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Musical Genres : Do they matter?

Music is love.

"For some people, maybe." —Frank Rizzo, The Jerky Boys

"I don't know love. I was built to protect, not to love..." —The Fifth Element


Seriously, I have no idea what that's about. And I've been making music in any form for more than half a century.

"what kind of music do you play?"

Touché. In recent years I took to answering "You listen to it and tell me."

When I was still publishing my modular synth music online so that it was publicly available (something I stopped doing a few days ago), among the comments I got from kindly listeners was that my music was "non-idiomatic": no two pieces were the same or handily identifiable as belonging to the same genre or movement. I told them that I agreed, but that it wasn't something I was trying for. It was just the concrete result of how I am related to music now.
 
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yes, genre matters...especially when you are booking gigs.
Your band says it is metal, then they put you on an opening slot for a metal band, and your band gets on stage and plays soft rock, people in the audience get upset, bottles and cans, etc.
Same with any genre, promoters group them all by genre.
if you have a funk-emo-crust band, then it will be very difficult to get bookings.
 
I think they matter to an extent. If I like Band A and want to find other bands similar to them, then a genre classifying them can help me locate similar artists that I may enjoy or it may lead me into another area that I end up liking.
 
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Ouch.
This topic has surely been debated ad nauseam. Which is why another thread won't hurt. :vomit:

After a light-hearted disagreement with a TB member about whether certain bands should be classified as "Metal" or "Hard Rock"; I had an epiphany of sorts:

Does it really matter what the box is labeled as; if you enjoy what is inside the box? No, it doesn't. At all. It can make communicating certain things with like minded individuals more easy; but at the end of the day it doesn't matter (Does it?).
I mean, for the most part if you tune a radio to a 'classic rock' station, you pretty much know what you are in for. Country too. So I can see the benefits of some sort of classification system; but this is art, not the Dewey decimal system, so everything is subjective.

I am set in my ways and label things as I see them; this does not make anyone else less valid.

You may love Metallica (great band); and I do too; but just because I label them as "Hard Rock" and you label them as "Metal" does not make either of us "wrong".

But then you'll come in with "But dude, metal is right there in the name!". To which I will have to reply "Yeah, and those Eagles of Death Metal? Most brutal metal band ever!"

Music is love. Who cares what we call it? :bassist:
Especially since my way of thinking is the only correct way. ;)

Kinda have to agree. Very young people seem to think the genre of a band matters and get super upset if a band's newest album switches genre. Older you get the more you ask "is it any good?" Instead of "is it metal* enough?"

*insert genre
 
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Lemmy, who would NOT be pigeon-holed into being called Heavy Metal, would be quoted as saying:

"There's two kinds of music — music you like and music you don't like."

That's basically how I feel about it, as well.
I recall someone trying to explain how a song was rooted in a particular culture & how I should appreciate that, but if I don't like it, I don't give a damn to learn anything else about it!
 
Kinda have to agree. Very young people seem to think the genre of a band matters and get super upset if a band's newest album switches genre. Older you get the more you ask "is it any good?" Instead of "is it metal* enough?"

*insert genre
Totally true. When you’re young the music you listen to is very important to you’re identity. When I was a lad we sometimes would debate whether a band or artist could properly be considered Christian if they had secular hits. (Amy Grant, U2 for example). Seems ridiculous now.
 
A few years ago, our neighbor held a birthday party for his 20 year old daughter, and hired a local punk cover band to play. Their bassist had to bail at the last minute, and they half-jokingly asked if I could fill in. I said, "Sure, I'll try," and off we went. After an hour set of Dead Kennedys, Stooges, Black Flag and other what i would call "punk" rock, it was agreed by general consensus that it went great!
So, since i have never played punk rock prior to that night (only listened), does that mean that what the band played that night was blue jazz Western punk swing core music?
Asking for a friend...