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Other music forums => Various Artists, Lyrics, Discographies => Topic started by: Joost on April 07, 2014, 05:11:08 PM

Title: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: Joost on April 07, 2014, 05:11:08 PM
I'm sure you have a few: bands that you really like, despite something about them that you really dislike. For instance: you only like their early albums, you like most of their work but not their best known songs, but like their studio work but not their live performances (or vice versa), you like their music but not the people in the band, or you can't identify with the band's image, etc.

Some of mine:

Beach Boys: greatest band of all time, but I almost never listen to their pre-Pet Sounds material
Red Hot Chili Peppers: love everything up until 'One Hot Minute', everything they've done since is kind of lame
Elvis Presley: one of the greatest singers and performers of all time, but he recorded more bad than good songs
Beastie Boys: were brilliant from the late 80s until the 90s, but dumb before that and boring after that
Nirvana: amazing band but Kurt was an a**hole
Green Day: only their first four albums were great
Elliott Smith: can't get into his first two albums, but the others are incredible

Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: Ovi on April 07, 2014, 05:40:56 PM
Fun thread. What's your beef with Cobain?

Aerosmith: love almost everything they've done up until 1982 and almost nothing since then.
Kinks: ditto, only replace 1982 with 1972.
Gabriel-era Genesis: love them on basically every level except for my indifference towards the lyrics - I can rarely make sense of what Gabriel's singing about and most of the time I don't even try.
Guns n' Roses: they were incredible as a singles band, but their albums were usually a mess. Axl was usually kinda annoying live, too.
Kanye West: his personality is a huge turn-off, I would probably smack him in the head if he were my friend. But I can still find things of interest in some of his music (I still wouldn't call myself a fan though).

I'll think of more later.
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: Ovi on April 07, 2014, 05:47:07 PM
Amy Winehouse: 'Back To Black' is one of my favourite albums of the past decade, but on the other hand I don't really like 'Frank' at all. Kind of a big deal, given that those are the only two albums she released in her lifetime.
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: Ovi on April 07, 2014, 05:50:35 PM
Talking Heads: 'Fear of Music' and 'Remain In Light' are genius, mind-bending records that deserve all the praise they get. Everything else I've heard, be it either pre or post those leaves me cold. They needed Eno to truly make things work.
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: Joost on April 07, 2014, 06:25:31 PM
Fun thread. What's your beef with Cobain?
No beef. As a musician, Kurt Cobain is one of my heroes. He was one of the main reasons why I got into alternative music and playing guitar 20 years ago. As a teen, I spend more time playing along with Nirvana records than doing homework and I once read Michael Azerrad's book about Nirvana three times in a row. But Tony Asher's famous quote about Brian Wilson probably applies even more to Cobain: "a genius musician but an amateur human being".
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: Ovi on April 07, 2014, 06:44:51 PM
No beef. As a musician, Kurt Cobain is one of my heroes. He was one of the main reasons why I got into alternative music and playing guitar 20 years ago. As a teen, I spend more time playing along with Nirvana records than doing homework and I once read Michael Azerrad's book about Nirvana three times in a row. But Tony Asher's famous quote about Brian Wilson probably applies even more to Cobain: "a genius musician but an amateur human being".

I dunno Joost, I think about 80% of the rock-stars that made it big are a**holes in one way or another. Was just wondering why was Cobain the only one to make your list and why not an easier target like Johnny Rotten, Axl Rose, Mike Love etc. I don't remember atm reading anything truly bad about him, but I'm probably (more like surely) not as informed on the matter as you are.
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: Joost on April 07, 2014, 07:30:20 PM
I dunno Joost, I think about 80% of the rock-stars that made it big are a**holes in one way or another. Was just wondering why was Cobain the only one to make your list and why not an easier target like Johnny Rotten, Axl Rose, Mike Love etc. I don't remember atm reading anything truly bad about him, but I'm probably (more like surely) not as informed on the matter as you are.

I just think he was a pretty misanthropic, negative, holier-than-thou, egocentric person. The kind of guy who would come to your party, bum everyone out, destroy your records and call you a redneck macho pig for kicking him out.

Last Saturday there was some footage from Nirvana's show at the Paradiso in Amsterdam in 1991 on TV. A camera guy was just filming him from a distance, not bothering him in any way. Suddenly Kurt decides to try to push him off the stage. It was a pretty high stage and the guy had a big, heavy camera on his shoulder, so it was really dangerous. I just thought that was just pretty typical: Kurt the alternative icon slash tortured artist almost breaking some poor guy's neck just to make some kind of crazy anti corporate media statement (or something...).

And two years later he's doing MTV Uplugged.

Kurt Cobain will always be one of my musical idols and I'm certain that despite his fame and fortune his life was miserable. But still, he was an a**hole.
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: stevie on April 07, 2014, 09:02:23 PM
U2 by a country mile.  They were awesome till the mid nineties. Everything since is rubbish IMO.
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: ibanez_ax on April 08, 2014, 01:34:29 AM
Jethro Tull-kind of lost me after Stormwatch, some good songs, but nothing like their earlier stuff.
E.L.O.-I lost interest after Discovery.  Time makes me feel uneasy when I try to listen, I'm not sure why.
The Who-they gave it the old college try after Moon died but it really wasn't the same.  Eminence Front is a really good song though.
Cheap Trick-they had it, lost it after Dream Police, then got it back again with Cheap Trick 97 and the records after that.
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: Hello Goodbye on April 08, 2014, 02:48:18 AM
Beach Boys: greatest band of all time, but I almost never listen to their pre-Pet Sounds material

Some very pretty songs came before Pet Sounds like Wendy, In My Room, Don't Worry Baby, When I Grow Up To Be A Man, California Girls, The Little Girl I Once Knew and Do You Wanna Dance?  I hope you're not depriving yourself of those, Joost.
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: Joost on April 08, 2014, 05:39:29 AM
Some very pretty songs came before Pet Sounds like Wendy, In My Room, Don't Worry Baby, When I Grow Up To Be A Man, California Girls, The Little Girl I Once Knew and Do You Wanna Dance?  I hope you're not depriving yourself of those, Joost.

I've got all the early albums and I used to listen to them a lot, but I got a little bit tired of them. Albums like 'Friends', 'Pet Sounds' and 'Sunflower' on the other hand, I can listen to those every day of the week without ever getting bored. There's just so much more depth in that music, more layers, more diversity, much more going on... The songs you listed all have gorgeous vocals and melodies, but compared to the 1966-1971 material they just sound a little bit shallow to me.
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: oldbrownshoe on April 08, 2014, 06:07:48 AM
My 'but' is always the same, I'm afraid.
'I love them, but only up to '69/1970/1971/1972*' (*delete as appropriate - it's normally '69!).

In particular.....
The Who until they stopped making great 45s and focused on dull 'rock operas' instead (i.e. up to 'Tommy'.....i.e. '69).
The Stones until they concentrated on LPs over 45s/U.S. stadium tours/Brian died (i.e. '69).
Dylan until he got ironic and made pap (i.e. Self Portrait.....i.e. up to Nashville Skyline.....i.e. '69).

And I like David Bowie up to the point everyone started liking him, his mid-60s 45s especially.

Much of it has to do with the 'look' of the artist/group as well (i.e. in 1976 The Stones looked awful.....in 1966 they looked fantastic).
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: Hello Goodbye on April 08, 2014, 09:57:34 PM
I've got all the early albums and I used to listen to them a lot, but I got a little bit tired of them. Albums like 'Friends', 'Pet Sounds' and 'Sunflower' on the other hand, I can listen to those every day of the week without ever getting bored. There's just so much more depth in that music, more layers, more diversity, much more going on... The songs you listed all have gorgeous vocals and melodies, but compared to the 1966-1971 material they just sound a little bit shallow to me.

Living through that time in the 1960s, Joost, I got to witness The Beach Boys go from a typical good West Coast band singing about surfing and cars to a group that led the way in music writing, arrangements and orchestration.  This was Brian Wilson's genius mind at work.  Some of his musical innovations predated those of The Beatles and served as an impetus for John Lennon and Paul McCartney.  When I first heard the songs I mentioned, I was struck by their departure from singing about girls, surfing and cars.  We didn't have the internet or any decent trade publications to help us understand what was going on, but those changes coincided with my coming of age and I knew there was something special going on with The Beach Boys.  Yes, those songs were not as complex as those which would soon follow but they were in a league of their own in the time they were first heard.

Pet Sounds was released when I was 16 years old.  I bought the album and took it along to summer camp with me where I worked as a waiter.  We couldn't stop listening to it along with Blonde On Blonde.  We had no radio reception in that part of Pennsylvania so the LPs we brought with us and 45s we bought in town were all we had to listen to.  Rubber Soul was the current Beatles LP and Pet Sounds was way ahead of that. 

That was a very special summer for music.  There was Motown, folk and folk rock, jug band music and early psychedelic rock.  And then there was The Beatles...and The Beach Boys.



Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: Hello Goodbye on April 08, 2014, 10:00:47 PM
Joost, this is a current radio and television commercial spot for a well known pediatric hospice here in the United States...


MJHS Pediatric Hospice TV Commercial: In My Room (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QMgo14M2OyA#ws)

Fifty years later and Brian Wilson's lyrics still take on special significance.
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: oldbrownshoe on April 11, 2014, 06:16:59 AM
How about groups/individuals to which there is no 'but'.

Try these five.....

Buddy Holly
Eddie Cochran
Otis Redding
Brian Jones
Nick Drake

None of them had time to make dud records or lived long enough for an era to arrive when dud records were the norm.
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: Joost on April 11, 2014, 06:54:18 AM
Nick Drake

A small "but": I love his first two albums, but I'm not a big fan of 'Pink Moon'.
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: Hombre_de_ningun_lugar on April 15, 2014, 08:22:41 PM
The Rolling Stones, the Doors and the Beach Boys are bands I like and respect, but I could live without them.
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: nimrod on April 15, 2014, 10:06:17 PM
Im a Stones fan UNTIL Ronnie Wood joined, theyre greatest period for me was early 70's, Sticky Fingers & Exile were great albums.

Im a Fleetwood Mac Fan (but only the Peter Green era)

Im a Genesis fan (but not after Peter Gabriel left)

Im a fan of America  (but not after Dan Peek left)

Im a fan of Supertramp (until Roy Hodgson left)

Im a Pink Floyd fan (but not so much after Syd Barrett era)

Im a Moody Blues fan (but not so much after Mike Pinder left)

its all about somebody leaving for me  roll:)

Oh Neil Young, I love everything up to his heavy grunge period, 20 minute meaningless guitar solo's on things like Hurricane & Rust for me are very boring, but Goldrush, Harvest, Neil Young, Stars & Bars, Zuma, On The Beach were all fantastic
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: tkitna on April 16, 2014, 06:01:12 AM
I love Kansas, but they lost it after Audio-Visions. Freaks Of Nature was decent, but the albums between and their last one,,,,not so good.

The Rolling Stones are another band I love, but they have a ton of albums that just wreaks of filler.
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: Moogmodule on April 16, 2014, 09:05:12 AM
I like the Decemberists but I confess the lead singers affected voice is sometimes irritating.
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: Moogmodule on April 16, 2014, 09:51:42 AM


its all about somebody leaving for me  roll:)


Who's going to be the first to say they liked the Beatles til Tommy Moore left?
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: oldbrownshoe on April 16, 2014, 01:17:52 PM
Tommy Moore's left?
Say it ain't so.
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: Ovi on April 16, 2014, 04:05:21 PM
Who's going to be the first to say they liked the Beatles til Tommy Moore left?

Totally. After that they were only in it for the money...
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: Moogmodule on April 18, 2014, 03:27:17 AM
Im a Moody Blues fan (but not so much after Mike Pinder left)


I like the Moodies too. They were my first concert. But they have their 'buts'. I was listening to Days of Future Past the other day for the first time in years. John Lodge's falsetto is ear grating. Like Yoko Ono had been hired for the session.
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: Hello Goodbye on April 18, 2014, 03:42:42 AM
I like the Moodies too. They were my first concert. But they have their 'buts'. I was listening to Days of Future Past the other day for the first time in years. John Lodge's falsetto is ear grating. Like Yoko Ono had been hired for the session.


The Moody Blues vocals needed a falsetto for that special sound we sat around stereos listening to in all states of mind.  John Lodge didn't overdo it at all.  I think he sounded just fine...


The Moody Blues, Ride my see-saw. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6CqwECqxGf4#)
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: Hello Goodbye on April 18, 2014, 03:45:07 AM
But I agree with you about Yoko.  Her voice would have caused irreversible brain damage.
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: Moogmodule on April 18, 2014, 03:57:40 AM
The Moody Blues vocals needed a falsetto for that special sound we sat around stereos listening to in all states of mind.  John Lodge didn't overdo it at all.  I think he sounded just fine...


The Moody Blues, Ride my see-saw. ([url]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6CqwECqxGf4#[/url])


I think it worked ok when harmonising with other voices and you're right that was an essential part of the Moody sound. But it irritates me on an exposed line. The one that stood out to me was Time to Get Away off Days.
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: Moogmodule on April 18, 2014, 03:58:36 AM
But I agree with you about Yoko.  Her voice would have caused irreversible brain damage.

It's nice there's at least one thing all we Beatle fans can agree on. Yoko sucked hugely.
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: Hello Goodbye on April 18, 2014, 04:08:36 AM
The one that stood out to me was Time to Get Away off Days.

Oh yeah!  I know what you mean.  Why did he do that?!
Title: Re: Your favorite bands and artists with a "but..."
Post by: Moogmodule on April 18, 2014, 07:07:17 AM
Oh yeah!  I know what you mean.  Why did he do that?!
Quote

I suppose Ill-advised Falsetto Syndrome (IFS) can afflict even the best.
Exhibit 1: John on One Day at a Time (and John had a great effective falsetto when used for good rather than evil).
Exhibit 2: Paul on Dear Friend .
Exhibit 3: George on That is All.