Suspect Music: Mediocre Taste - Page 4

What about S.O.D., they were started by Scott Ian and Speak English or Die is a great album.

Like Megadeth?

Agreed, with the sole saving grace that Godsmack still manages to put on a damn good live show.

Although, referring back to Miggs post, the Vinnie Vincent Invasion's 2nd album was pretty shit. The first was bad too, but in a glorious, testament-to-excess way.

Boyz R Gonna Rock, notable for the part when they come out of the guitar solo and the verse starts up but Vinnie just keeps jammin' - "shut the fuck up dude, I'm shreddin' it over here!"

The Violent Femmes' 'Hallowed Ground' and 'The Blind Leading the Naked' are both fine albums.

Overheard in the new releases section today:

(holding new Jeff Buckley collection) "I saw this guy perform once. I hate him."

That transcends mediocre taste. Now, I can believe that a person with otherwise good taste might not like Buckley on CD. I know several people of this persuasion.

But I saw him live twice - if he couldn't win you over, you just don't know a fucking thing about music. That guy probably shouldn't even be let into music stores for fear that his crap taste is infectious.

What about Steely Dan? For some reason they've got a fairly substantial following (and a fucking grammy) for a band with such soulless near-muzak level material.

I cannot understate how much I fucking hate Steely Dan. It's somewhat irrational, I know, but I hate them so goddamn much that it upsets me.

Speaking of angry - what kind of universe do we live in that some jackass who has the big, shiny stones to dismiss Jeff Buckley in public (when there could be people like me afoot) gets to see him live while I (whose senior-year nervous breakdown was fueled by Grace and a huge collection of bootlegs) didn't find out about him until about two years after he died? Something, something is decidedly off-kilter.

I possible have suspect music taste because I have an intense dislike of Jeff Buckley. I think it's some sort of Pavolvian trigger response, but because I had so many people try and enforce the idea of Hallelujah being the essence of god in musical form I kinda grew to resent the poor guy without really hearing his work. I can just about make it through Grace, but it's a hard album for me to find any feelings for.

I don't think that disliking Jeff Buckley makes someone's taste questionable. I understand that he's not for everyone. But something about the dismissal that Count Floyd described rubs me the wrong way.

For what it's worth, I don't think that Hallelujah is really the way into Buckley's work, though it sounds like you've tried other approaches.

You are, as always, entirely correct, but I had to share and it didn't quite merit a new thread. It is indeed far worse than suspect taste, though.

Spike, there's nothing wrong with not digging Jeff Buckley. I definitely have to be in a particular mood myself. It's seeing him live and not being able to at least objectively observe, "Well Jesus Christ, that was fucking impressive." I kept it short in the original post but here are a few of his other pithy observations:

"The Lost Songs of Danzig? Never heard of them. I don't even know the found ones."

(Something sarcastic about Ozzy Osbourne that I don't recall)

(Holding up an Elvis collection) "Here, something fresh and new!"

Nothing was spared his rapier tongue! It was like lunch at the Algonquin, I tell you.

Also, the Buckley performance was apparently "one of those shows were you go to see the main act at 10:30 and have to sit through like four other bands".

Steely Dan is great. Seriously - I used to hate them, but in the last year they've become one of my favorites.

The first time I saw Buckley (months before Grace was released) it was in much the same circumstances - he was the first opener on a four-band bill with Soundgarden headlining. The amphitheatre was only about a quarter full when he went on, and only about half of us there seemed to "get" it. At this point, a lot of meatheads had gotten into Soundgarden, I guess.

Then Tad went on, blew out half the speakers on our side of the amphitheatre, and left Eleven and Soundgarden with crappy sound for the rest of the night. The meatheads didn't seem to mind.

Timing is everything, it appears.

You seem surprised that soulless near-muzak level material wouldn't appeal to the masses. Some view it as yacht-rock at its finest - unobtrusive and smooth to the ear.

Which is sorta what makes it fucking brilliant - they seem to coast along like Mike Bolton on Xanax, but lyrically they're putting some great stuff in there, subversive as all hell.

Plus I recall getting so....fucking.....hiiiiiiiiiiiigh one day and listening to "Do It Again" about 7 times in a row (fortunately, I was living alone so nobody was subjected to this, else I wouldn't be here to relate the story) and the production was just immmaculate - listening to each instrument just doin' its thing that wouldn't appear to fit in with the others, but actually fits in PERFECTLY speaks to Fagen/Becker's talent as arrangers and producers.

Plus Becker can rattle off some pretty impressive solos to boot - musically, the players have always been a cut above.

At least, those are my justifications for enjoying a band that at face value most assume I would perform an Ed Norton-esque face-stomping upon.

A friend of mine loves Steely Dan. He's gradually been trying to turn me onto them for a while. I've come to like the couple of Aja songs I currently have on my iPod. If nothing else, you've gotta give them credit for being remarkably intricate musicians. Those guys are tighter than a mosquito's ass. My verdict is still not out on them yet, though. I think of them as a mellow rock band with jazzy instrumentation. While listening to their live album, Alive in America a couple of nights ago, it became stunningly obvious to me how much they influenced Trey Anastasio and probably Phish. Almost to the point where I'd say if you dislike Phish, steer clear of Steely Dan. On the other hand, give them a try before dismissing them as stiff light-rock. Guess who else doesn't suck? Paul Simon. If you disagree, I'd like to know your opinion of Graceland.

About Jeff Buckley, I remember the first time I saw the video for Last Goodbye. How floored I was by that beautiful voice. I know that was his biggest hit (his only hit?), but to this day - I love that song to pieces. Later, when the Mystery White Boy live album came out, I made it my first Buckley purchase. While I could appreciate the raw soul he put into his performances, somehow I didn't "get it" based on that disc alone. It really took listening to Grace and Live At Sin-e for me to fully embrace his music. I believe one of the things that set Buckley apart from most of his "peers" is that he played completely by his own rules. He really wasn't aping anyone else's sound - past or present. He didn't mind stretching his vocal cords either. And he'd carry those high notes shamelessly beyond what other male vocalists would dare try in front of an audience. He was an audacious, heartfelt and fearless artist. Over time, I've come to love him for that. He's the type you've got to be willing to open yourself up to for a while before it clicks, in my opinion. But even as a big fan, I've got to be in the mood for his stuff. I've come to find that his songs are especially effective when you've just had your heart broken and battered with a sledgehammer.

To me, Steely Dan belongs with The Eagles and Fleetwood Mac as pop music before my time that doesn't survive its era. When I was getting into purchasing music, at around ten or so, it was The Beatles, and then stuff like Ac/DC or Led Zepplin or The Dead Kennedys (which are awesome when you are 12) Without the nostalgia for their music, and having heard it either in soundtracks or in supermarkets, it strikes me as facile.

I hate Phish. I love Steely Dan.

That seems odd to me, but alright.

I don't know if I'd call it "aping," but a lot of critics initially leaped on his Robert Plant-isms, and, with the dynamics and Eastern-sounding chord stuff he did sometimes, I definitely caught a strong Zeppelin vibe even the first time I saw him and his band. You can also hear quite a bit of Nina Simone in his delivery. Even on Grace, he was just a great synthesizer of his influences, but he really started developing his own voice after that album. Mind you, he was still quite original in the melding of some very disparate influences, but those influences are very, very audible.

I'm kind of back-and-forth on Steely Dan. They're one of those bands with a rabid fanbase that largely doesn't seem to get the band on the level that critics (and presumably the band) want them to be gotten on, and I have to admit that fanbase makes them all the less appealing. The subversive lyrics that Chavez cites are a neat trick, but the irony's not only lost on tons of their listeners, but the words also aren't quite as clever as the band seems to think they are. On the other hand, I like the idea that Becker and Fagen supposedly recruited these top notch session guys, then intentionally exhausted them so that the performances would be simultaneously perfect and sort of wasted sounding. And they did manage to crank out some good songs, although the smoothness can be off-putting.

I like them miles more than Phish, though.

Paul Simon can be great, musically, and has been good, lyrically, but I remember pissing off a friend once by telling him that Graceland is a marvelous album in spite of its lyrics (which are mostly meaningless bullshit), not because of them. What I heard from his last album is awful, though.

Sure, everyone has influences. But perhaps I feel stronger about your comment than even you do:

...he was still quite original in the melding of some very disparate influences.

Because when a musician can do that with enough success, along with something unique to their own "voice", that's original enough for me. And while the Plant/Zeppelin influence is undeniable, it's a lot more apparent on certain songs than others. In a lot of cases, I don't hear it at all.

Not that there hasn't been good discussion here, but it feels all kinds of backwards discussing Jeff Buckley in a thread named Suspect Music: Mediocre Taste.

I love Steely Dan, even though their output is seriously inconsistent. Steely Dan, at least to me, is something that transcends both Becker and Fagen: both of them, when on their own, are really nothing special. They put out minimalist pop, with catchy, ironic lyrics, but overall they're not doing anything special. Steely Dan is really one of those bands that I think changed rock in a way that they became very much the epitome of the "studio sound," this kind of very smooth sounding rock perfected by intense production. They cross over to a point where their shit almost doesn't feel like music: everything is just too precise, from the rhymes to the hooks. I feel very much the same way about Squeeze, who are even more inconsistent (up to a point where the only album I feel like owning by them is their Greatest Hits... one of maybe 4 greatest hits albums I own).

Now I pretty much hate the studio sound... I don't want these immaculate recordings. I want the hisses, pops, flubbed lines, mistuned guitars. I want something that makes the music feel alive. I think the beauty of Steely Dan is that underneath this sugary, antiseptic pop muzak layer they are usually crafting some seriously dark shit. Now this is not always true, but even then, their lyrics have a weird kind of charm that elevates them beyond their simple pop trappings. I feel the same way about the early They Might Be Giants records (I'm thinking first three).

I also really enjoy Steely Dan because they really brought tons of different styles of music (most notably jazz) seamlessly into rock. They were able to do a lot of very experimental work under the guise of catchy pop. They basically decided that they could have fun and be diverse, but just make it approachable to the average joe. I guess some people could argue by doing so, they "watered down" these genres, to which I can't provide a great argument other than I enjoy their music for what it is: simple pop with great lyrics masking a duo's intentions to experiment with a diverse range of musical styles. I can't understand the fanaticism though: they have two pretty terrible albums (The Royal Scam and Gaucho) though Kid Charlemagne, one of their best songs, is on Royal Scam, and their new stuff is atrocious. Still, they're an important band in the evolution of rock.

Also: I’m not quite sure if Phish drew much inspiration from Steely Dan, as much as they did from something like Little Feat, a band of eclectic funk-rockers (at times a sort of odd jam band cum Steely Dan mashup), who Phish covered frequently. Not really a big Phish fan, though some of their live stuff is pretty great. Little Feat is perhaps one of the most overlooked bands of the 70s (Time Loves a Hero is just aces).

I'm a Jeff Buckley fan, but I can totally understand your point. Hallelujah is way overhyped, and it's frustrating whenever people overhype a certain "entry point" song. There were bands I didn't get into at first because I didn't love what song the majority considered a classic.

That includes NIN: Closer, New Order: Blue Monday, Smiths: How Soon is Now.

So glad Jeff Buckley died.

Hey, maybe you overheard Devin?

Firstly, Devin is WAY too cool to go to a music store.

Secondly, I have to agree with the Steely Dan respect on this board. I used to really, really hate their music. But over time I was able to enjoy them for what they are: catchy yacht rock. That's the thing: you have to respect artists for what they are. Not everyone makes introspective, indie rock and that's okay. There's a time and a place for all types of music. Sometimes artists aren't able to achieve what they set out to do. In that instance, the band becomes crap.

That being said, I will never get into screamo music. Anyone who has a screamo album deserves a long, serious time-out.

I'm not giving anyone credit for being good at making crappy music just because that's their intention.

There aren't any bands out there that make me feel more embarrassed for being white than Steely Dan. I just think of a lot of middle-aged guys in brightly colored polos or Tommy Bahama shirts drinking femme beverages and talking about their kids' soccer game.

My brother recently got into Steely Dan. All I can compete with is my unironic love for George Benson's BREEZIN', which I give lyrics to when driving. Those lyrics mostly consist of me saying "fuckin' your bitch in the ass-hole" to the "chorus."

The best thing that can be said about his death is that it prevented a generation of musicians from having to suffer by comparison.

Why? The music's what it is, whether the Browncoats get it or not. I'm not a musical theorist, or a music critic, but I know style and skill when I hear it. It's very evocative music. Who cares what other people get out of it?

Even the best lyrics rarely are.

I heard they were just really picky. Pickiness pays off, because you'll rarely find tighter recordings than Steely Dan albums.

Yeah, but 'I Know What I Know' is great fun to sing just because of the way the words sound.

So sad you didn't[/FaraciHater]


Hey, it was a fuckin' meatball over the plate.

Your embarrassment for being white should really begin and end with yo'bad se'f.

This one strikes a chord with me, because I'm in a Zevon mode at the moment - and I don't think too many would argue that Zevon's lyrics weren't half as clever as he thought they were.


Then again, they were more clever than most by about half, so mileage, as always, varies.

I'm not saying it's a rational response. I think most here would admit to the same problem with the Dead, even after being told that the music is incredible or whatever.

I don't think that's true. Most of the best lyricists (Dylan, Costello, Waits, etc.) tend to come off as pretty humble in both their delivery and in the way they discuss lyrics in interviews. With Steely Dan, there's always this patina of "we're putting one over on you because we're so oh-so-clever." Also, this may just be my impression, but they often seem to loathe their song's protagonists for their lack of sophistication. Costello and Dylan did this, too, early on, but at least they had the decency to sound mad about the stupidity - with Steely Dan, it comes off as more smug, generally. As if it's kind of good that these fictional people are dumb, because it makes us look cooler.

Undoubtedly, that's part of it, too, but I remember reading that that unusual mix of relaxed and almost inhumanly precise was a deliberate result of that technique I described.

Agreed. A lot of Graceland's lyrics are fun. They're just not particularly meaningful, which is what my friend was arguing.

I'm not insisting on a rational response, I just want to know why the other fans play into it for you. I don't think you can give a wrong answer.

I like their stories. Which is what Steely Dan songs are, for the most part.

I really don't care if the artists are humble or not. I understand one of their session guitarists is a rock-solid conservative. So what? Neil Peart is, or was, a pretty strident Libertarian. I like most of the lyrics he's written over his career, and his drumming is a pleasure to listen to. I wouldn't vote for him, but I'll buy his music. What does it matter if he's a nice guy or not?

I get the impression they didn't enjoy their stay in California too much. I'm not in a position to know for sure, but I imagine lots of people are disillusioned with the shallow people they find in the entertainment business and the surrounding culture.

I never got that out of it.

Okay, but so what? They aren't the only control freaks to ever set foot in a recording studio. I don't see that as a criticism. It might have made them hard to work with, but that's not my problem. It sure isn't a strike against the music they made. Is Aliens any better or worse a movie because James Cameron is a bastard on the set?


They probably meant something to Paul Simon.

I think I gave one. The fans are annoying, overstate the greatness of the band, and thus color the music, of which I'm only occasionally fond anyway, negatively.

Right. But they're told with a haughty narrative voice that I find troubling.

I'm not really talking about whether the artists are humble or nice - the loathing I mentioned is inherent in the song. I'm talking about the narrative voice they use in their lyric-writing. Fagen and Becker might be the greatest, down-to-Earth, humble guys in the business, but their music doesn't come off that way. The narrator often sounds like an asshole telling stories about the dumb people he knows. Maybe it's supposed to be an indictment of the narrator, too, but I don't care, because, unlike the great unreliable narrators (Humbert Humbert, for instance) he's not interesting enough for me to listen to him despite him being a jerk.

Well, that's something to build a career on.

I wasn't criticizing. That recording technique is original, at least, and the fact that there was this weird aesthetic plan at the heart of the recording sessions is one of the positives I find in Steely Dan.

That big blotch of red, blue, and yellow crayon on a three year old's piece of paper means something to the three year old, too. I don't have a problem with impenetrable lyrics - like I said, I just had a problem with my friend claiming that they were meaningful (i.e. in the general sense, not to the author).

Little Feat are still going, actually, although without slide-guitarist/singer/slapstick lyricist Lowell George, who sadly died in 1979. I saw them play a few years ago, and they're a really excellent live band.

As to their albums, Time Loves a Hero really isn't the best. Try their eponymous first album, Dixie Chicken, or Feats Don't Fail Me Now for the best of their material. The live album, Waiting for Columbus, is also excellent.

Some George-era Feat can be found on Youtube, for instance

Rock n Roll Doctor and Fat Man in the Bathtub, both recorded for British TV in 1975. Plus this version of Cold, Cold, Cold, which has such a blistering solo from George that it's easy to see why he's regarded as one of the greatest slide guitarists of all time.

Well, okay. I'm sort of unsure how they color the music, but taste is subjective.

Troubling? You're easily troubled, but again, taste is subjective.

I see. I don't really sympathize, but I understand.


Okay, but I disagree.


Write what you know. And I think they've built a career on their musicianship.

Yes, they are very talented and very professional. I don't think anyone's confused on that score.

Tell him Graceland's lyrics remind me of a children's book. They aren't terribly profound, no. I don't understand why someone would listen to Graceland for the lyrics anyway.

I've pretty much given up on their post-George material, which I don't find all that impressive.

My favorite Little Feat album is Time Loves a Hero (and it probably always will be), though their early stuff is certainly their most ground-breaking/influential.