bands/artists you have conflicting feelings about?

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Larry Mal
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Re: bands/artists you have conflicting feelings about?

Post by Larry Mal » Sun Apr 10, 2022 5:39 pm

Dok wrote:
Sun Apr 10, 2022 5:36 pm


And if you like Sunny Day and have never heard his first solo album, Return of the Frog Queen, it's totally different! And incredible! Yeah!
Thanks! That album has been on the list for a while.
Back in those days, everyone knew that if you were talking about Destiny's Child, you were talking about Beyonce, LaTavia, LeToya, and Larry.

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Re: bands/artists you have conflicting feelings about?

Post by Dok » Sun Apr 10, 2022 5:41 pm

Larry Mal wrote:
Sun Apr 10, 2022 5:39 pm
Dok wrote:
Sun Apr 10, 2022 5:36 pm


And if you like Sunny Day and have never heard his first solo album, Return of the Frog Queen, it's totally different! And incredible! Yeah!
Thanks! That album has been on the list for a while.
Oh, man. I'm excited for you. That's definitely one that I'd love to be able to hear with fresh ears and have my mind blown all over again.
Local milk person

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Re: bands/artists you have conflicting feelings about?

Post by Larry Mal » Sun Apr 10, 2022 6:01 pm

I liked that song, by the way. It has kind of a Nick Drake sort of thing going on there, but with great singing and more elaborate orchestration.
Back in those days, everyone knew that if you were talking about Destiny's Child, you were talking about Beyonce, LaTavia, LeToya, and Larry.

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Re: bands/artists you have conflicting feelings about?

Post by Veitchy » Sun Apr 10, 2022 6:18 pm

Sauerkraut wrote:
Sun Apr 10, 2022 6:01 am
jorri wrote:
Fri Apr 08, 2022 2:10 pm
mcbrandt wrote:
Fri Apr 08, 2022 12:40 pm
Maybe this doesn't belong here, as I don't have conflicted feelings as much as I straight up don't like them, is Wet Leg. I guess I don't see what the fuss is all about. If it's just a joke band or a piss take on indie music, I don't see how it'll last longer than one album. This is probably akin to an old man grumbling 'get off of my indie rock lawn', or something.
I don't understand either. Take every local indie joke girl band and make it worse? I dont understand.
Same. As far as I can tell, the only reason we’re even writing about them is because they’re being pushed very hard; it seems some people with money decided that they might make a great cash cow. I’m not sure how much you can even really blame the band for it.
Not for nothing, but The Times just called them "the most hyped band since The Strokes". So at least it's obvious to everyone.

I'm indifferent to their music. If they're able to make a living playing music then good for them.

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Re: bands/artists you have conflicting feelings about?

Post by Sauerkraut » Mon Apr 11, 2022 2:15 am

Whiny Minotaur wrote:
Thu Mar 03, 2022 12:18 am
1. Ariel Pink: Classic case of a great artist but shit person.
Jup. I found it a little annoying to see that, immediately after the Capitol attack, seemingly all my friends who I very much doubt had previously even heard of the dude suddenly had very strong negative opinions on his music. I suppose the reasoning is that if someone's a dick, their music must suck too(?). I think it would be pretty hard to deny for most people with ears and a little integrity that he at the very least put out a couple of great songs (loads, in my opinion). He's also a bratty little asshole.

As for Radiohead, I think they're great. As already mentioned a couple of times, their fans are a problem. I believe it's also their fans that make them seem more serious than they really are. And I also suspect it's mostly because of their pushy, obnoxious fans that it seems to have become kind of hip to slag them off.

Also already mentioned, Mark E. Smith. What a cunt. I still love a lot of the music he wrote.

Throwing in a new one: LCD Soundsystem. I'm sure they're super nice folks and all that, but they more than wear their influences on their sleeves. Endlessly copying David Bowie is one thing; it's obvious and everybody knows the originals. But I hate when they rip off more obscure stuff. Like Grauzone - Eisbär (You Wanted a Hit). Admittedly, that Grauzone song is hardly obscure now, it's been played to death at every hip party in the 2010s, but it was quite obscure when LCD Soundsystem released that song. To me, that's basically Jimmy Page level thievery. Also, if any band is going to be compared with Wes Anderson it should be them, not Radiohead; overly methodical, style over substance, overly concerned with hipness. Radiohead are a lot more like that other Anderson.

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Re: bands/artists you have conflicting feelings about?

Post by jorri » Mon Apr 11, 2022 5:03 am

Yeh wet leg are really being pushed. I first saw a clip one day and thought 'another local ironic indie band' and maybe they were doing a basement set. Because locally there are a lot of that formula. Suprise to me a non-local, non-music friend who goes about as far as the Cure said they liked them... Irony in a formula, did they just get the slight balance of some formula that has been tirelessly repeated for what seems like years?!

Yeh i agree the fandom of RH is annoying (on the internet? Saying "wot is ur ranking of albums" or "give us a new album, you dicks! Its all i have in my life!") But also they are like the successful monopoly of a niche so a lot more is heard from them, and if they drop anything people go bit crazy out-of-proportion to what they would with a similar quality artist. I rated them more because they put a lot of effort/time into making it consistently good at least, even in the art side of things, they do push a little harder to do that idea that's usually determined to be unrealistic ambtion.

Looked forward to the Smile but i liked their Glastonbury set a lot more than the singles (could be just the singles) perhaps they just had more spontaneous energy than RH and were as if RH were a regular band not an insitution/ensemble carrying pianos and modular synth onstage for every song in every style.

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Re: bands/artists you have conflicting feelings about?

Post by Veitchy » Tue May 10, 2022 6:03 pm

I've been mulling this one over and I'm going to put this out there.

Neil Young.

Specifically, some of the recent moves he's made in terms of the availability of his music.

Context - all my opinion.
I fucking love Neil Young. I'm more into the electric stuff than the folky stuff but that's cool too. His electric stuff is probably the most perfect synthesis of the disparate guitar sounds I'm into. Between his commitment to making the records he wants to to the chagrin of his record companies, to his anti-corporate and particularly anti-Monsanto preaching (fuck those guys in particular) I feel there's a lot to like there.

And then he goes and flogs his music off to Amazon.

This is where the conflicted part comes in.

I think his protest against Spotify is valid enough. I don't care for Joe Rogan (I don't think he's evil - I think he's an intellectual cipher who'll repeat strong opinions of those around him and conflates pushback with a renegade position). I also don't thing Rogan is necessarily the worst thing about Spotify either. I don't begrudge someone making a living off their music, regardless of their level of success. I know none of the streaming services are perfect, and an artist of his scale has a massive advantage compared to smaller/independent/less prolific artists.

But for a dude who seems to be pretty lefty, pretty for working-class people (or at least for farmers - I know that isn't always 1:1), and somewhat switched on for an older guy, the move to Amazon confuses me. I don't know if the music/media part of the company is separate (I don't believe it is), and it would be near impossible to not know how they treat workers, impede unions, and do whatever they can to maintain a near-monopoly. Like I said, streaming isn't perfect but I can't help but feel he picked the worst option on the table.

I really have a bit of a hard time rationalizing it.

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Re: bands/artists you have conflicting feelings about?

Post by mediocreplayer » Sun May 15, 2022 5:31 am

Veitchy wrote:
Tue May 10, 2022 6:03 pm
I've been mulling this one over and I'm going to put this out there.

Neil Young.
I love Neil as well but pretty much disagree with his "principled" actions. I usually find them poorly thought-out and rooted in the desire for some form of punk rock contrarianism. The Spotify thing, the Pono, etc.

I am not up to date with his output post 2005 or so. Is there anything I should listen to? I spent a lot of time listening to the Way Down in the Rust Bucket live record he released last year and that had pretty good moments.

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Re: bands/artists you have conflicting feelings about?

Post by Veitchy » Sun May 15, 2022 3:13 pm

mediocreplayer wrote:
Sun May 15, 2022 5:31 am
I love Neil as well but pretty much disagree with his "principled" actions. I usually find them poorly thought-out and rooted in the desire for some form of punk rock contrarianism. The Spotify thing, the Pono, etc.

I am not up to date with his output post 2005 or so. Is there anything I should listen to? I spent a lot of time listening to the Way Down in the Rust Bucket live record he released last year and that had pretty good moments.
I looked at the whole Pono thing as a vanity project more than anything else. His rancor around it's promotion and subsequent (calling it what it is) failure seemed a little blustery for a recording medium but whatever.

His recent output isn't groundbreaking or a brave new direction for his music, but if you dig what he was doing before you have the benefit of more stuff you haven't heard yet.

I think Colorado with Crazy Horse is a really solid NY album. His new one, Barn, I only listened to a couple of times before it got pulled but sounded alright. Nils Lofgren is on there and it's always nice to see him pop up. His stuff with the Promise of the Real is cool for a slightly different speed. Monsanto Years was decent IMO. It's got a message for sure but I'm sympathetic to it so it doesn't bother me. And to your point about Rust Bucket, the old archive stuff he keeps putting out is a treasure trove.

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Re: bands/artists you have conflicting feelings about?

Post by andy_tchp » Sun May 15, 2022 3:59 pm

I'm more conflicted about his terrible singing/voice.
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Re: bands/artists you have conflicting feelings about?

Post by Veitchy » Sun May 15, 2022 4:23 pm

andy_tchp wrote:
Sun May 15, 2022 3:59 pm
I'm more conflicted about his terrible singing/voice.
Someone on TDPRI way back when said they reckoned Cinnamon Girl was the best NY song as, vocally, you couldn't tell he was on the track.

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Re: bands/artists you have conflicting feelings about?

Post by sal paradise » Sun May 15, 2022 10:36 pm

My gf hates his voice. Aside from After The Gold Rush I can rarely pop any of his albums on without being told off.
I have nothing to offer anybody, except my own confusion?

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Re: bands/artists you have conflicting feelings about?

Post by s_mcsleazy » Tue May 24, 2022 4:22 pm

i got another one to add to this. frank turner. million dead are one of my favorite bands, mongol horde are pretty cool too. he's done a lot for the scene and is a super nice guy...... i just think his solo stuff is kinda dry. i think that's mainly because when i hear an acoustic guitar, my brain is like "oh shit, i'm about to hear ed sheeran"
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Re: bands/artists you have conflicting feelings about?

Post by Salfaromeab » Thu May 26, 2022 4:11 am

Messer Chups. I love Surf, and they're pretty big players in the modern Surf scene, they have some great tracks, their early stuff is really interesting and fairly experimental for surf, lots of loops and samples and stuff. But they seem to have dropped all that and are just essential recording the same album over and over again. I know it's not a genre renowned for variety, but all their albums post like 2007 are so god damn samey.
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Re: bands/artists you have conflicting feelings about?

Post by skeletonpower » Mon Aug 22, 2022 3:08 pm

This is my entire experience as a fan of black metal.

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