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The Thrills were absolute dross.
Fleet Foxes are good, but I can't listen to the whole album at once.
And Elbow aren't really in the Coldplay bracket, who aren't really in the Keane/Snow Patrol bracket.
I do think that there's an element of fashionability about not liking Elbow/Coldplay. The seem to be victims of the "they're mainstream (i.e. successful), therefore they must be crap" mentality. I think it's snobbish horseshit personally.
I didn't like Elbow when no-one knew who they were. That's how cool I am
I think Elbow are snobbish. At least the singer is.
Or perhaps its just because some people happen to think they are shit IHN.
Whatever bracket someone chooses to put them in is surely based on their own opinion?
I do think that there's an element of fashionability about not liking Elbow/Coldplay. The seem to be victims of the "they're mainstream (i.e. successful), therefore they must be crap" mentality. I think it's snobbish horseshit personally.
I totally agree, reminds me of something written about NME's opinion of Kings of Leon after they became a mainstream sucess:
because KOL aren't playing the "Dog and Bollock" in Fulhum to 3 people on a tuesday night they are sell outs..basically its a snob thing. The second after "sex on fire" come out, half the NME office HATED them...they prefer that band that started this morning, never played a gig and broke up by lunchtime without ever releasing anything, THEY were real music...NME is for music news and interviews...their reviews are dogshit written by scenesters in "vintage" clothes and "ironic" t-shirts...yawn!....
I like Kings of Leon
I like Kings of Leon
Christ 🙁
If you like Fleets foxes you might like calexico too.
Maybe people just like rubbish music like they always have.
its a no from me - dunno why, they should be right up my street, but just doesnt work. local natives far better 🙂
Beach House?
I also like Tuung very much, more obviously English folk though.
I quite like Fleet Foxes. The Trials of Van Occupanther has some good stuff (Roscoe is indeed a great opener) but Midlake's first album (a poor Grandaddy pastiche as far as I could tell), The Courage of Others (album #3) and an underwhelming gig in Glasgow last year have diminished them in my eyes a bit. Maybe I should just by Rumours and listen to that instead? 🙂
I don't listen to Elbow, not necessarily because I don't like them but I've never been exposes to enough of their output for me to form an opinion. That implies that what I have heard of them has hardly caught my attention.
I don't think it's just the success of Kings of Leon that has caused some people to regard them less highly than they used to. I really liked their first two albums, album 3 wasn't bad but I was pretty disappointed with their fourth and didn't bother getting their fifth and I wasn't really aware how much success they'd been accruing over that period.
If others have different opinions to me about these bands then I'm not going to insult them about it, though. Vive la différence, when it comes to music. Unless you start trying to defend something like Westlife, though. 😉
I wasn't going to get5 drawn in to this, I'm quite happy to have said my little piece and I still think I'll stand by it.
STR, GG - calling something "middle-of-the-road" or "dross" smacks of intellectual laziness and a lack of anything cronstructive nor destrictive to say. You're just dismissing them.
Fair enough if you didn't [i]like[/i] them. And after all, [i]de gustibus non est disputandum[/i]. However claiming that something is rubbish and providing nothing to back you up with an "I'm right, you're thick" attitude is just poor.
I'm with you all the way with The Thrills though. Don't like them. One trick pony. 😉
I thought they said
"They are an awful hideous parody of anything done in the late 60's/early 70's LA scene" and
"basket of uninspiring of 'we haven't really tried very hard to do anything original' dross"
A little more descriptive than you accuse.
And that: "de gustibus non est disputandum" means we shouldn't discuss music at all, surely?
Jon Taylor, I never said anyone was thick. You must be thick to have thought that. 😉
Well, I suppose that Fleet Foxes, Elbow et al offer nothing constructive to the world of music, or life in general. I like good music as much as the next man, but it smacks of intellectual laziness for someone to appreciate certain bands when they are just a pastiche of bands that have gone before. Less accomplished, lazy and more worried about the beards than learning how to play more often than not.
I said that the Fleet Foxes singer sounds suspiciously like David Crosby, just an observation, but a fairly valid one in my opinion.
Hey, it's only music, horses for courses and all that.
🙂
Try Boy and Bear, very like Fleet Foxes IMO
I don't think it's just the success of Kings of Leon that has caused some people to regard them less highly than they used to. I really liked their first two albums, album 3 wasn't bad but I was pretty disappointed with their fourth and didn't bother getting their fifth and I wasn't really aware how much success they'd been accruing over that period.
I was just using Kings of Leon as an example about how fickle the music press are. I like all of their albums and got into them when Youth and Young Manhood came out, but the sound and style has changed drastically over time, but that goes for quite a few of the bands I listen to that have been going for some time.
I've not slated anyone for listening to them with the exception of my original 1 line.retort to Jon. I honestly can't offer too much of an in depth critique of any of them, simply because anything I have heard has been that dull it hasn't inspired me to investigate furrther. Other than that not going to debate much further was I'm sat posting from a phone at the side of the road
You must be thick
Steady on chap, we've only just met...
I clearly skimmed the discussion too much and missed a couple of points; my apologies. My reasoning was that the attitude appeared condescending, that's all.
Dez - just saying that quality =! taste. Musical styles are all about taste and differences and we celbrate that.
They are an awful hideous parody of anything done in the late 60's/early 70's LA scene
I'd like to give some of these a listen, would anyone recommend some? Anyway, at what point does 'influenced by' become 'parody of'?
basket of uninspiring of 'we haven't really tried very hard to do anything original' dross
That statement doesn't actually say anything much. Uninspriring? Unoriginal? Dross? My point was that this is a surface deep examination only. I'll normally give an album a few listens before consigning them to the dross pile. If I cna't make it that far I'll dismiss them but not be so forthright with my opinions.
Hey, I'm back. And this is aimed at no-one in particular, think of it as a mild David Mitchell-esque rantette
People like different music. That's cool and indeed right and proper. And as long as people like/dislike bands because they like/dislike the music that the bands make then that's dandy too. The point I was making is that there is a lot of musical snobbery where bands that are successful are deemed to be less worthy [i]because[/i] they are successful and have therefore 'sold out' or whatever.
They are successful because they make music that a lot of people like to listen to. Is that so bad? I suppose it's a reasonable argument that to have a lot of people like them then they must make music that is less 'challenging', but, again, what is so wrong with that? Are all those people wrong for liking those bands?
And as for being 'unoriginal', find me a band since, well, when neanderthal man starting whacking sticks against trees and dancing around, that doesn't sound a bit like a band that came before it. There are only eight notes for flip's sake, only so many ways that you can string them together, and if you've heard music you like, you'll probably create music of your own that's a bit like it.
No-one critizes Heinz for making tasty baked beans that lots of people love and therefore they sell millions of cans of them. Why therefore is it bad that Coldplay (or whoever) make music that lots of people like and therefore sell millions of albums?
Anyway, there you go. Tea anyone?
Yeah, but Coldplay are rubbish.
😉
[i]Yeah, but Coldplay are rubbish[/i]
My finely-honed argument destroyed in but five words. Gah! 🙂
I quite like Fleet Foxes. The Trials of Van Occupanther has some good stuff (Roscoe is indeed a great opener) but Midlake's first album (a poor Grandaddy pastiche as far as I could tell), The Courage of Others (album #3) and an underwhelming gig in Glasgow last year have diminished them in my eyes a bit. Maybe I should just by Rumours and listen to that instead?I don't think it's just the success of Kings of Leon that has caused some people to regard them less highly than they used to. I really liked their first two albums, album 3 wasn't bad but I was pretty disappointed with their fourth and didn't bother getting their fifth and I wasn't really aware how much success they'd been accruing over that period.
Perfectly sums it up for me. Roscoe is great; rest of Trials of Van... is not bad, but I couldn't get into it. Other Midlake albums not amazing IMHO.
And Sex on Fire was kinda the turning point for the KoL. When you listen to it back to back with anything from the first album, most of the second, or the best bits of the third, you realise that it's just not great. It does seem that they've descended into the 'stadium rock' genre, which does make a band millions, admittedly, but isn't quite the same. It's kinda like the Stones, comparing Exile on Main Street to the later stadium-filler tracks. The later stuff may not be bad, it's just not appealing to the same audience.
Oh, and Fleet Foxes - great. Would like to see them live, although amn't certain about how much moshing there would be...
Animal Collective
I have a confession to make - Elbow aren't quite as high up my dislike list as I'd have first had you believe.
I was getting confused after a few whisky's last night - Editors, now they really, really don't do it for me.
Someone asked earlier in the thread what music I was in to.
Too eclectic to list really - can range from hip-hop, to rock, to pop and classical.
Currently on my MP3 player/in my car are the likes of....
Kings of Leon
Example
Plan B
Faithless
Chase & Status
Run DMC
Queen
Arctic Monkeys
Groove Armada
Cage The Elephant
Reverend and the Makers
The Cult
Slash
Audioslave
The Streets
Milburn
Ministry of Sound - Chilled Acoustic
The Libertines
Morrissey
To name a few
Ah, there's an interesting one, Faithless
Successful, been around yonks, sell squillions of records and make, let's be honest, pretty mainstream and in no way genre/envelope pushing music. Indeed, I'd say that musically they are to dance music what Coldplay are to indie/rock music. (Note, I like Faithless and Coldplay)
However, Faithless seem to have stayed 'cool' whereas Coldplay have not.
Why is that?
I'm not interested in anything Faithless bring out now, as it sounds exactly the same as stuff they brought out 10 years ago.
I'm pretty sure the album (?) I've got is a Greatest Hits from a few years ago and that's the sum total of my listening to them. To be honest it doesn't get listened to much, and was just an example of something that's in my car.
Just for the record - I found Coldplay dull a dishwater waaaay before it was cool to dislike them.
If I were trying to be in with the crowd, having Queen cited as being in my possession would be a bit of a fail.
Faithless seem to have stayed 'cool'
to who!?
when were they ever cool?
I have to admit to really liking a couple of the albums they made half way through their career.. fantastically produced and very moving..
they were never cool though..
[i]I'm not interested in anything Faithless bring out now, as it sounds exactly the same as stuff they brought out 10 years ago.[/i]
That's kind of my point (I'm not having a go at you by the way, I just saw them on your list and it made me think).
Some bands get slated for, dare I say it, churning out the same stuff. some get slated for trying something different and 'abandoning' their fans, some stay cool no-matter what they do. Some become cool after years of being the height of un-cool (I'm looking at you Ms Minogue and you boys too Take That). Fashion eh? Pah 😕
[i]If I were trying to be in with the crowd, having Queen cited as being in my possession would be a bit of a fail.[/i]
I'll be honest, I nearly rose to the bait 😉
[i]they were never cool though.. [/i]
Yeah, maybe, but no-one ever rolls their eyes or tuts when someone says they like Faithless.
fashionable things are so desperately uncool that it makes me wince..
and I'm now reading all these posts in David Mitchells voice..
I want my mum..
I don't think anyone's ever accused Faithless of being 'the biggest band in the world' though - a complete load of b******* that I've heard levelled at Coldplay, probably by some nobber at Radio 1.
ianpinder - You should check out The Low Anthem - Oh My God Charlie Darwin.
Bit like Fleet Foxes but much less fey and better songwriting (IMO).
Some interesting observations above re. music snobbery.
As (mostly) middle aged men we're in no position to decide what's cool though, even though we probably do know best.
Yeah, but it wasn't Coldplay who described themselves as that. And it was Radio 1 who for years refused to play Kylie because she wasn't cool, then she wore some gold hotpants, and suddenly she was cool again and Radio 1 fawned all over her.
The Beatles of course did describe themselves as bigger than Jesus. For the record, I don't like the Beatles. I know that they invented music or something, but they just don't do it for me.
I think I actually thought I was going to like Fleet Foxes for a nano-second when I first heard them.
We then went to a dinner party, where the album was played through the meal - I wanted to hurl my plate at the stereo.
I also confess to thinking I might like Mumford & Sons to the point where I bought the (never listened to after 2 plays) album. With the exception of Little Lion Man, which I don't mind.
Glas Vegas is another one d/l'ed on the basis of hearing a song or two, although I could still listen to that if I put my mind to it.
[i]As (mostly) middle aged men we're in no position to decide what's cool though[/i]
That's right, we should leave that to the middle-aged record company, radio, magazine and TV executives 🙂
I never got the Beatles either
[i]I think I actually thought I was going to like Fleet Foxes for a nano-second when I first heard them.
We then went to a dinner party, where the album was played through the meal - I wanted to hurl my plate at the stereo.
I also confess to thinking I might like Mumford & Sons to the point where I bought the (never listened to after 2 plays) album. With the exception of Little Lion Man, which I don't mind.
Glas Vegas is another one d/l'ed on the basis of hearing a song or two, although I could still listen to that if I put my mind to it. [/i]
That's uncanny, are you my girlfriend? 😯
if it's on the radio.. TV.. or in a magazine then it's definitely [i]not[/i] cool..
then she wore some gold hotpants, and suddenly she was cool
Kylie started using good producers and songwriters around the same time as she bought the hotpants though.
I'm not a massive fan, but I think she's got terrific taste in music.
That's uncanny, are you my girlfriend?
I can be if you want me to.....
Hooray, I've pulled!
Who says music can't bring people together 🙂