Posts by Scott Chris
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Hard News: One man’s Meat Puppets is…, in reply to Russell Brown,
I mean, who cares?
Well I do I guess. I’m sick of people misrepresenting the history of popular music by describing it in absolutist terms. So much of the narrative seems to be based on assumptions about what motivated various bands to produce the music they did rather that providing a relative description of a free market fashion phenomenon, which is what the music industry essentially is.
So when people criticize music for being ‘progressive’, I’m inclined to leap to its defence because when you challenge someone to say exactly what it is about, say, Hotel California that they really don’t like, all they can say is “eww prog rock” which has as much analytical merit as saying “eww flared trousers”. It’s essentially a conditioned response.
Perhaps I could illustrate my point with this Richard Thompson cover: (why does he give it cred? It’s the same song as Spears’)
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Hard News: One man’s Meat Puppets is…, in reply to Dean Papa,
Nick Drake and Will Oldham are 2 of my favs
Ah, the good taste is yours by my reckoning. This guy's gone under the radar a bit too and has a fascinating back-story - the son of Anthony Perkins of Psycho fame no less:
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Hard News: One man’s Meat Puppets is…, in reply to Peter Darlington,
Hey, you're the anti-me!
And I notice your picture is upside down, so I'd suggest that I have things the right way up. ;)
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Hard News: One man’s Meat Puppets is…, in reply to James Butler,
it's pretty hard to pin down the difference between "pretention" and "being really good at something
Yes I agree. If you define pretentiousness as "showing off to compensate for emotional insecurity" or "taking yourself too seriously" then nearly every human I've ever met is prone to the resulting affectations.
On the other hand, people quickly get bored with what they've mastered and so may wish to extend themselves. Not to mention the competitive instinct. You hear something and you are impressed by it so naturally you want to emulate it. That's why shit improves.
Yep, the faux-modernist strings are a give-away.
Hmm, I don't see that. By which criteria would you exclude a modernist string arrangement from a popular song? I love some of those Shostakovichy chords so it makes little difference to me that they are played by violins and not a synthesiser.
And it's in 5/4 or some variation thereof.
Yeah, well picked.
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Hard News: One man’s Meat Puppets is…, in reply to Danielle,
Prog in general is difficult for me because the self-conscious virtuosity kinda makes me want to hurl, and I hate all that 'look at us stopping and starting on a dime with our weird time signatures, aren't we awesome?'
I don't buy that argument. What are they supposed to do - dumb it down? Was, say, Velasquez being pretentious because he wanted to refine his craft and experiment with technique?
Sorry, most of the anti-prog sentiment basically boils down to jealousy imo. And as for switching time signature, well, was John Lennon pretentious? Or Radiohead?
Or this guy? (try and pick the time sig)
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....but nothing surpasses AUTOTUNE! I cannot even stay in the room with that effect on. This includes Peter Framptom's effort from the late 70s or whenever it was.
Depends how it's used: (BTW Frampton used a talk box not autotune)
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Hard News: One man’s Meat Puppets is…, in reply to TracyMac,
Count me in as another c &.w hater. And yes, “alt” country is just as whiny.
Yeah maybe, but there are always exceptions to the rule. Are you familiar with Bonnie 'Prince' Billy? (Sorry no video but the music compensates)
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Hard News: One man’s Meat Puppets is…, in reply to JacksonP,
Why be quiet about it?
God it must be me. Van the Man who desperately wants to be black. Like fingernails on a whiteboard.
Sorry, I'm not trolling, I just have exquisitely bad taste in music. I rate ABBA for starters. Seriously.
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Hard News: One man’s Meat Puppets is…, in reply to Chris Waugh,
Absolutely. That’s why I now loathe Pearl Jam.
Hmm, I went the other way. Vedder’s vocal style annoyed me a bit ’till the day I heard this song and the scales fell from my ears: (apologies for the mental image)
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Hard News: One man’s Meat Puppets is…, in reply to James Butler,
Ah yes. Tool.
What the hell is that bollocks about?
......Fisting.
Bare knuckle or Queensberry?