile. My friends think it's the most abhorrent thing in the world when I eat canned smoked oysters on saltines, but I can personally tell you they are good.
Luckily, my friends don't rant about how hamburgers and pizza and other common fares are the only foods worth eating.
Way off topic; did you take your user name from a Clive Barker book? I've wondered that for a while now....
Yeah, pretty much. Musical elitism is as silly as food elitism. Not everybody likes the same things, and we'd be doing ourselves all a favor by getting over that fact.
And yes, I did take the name from a Clive Barker book. I think you're the first person who's ever made the connection.
It's human nature to bitch about things. I also think it has to do with the fact that a lot of people here probably worked really hard to get good at bass (and perhaps other instruments) and they feel that all that sort of dedication is thrown out the window by bands like this. I believe it is seen as a lack of respect for music, but in reality, it's a different style. It's like when people rant about death metal not being music ("It's just a wall of noise! Argh!"), but those guys are some of the hardest-working musicians there are. They practice like hell to play that hard, fast, and intricate. Punk, on the other hand, isn't so intensive on skill and musicianship, but on feeling and energy. It's definitely not The Eagles, but it's no less music.
I thought so.
You have utterly misinterpreted my post. My point was that I love SOME music from 30 years ago (REO Speedwagon you can keep, thanks), and I love some music from last year. I am in no way tethered to the music that was released in my youth... in fact, I hate a good portion of it. And suggesting that The Clash was "relatively mainstream" when their music was released evinces a complete lack of knowledge or experience of that era.
I am a songwriter, and I appreciate good songwriting. Perhaps my notion of what makes a "song" is limited by my advanced age. I like a melody, a hook, a provocative lyric that that makes me think or makes me feel something. So this can range from The Clash's "Straight To Hell" to My Morning Jacket's "Into The Woods" to Dave Alvin's "Rio Grande" to Y La Bamba's "Michoacan." I have NIN and Ministry and Crystal Method and Deadmau5 and Propellerheads tunes on my iPod for the gym. Whatever works.
I in no way discredited this band's appeal to their fan base. God bless 'em if this music does something for them. I admit that I do not understand the appeal, as I hear no melody, no harmonic structure of any interest, and no intelligible lyric. The lyrics may be freakin brilliantly insightful and revolutionary, but who could ever know, when she sounds like she's vomiting? It all strikes me as an histrionic display of angst for the purpose of proving some sort of anti-establishment cred. But the problem with this is two-fold. First, if no one can understand your lyrics, how can you be fighting the establishment? I mean, imagine if the lyrics of The Clash or the Sex Pistols or Leonard Cohen or the Buzzcocks or the Stooges or Tom Waits had been entirely unintelligible... where would that have left them? Secondly, from a musical standpoint these guys are anything but anti-establishment. They are following a formula that has been entrenched for a decade at least. Not sure what the current nomenclature for the style is (Thrash-punk? Death-noise? Speed-garble? Grind-core? Whatever....) but if it was ever innovative, it was innovative 10-15 years ago.
Which leaves me wondering, what are these guys bringing to the table musically, lyrically, socially? Their fans be damned, how are they evolving the music? And frankly, I'm stumped.
This "whether you like it or not" argument is a way to excuse anything. Listen to "Adventures In Your Own Backyard" by Patrick Watson, and even if you DESPISE it, you gotta go, "Well yeah, this guy is doing something that no one has ever done before." You listen to this band in this video, and it's formulaic and utterly vacuous. Oh yeah, it's "energetic," as if that excuses a total lack of any other musical values. If I vigorously hump my bass on stage, that's "energetic." Oh, but wait, Lux Interior did it 20 years ago, and Jimi Hendrix did it a bunch of years before that.
The band in this video is in no way "atypical." There are 20 bands here in RI who are doing the exact same thing, and that was the case ten years ago. And if there's a "larger movement" toward atonal, enharmonic music with unintelligible lyrics, well you can have it. But to my ears, it simply sounds like bad execution of what was once a good idea.
Maybe that does make me old.
I guess what really bugs me about this thread is this notion of musical egalitarianism, that all music is equally good, and that anyone who suggests otherwise is somehow "out of touch" or "a hater."
Let's travel back to the 1960's, shall we? A lot of people seem to harken to that era as being the greatest in rock and roll history. Now, in the 1960's, we had Jimi Hendrix. And the Beatles. And Petula Clark. And Sonny & Cher. And The Archies.
By the standard that's being proposed broadly in this thread ("just because you don't like it doesn't mean it's not great"), then we must accept that The Archies are as great as Jimi Hendrix. You don't agree?!? What are you, a HATER?!?!?
I had an art history professor who said that "art is whatever the artist says it is." Extrapolating from that, music is whatever the musician says it is. If I record myself farting into a tin can and say it's my "symphony," well, then it is my symphony.
Does that make my musical composition on a par with the work of Philip Glass or John Adams or other contemporaries? Well, from the standpoint of saying that "IT IS MUSIC," yes, it does.
But what we're losing sight of here is that there is GOOD and BAD art, and it's not hateful or nasty or dismissive to be DISCRIMINATING. Because if you are not discriminating, then yes, the Archies are every bit as significant as Jimi Hendrix or the Beatles. To suggest otherwise would make you a hater.
We have to be courageous enough as consumers of art to say, "That sucks." But we also have to have to be INFORMED enough to know why one thing sucks and another doesn't. And we have to be prepared to discuss the value of art in terms other than "I like it." Otherwise, bitching about Justin Beiber is just so much self-absorption. Why is Justin Beiber's music better or worse than anything else that's being produced today? Because you're a Justin hater? Or because the music fails to meet certain criteria for greatness? What are those criteria and why does his music fail compared to, for instance, the music of Wilco?
Why are we so shy or ashamed or timid to say that some things are great and some things suck? Why do we pay money to music critics? Why do some pieces of music withstand the test of time ("Purple Haze") while others are swept into the dustbin of history or regarded as mere novelties ("Sugar Sugar")?
Because there is such a thing as good music and bad music! We need to stop being so AFRAID of that concept! It's not just a matter of taste, people. If that were the case, then the guy who exhibited a suitcase full of rotting bologna in NY would be held in as high regard as DaVinci. He's not! And there's a reason for that! It's OKAY to be discriminating! It's okay to say that, whatever your age, whatever your musical perspective, whatever your favorite bands, that the band in this video is AWFUL.
That's OKAY!!! Liberate your minds!!!!!!
Let's travel back to the 1960's, shall we? A lot of people seem to harken to that era as being the greatest in rock and roll history. Now, in the 1960's, we had Jimi Hendrix. And the Beatles. And Petula Clark. And Sonny & Cher. And The Archies.
By the standard that's being proposed broadly in this thread ("just because you don't like it doesn't mean it's not great"), then we must accept that The Archies are as great as Jimi Hendrix. You don't agree?!? What are you, a HATER?!?!?
I had an art history professor who said that "art is whatever the artist says it is." Extrapolating from that, music is whatever the musician says it is. If I record myself farting into a tin can and say it's my "symphony," well, then it is my symphony.
Does that make my musical composition on a par with the work of Philip Glass or John Adams or other contemporaries? Well, from the standpoint of saying that "IT IS MUSIC," yes, it does.
But what we're losing sight of here is that there is GOOD and BAD art, and it's not hateful or nasty or dismissive to be DISCRIMINATING. Because if you are not discriminating, then yes, the Archies are every bit as significant as Jimi Hendrix or the Beatles. To suggest otherwise would make you a hater.
We have to be courageous enough as consumers of art to say, "That sucks." But we also have to have to be INFORMED enough to know why one thing sucks and another doesn't. And we have to be prepared to discuss the value of art in terms other than "I like it." Otherwise, bitching about Justin Beiber is just so much self-absorption. Why is Justin Beiber's music better or worse than anything else that's being produced today? Because you're a Justin hater? Or because the music fails to meet certain criteria for greatness? What are those criteria and why does his music fail compared to, for instance, the music of Wilco?
Why are we so shy or ashamed or timid to say that some things are great and some things suck? Why do we pay money to music critics? Why do some pieces of music withstand the test of time ("Purple Haze") while others are swept into the dustbin of history or regarded as mere novelties ("Sugar Sugar")?
Because there is such a thing as good music and bad music! We need to stop being so AFRAID of that concept! It's not just a matter of taste, people. If that were the case, then the guy who exhibited a suitcase full of rotting bologna in NY would be held in as high regard as DaVinci. He's not! And there's a reason for that! It's OKAY to be discriminating! It's okay to say that, whatever your age, whatever your musical perspective, whatever your favorite bands, that the band in this video is AWFUL.
That's OKAY!!! Liberate your minds!!!!!!
father of fires
Commercial User
You make some great points. What I'm personally rallying against is not whether this band is any good but the notion that this band sucks because someone doesn't get the style.
We are allowed to discriminate. There is a reason I've never heard if this band but that I do own several CDs by bands who sound similar. There are good and bad bands in any style.
We are allowed to discriminate. There is a reason I've never heard if this band but that I do own several CDs by bands who sound similar. There are good and bad bands in any style.
So, how does playin' in a band like that work? As long as you can absolutely thrash on your instrument in time, and stop when the drummer does, your in? I don't get it.
father of fires
Commercial User
They are playing notes. But precision is key. When I was in super technical bands regardless whether it was metal or not I used to always joke that if I got lost all I'd have to do is make sure I stop on time and no one would notice.
Personally, I can't play this style very well. I don't have the dexterity.
My first reaction to the clip was along the lines of ,**¿%4.
Then I read a couple of post attempting to explain the differential and conceptual aspects of taste within art and what the band where perhaps trying to achieve. Which seemed to resolve themselves around ´taste`, or perhaps more correctly what appeals to different folks.
After a few minutes thought I reached the the conclusion that not only was my first reaction indeed correct but to make matters even worse, I was left to consider the mental state of the people it appeals to (on the basis that they are the future).
I will however, unreservedly, accept that to produce a combined sound such as that requires some serious dedication and no little effort.
Then I read a couple of post attempting to explain the differential and conceptual aspects of taste within art and what the band where perhaps trying to achieve. Which seemed to resolve themselves around ´taste`, or perhaps more correctly what appeals to different folks.
After a few minutes thought I reached the the conclusion that not only was my first reaction indeed correct but to make matters even worse, I was left to consider the mental state of the people it appeals to (on the basis that they are the future).
I will however, unreservedly, accept that to produce a combined sound such as that requires some serious dedication and no little effort.
Don't worry. The future belongs to the vastly larger numbers of people who are younger and are into more modern music. You know - Psy, One Direction, Nicki Minaj...
