i'm noticing that listeners on youtube have an attention span, both through metrics and observation. people are in it for the full record. so, i'm repackaging a few things to make them more whole. i don't think people are likely to use my playlists, but if i give them the whole thing at once they may just listen..
even my earliest material was short on traditional songs, so this really stands out in my discography as a lo-fi psychedelic pop tune. i've connected the track to two guitar-driven psychedelic instrumental sections that i'm also rather fond of and that are leaning towards the composer that i became as i grew older.
something else i like to say about this song is that i give my age away clearly. it's a silly song about imaginary villains. not much depth to it. it's one of the few places where it's obvious that my voice hasn't changed yet. beyond that, this simply couldn't have been written by an adult. it's just too cute.
the instrumental sections at the beginning and end of this are older than 1996, and were both things that i would often play in my room for hours by myself to sort of chill myself out if i was going through some childhood drama. i dressed them both up here, but at their core they're both very sombre folk tunes. while i don't have clear memories of many of the thoughts i had when i was between ten and fifteen years old, i can state with certainty that i developed a lot of the core concepts that define who i am while meditating on these chord patterns.
this is the second recording of the track (you can get to the first by clicking through the link). the initial 1997 recording is the first song-oriented keyboard-driven track in my discography. it's not the last one, but these tracks are relatively rare, coming from me. production wise, both versions of the track were huge steps forwards relative to when they were created. this version is defined uniquely by the sequencing. while i'd actually hesitate to order the two versions (the original is maybe a bit more raw, while the rerecording is more elaborate), i only want one version on youtube......
so, yeah: this is a song about a pre-treatment transgendered teenager fantasizing about genital mutilation. yeah, well, *life* is heavy. deal with it....
this was initially an anti-smoking song, and you want to interpret that as a kind of anti-corporate punk rock thing rather than an anti-libertarian thing. public health has a slightly different dimension to it in countries where health care is publicly operated. canada's health care system (or collection of systems) is not technically socialist, but the public funding model still brings ideas of public ownership (or at least public investment) into the equation. the question of finding ways to reduce large costs on smoking related illnesses is consequently a valid policy discussion, as it opens funds and resources to spend on other health concerns.
the initial demo version of this was recorded when i was 16; this version was recorded a little more than a year later. over that period, i smoked a few things, and i liked some of them. my anti-tobacco perspective did not weaken until my early 20s, and i actually even started smoking around the age of 20 as a stimulant (it works well with coffee), although all the versions of the track were done by this point. a lot of my argument against smoking was that it was just a pointless destruction of yourself. what i learned was that it has useful properties in increasing alertness. i suppose it's up to the end user to weigh the costs.
but, by the time i had this version done, i had made a clear decision to not be anti-pot. at the time, i would have been anti-alcohol, anti-tobacco and pro-pot. it's what the evidence i had seen suggested to me: alcohol and nicotine were very dangerous, while marijuana was not. so, i converted this song out of an anti-tobacco rant and into a pro-marijuana sample collage. that collage was somewhat juvenile, and has been removed from the track. however, it's accessible from bandcamp if you stumble through a maze of links to it.
musically, this is very post-punk and is coming out of the large amounts of early 80s music that i was listening to at the time.
this is the final section of the last proper inri demo, which was written as somewhat of a suite, but only in a fleeting moment, and then forgotten. it's a sort of sardonic take on the jesus story, in that it follows a persecuted person through a suicide and a resurrection, with tongue in cheek commentary.
initially, it was a song suite about being young and not listened to, culminating in a rather dramatic overreaction - that i ridiculed as counter-productive, partly by reference to kurt cobain, whose suicide is an event that hangs over the childhood of my generation. people that were adults at the time might want to think of it in the same way that they interpreted watching kennedy get his brains blown out on live tv. as i grew up (stated loosely - i was still 17/18, here), i realized this is a general condition of society that is not limited to young people. so, i generalized it to reflect the illusion of what we call "democracy", and gave it an exaggerated persecution complex. the cynicism was targeted at the clinton administration, but in a broader sense i'm sort of ridiculing the rather cartoonish perception of generation x as this kind of raelian mass of fatalist children....
the vocals seem dead, and may confuse people looking at this as 90s punk (which is retroactively defined by it's screamy vocals). at the time, i considered screaming to be sort of contrived and passe. the recitation is a very considered reaction to something i interpreted as largely cartoonish. i mean, i was still influenced by the screamy stuff i grew up with, but it wasn't a characteristic of much of anything i was attracted to after about '97 or so.
the initial, somewhat abridged version was initially the end of my first inri cassette demo, which you can get to by clicking through the links.
i've pulled back from insisting on recited vocals in order to minimize that contrivedness, but the truth is that the vast majority of music released after about '97 that has screamed vocals very much *is* contrived. time has only cemented my rejection of falsely emotionalized vocals in punk-derived genres.
deathtokoalas
ok, so, as we all know, this record was hugely influential on both "post-hardcore" and, by extension, "post-rock". specifically, the "jazzy" guitar playing.
i'm just wondering if anybody can pinpoint any influences on the guitar playing on this record? i mean, i can hear an influence from new york (sonic youth, and the web of artists behind them), but it's not total. specifically, it's not the extent of the tonality.
more specifically, i'm hearing the sound come up in a lot of recent hardcore acts (animal faces, touche amore, la dispute, defeater, native, loma prieta) and i'm starting to realize that it's a huge part of what i like about them, partially because i'm relating it to my favourite post-rock bands (do make say think especially) and a bunch of noise & no wave i grew up with. so, there's all kinds of continuity there. what is really the source, though? it must have a history before spiderland.
conversely, i'm also wondering if anybody could steer me carefully through emo & post-hardcore from slint to the bands i've mentioned, with a specific focus on that clean and jazzy guitar playing. i was listening to post-rock & idm, mostly. up until extremely recently, i've never really been able to get into any kind of dc punk, or anything that's come from it. it just all sounded like noisy garbage to me. but, the merging of dc punk and melodic hardcore is striking me as a killer combination - the dissonance is reclaiming it from being noisy garbage. that, and a lot of these bands are writing weird concept albums and stuff.
anyways, yeah. research project - trace the guitar style on this record both forwards and backwards.
MrOtisotis
I'm not really clear on what your question is, but the guitar sound in Slint is essentially expanded upon in the band Tortoise, which is the band the guitarist of Slint formed after this album.
deathtokoalas
yeah. there was labradford, too. i'm deeply familiar with post-rock. it's the hardcore side i'm less familiar with.
the closest thing i've been able to find so far is the first june of 44 record.
MrOtisotis
oh I see what you mean, hardcore I know nothing of either, sorry I could'nt help you out
Lourenço Veiga
maybe king crimson
deathtokoalas
actually, i need to vehemently state that this does NOT sound like crimson of any era. it's sort of an annoyance to me, actually, because i grew up listening to crimson (and studying fripp's guitar playing). there's a certain metered guitar aspect to it that very vaguely sounds like some of the things robert fripp was doing outside of king crimson, but the proper influence on this in that aspect is steve reich, and not through fripp or eno but through branca, swans and sonic youth. a better english prog comparison than fripp & crimson is actually the hackett/gabriel period of genesis.
where crimson had an influence on post-rock is more indirectly through the symphonic side, such as a band like gybe!. that's lark tongues in aspic period crimson, mostly. all the weird rhythms and stuff can again more accurately be traced to the no wave scene: dna, teenage jesus, that kind of stuff. pajo's style was always highly fluid and lyrical, whereas fripp's was very jagged and constructed.
crimson, of course, has had a huge influence on various neo-prog acts from dream theatre to porcupine tree. and, through his work with bowie and gabriel, he helped define a "new wave" guitar style that was dominant in the 80s. you can also hear a lot of fripp in something like polvo, and a lot of the noise that came from it. but i'd really like to go back in time and yell at whomever it was that first drew the comparison between crimson and math rock. it was just lazy journalism. it must have been that crimson was the only band that the guy knew that played in abstract time signatures. i guess he'd never heard of led zeppelin. more topically, he clearly had no understanding of the punk jazz thing, or of john zorn.
Lourenço Veiga
the guy from slint? of course the style came from no wave but the guitars sound a lot like fripp.. if he heard them or not i dont care, they are amazing anyways.. big black, sonic youth, talk talk and rites of spring are obvious inspirations since they were an american hardcore band, and those guys were very close minded in terms of music (actually they only heard those bands - steve albini said) that was american and underground. glenn branca and swans and that stuff were an influence to the influences of slint, in my opinion
deathtokoalas
i dunno. i don't hear any rites of spring on the record, but i think i can weakly abstract the big black. talk talk is often cited in such situations, but i honestly don't really hear the similarity. sonic youth, i agree is pretty dominant.
regardless, i think the crux of my argument was that what you're mistaking for fripp is really reich, through a few channels of influence.
i was really more interested in charting the way forwards, and i think i've found an undercurrent that's been previously traveled.
DiamorphineDeath
there's a lot of rites of spring influence on this album dude....
deathtokoalas
i don't agree at all.
i mean, to begin with, i don't think rites of spring were very special. it's pretty garden variety, generic punk. embrace took a really weird spin on black flag (and ian mackaye's attempt to sell out didn't initially work as planned), but before that there wasn't really anything special about what we anachronistically label as emo. so, if you could identify a punk sound, there's not any reason to pull the influence from rites of spring specifically, rather than any other punk band - except certain conventions that are almost entirely bullshit.
....but there isn't a punk sound to the disc to begin with. at all. remotely...
Lourenço Veiga
lol of course there is... this is pure hardcore PUNK but slower (it's called post-hardcore). and i still think it sounds a lot like crimson
deathtokoalas
i've stated repeatedly that the dominant guitar influence on the record is sonic youth. at no point do the guitars deviate from a massive sonic youth influence. it's the only really discernible influence. that's the reality. as you've confused fripp with reich, you've confused dc emo with new york no wave.
i would nearly be willing to restrict the record to a SINGLE influence of sonic youth, and even insult slint by saying "man, they're just a second rate sonic youth knock off" except that there's a missing quantity. this record is 90% sonic youth, 10% something else (exact numbers derived from the a.s.s. equation). i don't know what that something else is. it'll bug me forever. i'll get it eventually.
Stefan Bruge
Although I'm sure they weren't influenced by them, whenever I hear Spiderland I am always reminded of The Gordons, an early 80s New Zealand band who have that Sonic Youth detuned guitar sound and sort of lurching rhythm that The Butthole Surfers would make their own. The Gordons revival starts here!
deathtokoalas
just in case anybody was curious, the path outwards i've found (and what i was more interested in discussing) goes through the following:
june of 44 - engine takes to the water (louisville)
a minor forest (sf bay area)
*indian summer (sf bay area)
*portraits of past (sf bay area)
*native nod (new york)
i've searched through hundreds of crappy (scr)emo acts of varying levels of popularity and that's the entirety of what i can pull out as being both influenced by slint and an influence on either late 90s and early 00s post-rock or modern hardcore or both, and actually being worth listening to. there's some other obvious links (eg, saetia) that are just awful. the sf stuff is noticeably coloured by drive like jehu and seems to be the "home base" of the sound i'm tracing here, if you will.
* - bands i'd flat out never heard of until this week.
if anybody has any further suggestions as to how to trace this particular jazzy guitar sound (and recited beat vocals) into the existent "wave" of arty melodic hardcore that exists, it would be neat to hear them.
and maybe we've exhausted the boundaries of the existing debate?
+Stefan Bruge it's a bit weird deriving the missing section from the butthole surfers, who were of course never meant to be taken very seriously. i just put on hairway to steven for the first time in a long time, though, and i think you might have a point.
what's interesting is that that record is a lot easier to deconstruct into morricone, zeppelin, hendrix, etc.
i was kind of hoping for an obscure jazz musician. i think it's a little bit of a downer to take it from there, tbh - but it's the best suggestion i've seen so far,
(pause)
yeah. halfway through piouhgd and i consider this issue resolved - slint is roughly 90% sonic youth, roughly 10% butthole surfers. so, we can close this discussion now.
unless people have suggestions moving forwards
gorryman
There is a doc in the works something like "following the breadcrumbs" might have some definitive answers ,,,being that they were from Loisville ,,,I might ad them kids is crazy down there I would dig deeper into jazz for lack of a better term for peeps like Larry Coryell and John Fahey awkward spacey finger picking and dissonance probably had a crazy jazz fusion drunk uncle around handing them weird vinyl "my two cents"
kerry mcphearson
Jawbox and Glassjaw are definitely the bands your looking for. "See For Your Own Special Special Sweethart" and "Worship & Tribute"...I would say that they also influenced artist like PJ harvey, Modest Mouse and Built to Spill. Hell spiderland even influenced older artist like Tom waits, Swans and Scott Walker
deathtokoalas
naw, that's exactly what i'm trying to avoid. terrible music, all of it (except swans).
glassjaw got a little better when they grew up a bit, but their early material is some of the dumbest noisy garbage i've ever heard. jawbox were always boring corporate pop that had more to do with bon jovi than punk rock. modest mouse, pj harvey and built to spill were equally boring indie rock for college dropouts. and i'd rather listen to bowie than walker.
but, while all of that horrible music was selling lots of records, there has to have been something more interesting happening under the surface because i can hear it's effects in bands like la dispute. that's what i'm charting out.
what i'm realizing is there was an underground movement i wasn't aware of. please avoid further corporate rock suggestions. not a fan of corporate rock...
o9k
Omg you are such a douche. Even if they (or you) disliked 'corporate rock' they could very well be inspired by it. Without knowing it, or just to do it differently. But to get back to the point, I think the guitar-style is influenced by Greg Ginn. He also had this unique "jazzy" and "off" way of playing.
deathtokoalas
i was rejecting corporate rock derivations from slint, not proposed corporate rock influences on slint. i asked the question, so i have a right to restrict the answers. really, nothing that's been discussed as influential up to this point would qualify as corporate rock. crimson had some influence on garbage like journey, but crimson themselves are generally acknowledged as "the prog band that never sold out". and they really didn't. even their early 80s new wave period remained challenging listening.
ginn and morris were both talented and educated punk guitarists and definitely stand out in that sense. i have to admit i'm not familiar with the jazz side of the sst catalog, and i'll acknowledge that's a good suggestion for possible influence. it's easy to see how they could have just grabbed some sst discs thinking they were hardcore and - surprise! but the ginn sound was more free jazzy. it's not really the flowing, shimmery, morricone-esque style that i'm hoping is ultimately traceable through from slint to defeater and la dispute.
to update on that, i've bumped into a band called frodus that seems as though they were destined for greatness and yet had to deal with unending bad luck. but they themselves sound, to me, like a cross between foetus and nirvana, with a heavy dual influence from la (jane's addiction, rhcp) and dc (fugazi). those shimmery guitars are there, but they're a minor aspect. so, i'm trying to find something parallel to that that jumps underneath the next wave of bands (that is, i'm seeking an influential underground, arty counterpart to thrice or thursday that isn't as metal as saetia).
to broaden the spectrum a bit, i should point out that there were some very mainstream 90s records that have that jazzy guitar sound - lp2 by sunny day real estate, ok computer by radiohead, razorblade suitcase by bush and to a lesser extent anything by tool. what i'm looking for might actually be those bands. these acts were teenagers in the 90s...
Chris Anderson
Check out "Cows- Sorry in Pig Minor". The style reminds me a little bit of this, and it came out just before Spiderland. Not entirely the same, but I definitely get similar vibes-- and Cows are more on the hardcore side of things.
deathtokoalas
i'm not as familiar with cows as i am with some of the other stuff from the period (i tried a few times, but it's just too atonal), but i really don't hear what you're talking about - unless you mean to draw attention to the common influence from sonic youth type stuff, in which case that's true, but not at all what i'm talking about. also, that seems to be their last record, from many years after spiderland.
yeah, i'm listening to that one right now and i don't hear much of a comparison (except in the sense that the first track seems to be a bit of a joke), but it's definitely a lot less.....stupid.....than their earlier material.
i've never really understood why people really listen to stuff like ween, butthole surfers, cows, etc over and over again. or even the acid mothers. i could see how it would be fun to see live, but the recordings become flat out idiotic after the shock value wears off.
it mostly comes from zappa, but zappa's musicianship was really top notch, which can keep you coming back. bungle, i get, for the same reason. but the bulk of that stuff is just....yuck...
Chris Anderson
Eh, it's just music. I don't think it's really supposed to be taken that seriously. For the same reason people like Picasso even though his paintings aren't that technically impressive, people enjoy The Cows, Butthole Surfers etc. It's not about power levels or some pedantic wrong or right- it's just art-it's an aesthetic. It's meant to express a mood felt by people during that time- it's supposed to be fun. Even if something seems like 'a joke' that doesn't mean it shouldn't be taken seriously.
Personally, I think 'Cabin Man' is a pretty solid track, all around. It portrays a definite nihilistic kind of delirious aesthetic. On the other hand, I could argue that in a lot of cases Zappa gets too farcical and starts to suffer musically due to this-- but I'm not going to, because I get that it doesn't matter and that was just the art he felt like making at the time. Listen to what you like, I only recommended Sorry in Pig Minor because it has a similar grim existential aesthetic to Spiderland, albeit the group is more conventional for music of the period.
deathtokoalas
most of that strain of noise music is definitely not meant to be taken seriously, which is what i'm getting at. that's why it's awful. there's not serious on the level of satire, and not serious on the level of not having an artistic vision. these people were better labeled drunkards than artists.
and, no, art isn't entirely subjective. there's no use in comparing apples to oranges, but it's very much worthwhile to point out that this person here has a cogent thought process that was carefully put together and this person here flipped on a delay pedal and went for a smoke. at that point, it's up to the listener to consciously choose openly bad music, which is no doubt exactly what's going on when somebody picks a butthole surfers record off the shelf.
to put it another way, i run a review page that has a five year grace period on it because i want to get what the record meant rather than first impressions. there's a scale from 0 to 11 with 0 the highest, but it's not strictly a linear ranking. near the bottom, it's more about categories. a mark of 8 translates to "it's fun because it's stupid". i'll analyze something like white zombie that way. i know it's stupid, but that's exactly why the jokes keep on giving. that is to say that nailing white zombie, which would be necessary if i were to do the review objectively, would be to miss the reality that it's stupidity is also it's charm. there's a wide swath of music that, in this way, defies the way that music critics work. it needs to be put aside into it's own space.
i wouldn't put most of the material by meat puppets, butthole surfers, ween, big black, the cows or the rest of that batch of music in this category, because the jokes aren't good enough. it's just shitty music; it doesn't deserve that kind of special treatment. however, separating them out from normal analysis as outliers is more or less what most of their fan base is doing. in the more extreme cases, it may be all they listen to. understanding that requires a pavlovian, not a music critic.
there's absolutely a level of objective analysis underlying that, but it's suspended to take into consideration that the musicians involved are purposefully pushing back against it. personally, i'd rather just ignore that and bulldoze them into the crap pile, but that's precisely where the choice to listen to objectively bad music comes in.
Chris Anderson
That's just, like, your opinion man. Music is probably the most subjective art form there is next to visual art-- I think you'd be doing your line of critics and viewership a lot of credit if you'd stop using an arbitrary scale to rate bands that you just don't feel. You're comparing sounds, dude, literally you are comparing sounds and making that judgement, that one is silly and fun and the other is just stupid. I get it, I make my own judgements like that all the time-- I just don't know where you get off pretending you are so justified in your analysis. I guess that's the problem with critics, just have to convince yourself your opinion is final.
deathtokoalas
i'm not suggesting people aren't allowed to disagree with me. in the end, it is indeed merely my opinion. but, analyzing the creative organization of sound is not the same thing as analyzing the wind blowing through the trees. in the sense that organizing sound is a type of thought, criticizing music is as valid as criticizing any other argument.
(deleted post)
deathtokoalas
if this is trying to sound like red, it's the greatest failure in the history of music. i'm a fusion guitar player. i've studied fripp's playing in a lot of detail, off and on for roughly twenty years.
(edit: here's one of my frippertronics influenced pieces. there's several others if you click my name and check the vid. well, might as well, considering the length of the thread. /watch?v=OsbbHeMAenE)
and it was basically my childhood lullabies. it's a record i could hum from start to finish. spiderland is really not remotely similar. so, even if there was an attempt (and i'm really not buying this), the absolute dissimilarity indicates that there must have been more dominant, subconscious influences.
it sounds far more like the meat puppets.
besides, as has been mentioned repeatedly, it's abundantly obvious that they basically ought to be sending out royalty checks to thurston moore and lee renaldo. not that they'd take them. but, it's abundantly clear that that's the dominant influence.
rhombusskullvsteal1
this is distorted guitar which is used in post hardcore more than post rock, but could be said to take place in both. I think it's post rock/ emotive hardcore, or somewhere on the schism between genres. they are unique for sure. I don't know how to label them.
deathtokoalas
yeah. i'm not having difficulty putting the noisier aspect in context. that's kind of more my niche. like i say, i'm pulling it directly from sonic youth but there was a whole movement there, really. "no wave". it's the sound of 'for dinner' that has been hugely influential and seems to me to come out of nowhere.
as an aside, i don't think the spoken word aspect of this is really connectable to what was called "emotive hardcore" in 1991. in 1995, maybe, but that's getting anachronistic. i think that needs to be traced right back to the beats. but, through who? again, we have sonic youth as the most likely suspect, due to their sort of obsession with burroughs and others. in the context of the period, then, i'd have to put slint in the same genre as sonic youth and swans - no wave, with a bit of a goth flair. or even just alternative rock. it's fair to point out it had an influence on other stuff, but trying to connect it to stuff that came later is sort of anachronistic.
i honestly can't really hear what's particularly different about rites of spring at all. and it just sounds to me like mackaye was listening to a lot of black flag when he put together embrace. then fugazi drew a lot both on the chicago big black thing and the la rhcp thing, which brought that big bass sound forward as dominant in the area. for a good five years that big bass sound seems to have defined the punk of the area, or at least virtually all of it i've heard. one has to go to the west coast to hear the future (scr)emo sound begin to develop. neither this nor what followed it sound to me like they're in that dc punk genealogy; i really don't hear any dc punk or even chicago punk in this at all. it's all new york, to me.
ReadyMindsetGo
Just a thought that arose while reading this dialogue... instead of speculating and coming up with your own conclusions on who influenced whom, why don't you contact band members themselves with your questions? Also, I wonder what you hope to get out of all this.
deathtokoalas
asking people directly is never a good way to get a good answer. it's inevitably going to come with little more than a set of biases. i grew up listening to tears for fears and they formed a big part of how i understand melody. yet, i would never cite them as an influence, for a variety of reasons. so, i don't think i'm going to get anything out of asking them besides the standard story, which is at best incomplete.
and i'm just looking for a guitarist to listen to.
Dan White
Wouldn't an incomplete story from the artists themselves still be valuable?
deathtokoalas
i think i'm likely to get more valuable responses in a forum like this.
JeanPaul LeFebvre
I honestly think you are putting WAY too much thought into what these guys were thinking when they made this album. Just listen. Everybody is going to hear something different. That's what is so great about music.
deathtokoalas
nah. i'm just looking for the source of the guitar style, again mostly because i like listening to it. although, admittedly, also because i have a hobby review site that aims to piece together these kinds of connections.
for me, the sound peaks in do make say think. so, when i get around to writing essays about their records, i'm going to want to understand the historical context properly.
i know writing these histories is something a lot of people frown on, but it's something i think somebody really should be doing. as is probably clear, slint is a bit before my time. but i lived through dmst's rise in ottawa. and they're important, historically, for other reasons i'd rather not remind myself of.
i should probably point out that this isn't my favourite record or anything. we all know how influential it was. but regarding the rock of the period, i'd personally rather listen to sonic youth. or drive like jehu. or the smashing pumpkins...
Eben Hoffer
there was a pitchfork interview with slint a little while ago, on the anniversary-- which I can't seem to find right now, but go looking-- and they talked a good amount about how being in louisville at the time they were playing meant they were really cut off from a lot of what was happening in other indie scenes, and to a large extent were trying crazy stuff and following their noses without much of a sense of 'influence'. I'd look to other 90s 00s kentucky bands, like rodan, rachel's, and in general anything on quarterstick records.
Ned Blackburn
are you sure you don't hear some Red-era crimson in here? Dem tritones...i can hear some shellac too. also leave Jawbox alone, FYSS is a fantastic record
deathtokoalas
as i said before, fripp was a very jagged and constructed player when he was in crimson. his rhythm work was based on sudden interruptions and jarring juxtapositions. his work with eno was a little less written out, but it was almost entirely lead playing. the aspect of pajo's style that i'm drawing attention to and trying to trace forwards (through a minor forest and tortoise to do make say think, and also to la dispute through some still unknown intermediary) is really fluid and based mostly on strong voiceleading. this is a renaldo/moore/branca/reich thing.
about the only thing i can hear is a mild similarity between washer and starless, but it's mild - washer sounds no more like starless than it does like tears for fears or joy division or the cure or television or even u2. red is mostly a jazz fusion record; slint is definitely in a punk lineage. again: sonic youth is the missing link there, not king crimson.
if anything, i hear more of an influence from early 80s belew, which was the period he was also working with the talking heads.
i may have over-reacted in reducing the shellac and big black influences. that would have been out of annoyance. i'm asking for influences forward (and tangentially, backwards) regarding a flowing, jazz-influenced, voice-leading clean guitar style. that's not coming from albini, although some of the (sporadic) heavier sections might plausibly be. again, though, i don't see any reason to deviate from the heavy sonic youth dominance in the sound.
functio1
It's no big deal in terms of their sound. If you play the vinyl at twice speed it sounds like various bands that were around slightly before this album, specifically punk bands like SNFU, Spermbirds and a few others. Slowing all that down wasn't just something Slint did - Codeine did the same thing, and others slowed things down even more (even down to the 'brown note'). The only reason some people chuck the 'jazzy' thing at Slint is probably because (a) they're music journos who'd never heard of the band until post 2000 and were desperate to quantify it into some sort of genre pigeon hole (such is their wont, the talentless gits) and (b) some people are generally ignorant of a whole flavour of hardcore punk that did the whole timing/chord change stuff, only faster, in the late 80s. I first heard this album the week it came out in the UK, and at very very high volume through a madly powerful PA. Yes, it was amazingly good, but at the time we didn't sit around rubbing our chins and pondering where it all came from, whether it was jazzy, etc etc - it was a progression of things that had gone on before, especially if you'd listened to some US hardcore bands from a few years before. And, to be honest, it did have the flavour of Big Black, Bitch Magnet, and a few others when hearing it the first time around - and especially if you'd heard Slint's first album when that came out. So it's a melange, in a good way. But anyone trying to make out that it was some sort of isolated new sound that suddenly appeared in 1991 is not only barking up the wrong tree, but is barking up the wrong tree in the wrong forest.
deathtokoalas
i think i mostly agree with what you're saying (although it should be clarified that what came from it was pretty jazzy. i mentioned a few times i'm working backwards from dmst and tortoise, who are both pretty jazzy), and i can construct the general idea of it well from all the stuff like swans and sonic youth that i spent so much time with in the late 90s (working backwards from growing up with grunge), but there's a specific voice leading in the sound that is undeniably Jazz (with a capital j).
but, maybe it was just some guitarists sitting down and deciding they liked a type of voice leading. nobody seems to have a better answer.
i seem like i'm contradicting myself, lol. i mean, it's slowed down hardcore (i've used the goofy term no wave, just cause people understand what that means, and it fits like a glove in it's most generic meaning), at it's root rather than jazz. but (in places) it's using a guitar-centric compositional technique found in a lot of smoother types of jazz (rather than the more free, noisy jazz crimson fit into.). and i've listened to so many jazz guitarists, and just can't place the style well - despite hearing it come up over and over again in all kinds of music from about 95 onwards.
*shrug*.
functio1
Maybe it's better just to see it as coming from the more metal elements of hardcore/thrash. That all may have jazz roots, but it doesn't mean that any of those bands had heard of any of it. People borrow from all over the place without having to trace a direct line from one form of music into their own. You just roll with what you like the sound of, and may not know - or care - where it comes from. The same could be said of jazz guitarists too, of course.
deathtokoalas
there's practically no voice leading in that type of metal. it's pretty much the precise characteristic that gives it that ugly sound. it's all fifths crashing against each other.
as somebody that is interested in the historical development of the instrument, it's very interesting to me. so, it'd be nice if people could lay off the "it doesn't matter" schtick. to me, it does. because i want it to..
For the record neither mentions King Crimson or Butthole Surfers
deathtokoalas
see, this is what i mean, though. the reich and cave (and maybe cohen) are probably legitimate, the big black is maybe posing a little (although it's there), the die kreuzen is probably posing flat out (it's often mentioned as an influence on "emo") and the rest of it almost seems sarcastic. it's like he's inserting madonna for swans or something. still, none of it gets to the aspect of the sound i'm thinking of...
Voyaging123
the playing is largely uninfluenced; in other words, it is almost entirely original/innovative, there's a reason this album is so important in the history of rock
great works of art cannot be strictly traced back to their predecessors for the very reason they are great: they are original, though of course true and complete originality is impossible... I see no obvious direct influences on the playing
deathtokoalas
nothing is uninfluenced. pretentious nonsense.
it's a total rip-off of sonic youth.
and it's not a great record. an influential record, sure, but a pretty boring one, in totality.
i'm sick of morons responding to this so i'm closing the thread. if you have anything worthwhile to say, find a way to contact me. otherwise, fuck you.
ugh. if you're going to try to track me down to give me your brilliant insight, please LOOK UP WHAT THE TERM "VOICE LEADING" MEANS FIRST.
judging from past attempts to track me down, chances are that you not only do not have the insight i'm looking for, but you probably don't even understand the question.
we require only a miniscule fraction of the population to carry out the useful work that is required to make society function. of the population at large, there are more volunteers than there are useful positions. the jobs that people do not volunteer to do are mostly not useful - which is why people don't want to do them. for the few exceptions, we could rotate the labour around to the point where we're working a few hours a *year*. keynes suggested a few hours a week, but the technology is way beyond that point, now. i see no reason to think this reality of volunteers existing to do meaningful and necessary work because they want to will ever change.
what that leaves is millions of people that really have no social value beyond that which we contrive for them. what's the difference, in terms of social value, between working as a server or in a supermarket and living on disability? there isn't one. neither produces anything of any kind of value. while there's no doubt that a retail worker fits the definition of "nothing to sell but labour", they don't belong to the productive class. in terms of actual contribution in terms of producing something valuable, the reality is that they're just as "parasitic" as welfare recipients. a really disturbingly high amount of our workforce exists as an appropriating "middle man" between producers and consumers. the cashier at the grocery store is stealing profit from the farmer that made the food, while the sales person at the clothing store is stealing profit from the workers that made the clothes. so, proletariat by definition, but not proletariat in substance. a union of service workers is a bourgeois union.
when you look at the actual producing class, most of it isn't even on this continent. technological shifts may be in the process of relocalizing production, but it will not create new jobs (unless you count robots as people).
so, there is no longer a concern of the productive v. the unproductive. almost none of us are actually productive. what we need to do is find a way to distribute goods fairly amongst the unproductive, and that's not going to be possible until people come to terms, "en masse", of the uselessness of their daily existence. that is, we will not revolt until we understand how unproductive we really are, and how that makes us all equally entitled to the benefits of technology.
deathtokoalas
i hope the record sounds less like late 90s radio pop, which usually makes me want to throw things through windows and vomit all over people.
bunzigga
yeah honestly...like there are hints of it throughout their music but i can tolerate it
deathtokoalas
well, one of the things i grew up listening to was "pop-punk" like weezer, nirvana, early offspring, bad religion. i loved that sound. it was catchy, but it had a really gritty edge to it. you could kiddy mosh while you were singing along to it. it was just super fun...
....but i have very specific and not-so-good memories of mainstream rock music just going full suck around '98, when mainstream "punk" (it was already pop at this point, but it still had an edge) got so sappy and stupid that it was basically nkotb with power chords. if course, if you didn't like that you could listen to a lot of homophobic stupidity like limp bizkit, or become a sad emo kid, instead. thank god for the arrival of post-rock at roughly the same time. but i always missed more traditional mainstream type in-your-face rock, and about the only place i was getting it for years was the white stripes (and then the thermals for a bit).
i found their last record really hit a sweet spot there, mixing the infectious catchiness with enough grit that it was still undeniably "rock music". i'll admit it hit me in a quarter-age crisis. wasted days ticked off all those boxes. this thing, i don't know...it's crossed the line for me...
but, you're right: it's not a total discarding of their previous sound, it's just honing in on their more marketable side. and it's a single. that even makes sense.
like i say, i'm hoping it's just a single to push the disc with. but, i mean, this is a path that's well charted. the "green day rise to fame" phenomenon is highly emulated. they may lose me in the process, but i'm old, anyways. further, as an abstract musician that will probably never sell a cd in my life, i find it hard to blame anybody for hopping on to that path and just going with it.
it would still at least be nice if the record rocks a bit harder than this.
Bootiee “The Human” Shorts
post rock arriving in the late 90s?
deathtokoalas
there may have been earlier precedents of questionable relevancy (in hindsight, it's hard to think of a band like tortoise as 'post-rock', despite how they were earlier synonymous with it), but post-rock first started building a real audience around '98 or so.
(i should also point out that i was 17 in 1998, which was old enough to start getting into more serious music. for me, that was a convergence in my maturity level developing with a new form that was starting to gain more popularity. i thought siamese dream was pretty awesome in '94, but i would not have had the patience to get into the genre foundations of post-rock, despite enjoying it now. let's not try too hard to prove me wrong :P)
(deleted post)
deathtokoalas
(i've deleted an extremely offensive post from bootiee shorts and blocked him. instead, note the following.)
fwiw, '98 was a terrible year. between the skaters threatening to beat me up, the friends that deserted me because i had something other than sex on my mind and the gender identity crisis i was going through, it's a wonder i made it out of it alive.
people need to learn to pull their heads out of their asses.
so, back to the point - this is music that reminds me of the people that used to beat me up in high school, rather than music i used to connect to while getting beaten up. it's a bit of a disappointment. i hope the disc is a little less boring.
Solace Creat
I find it ironic that you relate more to, or prefer, the 'in your face' music and were also beaten up in highschool.
deathtokoalas
the mid 90s were weird. everything was mixed up. i get the impression that things have restabilized since, with metalheads and jocks beating up punks again (although the names may have changed a little, and the lines may have blurred, the three distinct subcultures seem to have reconstructed themselves). but the sort of weakening of jock rock in the 90s (whitesnake and skid row became green day and blink 182) didn't eliminate the basic "jock beating down freak" relationship. the fashion just changed, that was all. that being said, i wasn't listening to slayer, either - and they were the really violent kids that would literally assault you with skateboards and steal your shoes. the jocks didn't really know how to skate, but the metalheads did.
it was weird. i have specific memories of listening to bad religion in my headphones while snaking through back alleyways trying to avoid the skate gangs in slayer and pantera muscle ts. all the stereotypes were just wrong during this period.
punks were always the kids that got beat up, though. that's a constant from the mods forward. it's a big reason why the anger and insolence of punk has always appealed to punks. and, arguably, the release is why it was created in the first place.
that whole tough guy bro poseur shit that the metalheads have nowadays is a hip-hop thing that came into rock culture in the 90s.
Solace Creat
I would classify myself as a metal-head, but I don't think I agree with you. Well. I guess I wasn't in highschool in the 90s, or middle school...But: All of the metal heads I've known are very open, inclusive, and passive (perhaps with some anger issues, but I don't think it's a general rule that they're aggressive). I view them much more as rebels than jocks. All the jocks did listen to hip hop, rap, and blink 182 stuff, but I don't think any of them were into metal. If anything, at my school, there was more aggression towards Mexicans. There were often fights dubbed, "Whites and blacks versus the Mexicans". The jock group was still technically a clique, and they made fun of whomever in a much more light-hearted way than I think is generally portrayed in the media. Though, the fights were also a bit more individualistic, rather than groupy. The basic principal of the social herd was the same, (people hung out with people with their interests) but I don't think there were active rivalries between 'cliques'; at least, not that I was aware. The entire school was much more inclusive than, say, the 70s-90s cliche. I think the cliques are much less defined, nowadays. Who knows. Maybe I was oblivious. This song does sound a bit like punk meets mainstream '(indie) rock/pop', with the punk turned down heavily. I think I get what you mean, now. The opening is like the start of a punk song, then it falls into the more...poppy shit. I would say it lacks more of the punk eccentricity and spirit.
deathtokoalas
the root of the subculture war that took place from the 40s to the 80s (and got all confused in the 90s) was the rebels/rockers/metalheads on one side and the mods/punks/teddy-boys on the other. it's a fascinating thing to check out. there were actual riots between "metalheads" and "punks" at stones and hendrix concerts. there was a crossover there, so they were brought into contact. and you couldn't ever have something like a sabbath-who tour because it would just be bloodshed. people would literally get killed.
throughout it all there was another subculture a little more underground that worked it's way through in complicated ways: beat culture. burroughs, kerouac and the like. they had an influence on both the hippies and the mods, and, later on, a giant influence on "alternative rock". (and the hippies turned into disco fans). that style of emo spoken word is literally just beat music. i know most young metalheads would shudder at the suggestion that they have anything to do with emo or alternative rock, but the stoner and doom styles of metal nowadays are culturally beat music, rather than in the biker/rocker/metal realm. a lot of it even traces through boris and melvins and back to punk rock like blag flag and swans. that is to say that it comes from punk. i've been to enough doom and stoner shows to know that these kids are not metalheads but punks. that was kind of what i was getting at with the labels changing. on the other hand, the kids i see at legion shows nowadays tend to give me the creeps. to me, they look like they should be wearing slayer ts.
...and there were always places where things merged. i mean, the musicians themselves mostly don't have time for this stupidity (although it's actually true that black flag used to get into actual fistfights with l.a. metal bands that would go down to find them to beat them down - both motley crue and guns 'n' roses are known to be among the many bands that rollins and friends had to physically defend themselves against.). while that was happening, there was a lot of music in the 80s that mixed punk and metal. what the kids call "hardcore" (rather than black flag or dead kennedys) and "metalcore" nowadays musically comes from that mix of metal of punk, rather than one or the other. culturally, though, it's more "metal" than anything else i can see. and, again, with the shifted labels.
so, it's not really reasonable to look at what you see around you and connect it back to 80s metal. i know the marketing might want you to, but you really can't. rather, you've got four types of youth subculture:
1) kids into sports, competition and capitalism. they're usually rich. they need to be dominant and will beat down anyone who challenges their alpha standing. jocks. douches.
2) macho types that hate anything effeminate, from hippies to queers to women and will beat it down out of genuine *phobic hate. bikers. metalheads. rockers. skinheads. assholes.
3) nihilists, mostly. anarchists, not pacifists. punks. mods. some emos. they tend to get beat down because they speak out and/or because they "look gay".
4) beat culture. pacifists. poets. surrealists. sonic youth fans. trent reznor was the archetypal 90s beat icon. they hate everybody and tend to avoid conflict by staying apolitical.
you can kind of combine 1-2 and 3-4. but, as mentioned, nowadays you're more likely to find beatniks and punks at a doom "metal" show and metalheads and jocks at a "hardcore" show.
Solace Creat
Ah. Nevermind, gotcha. I tend to group all of metal within the subgenre of melodeath for some reason. Still, I haven't known any jocks into any kind of metal.
deathtokoalas
that piddly malmsteen shit is really 90% prog. they just took their image from metal, really. historically, that goes back to stuff like yes and genesis, which is very much on the beatnik side. the modern parallel to what i'd call "metal" is what the kids call "metalcore". they're very confused - they think it's some kind of hardcore, when it's really the evolution of thrash.
Sam Kernodle
A while ago there was a download for the whole record when they played it live in Boston. It wasn't the best quality but it sounded really like their last album.
Aldo Hanel
the rest of the record is a lot different, don't worry
Ned Blackburn
if only 90s radio pop actually sounded like this and you weren't just exaggerating for effect
Olm8Cuz
you're sexy and I'd probably fuck you if you were down?
Solace Creat
Well. This took a turn.
deathtokoalas
possibly obvious implied sarcasm aside, and it might be a little weird to expose this on a random youtube comment, but i identify as something called 'asexual' - in addition to being transgendered. it's actually been nearly ten years, and i'm not in much of a hurry to get back to it. so, it's a very broad, general 'no' with absolutely no chance of wavering on it. sorry.
Solace Creat
You don't see many asexuals these days. While I personally identify with the term 'asexual', I do think it's more of a psychological suppression rather than an actual orientation. Though, that's a bit semantic.
deathtokoalas
there's no such thing as sexual orientation. any human can be conditioned to be attracted to anything. if media decided to run with it by spreading the proper kind of images attached to the right kind of stimulus, we could have people sexually attracted to trees or airplanes or anything else. we could have an entire class of people that are only turned on by aromatized plastics. this has been demonstrated using pavlovian methods: orientation is highly malleable and entirely plastic. as it is, we live in a society where both genders are highly sexualized. that's both why hypersexuality is the current trend and bisexuality is becoming the new normal. we're constantly being conditioned to interpret both genders erotically, and slowly learn to respond through arousal - just like pavlov's dog salivates on the ring of a bell. it follows that people can avoid that conditioning by avoiding media, people and culture. i don't want to pretend that's a conscious choice on my behalf - that i'm avoiding the conditioning - but i happen to prefer spending time by myself, and as a result haven't been conditioned. the fact that i don't watch any tv (none. ever.) is probably a dominant factor in my lack of sexual interest. not watching tv or films or much of what's popular on youtube means i haven't been through that conditioning of what is really pornographic media that saturates the lives of most young people. so, i'm not suppressing anything, it's just that the conditioning i've been through has been very weak because i'm not interested in the culture that enforces it. there's also a feedback cycle inherent to that that leads to ever decreasing sexual interest, which means that once you get into the asexual "zone" it continues to self-perpetuate itself.
Olm8Cuz
touche my friend, touche.
David Gorczyca
responding to your initial comment - i really like the band but they sound softer and softer on every album.
Solace Creat
I don't know if I believe that. I also don't know if I don't believe that. As in all things, I would be more apt to attribute sexual orientation as nature as well as nurture. If the gay gene is found, that'll settle that. Until then, it's a moot point, though I could see that as being true. Pretty sure that a sex drive isn't a result classical conditioning, though operant conditioning may play a role. Perhaps the way people go about it is influenced by society, and while there is programming involved, it's more biological, imo. It's instinctual; otherwise, the human race probably wouldn't exist. If that were the case, then, myself, watching an abhorrent amount of television would be more apt to adhear to the aforementioned conditions. However, I'm not really asexual. If Kate Beckinsale or Natalie Portman showed up at my door ready to go, I'd have a difficult time saying no. So, I guess I just prefer not to go through all the complications of the ritual dating game, but I do value being close with someone. Also instinctual. I really think that since the base drives are instinctual, if someone doesn't adhear to those instincts it's a personal choice or a psychological...I don't want to say issue, but...complication of some sort. Of course, I guess this is all pretty semantically. I just don't believe that 'asexuality' is really a thing; in addition, if sexual preference doesn't exist due to the above criteria, then neither does asexuality. Though, I can appreciate the disgust or aloofness towards the typical courting rituals. They're pretty ridiculous.
deathtokoalas
there's no evidence of a gay gene. it's been used as a legal argument because american case law is exceedingly illiberal when it comes to certain things. arguing that gay people have no choice but to be gay has at times been the only available argument to prevent them from being punished. the legal argument has been "it's not their fault". it's been successful enough that it's taken on this sort of popular perception. however, it's not at all a scientific position and it's really almost certainly wrong - despite it's historical usefulness in court. i'd argue it's actually more liberating to think of sexuality as a choice than as something genetic. homosexuality is not an incurable disease, it's a decision that people should be given the right to make freely. but i'm actually taking a middle position in arguing in terms of unconscious conditioning - it's malleable (and this is demonstrable), but the result of uncontrollable stochastic events. i didn't mean to be too specific about the type of conditioning. if operand plays a role, it's probably in normalizing heterosexuality as "natural", i.e. in rejecting homosexuality. that would be strictly cultural. the type of conditioning i'm thinking about is something very chaotic that doesn't follow any kind of exact rules or patterns. but there are studies that demonstrate the malleability of it using classical conditioning. have you ever had a dog hump your leg? i don't think we're more complicated than that. the dog could be conditioned to become aroused at the sight of your leg, to the point it loses attraction to other dogs. the biological urge creates the arousal, but it clearly doesn't specify a target. if it did, there wouldn't be gay people at all, and dogs wouldn't hump your leg. anybody who's ever had a penis knows they don't always react to a clear stimulus. how that biological urge is shaped is where the complicated, stochastic conditioning comes in. to suggest it's hard wired really strikes me as entirely ludicrous; most people will agree that they've gone through phases in their lives where they seem to be aroused by almost anything at all, and should a phase of the sort intersect with an experience there's a substantial chance it could become habitual. it's a mild shift in mindset. rather than seeing us as evolved to fulfill a biological function of sex to reproduce, and deviating from that being pathological or defective, i see us as primitive creatures that will mostly fuck about anything we get the chance to - human or not. i go back and forth between thinking that our hormones are too stupid to understand the difference between a member of the opposite sex and livestock, and thinking that this indiscriminate level of persistent arousal is actually an evolutionary trait. that is to say we've evolved to fuck anything and everything we can, without being picky about things like function, gender or species. the suppression is mostly in "heterosexuals" denying "homosexual" urges, and that's entirely cultural. one of the ways to understand all this is just to look at human history. sexual orientation shifts with culture, both ways. in classical greece, virtually everybody was openly bisexual. but sex was an act that was very connected to class. for example, a man who owned slaves was expected to penetrate them as a statement of dominance and ownership. yet, a free man could never be penetrated by a slave or by another free man as that was a sign of submission. a lot of the taboos we have around sexuality come from these sorts of cultural things, rather than anything biological. and they can be easily traced by anybody with the time and patience to do it. also, as an aside, asexual isn't a lack of attraction in the sense of being impossible to arouse. it's just a disinterest in sex. some people that identify as asexual maintain sexual relationships. it's just not what drives them.
Bertie Wooster
good god. i guess you spend the time you free up not being sexually-attracted writing ridiculously long, completely bullshit comments on youtube. outstanding life choices you've made. the idea that sexual attraction is completely conditioned and isn't tied in anyway to the procreation drive is the most hilariously anti-science thing i've ever read, making the average creationist look like a biology phd.
deathtokoalas
i didn't say it isn't tied to the procreation drive, i've pointed out that this mechanism is imperfect. the creationist ideal ought to be that non-standard sexualities are some kind of abomination. if you think of life as a perfectly created thing by some divine force, that makes sense. modern science, on the other hand, introduces a lot of error. newton, for example, would be considered a creationist today. it's maybe ironic that his clockwork universe was used as an argument against god, because he actually saw the perfection of his system as being an argument in favour of it. but, we know now that things aren't so simple - that there's all kinds of error terms brought on by random events. it's the randomness that presents an argument against creation, even as it collapses the perspectives of classical science. extrapolating this (now not-so) new understanding of the universe to biology is admittedly an argument against darwinism in it's strict sense. i'm an evolutionist, but i have a lot of problems with the idea of natural selection and think it's ultimately destined for such a drastic reworking that it will find it's way into the dustbin. i'm more inclined to lean towards genetic drift as a sort of "background radiation" that explains most evolutionary change, and natural selection as something rare that must be rigorously demonstrated rather than philosophically assumed. if i'm right, that's ok; that's how science works. put bluntly, you're stuck in the nineteenth century, dude. for example, one could consider the dawkins-gould debate. is the rate of evolution constant or fluctuating? i'm over-simplifying, and dawkins would correct me, but consider the medium. gould has pointed out that there are large jumps in the fossil record that seem to contradict the idea of constant change. but, maybe the answer lies outside of this paradigm. as the climate is changing, we're seeing evidence before our eyes that hybridization is more common than we thought. a model is developing whereby changes in climate lead to recombination of related species - hence coyotes and wolves are recombining into one species, and there's some evidence that grizzly and polar bears, as well as lynx and bobcats, are going through similar hybridizations. with these hybridizations, we see the kind of morphological changes that gould has pointed to for evidence of dramatic jumps in the speed of evolution. i don't want to mislead you, here: i'm presenting a highly contentious hypothesis. yet, as more evidence builds to corroborate it, the end result could very well be that they are both wrong and that natural selection really is micro, while macro is driven by hybridization events. is this perspective not more consistent with a chaotic universe than the modern synthesis is? in the question of sheer survival, ask yourself this question: is a species that highly specializes it's reproductive behaviour to carefully sexually select more or less likely to pass on it's genes than a species that just fucks everything? are genes more likely to pass on when they are held back to certain traits or when they're just playing the odds? is survival of the horniest not a rational proposition? why does your dog hump your leg, anyways? you can see it all over the place. all kinds of species produce hundreds or thousands of eggs. advanced mammals cannot reproduce like this; it just requires too much energy. but, the equivalent strategy is to just fuck at every possible opportunity.
the actual science on the topic seems to indicate that humans are born horny, but without any innate preference one way or another. i would think that, if left to develop without any kind of gender coercion, most humans would mature into bisexual creatures that are driven by what could only be deemed "barbaric" levels of lust towards just about anything - humans, animals, whatever is around. one of the defining characteristics of civilization is the ability to repress that lust. the freedom for women to walk around half naked is a long way from the rape of the sabine women. it follows that attraction to the same sex can be exaggerated or minimized, as can attractions to the opposite one, but that neither is exclusively hard-wired in anybody at birth. sexual tabula rasa....
also, fwiw, i do enjoy this quite a bit more than i would enjoy any kind of conventional existence. i'll never understand why people take such narrow perspectives that they have to criticize people for not living up to some contrived ideal. maybe there are people on this planet that would rather spend time alone on the internet. that's a personal choice. i don't criticize people for wasting their lives and their minds on sex; learning a little bit of mutual respect for other lifestyles would do you (and others) some good.
Solace Creat
You make convincing points. My understanding of the word 'asexual' was off, then, at the very least for the purposes of this conversation.
umjim
Everyone is arguing and I just want to know what your deal with Koalas is..?
deathtokoalas
their despicable cuteness necessitates their imminent destruction.
Sunday, February 2, 2014
deathtokoalas
ok, i've listened to this a few times.
i don't know or care about what "black metal" is. satan shmatan. GREAT GOOGLY MOOGLY.
comparing this to mbv, however, is highly degrading to mbv. the songwriting here is totally bland, and at no point do i ever want to float off to another planet. i don't want to turn the tables too strongly, but if you're ignorant enough to compare this to mbv then you should probably, honestly, just shut the fuck up. or maybe go listen to some mbv.
as mentioned in another comment, the best comparison is to isis: it's long, drawn out and ultimately kind of boring.
ProfessionalMemeMaker
sounds more like if slowdive and ulver had a baby
numba1netsfan
It's a legitimate comparison though.... its influenced by shoegaze. Maybe you should learn the production techniques behind the different genres of music you claim to have so much knowledge about. If you can't hear the thick wall of sound on this albumn, then you're ears are shit. It's called blackGAZE for a reason.
deathtokoalas
is there a group of people following me around the internet or something? nor do i know why i'm getting this strange characterization as being a genre freak.
i'm not denying it's shoegaze. i don't care if it's shoegaze. what i'm saying is that, as ambient music, it SUCKS. it's some of the most watered down, unemotional, dry ambient music that i've ever heard.
i can't speak to it's quality as metal because i don't listen to metal, but i do listen to ambient music and, as ambient music, it is entirely unremarkable. mbv, on the other hand, is one of the most interesting acts in the genre.
it's like comparing every band with a riff to slayer. now, i don't think i've ever even heard an entire slayer record from start to finish. i've just never had a desire to shoot up a post office, or ever wanted to work that out through sound. but i think slayer fans would get fucking pissed after a while if every time somebody heard a distorted guitar they said "gee, that sounds like slayer". it would be really negating the artistry underlying slayer.
as mentioned, this sounds more like isis. the mbv comparisons (and if it's not obvious, i checked this out because it was being compared to mbv, not because it's some kind of spooky ghoul music) are just incredibly lazy journalism - if they're not delusions of grandeur. these guys don't have the talent, as songwriters, to be compared to a band like that...
what that means is that people that feel to need to be like "man, this is black metal for shoegaze fans" or "mbv fans should check this out" really ought to shut the fuck up. it's meant as an implicit, really head-scratching insult. nothing says "ignorant metal hick" like insulting something by comparing it to mbv.
but in this case it's a horrendous comparison. mbv fans that can handle drudging through all the pointless screaming are generally not going to react well to the watered down and totally boring ambient sections that are pasted in between the "songs" on this record. fans of boring third wave post-rock might be more likely to dig it. but...again...
THIS SHOULD BE MARKETED DIRECTLY TO ISIS FANS.
numba1netsfan
Uhh you're posting stupid shit on the internet, of course people are going to reply. We get that you don't like this, its being compared to MBV and post-rock because fans of those genres will most likely like this because it has shoegaze and post-rock elements. I know many fans of Loveless that liked this albumn, and had never heard of black metal. Post your own music, or shut the fuck up.
deathtokoalas
you're a liar.
there's some far more interesting music than this on my youtube channel.
numba1netsfan
rofl everybody listen to this guys music, its aimless bleeps and bloops that wouldnt even make sense on a 3rd plat robotrip. dude just shut the fuck up and move on, we get that this album is causing you asspain,
deathtokoalas
this album couldn't afford to fuck me.
you listened for what, thirty seconds? i'm sorry that you lack the attention span and intelligence to enjoy something more developed than this watered down corporate garbage.
numba1netsfan
Judging by the titles of your tracks and your face, i dont think anybody would fuck you for free. Also I listen to Psykovsky and Autechre on the reg, I like complex bleep bloop music but your shit just sounds like shit. I'm sorry you dont have the attention span or intelligence to produce good music.
deathtokoalas
it's more like pink floyd than autechre. it's psychedelic or space rock. you're just demonstrating you haven't listened to it.
numba1netsfan
apparently you dont even know what you upload to your own channel, jesus does robotiussin
deathtokoalas
there's a definite coil influence on the track, but it doesn't contain any sequencing (blips or bloops) and it's hardly trying to be autechre. there's not even a drum part in the track. it's just some looped guitar parts and a simple piano part (played live, fwiw).
if you're going to bother listening to any more of it, you should realize that up front: it's almost all processed guitars. there are some electronic aspects, but it's not electronic music. it's psychedelic rock.
Ricky X
I love M B V but I also love black metal, so deal with it.
deathtokoalas
surely, as ambient music, you don't wish to suggest that this is on the same level as mbv? surely, you'd realize that a homogenous, watered down third or fourth gen post-rock act like 'and i watch you from afar' is a better analog to the dry, repetitive, musically unadventurous "melodies" on display? Ricky X
I mean I don't like this as much as Isn't Anything or Loveless, but this really is incomparable, I can understand how a MBV fan wouldn't like this since this is intense, screeching vocals and MBV is a dreamy pop band, I don't view this as "watered down" though, seems to be on the breaking point of something new to me. Also, you can imply that they are a watered down post-rock band but by saying this you are also saying that M B V is a watered down version of Jesus and Mary Chain, bauhaus, Joy Division and The Velvet Underground
deathtokoalas
i'm still not sure you're getting the point. whereas mbv wrote starkly original and deeply melodic songs, the ambient sections on this record are amelodic, rambling and highly derivative of a post-rock formula that's been recreated hundreds of times. the sense that this is comparable to mbv is similar to the sense that the beatles are comparable to hall & oates. hall & oates wrote pop music - just like the beatles. but, one was highly original and groundbreaking and compelling and the other was at the end of a decade of prog being dumbed down for the masses until there was nothing left to jettison.
that has nothing to do with the volume of the record. it has to do with the crappiness of the ambient portions of the disc. you'd find better ambient music in the box of demoes kranky records never bothered sorting through. it's subpar.
now, i'm not sure i'd concede that mbv was even influenced by any of those bands, especially not joy division. but, stating that this is watered down post-rock (and consequently not genetically connected to mbv) in no way suggests anything to do with mbv's influences. the better and more standard argument, fwiw, would be that mbv began with a sound that was pioneered by the cocteau twins, u2 and the cure and slowly made it their own. but this isn't relevant to the very bad and horribly lazy comparison that the music press is making on this disc.
Ricky X
enough with the classifications, lets just enjoy the music we like lol.
COSMIC666
degrading to mbv hahah your funny bro mbv are my favourite band ever and i also think that this is an amazing album and it did make me think of loveless the first time i heard it and you think its degrading to mbv that i thought that? that is hilarious. FUCK GENRES LISTEN TO THE MUSIC WITHOUT THINKING ABOUT BOXES
deathtokoalas
well, i can't speak to your thought processes. i don't know you, or why x triggers y in your brain. that's a complicated, non-linear thing that could very well reduce to that time you caught your mom making out with your sister or something.
but, the comparison simply isn't grounded, for the myriad of reasons i've stated.
(deleted post)
deathtokoalas
as an aside, if you'd be interested in starting a queer-positive activist group to crash black metal and metalcore shows and just hang out and look queer, let me know. i'm not blaming the bands. i'm reminded of kurt cobain's plea. but the high volume of homophobic comments on the internet as they are connected to metal culture indicates that there's a problem that requires some activism.
From: Jessica Murray <death.to.koalas@gmail.com>
To: the surviving uncle
well, the reasoning behind going to windsor is that the rent is cheap. i was having difficulty finding even a bachelor in ottawa for less than $800, although like any other market there's not always a lot of logic put into the prices. one week, there'd be something decent for $750, the next week the best thing would be a closet for $900. i'm not exaggerating. a few of the places i checked out were just absurd. there was a one room basement apartment on cooper for $850 that had two items in it: a fridge and a bed. but, you couldn't open the fridge because the bed was literally lodged between the front door and the fridge. other places would literally convert walk-in closets into bedrooms, then price the place as having an extra bedroom. the few places i was able to find that i thought i could stay in basically told me my income was too low (which is bullshit, but who wants to go to court over that?). i didn't really want to move, but the absurdity of the market in ottawa led me to giving up on being able to stay there.
i talked to a couple of people about it. i mean, i had to ask - "do you really think you're going to get what you're asking for this?". they explained it by the high student population in ottawa. algonquin's the same size as a university, now, and there's another college out in orleans that keeps growing. the general perception is that they can keep the cost of rent at absurd levels because some kid's parents will pay it to send them away, and that it's as much about getting rid of the kid as it is anything else. it's as good an explanation as i can come up with, although i think it would help if the city would force people that own abandoned property to develop (and there's a lot of it, like the old sears building on rideau, for example).
i don't know if you realize it, but ottawa is actually the most expensive place to live in ontario. most people would think toronto. and if you work out the average price, toronto would be higher. but ottawa doesn't have the low rent areas that toronto does. even vanier is being gentrified. i was actually strongly considering toronto, but i didn't want to make any snap decisions that would land me in a bad neighbourhood. i was really dissuaded from the idea by an experience i had hitching down to windsor. a trucker let me off the 401 at jane street, and i got picked up by somebody that thought i was a prostitute. i mean, ten minutes in the area and that happens - i think i'll avoid that city, thanks.
i was lucky enough to have some nice basements to live in growing up, and where i've moved is as nice as any of them. it's a very large two bedroom for $650. so, i've got a studio in one bedroom with my gear in it. i've got a den separated from the big living room that's big enough for a couch to smoke on. the kitchen could seat ten people. this place would probably be pushing $1500 in ottawa. it's that stark a difference. it comes with some down sides. last month, a house about five doors down got showered with gun fire and invaded and ended with somebody getting shot in the forehead. they're saying it was drug related and nothing to be concerned about. i'm willing to believe that, but it's not really something you want to be near.
overall, the area is sort of like chinatown in ottawa - specifically the strip south of somerset between preston and bronson. i'm a block from the italian district, and a block from the arabic district. which means i've been eating a lot of deli meat and a lot of hummus.
the landlord is also pretty good. it's a dude, rather than a company, which is probably a key factor in not needing any kind of co-sign. he's a middle age guy that spent most of his life as an electrician and inherited a chunk of money from a cement business. he bought this place so that his slightly autistic brother would have a stable place to live. he's renting out the other three units simply to pay down property taxes. it's not about making money for him, it's just about his brother. one of the things we agreed upon is no rent increases because odsp doesn't go up very often. so, i'm getting $1080 from odsp and paying down $650 for rent. given that i don't eat that much, and i don't have any other major expenses, i'm actually quite comfortable right now. so long as that stays steady, i should be good here pretty much forever.
nor is this area gentrifying. the commercial district is mostly boarded up. it's sort of surreal to walk down "main street" and encounter closed shops and boarded up windows. factories are still closing fairly regularly, putting more and more people out of work. people are continuing to leave, and there seems to be no end to that trend in sight.
so, you can imagine that the city is sort of dead. but, i don't really like to go out much or spend time with people, anyways. i'm extremely introverted, so the isolation has played into that in ways that are actually positive for me. pretty much the only thing i'll ever go out to is concerts. windsor? well, i've hit a few punk shows. but, windsor is a suburb of detroit, and everybody plays detroit (or, increasingly, a suburb of detroit). i haven't been across yet because the paperwork to get across the border nowadays is a headache. for example, i need to get a phone before they'll give me a card. i'm hoping to deal with that soon so i can go over and see some shows there.
overall, i'm happy with this. i think it was a good decision that's going to keep me stable for quite some time.
i've found there are very few legitimate constants in life that transcend time and circumstance, but, for me, one absolute certainty is that, wherever i go, and whatever type of people happen to be there, and however it happens to be managed, i tend to get compliments about my hair.
it's nothing, really. i blacked it months ago. i blonded it months before that. i reded it still months before that. and blonded it still further months previously. now, i haven't touched it in a little over a year. so it's just grown in to have blond highlights at the end, and a few different shades scattered in. nothing managed - if anything it's sort of dilapidated.
we will all consider the idea of dilapidated hair now and if it really makes any sense.
regardless, tonight somebody liked my hair. thanks. i guess. i was out to see a couple of concerts....
there's two themes for the evening. the first is the fact that windsor also has a dom. not just a dom, but a punk/metal dom. two examples are not enough to build a general theory, but i do wonder how many other cities have punk/metal doms. of course, i had to compare...
it's a little more up kept, but not by much. pool tables. the difference is really that the stage of this dom is downstairs, which gives it a basement show feel more than a bar show feel.
there's even a staircase you don't want to walk down at all, let alone after a few drinks - except it's worse, because it's outside and iced over.
it was freezing in there, and that's theme number two. it seems to have literally been not heated. i wasn't dressed for it.
see, this is where my subconscious dom expectation was no doubt a serious impediment. -10 is manageable in a sweater, if it means walking to the bus stop and back in between hours of warmth. in my mind, i thought "well, the heat is always on in the dom - when i get there i'll put the sweater around my waist". not this dom.
it's not a fashion thing. i'm there to hear the music, i don't care about that nonsense. it's just that carrying around a jacket at a concert is annoying. it makes holding a beer difficult, and it makes taking part in any audience participation impossible. i'd rather go in a sweater if i can.
-10 is admittedly the extreme point. -15 is not sweaterable.
unfortunately, the issue compounded itself. i could have easily handled a ten minute wait for the bus if i'd been inside for two hours, but i was actually getting seriously worried for a minute because i'd been shivering for several hours.
obviously, i'm ok, i'm not naked in a snow bank complaining about the heat (more like wrapped up in a blanket and still shivering a bit) but it was kind of scary.
anyways...
narcolepsy. two drinks over three hours will not render one drunk, but it'd been a while since i'd slept and the eyelids tend to overpower. i've stopped fighting them, under the agreement that they don't enforce an arbitrary 24 hour schedule on me.
one more thing before i finish this: the historic strength of punk rock (as a type of music, rather than an attitude) is that it gets your adrenaline moving. that's how you know you're doing it right. it's the characteristic that defines punk as a type of sound. it's the reason people throw themselves around everywhere. it's the reason green day and mcr and ... aren't punk. adrenaline. on the other hand, metal seems to focus more on testosterone. that's the chemical reaction they're really going for (and, yes, women can feel testosterone). there's overlaps and levels of mixtures and points where people get confused and other things. but a punk experience need not include any testosterone at all, so long as the adrenaline is high - and there has always and always will be (for as long as punk exists) a subset of the audience that is interested 100% solely in adrenaline, which happens to be the subset of the audience i'm in. i'm not interested in punk with testosterone, or exploring testosterone in music in general.
ok, that's enough rambling.
keep getting distracted, lol. ok.
so, the first full set i caught was this band called minors and it was better than i expected. it's local. the core of the sound was pretty generic, but they mixed it up with some ambient, droney type stuff - as is the fashion as of right now, i suppose - and also with some spastic punkish stuff. it's nothing particularly novel, but it's a little bit more eccentric than the average basement punk band.
white ribs is the band i went to see. the record is a pretty creative mix of lightning bolt with hipster hardcore and no wave. that sounds off the wall, but i'm playing it up a bit. they're clearly trying to look like lightning bolt, down to the masks, but they can't play like lightning bolt - and seem more interested in being weird.
the show was a little flat. it lacked the valleys of the record, and the audience didn't get it. small town. *shrug*.
the record they have up on bandcamp is interesting though, and i'd check it out if you like weird experimental loud shit.
bird death was spastic and incoherent, but it's the point. it's fun in small bursts, but i wouldn't go out of my way for it.
unfortunately, the bassist broke a string and the singer made an ass of himself while he was fixing it, but i was kind of more paying attention to the lumberjack that had been bugging me all night and was now going on about where to get meth. self-preservation was more important than paying attention to the singer being a douche.
anyways, there's nothing special here, but it does what it does competently.
From: the surviving uncle
To: Jessica Murray <death.to.koalas@gmail.com>
Having been in hair raising situations more times than I care to remember, I can honestly say that the first step to resolving everything else is having your own stable place to live. So, I'm really happy that you have found that. I know ODSP isn't much, but it is enough to be stable and is somewhat of a chance to build on.
Windsor is one of the few places in the country that I haven't been to. Is there much to do? Made any friends? What about your sister, any contact or is that pretty much a write off?
From: Jessica Murray <death.to.koalas@gmail.com>
To: the surviving uncle
i've tried to respond to this a few times and it keeps turning into a lengthy response going through topics i don't really want to go through. starting with a difficulty finding employment back in '07, the last several years of my life have been full of emotional and financial instability. i often haven't had a stable place to stay, or a stable source of income. a culmination of things has finally put me in a safe, stable situation here. so, it's led to being happier as a result of that stability.
i more meant that losing my father was kind of up and down for a few months.
i've been focusing on two central projects. the first is running through the music i've recorded over the years, cleaning it up, finishing up existing projects and uploading it. i've made it up to the beginning of 2001 so far: http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/
Uncle Elvis
Wow. Boring! This crap put me to sleep! Where the fuck does a band like this get its influence from? Cough syrup commercials?
deathtokoalas
sounds like bon jovi, mostly.
i honestly don't care if people enjoy this. i just wish they'd stop marketing it wrong. it's hair metal, and the demographic is teenage girls that think the singer is cute.
arod13arod
in what fucking deluded world do you live in that you think this sounds even remotely like bon jovi?
deathtokoalas
i don't know how you can miss it, really. but i think thursday sounded like bon jovi, too. that whole jersey punk thing was 90% bon jovi, 10% ian mackeye.
(deleted)
deathtokoalas
i'm sorry that you don't realize that corporate emo and hair metal are indistinguishable up to the age of the listener.
Nickelpitts
Stop hating on a talented band. If you don't like it, listen to your own crap. Just don't make fun of people's musical interest. deathtokoalas
i didn't, honestly. i stated specifically that i have no ill will at all whatsoever in any form or content towards people who enjoy music of this particular variety. my interjection into the conversation was even with the specific intent of converting a crude outburst of disgust into a more tolerant discourse. you oaf. that being said, my lack of ill will towards those that do enjoy this does not in any way preclude me from making objective, comparable statements about the nature of said sound - namely that emo of the pop-punk variety is virtually indistinguishable from bon jovi in terms of melody and songwriting structure. they may have different hair. i'm talking about sound, though.
so, might i reflect to those that feel the need to jump to conclusions that inquiry is not equivalent to hostility and people that don't enjoy the same music as you don't therefore (implication i think, here, is key) hate you.
DatzWhatsUp
hahahahaha bon jovi hahahahaha
Nickelpitts
You know showing off your vocabulary to defend your unneeded criticism doesn't make you appear smarter. If anything calling me a "oaf" does nothing but convince me further that you simply consider yourself as someone who has a issue with tearing a talented band down in order to make yourself seem like a musical prodigy. At least they are following their dream >.> not making fun of other musicians.
deathtokoalas
ok, but now you're basically conceding the point that i wasn't intending to tear anybody down and tearing down a strawman of me instead. and, to that end, i wish you great fun. i'd even help brainstorm strawman ideas to tear down if i didn't think it was a waste of time.
TheStory SoFar
Actually I've been listening to them for awhile now and I never once looked at the band members so no, not everyone likes bands for their looks. Its how they can relate to lyrics and how they like the sound. Get your head out of your ass and go somewhere else.
deathtokoalas
nonono, i'm the one that tells people they have their heads in their asses.
my statements admittedly excluded the caveat that some people have incomprehensibly bad taste. apologies. but, on the balance of probabilities...
i actually don't know what these kids look like either, i just assumed they have long hair and wear their shirts open. that's what they sound like, anyways...
TrulyHorrifying Productions
There is two types of people in this entire conversation. People who dont like the music and fans of the music. Neither one can lose at the argument because both are providing theories that are un-falsifiable, one saying that the music is bad and one saying it is good. Neither of the statements can be proven wrong because they are solely based on personal opinion one can tell the other as many things as they want to "prove" they're wrong but no one will ever come to conclusion because both people a basing their evidence on opinions. Therefore it is pointless to argue with one another; so share your opinion and view others opinions with open mindedness everyone's personal interpretation of art is meant to be different so don't ruin it by being egotistical about your own opinion. Art was never meant to mean one thing it was meant to mean many things to many people.
deathtokoalas
you're trying to say something that intends to be technically correct, if somewhat lacking in it's application to art, but you're both interpreting it badly and misunderstanding what is written here.
i've been blatantly clear that i'm not judging this, but simply pointing out that the marketing is terrible. this isn't punk, and shouldn't be marketed as though it is. i wouldn't have even found my way here to this page at all if it weren't for the bad marketing. i don't often click through to bands that sound like bon jovi. what i'm irritated about is actually that i was tricked into listening to this at all. had it just been marketed as radio music like it should have been, i wouldn't have wasted my time with it. conversely, i think it likely that there's a lot of young people that could be connected to this by advertising it to a more bubblegum market.
i think that what you meant to say is rather that comparing music needs to be done in a way that is coherent. so, "dead kennedys are better than beethoven" isn't a meaningful statement. but, arguing over whether dead kennedys or black flag were better is something that can be done meaningfully.
TheStory SoFar
Let's just stop talking to her about it. She obviously doesn't understand that this sounds nothing like Bon Jovi and we don't want to listen to her act like she knows everything about music when she doesn't. I mean come on, she called this hair metal. She obviously has no idea what she's talking about so why allow her the satisfaction of your time to post a comment. Just leave her to her delusions and move on.
deathtokoalas
...but it does sound like bon jovi. bon jovi was exceedingly melodic corporate rock music without any kind of discernible message that was centered around fashion, designed for arena rock play and radio domination. this is precisely the same thing. they just have a different fashion sense, because they're separated by a generation. i'm sorry you don't see the comparison.
listen to this and then listen to "you give love a bad name" and tell me it isn't the same genre.
as for my own music, i don't think it's questionable that it is produced at a far higher level of detail and production. however, it isn't remotely comparable to any kind of corporate rock music. it's flat out moronic to try and compare a four minute radio song to a forty-five minute symphony. they're created for different purposes, and listened to for different reasons. i'm not going to reach any points of reflection listening to weezer (although i may still think it's fun from time to time), nor am i going to have fun dancing to arvo part at the local bar. i don't suffer idiots well, and have just flat out blocked that hopeless dipshit.
people (and especially you shallow corporate emo / hair metal "punks") need to learn not to dismiss things that they don't understand. i wouldn't expect many people that post here to understand the music i produce, but i'd rather they admit that than ignorantly kneejerk and dismiss it.
Erik Paulson
Hold up, you are comparing the two based on their business model, but your logic is heavily flawed. The business model of hair metal incorporated giant record labels, huge budgets, overbearing guitarists, band antics, ect. The lyrics are unarguably more interesting in this genre. To assume that people here wouldn't understand what you produce is also stupid. You constantly post about Adrian Belew, an artist who hasn't done anything particularly interesting since the 80's. In summation, It's fine that you don't like this, but you need to reconsider your comparison.
deathtokoalas
one of the strongest comparisons is in the lyrics. the primary concept within hair metal lyrics was the objectification of women, either directly through reduction to "sexual play thing" or abstractly into evil, jezebel types. that's why i picked that particular bon jovi track. the thematic unity into what has been called emo, with all it's woes of sexual malice, is heavy-handed - and, i would argue, mostly linear in direct influence.
i have to separate out a few acts. i think i was checking out citizen in the first place because they were touring with defeater, who are lyrically not at all comparable (and, musically, really are pretty "grunge"). then there's la dispute, which take the emo stereotypes to a transcendent point of absurdity (and i'd argue are actually mostly descendent from tool and the mars volta). so, there are certainly examples where what is called emo has more interesting lyrics than what is called hair metal. but, i think it's a stretch to compare citizen to defeater or la dispute or put them into the same genre in the first place. that is to say that this argument is not applicable to this band.
rather, overall, it's the comparisons in the lyrics that dominate.
how much classical music do you listen to, erik? how much do (or did) your parents listen to? how much do (or did) your grandparents listen to?
now, as for belew, he's been on my mind lately because i run a sort of a hobby review site. he happens to be my current topic of review. in actuality, belew's solo work in the 80s was terrible - mostly second rate bowie and byrne knockoffs. this is widely acknowledged. he was, however, involved in some of the most important records of the 90s. for example, he was responsible for most of nine inch nails' lead guitar work in the mid to late 90s (including on the downward spiral). his "strong period" actually begins in the mid-90s (when he was in his mid 40s), when he stopped trying to be somebody he wasn't.
you'd do well to have a little bit of respect for important and influential artists, rather than buy into the continued corporate narrative of generational overturn. when you grow up a little bit, you'll understand that age is something the industry correlates with music to create specialized markets, and pushing that narrative pretty much makes you a tool.
kurtless guhle
i don't know about you guys but music is suppose to bring people together, hold hands while singing the lyrics to your favorite song. not this shit, to be honest i thank the internet for showing me music but fuck all you hurting people craving attention. music is the only thing that makes sense in this world and you are ruining it one step at a time
deathtokoalas
ugh. fucking hippies.
world's full of conflict, man. best way to reach nirvana (pun not intended) is to shoot yourself in the forehead.
the hippies’ approach to revolution:
GUYS WHY CAN'T WE ALL JUST GET ALONG.
bosses should love their employees as the force which gives them life and luxury, and employees should love their bosses for expropriating their labour.
marx is bad karma, man.
danny shuddup
For the record, they aren't hair metal, and I doubt anybody likes them for their looks. I like the band and no disrespect is meant but the singer sort of looks like Pepper from American Horror Story: Asylum. But yeah, look at their Waiting Room set and you can see that they aren't hair metal...
deathtokoalas
that reference means nothing to me. but this discussion has already been had, and it's already been explained that contemporary hair metal looks a little bit different than it used to - and that, musically, it's in the same category.
cklin114
"and that, musically, it's in the same category."
for fuck's sake, shut the fuck up
deathtokoalas
yeah, great. i provide all kinds of valid comparisons about the shared misogyny, melodic approaches and aesthetics of emo and hair metal, and your response is "shut the fuck up".
i'd rather extend the invitation to you, all of the fucking whiny brats that listen to this and all of the bands that perpetuate the continued idiocy.
danny shuddup
You shouldn't really be so judgemental when your own music is shit... And you look like fucking tiny tim
deathtokoalas
again, i'm not about to take critical evaluation from people that listen to glossy pop music. i wouldn't expect you to remotely understand anything that demonstrates any kind of depth.
people that listen to this kind of radio drivel are not my "target demographic" (if you'll allow me to be crude), and i really couldn't care less what you think - other than to correct your constant ignorance and/or tell you to shut up because you're being fucking annoying, yet again.
i was here to check out a band that was touring with defeater, and agreed with somebody's revolted reaction. because this is revoltingly bad, especially in comparison to something as in depth and intense as defeater. i would have probably skipped the show, had defeater not cancelled (and made the show not worth attending).
nor, again, was i intending to be particularly insulting. i was simply drawing attention to the reality that it sounds a whole lot like bon jovi.
danny shuddup
It sounds like your target is to not have a demographic
deathtokoalas
it's music for adults and precocious young people, which i'm not going to find many of here. i'm probably at least ten years older than you are, possibly closer to or maybe even more than fifteen (although probably not as many as twenty). and maybe i grew up too fast. but i happen to have a soft spot for no bullshit, riff-heavy, solid grunge (like defeater, not like this), which brought me into contact with this. i wouldn't normally go anywhere near this type of music or the people that listen to it...
danny shuddup
You might be confusing precocious with pretentious
deathtokoalas
no. rather, i'd suggest you don't know what either word means.
Matt Gaub
Mom- "Hey honey, what did you do today?"
You- "LEAVE ME ALONE, MOM! I'm getting into pointless Youtube arguments! I know more about music than anyone, and everyone needs to know that! Now make me my goddamn hot pocket!"
Mom- "Sounds good! Pepperoni pizza or ham and cheese?"
You- "HAM AND CHEESE! IT'S THE ORIGINAL!"
deathtokoalas
shut up and click my links.
and, yes, it's a far better idea than paying $50 to play an empty bar (plus 1 or 2 hopeless hipsters), while the kids stay home and surf their tablets. especially in this cozy suburb of detroit...
maybe, one day i'll meet some musicians with similar tastes. but, it hasn't happened yet, and i'm not counting on it.
so, shut up and click my links.
Memphis. Methods
You stated, "i actually don't know what these kids look like either, i just assumed they have long hair and wear their shirts open. that's what they sound like, anyways..." You just proved a lot of people's arguments about you. You stated they were a hair band yet you don't know what they look like."it's hair metal, and the demographic is teenage girls that think the singer is cute." You also stated above that you assumed. Assuming lead you to this long argument you've got yourself into. I understand that you meant no harm and you are probably trolling, but this has gone rather farther than expected I bet. This is something that will never end musically. No one really knows what genre something is. We all THINK we know when in reality we have no idea. We are trained by ear to hear what we think. We can think that John Mayer is alternative, but someone else may say, "no no there's no way. He sounds Indie or folk rock to me!" No one is right or wrong. It's solely based on opinion. I hope you can understand my viewpoint on this subject. Thank you.
deathtokoalas
well, no. the evidence is the music. it may not look like a duck, but it walks like one and quacks like one. you can put a duck in a new suit, but it's still a duck. i don't have to know what they look like in order to understand what it is.
they don't have to have long hair and wear their shirts open to be hair metal. it's sort of an out of date caricature, which is something i pointed out repeatedly. and, you may try to gain a sense of humour about it, because you're missing the joke.
they write catchy, vacuous songs about broken relationships. that's what hair metal is, and what ian mackeye was trying to copy back in the 80s in order to sell more records to young girls.
Memphis. Methods
then again someone can say they make pop music. Pop is obviously what you just described.. Broken relationships and catchy lyrics. So do indie and alternative bands. You're basically describing every genre out there.
deathtokoalas
hair metal, pop, blues, emo, whatever - they're all basically the same thing. the point is that this isn't punk rock. what i was trying to express, initially, is that it sounds like bon jovi, not that it fits the precise definition of any specific genre. i brought in genre markers to solidify the bon jovi sound-alike comparison, not the other way around.
Memphis. Methods
I'm not talking about Bon Jovi. I don't listen to him.
deathtokoalas
bon jovi was a band, not a person, and it's an important difference because jon bon jovi mostly wrote ballads as a solo artist but the band, bon jovi, more or less invented what we now refer to as "emo".
if you like this, you should check out new jersey.
yes, they wrote an album called new jersey. because they were from new jersey. just.....like....
Evanya Parker
Honestly, if you don't like them; fair enough. But don't comment your unwanted opinion. The comments should only really be open to people who ENJOY the music and like it. We don't want to hear what you have to say :)
deathtokoalas
why do you think i care what you think, or that you're entitled to a greater share of the comment space?
Evanya Parker
I'm not entitled to a greater share of the comment space at all. I think everyone who enjoys the music and maybe even has some actual CONSTRUCTIVE criticism (which is rather pointless as the band wouldn't see it anyway) towards the music video should be allowed a greater space of the comment section than you.
deathtokoalas
well, that's nice. thanks for sharing.
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deathtokoalas
this is mainstream crap, you buffoon.
Nowell Kishimoto
oh, so this is on MTV right? And the radio? Yeah, thought so. Smh.
deathtokoalas
well, there's lots of shitty bands out there that haven't hit a break, and probably never will. that doesn't have anything to do with whether it's written for mtv and radio or not. and this clearly was....
George Porte
You are the epitome of music snob elitist. Everything you say is pretentious. There are varying amounts of inaccessibility for music depending on how much attention you are willing to invest into it. Nobody is going to look at this album and say it's one of the best albums of all time, obviously. But that isn't what it's supposed to be and I think you're missing the point of it. No, this isn't relabeled hair metal about fashion sex drugs and rock n roll, it's literally a group of childhood friends who are like 19 writing easy going (and loosely MBV influenced) alt rock with pretty generic but relatable emo lyrics that a teenager would really empathize with. But according to you're logic every single artist has to put out music as challenging as say, the movie donnie darko is. But in reality, there are different types of music for people who prefer a different amount of depth. It's like saying a comedy movie like wayne's world is bad because it doesn't break any molds or try to be something different when in reality it doesn't have to in order to be considered a good movie. Anyway, music taste is completely subjective so you're entitled to your opinion; but if you base everything about an artist on how expiremental/avant garde or how "corporate" they are, I think you're missing the bigger picture, honestly.
deathtokoalas
indeed. buy more disposable garbage. keeps the economy going.
and i need to point out again that i was checking out an opening act and trying to soften somebody's criticism by pointing out that, as boring as it may be, it is what it is. i don't go around looking for 80s radio rock to criticize....
i didn't make it to the show for a variety of reasons. the process of getting papers to cross from windsor to detroit has proven absurdly slow. gotta make sure terrorists like me have a hard time of it, i guess. second, i don't think defeater made the show, anyways. something to do with a sore back.
i'd not have thought anything else of this if people hadn't continued responding for months and months. and, i'd have closed the thread and deleted most of the responses weeks ago if i was unkie elvis up there. alas...
Bearslikejaimie
This comment is really pointless. Lol
deathtokoalas
you're subscribing to this thread, admit it. which frightens me.
Adam Moscinski
people like you make me hate people
