TheBig3

While I’m waiting for Burning Down to post a link about something called Lollicore, I’m letting my mind wander and I’m wondering: Does melody have a built time timing?

I’m asking because of something my German professor said to me once. “If it was in French, it could have been over in 30 minutes, but in German theres a pacing to the language that only lets you go so fast.” It was in reference to some song from a musical. That was 10 years ago so I couldn’t possibly remember what was said or what it was about, but it was the first time I recognized consciously that language had some inherent distance to it, depending on the language of course.

And then BD’s comment about it being K-Pop on Speed. Would that work? I’m currently still waiting on the link (I’m not looking at MB) but it makes me wonder – does Pop work that sped up? When I was a younger man, “pop punk” bands were trying it constantly at live shows – some even had the balls to record it. But in each instance, it was a very tongue-in-cheek, “hilarious” wink to the crowd – just as much as the knee-high tube socks and Chuck Taylor’s.

Can pop, implicitly played at a tempo above (lets say) 220 bpm? If it can, does the melody loose something? I’m sure some of the academic music folks (BD for example) might be able to link me to some higher-theory, but screw it – what do you think?

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TheBig3

In some of my more high-profile fights on MB, I'm generally defending Metallica, The White Stripe's later CD's, Mackelmore, and Ke$ha. They are, as far as I'm concerned, quality artists who produce great work.

But then there are bands I won't even pretend to defend. And when those bands go to pot, its a terrible depressing thing. That leads me to TV on the Radio. Riding home from work today my iPod's shuffle feature decided to hook me up with a few TVotR tracks in close proxemity.

1. "Wolf like me"
2. "Blues down here"
3. Satellite"
4. "Young Liars"

Life was good. But when the party ended, I was forced to recognize that this is a band who couldn't handle the heat, and should have exited Brooklyn. instead they succumbed (I'm guessing) to the paranoia-hype of the indie-stry and cashed in Dear Science and 9 types of light. And whatever you think of those two, there is one universal truth about them and its that "Return to Cookie Mountain" - they ain't.

I think the thing that really sells me on them having lost their way was a statement I read in some review of one of these later albums that said "they're finally having fun and made a dance record" or some **** like that. I was furious. I don't mean this to become an off-topic tirade, but there is something in the sub-cultures of music where some ****ty idea takes on its own heat and fury and becomes expectation. Everyone, apparently, at some point says something really feel-goody and Hallmark-like such as "Oh just make a dance record already!"

Its the sort of corn-ball line found in ****ty sit-coms designed to be watched by Grampa and the kids and everyone can laugh and feel good because there wasn't a dick joke. The "just make a dance record" mentality is what leads good bands like TVotR to get real ****ty (imo). Because you can see how a band like this would make a dance album doesn't mean they should. In other words, you can go to a junk yard and find all the pieces to put together an automobile, that doesn't make the junk yard a car lot.

Similarly, all the parts of a dance band are in TVotR - that doesn't make them James Brown, and for christ sakes it should not encourage them to try.

I can't think of another band that received the same death sentence as TV did here, but let's go with the opposite. For years they foretold of the rap album Beck was supposed to put out. Oh he did "Mellow Gold" they said, and then he did "Midnight Vultures. Its a natural progression." But praise be to the great alien race of Scientology, Beck knew better than to put out a ****ing rap album only to have it drown in the wake of Jay-Z and Eminem's path of destruction. Beck had zero business putting out a rap album and thank god he didn't. This is the sort of hairbrained scheme cooked up by people like Rob Sheffield in his bedroom between Pavement and MF Doom albums when he thinks he's ****ing hip.

But he's not hip. Is he? And neither would a Beck rap album be hip. And this leads me to my point.

We get in a lot of fights here about genre. Its fine, thats what music nerds do. But we always settle on genre's have a use though shouldn't be held tightly to, and here is why - genre's are like ethnicity in America. Your mothers half Irish/Italian. Your father is half Dutch/English. But neither of them those things really. And if you went to those countries and said "Oh my mom's Irish" they'd say "No she ****ing isn't, you Yankee moron."

Beck isn't rap, and TV on the Radio isn't dance. They're influenced by them, and they should be. Good for them. But attempting to become completely what you are in part only makes you a fourth of a band. And we can find those in every subway station in America. I hope, for their sake, TV gets back on the badfoot and remembers what depression tastes like. Until then, I'll be dancing to Ke$ha, and playing "Cookie Mountain" when it rains.

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djchameleon

So basically what you are saying is that you don't like when bands step outside of their comfort zone and experiment a bit even when they aren't really straying too far just trying out a part of what they are influenced by.

I understand that certain bands should stay in their lane and continue what they excel at but creatively it becomes a drain. I don't get why fans are always trying to pigeon hold their favorite bands into sticking only to the particular sound that they enjoy and not trying different things every once in awhile. Sure, it might not turn out that great but at least they tried. This kind of reminds of the backlash that Muse received for their last album The 2nd Law.

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Trollheart

I don't think for a moment that's what he's saying. Urban was very specific about the "d" word: I heard him say why does everyone have to make a dance record? That's not the same as experimentation: in fact, that's the opposite. Dance music is so generic and corny that it's seen as the safe option, which is what I think our Hatemongering friend is saying --- why go the safe route INSTEAD of experimenting in another direction OR sticking at what you're good at?

That's how I read it anyway. No doubt Urban will tell me if I got it wrong....

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Urban Hat€monger ?

Yeah I do remember saying that, but that was more aimed at pop acts than what I think Big3 was talking about.

I think bands experiment for 2 main reasons.

1. It's always been in that bands nature.
2. They've run out of ideas.

To give an example of both, Primal Scream pretty much embody No 1. Each album sounds very different to the one before it. At their core they're a Rolling Stones influenced rock band but they've always added extra things to it with each album so when you do buy a Primal Scream album you're never quite sure what you're going to get anyway, they're released both good and bad albums but I've never really seen them get a backlash over it.

Compare that to a band like DJ said, Muse.
Muse basically made a decade long career of making records that sound like a cross between Radiohead & Queen, and probably beaten all the life out of that concept by taking it as far as they can go with it. Any experimentation or change with that formula was very minimal. They spent a whole decade doing this, so when they do decide they want to do something different to that their entire fanbase thinks 'What the hell is this sh*t?' because it's so different and comes as something of a shock.

That's basically why I think some bands can get away with it and some bands can't.

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Trollheart

God-damn it! Wrong journal! I've been so into Urban's "Now" series that I melded him with the Big3 (now there's a frightening/powerful concept!) and attributed Big3's words to Urban.

Sorry guys: hope no identity crisis ensued! I meant Big3, not Urban, though it's interesting to see you both more or less share the same view.

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TheBig3

I've been a fan of Clutch for awhile. They had received some one-off play an eternity on one of the major rock stations in Boston (R.I.P.) and its weirdness hit me hard. A "Shogun named Marcus", in title alone, was something that just appealed to me. At the time, bands were outlandishly serious. If you believed their songs, most bands on mainstream radio had terrible childhoods, it made them depressed adults, and they were usually angry.

As a teenager that was around during the beginnings of the internet, radio was what we had, really. But this song came out of nowhere. I had been lucky, all things considered, to grow up near a college radio station and was only slightly out of range of an "alternative" station (actual alternative, in its literal definition), and I had been familiar with bands like Primus and Green Jelly, but with songs like "My name is mud" and "The Bear Song", you could tell they were being tongue-in-cheek. When I'd heard "Shogun name Marcus", this was serious business, but it was also a little bit weird, and I ate it up like it was my first meal in year.

There was a good deal of time between when I'd heard that song and when I'd really started buying Clutch music. I had heard "Careful with that Mic" on the Hard Rock station here, which would be more inclined to play bands like Clutch, but since songs like "Mic" were a little less than the grave-serious rock of Staind, Limp Bizkit's later, sad-sack music, and the "high-brow" intellectualism of System of a Down, it got minimal play at best. Still for all the clever nature of both "Shogun" and "Careful", both songs never had a "See what I did there?" attitude. In so many ways, it had a rebellious attitude, but since they were speaking out against the sad-rock of the day - which seemed like the revolution at the time - it had a very punk attitude. It seemed to say "hey guys, maybe we ought to really look at what we're doing here and see if its what we mean."

Clutch seemed to hit me hardest as I was coming up in my musical journey. They seemed to be there with me. They liked a bunch of different genres, but they also had one foot solidly planted in the hard rock-grave. Only now, so far along would I realize Clutch seems to be a great example of how to be yourself by while also exploring your interests. You know, its so easy to get caught up in the movements of fads, or even your own evolution. I can remember a time where I denied myself music I enjoyed because I would say things like, "That music is for stupid people" or "Isn't it time you grew up and listened to more adult music." It was always a struggle because I had who I wanted to be/become in my mind, but I knew deep-down I'd loved music like this. When I'd finally gotten over myself (or more accurately, become disgusted with the people who said the same things I was saying) I'd learned to fully embrace bands like Clutch, or even Tool in some respects that didn't think hard rock had to be about sex, depression, or being a tough guy.

Today, I'm almost evangelical about them. Mostly because too few people listen to them (despite their continued chart position on released - #15 on this latest album) but also because I think they blend genres incredibly well, to a point that I think they're a gateway band - either to a multitude of new genres, or back to a primalism that we can get too far away from when we appreciate too much with our minds and not enough with our spirit.

From Socrates to scotch, the wild west to martian diplomacy, from sexual prowess to ghosts, Clutch delivers. Their albums should be found in the draws of every hotel across America, and you should hear two songs every morning with breakfast. Figuratively speaking, of course.

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TheBig3

"There's going to come a day when we wake up, and on the horizon there's going to be this huge wall of white silence, slowly rolling toward us" - Patton Oswalt

So let me being by saying that this "piece", if you can call it that, was inspired by an incredible podcast I'll link below. While I think everything RadioLab does is incredible, nothing they've done before this was made for MusicBanter quite so well. Music, racial questions, gender equality, old school, street cred, the evolution of a genre; this ****ing thing has. it. all. Check it out: Straight Outta Chevy Chase. You don't really have to listen to it to get this, but it might help. Let us begin.

Much hay has been made for centuries now about the generations coming up, and typically how they're absolutely useless. Its humorous for grandparents, once decried for "not getting it" to hear their own progeny complain that their kids don't have taste anymore. Time shambles on, nothing really changes.

But a weird thing struck me today as I listened to this Podcast. Really, a few facts:

1. 2013 was the first year, since 1958 when they started tracking Billboard hits, that a Black Artist didn't have a number 1 hit.

2. This is due in large part to EDM: a faceless, wordless, wall of sound that isn't intended to "be" anything. The wall rolling toward us may not be silence, but its everything else implicit in that quote.

One has to wonder where we'll go; If this might finally be the generation that gave up on the struggles. Has technology, moving so fast and nearly ever present, finally removed the itch of boredom that causes people to be curious about things? We could stay positive and suggest that, like the "de stijl" movement (thanks, White Stripes!), maybe this is just the form reaching an end. Maybe we should conclude that for every 60's hippie rebellion, it all died in a horrible, useless, do-nothing 1980's of an ending with all the revolutionaries giving birth to their own Alex P. Keaton. When I started to wonder about this, I was dismissive thinking "no one wants to read another cranky old man's rant." But something about the lack of a black artist hitting #1 was weird to me. On one hand, it might a homogeneous mix of culture for the future generations. Just as California tends to be America's cultural run-off, so too might EDM be the final port on the drainage line to empty out any and all remaining ****. Maybe its the pile of ashes a brave new world will be born from.

But can we move on without humanity? I'm not talking about EDM here, its soulless and I think 98% of it is complete ****, but all great music heretofore has required some element of human bones, wrapped in flesh, sweating on their instruments. Even if that instrument was a pad of paper. And it required people in rooms coming together to do things. To frame this another way, I read a video game article many years ago about a PAX-like conference where games of various sorts were played in one conference center. Two games were chosen for the article: HALO and Super Smash Brothers. One was an on-line game with a vast, unified player-base and, as it happens, almost a uniformed meta play-style. The other was just for consoles. The end result being that regional players seemed to have different styles, and this coming together created unique and interesting outcomes that both players had never seen. The latter has been music up until now. The former, it would seem, is where we're heading. If that's accurate, I fear for the future.

A smart ass comic once said "you can celebrate how unique everyone is, so long as you don't point out anyone's differences." Its a great idea, but it leads us all to be something like the BK Kids Club Gang. Diverse in appearance, but homogeneous in culture, and we're all shilling out for the same processed crap thats going to kill us one day. (I'd be Lingo, by the way). Mathematically speaking, we're achieving a permanent equilibrium. When all colors are used together, everything just comes out brown. And I don't know if we can live through another decade of EDM's "brownness" I'm hoping to Christ I'm wrong. I'm hoping that music will collapse on itself indefinitely until it explodes again. And not in the hipster, lets play **** people used to play, way. Not diversity for the sake of diversity, but honest to christ, move away from your keyboard, play things out of tune way.

Then again, maybe machines are already the future. Maybe machines are whats left, and whats next...

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Trollheart

See, this is what I love about your journal. I can update every day with reviews,. sections, features, some humour, but it's basically mostly the same stuff. You on the other hand update once in a blue (screaming at the) moon, but come up with something totally unique and insightful. I read everyone's journals but usually skim though most to get the general idea. Yours, when I see an update, I stop what I'm doing and concentrate, knowing I'm going to be reading something both worthwhile and important.

You're a true innovator and something of a voice for generations, a voice crying in the wilderness kind of, and that's one of the reasons why I always look forward to your very sporadic updates. You don't post often, but when you do --- BAM! Right to the heart of the matter, no bull.

Excellent post. As ever.

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TheBig3

Jeez, Troll. Thanks for the kind words. I'll sig that since I'm a shameless attention whore. I owe ya one, man.

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