OT: Styles, Genres, etc

[J. Dan]

Let's keep this friendly. I know not every one thing is everybody's bag of chips but I think there are DIFFERENT elements to be appreciated.

 

Let's back up. I'm starting this because there was a discussion on local radio today after Francis Ford Coppola trashed Marvel films for not being Cinema and that he'd never do one. Fine. Somebody said on the radio that it's irrevelent, kind of like asking Bob Dillan what he thinks of Arianna Grande. It struck me that, musically, we run into these sorts of things from time to time. So I thought I would bring it up, with a twist.

 

Forget, if you can, for a moment, about generational stuff....and let's focus on technical playing ability, vs Art, vs creativity (same as art?) vs technology.....and further think about something as music vs a song, and craft vs talent if that makes sense. I think each has their place and has merit in various ways depending on what grabs you. Even getting into DJ's and producers.

 

I'll give just a few examples to kick things off.....

 

Techno, dubstep, etc..... bashed by many a musician. No live playing, not any creative song composition, usually no lyrics even. Flip side: ability to create some really awesome original sounds, strong production, in the right environment will absolutely bring energy to a crowd. In MY opinion, not songs, but music. Not musicians, but producers and sound architects. Different skiils but still talent. If you're into Jazz, piano/organ performance, etc.....not your thing. But surely you can recognize that one way or another they crafted something unique that pushed the limits of the technology to make a sound.

 

Brittney Spears. We shouldn't bash her in my opinion because she can sing and dance and puts on a show. YES, we would all like to have a band really playing. But my 14 yr old daughter has done dance her whole life, does musical theater, etc. While we all want to promote music education, if we take ourselves and our personal interests out of the equation, the fact of the matter is that her and her likes who have come in the decades since are still talented performers, but more like a broadway show instead of a musician.

 

I guess what I'm getting at is that it doesn't have to be your bag of chips, but there is still a lot of talent in the world. We would all love everything to still be all live musicians performing every show, but a good dancer is still a good dancer. A good DJ is still a good DJ. Let's not rip on other trades just because it isn't our own.

 

Peace.

[J. Dan]

I'd like to elaborate. For a long time, Electronica/Techno/Dubstep/whatever has been something I appreciate but only listen to sometimes. I'm into synth programming, so I like the SOUND. I appreciate what they come up with from a sound programming and production standpoint. Would it be better if it was worked into an ELP performance? Sure. But I still appreciate the CRAFT. By that I mean the guy might not even know how to play keyboards, but he can still make something SOUND cool. So for me as a listener, that type of music is more of a soundtrack for my life. I'll put it on in the background while I clean the house, or even in the car if I have a 6 hour drive ahead of me, and enjoy it.

 

When I want to be MUSICALLY stimulated, I'll further divide some genres that may BOTH be more respected here, but still different. IF I want to SEE a performance and be impressed (actually HUMILIATED!!!), I'll listen to and WATCH something like a Snarky Puppy video. If I have to be honest, it is SOOOOOO far beyond my ability that it's just times when I want to drop my jaw and wish I had practiced more. But it's so impressive, it's kind of like watching Chris Angel do magic tricks or something like that.

 

Then really the music I connect most with is probably somewhere between older pop and progressive, and I think most of us live there (though there are SOOOOO many on here that are WELL beyond that). So that is stuff I've heard enough that I can hear it in my head even if I'm not hearing it in my ears. Songs that are written in a way that they move me. NOW we aren't necessarily talking about technical musicianship in terms of the mechanics of playing, but WRITING! It could just be a lyric. A composition. It could be difficult to perform, or dead simple....doesn't matter. I love songs from my late 70s punk rock phase as much as I love ELP.....slightly different reasons but not entirely.....the main common thread is personal connection. Everyone will hate me for saying this, but even though keys in Police songs are pretty sparse and simple, I'll still probably listen to them before Pink Floyd because local radio just burned my out on PF. Sure it's better, but I just enjoy listening to the Police more. Does that make sense?

[Mark_OA]

I'm a classically trained trumpeter and love classical and jazz music. It's the ultimate expression of emotions through music for me and that has been so my whole life. I played in many orchestras, combos, big bands and solo work and never get enough of it. But as a contradiction to your statement, I really love electronic music as well! As you said: the energy it can bring and the different textures those sounddesigners can coax from their instruments helps me escape my "little" classical world and take me on a trip elsewhere. For more contemplative moments, music in the ambient genre can be very enjoyable.

 

The thing with electronic music for me it that the same drive that can be energizing can be very fatiquing, very quickly. I didn't know what "ear fatigue" was until I started listening to electronic music. So I don't listen to it when really tired. It's not like jazz, which I can listen to all day long.

 

What I never liked and really can't stand is a lot of the popular songs you hear on the radio and tv. Big thing for me is the experience of listening to music, how it is delivered. Electronic music works well listening to it through a headphone on my way somewhere. Classical and jazz only shines in a live performance.

[J. Dan]

I understand exactly what you're saying and have the same issue to some degree. Somebody who is an extremely talented sound designer can just beat us over the head for 6 minutes. It sounds cool for about 20 seconds and the rest is torture. That's what I mean about songwriting and performance, vs the skill of crafting a sound.

[Mark_OA]

I understand exactly what you're saying and have the same issue to some degree. Somebody who is an extremely talented sound designer can just beat us over the head for 6 minutes. It sounds cool for about 20 seconds and the rest is torture. That's what I mean about songwriting and performance, vs the skill of crafting a sound.

 

That's the thing with electronic music: it only works when you're a jack-of-all-trades. You need to create interesting sounds, but for those to work in your intended context, you need to be a composer and arranger too. And don't forget all the technical skills you need to have in order to get a song produced. A trumpet is a very simple thing for someone who programs their FM synth.

[CEB]

What does the gig pay?

 

I"ll play anything.

[PianoMan51]

We Musos like to think about music as a 'separate" thing, but I think that a lot of our questions about what"s valid come down to cultural differences. Because music doesn"t exist in the same abstract non-cultural space as mathematics.

 

In the mid-70s I spent a summer playing with a Southern Rock band on the Jersey Shore. I had just come from a Black/Puerto Rican/European funk band. My new band mates hated that 'black s**t". I"m thinking WTF!, don"t you know the origins of what you"re playing? The answer can be found in the difference between 'Soul Music" and 'Beach Music".

 

IMHO 99.99% of people love 'their music" because it supports their own tribe. Especially the tribe they bonded with from the ages of 12 to 25.

[Mr. Nightime]

I try to give any form of music there is the benefit of the doubt. If it is well constructed, the care is there to make the sound work, it there is something interesting, I'll probably like it.

 

Where I start disliking something is when different pieces by different artists start to sound the same. This can be in any genre.

 

I consider myself a Blues Man (even the licence plate on my truck proclaims that), but I can experience ear fatigue from too much blues.

 

I need a variety of music. Too much of anything will cause me to reach for the off button.

 

 

[Ken Beaumont]

I need a variety of music. Too much of anything will cause me to reach for the off button.

 

This! I know when I like a song or don't. It's usually a fairly quick decision and no amount of further listening ever makes me change my mind. It only re-enforces my disdain.

I can grow to dislike a song but rarely the other way around. In the 70's I hated rock songs that went on too long with continuous solos that never seem to end.

I hate the exact same thing in Jazz, the busier and longer it gets the more I start looking for an escape. Any genre if the song is well crafted and complete works for me.

If a song is going to be longer than about 4 minutes it better have lyrics that is telling an interesting story! And even that gets old "Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald"!

I love playing and interacting with others musically. But listening its a whole different story. Every one in my current band is 15 - 20 years younger than I am and they don't have the same tastes.

That is a lot of fun for me since there is a variety in what we are playing. Too much of anything gets old fast. Even stuff I liked as a pre-teen and teen.

[Mark_OA]

I agree with the sentiment that solos that just go on and on for too long destroys the experience. Too chaotic and busy doesn't suite me either. It's why I don't like and play Bebop. Just too much, too conceptual and too technical versus musical.

[EricBarker]

I love songs from my late 70s punk rock phase as much as I love ELP

I'm going to say something sacrilegious here: I don't think ELP is a very good band.

 

Keith Emerson, Greg Lake, and Carl Palmer are AMAZING musicians, without a doubt. I can't deny that Emerson's playing has been a HUGE influence on my own work, and his stylings always slip into my B3 playing... not ashamed. I don't even really begrudge them, because I think it was a great experiment, and I love their trailblazing attitude. But when push comes to shove, I think they're a pretty terrible unit together. Their time SUCKS to put it mildly. No concept of pocket... or the pocket that's there has holes big enough for loose change to fall out. The "feel" always seems frantic and stressful (and not on purpose). I love prog, and I disagree with a lot of criticisms it gets, but in this case I do feel like ELP sounds like 3 guys in their own worlds fighting for control of the ball. Compare that to Yes, which is far more "out there" and even with their ridiculous jammy bits still somehow maintains solid cohesion (named Chris Squire). Or Lake's own band King Crimson, whose pocket would make Bootsy blush!

 

So, ELP vs. Police??? Easy call for me. Plus, is it just me, or did Police just use "punk" as an excuse to play prog when it wasn't cool? They're all a bunch of jazzers and studio cats who talked up their 'punk cred' because it was the thing you did in 1980. Half the time they sound like Rush from that era.

 

As for long songs, I'm a sucker for epics... as long as they evolve or change. I like the sound of divergent material juxtaposed against each other, I like a good recapitulation of a melody you heard 8 minutes earlier. But 5 minutes of one guy wanking followed by another guy wanking in the same style with no overall development? No thanks. The best epics have clearly discernable sections, but with smooth and creative transitions between them.

[marczellm]

I think ELP is a very good band and their time does suck.

[Bill H.]

Emerson's America (with the Nice) was transformative in my life, and nothing ELP did was it's equal - sacrilegious in here I'm sure.

 

Anyway... as much as I appreciate Marvel movies I think Coppola and Scorsese have a point because they're so formulaic:

 

A bad guy wants to take over

 

1. The Earth

2. The Galaxy

3. The Universe (somehow the Solar System gets skipped over)

 

And a good guy must stop him - usually by forming a team.

 

And then along comes Joker - a comic book movie that doesn't follow any of these conventions. I think it would be hard for Scorsese to argue that this isn't good cinema - especially since it seems to be inspired by Taxi Driver. And just like Emerson did with Bernstein, Todd Phillips takes Scorsese's source material and moves it in a startling new direction that literally gave me goose bumps in the theater. What that movie is really about has been the topic of several conversations I've had with others since.

 

My relation with current music is much like what it is with Marvel movies. It's slick, it's smooth, and I like a lot of it. The sound design is awesome at times, and like the final battle in Endgame I have no idea how it's done. But that WOW moment - like America or Joker... I can't think of a single song that's done that to me. I still prefer to listen to it while driving - I've heard older stuff so much.