Quote:
Originally Posted by The Bearcat
I thought being pretentious meant trying to appear more smart and cultured than everyone.... or maybe I should invest in a dictionary.
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pre·tense /
prɪˈtɛns, ˈpritɛns/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[pri-tens, pree-tens] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
–noun
1. pretending or feigning; make-believe: My sleepiness was all pretense.
2. a false show of something: a pretense of friendship.
3. a piece of make-believe.
4. the act of pretending or alleging falsely.
5. a false allegation or justification: He excused himself from the lunch on a pretense of urgent business.
6. insincere or false profession: His pious words were mere pretense.
7. the putting forth of an unwarranted claim.
8. the claim itself.
9. any allegation or claim: to obtain money under false pretenses.
10. pretension (usually fol. by to): destitute of any pretense to wit.
11. pretentiousness.
As to how this relates to music... here's an example. People might accuse a musician with a lot of technical skill of being pretentious because he/she thinks that technical skill makes them a superior musician in general. But there's the problem right there... in order to fairly accuse someone of being pretentious, you need to know their intentions first... and that's where a lot of people incorrectly assume.
Just because a musician is very skilled doesn't mean they think they're some sort of superior being. Making that assumption would be foolish, but you'd be amazed at how many people do it.
Prog catches a lot of flak for supposedly being pretentious due to the complexity/length/technicality. Indie catches accusations of pretension due to long song names, fashion and underground status etc. For some reason, some people seem to think that jazz fans consider jazz superior to most popular music because of the sophisticated chord progressions. Ditto for classical for various reasons.
These are all silly accusations of pretension in music. For example, you can call a band like Meshuggah pretentious for using complex time signatures in every song, but unless you know their intentions, you're most likely sorely mistaken. If they're making the music they want without pretense, more power to them. There will always be people bringing them down for being more skilled than the average Joe, but that's life. You can look at the guy who makes straight As and assume that he considers himself superior to other humans because of it, but again, that is severely flawed judgement.