Unpopular Musical Opinions

Philly_Q · September 2023

DefaultM said:

My wife hates all live albums. She says its like listening to a greatest hits album with worse sound quality.
I agree with some they just end up sounding flat, but I enjoy ones like Ozzy Tribute where's a bit of improv on the parts.

Absolutely, there are some great live albums. I just think some bands release too many of them, and it seems to go hand-in-hand with the cycle of taking so long between studio releases. I buy the live albums but to be honest I hardly ever listen to them.

In the early days Rush would release a live LP after a "cycle" of maybe three or four studio albums are that seemed the right kind of balance to me. In the case of All the World's a Stage, I bought that before I bought the early studio albums and I still prefer the live versions.

Also, back then in the 1970s, studio albums often sounded a bit feeble so for certain bands the live recordings would show them in their best light - Thin Lizzy, UFO, Rory Gallagher, the first Scorpions lineup. The Wishbone Ash live albums are great. Robin Trower Live is probably my favourite album ever.

Since you mentioned Ozzy, Talk Of The Devil, with Brad Gillis on guitar, is my absolute favourite Ozzy album. It came out about the same time as Black Sabbath's Live Evil and I love the contrast between the two approaches to the same songs.

Offset · September 2023

If we're talking live LPs, my two all-time faves are UFO's 'Strangers In The Night' and Talking Heads' 'Stop Making Sense'. Both are certified 24 carat classics. They're live albums for people who don't like live albums.

darthed1981 · September 2023

ICBM said:

darthed1981 said:

Shrews said:

The Mercury Music Prize is laughable.

Not sure if that is an unpopular opinion actually.

Evidence:

M People - Elegant Slumming, when in the same year there was Parklife and His n Hers
Gomez - Bring It on, when in the same year there was Urban Hymns

And the creme de la creme of all travesties..

Portishead - Dummy, at the expense of one of the greatest debut albums of all time - Definitely Maybe.

It's very much personal though.

The 90s were incredibly strong for mainstream British rock, two of the Britpop big four won at least.

If you want a real travesty, Roni Size's album of tssking and beeping noises beat sodding OK Computer in 1997!!

Every album mentioned here is shit.

You did say unpopular opinions…

(Actually slight exaggeration, His ‘n’ Hers is OK, although not their best album.)

Little secret...

A lot of the time when people go on here about X artist from the 70s, not the big ones we all like a few songs from like Led Zep but the 2nd division, I often listen to a tune or two and think "yep, that's definitely some more 70s rock".

Not that I think much of it is actual shit (I save that for things that clearly are not things I just don't like) but my reaction is just "meh".

It's what I also find funny when I see 100k songs a day are uploaded to Spotify.

Most things from any single perspective are staggeringly mediocre.

Haych · September 2023

Philly_Q said:
Since Rush were mentioned, I do have one gripe - they released far too many live albums! It was almost one live for every studio in the latter years. Iron Maiden are guilty of the same thing.

In their latter years I’d have to agree. After the Vapor Trails tour it seemed to be a case that there would be a live album for every tour.

I haven’t heard many of them, I didn’t rate the production on the ones I have heard, especially from recordings of outdoor concerts.

A Show of Hands is a perfect live album that accurately represents their sound and that particular era. After that the live recordings went south for me.

scrumhalf · September 2023

Graham Bond Organisation live at Klook's Kleek is a fantastic album by a brilliant band.

Rory's Live In Europe, Irish Tour and Beat Club Sessions are all top notch.

I tend to prefer live bootlegs, less mucking about with the sound.

Philly_Q · September 2023

darthed1981 said:
Little secret...

A lot of the time when people go on here about X artist from the 70s, not the big ones we all like a few songs from like Led Zep but the 2nd division, I often listen to a tune or two and think "yep, that's definitely some more 70s rock".

Not that I think much of it is actual shit (I save that for things that clearly are not things I just don't like) but my reaction is just "meh".

That's probably a lot of the stuff I keep banging on about.

darthed1981 · September 2023

Philly_Q said:

darthed1981 said:
Little secret...

A lot of the time when people go on here about X artist from the 70s, not the big ones we all like a few songs from like Led Zep but the 2nd division, I often listen to a tune or two and think "yep, that's definitely some more 70s rock".

Not that I think much of it is actual shit (I save that for things that clearly are not things I just don't like) but my reaction is just "meh".

That's probably a lot of the stuff I keep banging on about.

It's all subjective, one person's masterpiece is another's poison, yet we all try and make "objective" judgements, a bit daft really.

MaxA867 · September 2023

stickyfiddle said:

MaxA867 said:

All bands and artists should have a maximum four album limit. No one needs, wants or indeed makes, a ground breaking 9th album.

A lot of bands should stop after 2!

But plenty get better with age - Jason Isbell's new one is his 9th and one of his best. Sticky Fingers was the Stones' 9th. The White Album is #9. Achtung Baby and In Rainbows are both #7. Out of Time & Automatic for the People are 7 & 8.

I think the best suggestion is "bands and artists should know when to stop"

Haha. I jest obviously, and you’re absolutely right with that last sentiment. But I will qualify that Jason Isbell knows about this rule and has gamed the system, half of his are just under Jason Isbell and half are under Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit…

Timcito · September 2023

Cranky said:

Timcito said:

Cranky said:

Timcito said:

One opinion I've often seen on the Internet is that there is great modern pop/rock music if only we know where to look. If this is true, then it continues to elude me ... My feeling is that musical genres have their day and then eventually sink into the background, endlessly rehashing old achievements. It happened with blues, jazz, the big bands, even classical music. How many people have a collection of modern classical composers compared with those who have Beethoven, Tchaikovsky, and Vivaldi in their collection?

Those of us who were musically lucky enough to have been young in either the 50s, 60s or 70s experienced a blossoming of rock/pop music which young people of today do not and likely never will enjoy. .

So, basically “to be young again.”

Thing is, there are millions of young people loving their new music as we speak. It’s all fine.

Not sure what your first sentence is supposed to mean.

Sure, no doubt there are young people enjoying their music today. However, if they are listening to modern incarnations of the pop-rock genre, I think they are listening to weak reformulations of stuff that was once fresh, cutting edge and inspired from decades ago. Nothing wrong with that - artistic genres continue to give pleasure long after their creative bloom has passed.

It means that your point is purely psychological; we all like the things of our youth, it’s a force of nature. Nobody is more or less “musically lucky” than anyone else. Youngsters today mostly want you/us to shove rock/pop (which in itself was already a watered down, sped up blooz) up our arses.

Our childhoods aren’t their futures. Nor could we afford it to be so.

I respectfully beg to differ. Sure we all love the things of our youth, but I think it would be optimism bordering on personality disorder to suggest that modern pop-rock is still producing music of the calibre and magnitude of such as Sgt Pepper, Exile on Main Street, or Ziggy Stardust.

Cranky · September 2023

Timcito said:

Cranky said:

Timcito said:

Cranky said:

Timcito said:

One opinion I've often seen on the Internet is that there is great modern pop/rock music if only we know where to look. If this is true, then it continues to elude me ... My feeling is that musical genres have their day and then eventually sink into the background, endlessly rehashing old achievements. It happened with blues, jazz, the big bands, even classical music. How many people have a collection of modern classical composers compared with those who have Beethoven, Tchaikovsky, and Vivaldi in their collection?

Those of us who were musically lucky enough to have been young in either the 50s, 60s or 70s experienced a blossoming of rock/pop music which young people of today do not and likely never will enjoy. .

So, basically “to be young again.”

Thing is, there are millions of young people loving their new music as we speak. It’s all fine.

Not sure what your first sentence is supposed to mean.

Sure, no doubt there are young people enjoying their music today. However, if they are listening to modern incarnations of the pop-rock genre, I think they are listening to weak reformulations of stuff that was once fresh, cutting edge and inspired from decades ago. Nothing wrong with that - artistic genres continue to give pleasure long after their creative bloom has passed.

It means that your point is purely psychological; we all like the things of our youth, it’s a force of nature. Nobody is more or less “musically lucky” than anyone else. Youngsters today mostly want you/us to shove rock/pop (which in itself was already a watered down, sped up blooz) up our arses.

Our childhoods aren’t their futures. Nor could we afford it to be so.

I respectfully beg to differ. Sure we all love the things of our youth, but I think it would be optimism bordering on personality disorder to suggest that modern pop-rock is still producing music of the calibre and magnitude of such as Sgt Pepper, Exile on Main Street, or Ziggy Stardust.

Yes. I get it. They don’t make them like they used to.

You just don’t seem to grasp the sociality of your own psychic makeup, which is the only thing driving your opinion on any of this. All you are really saying is, “I was young then, but not now,” which isn’t very interesting.

I will give you this. You are wrong on caliber, but probably correct on magnitude because our choices in music are so much more diverse and expansive now than they were in the 60s-80s. Pop rock simply doesn’t have the same market share as it used to, and rightly so. There’s also the fact that music is an industry, a function of the marketplace, which is increasingly global and complex, so the amount of music you don’t like is going to grow at least as large as the amount of music that you do like.

With the Beatles and Stones especially, you’re talking about bands that dominated a new, small but growing industry that catered to an unusually large, fairly homogeneous and entitled generation of youth.

As a 90s kid, I feel like I’m getting the best of it all because I’ve got one foot in the pre-90s realm and another post-90s. But 9.5x out of 10 I’m playing Radiohead, Foo Fighters, Orgone, St. Vincent, Strokes, Cage the Elephant, Tame Impala or something like that over the Beatles, because it’s higher caliber to me. I never cared about the Stones. I listen to the Kinks more than the Beatles. Stuff like Bowie, U2 and Costello get decent airtime in my house. As does hiphop, edm, funk and jazz. But the bands I specifically listed are all high-caliber pop rock bands. Maybe they don’t have 4 frontmen like the Beatles did, but they make no lesser music for it.

Surely you understand how pointless, childish and wrong it would be for either of us to say “if you don’t understand that A is better than B then you just don’t get it”. Today’s pop rock is fine, even if it is comparatively sidelined. What kids are doing with guitars these days is incredible.

stickyfiddle · September 2023

MaxA867 said:

stickyfiddle said:

MaxA867 said:

All bands and artists should have a maximum four album limit. No one needs, wants or indeed makes, a ground breaking 9th album.

A lot of bands should stop after 2!

But plenty get better with age - Jason Isbell's new one is his 9th and one of his best. Sticky Fingers was the Stones' 9th. The White Album is #9. Achtung Baby and In Rainbows are both #7. Out of Time & Automatic for the People are 7 & 8.

I think the best suggestion is "bands and artists should know when to stop"

Haha. I jest obviously, and you’re absolutely right with that last sentiment. But I will qualify that Jason Isbell knows about this rule and has gamed the system, half of his are just under Jason Isbell and half are under Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit…

He's a clever one?

PetGerbil · September 2023

The music of my youth wasn't better, Being young was better.

Timcito · September 2023

Cranky said:

Timcito said:
I respectfully beg to differ. Sure we all love the things of our youth, but I think it would be optimism bordering on personality disorder to suggest that modern pop-rock is still producing music of the calibre and magnitude of such as Sgt Pepper, Exile on Main Street, or Ziggy Stardust.

Yes. I get it. They don’t make them like they used to.

You just don’t seem to grasp the sociality of your own psychic makeup, which is the only thing driving your opinion on any of this. All you are really saying is, “I was young then, but not now,” which isn’t very interesting.

I will give you this. You are wrong on caliber, but probably correct on magnitude because our choices in music are so much more diverse and expansive now than they were in the 60s-80s. Pop rock simply doesn’t have the same market share as it used to, and rightly so. There’s also the fact that music is an industry, a function of the marketplace, which is increasingly global and complex, so the amount of music you don’t like is going to grow at least as large as the amount of music that you do like.

With the Beatles and Stones especially, you’re talking about bands that dominated a new, small but growing industry that catered to an unusually large, fairly homogeneous and entitled generation of youth.

As a 90s kid, I feel like I’m getting the best of it all because I’ve got one foot in the pre-90s realm and another post-90s. But 9.5x out of 10 I’m playing Radiohead, Foo Fighters, Orgone, St. Vincent, Strokes, Cage the Elephant, Tame Impala or something like that over the Beatles, because it’s higher caliber to me. I never cared about the Stones. I listen to the Kinks more than the Beatles. Stuff like Bowie, U2 and Costello get decent airtime in my house. As does hiphop, edm, funk and jazz. But the bands I specifically listed are all high-caliber pop rock bands. Maybe they don’t have 4 frontmen like the Beatles did, but they make no lesser music for it.

Surely you understand how pointless, childish and wrong it would be for either of us to say “if you don’t understand that A is better than B then you just don’t get it”. Today’s pop rock is fine, even if it is comparatively sidelined. What kids are doing with guitars these days is incredible.

It's a thread on unpopular musical opinions, and I have an unpopular musical opinion. I think the idea of the thread was more to air the opinions than to fight them out on the carpet!

I'll also echo the feelings expressed by someone here earlier about live albums, which may also be unpopular: that they are invariably a disaster. They remind me of occasions when a stage play, one performed at a theatre, is filmed and put on TV. It just doesn't work. The point about live performance is that it is 'live,' as in 'experienced at the moment of execution.' There is a magic in that which does not translate well to recording and posthumous appreciation. For that, we are usually (not always!) better off with the technical assistance of recording and film studios.

Cranky · September 2023

^^^ all true. I suppose it began when my summary of the point was pushed into the realm of “optimism bordering on personality disorder.” Somewhat beyond mere opinion.

I don’t find “kids these days” and “they don’t make them like they used to” to be unpopular opinions at all.

I, too, agree about live albums, with the exception of some MTV unplugged albums and Live at Leeds. I guess Foo Fighters have a decent live album (Skin and Bones, I think). Otherwise it’s always studio recordings for me.

darthed1981 · September 2023

Timcito said:
It's a thread on unpopular musical opinions, and I have an unpopular musical opinion. I think the idea of the thread was more to air the opinions than to fight them out on the carpet!

...and there was me polishing up my duelling pistols so you two could sort this out at dawn tomorrow...

stufisher · September 2023

Can't you just record Duelling Banjos together and upload it

Cranky · September 2023

Paolo Fresu plays a better horn than Miles Davis.

Philly_Q · September 2023

Cranky said:

Paolo Fresu plays a better horn than Miles Davis.

Well, I'm certainly not in a position to argue about that...

Timcito · September 2023

darthed1981 said:

Timcito said:
It's a thread on unpopular musical opinions, and I have an unpopular musical opinion. I think the idea of the thread was more to air the opinions than to fight them out on the carpet!

...and there was me polishing up my duelling pistols so you two could sort this out at dawn tomorrow...

Yes, I think the point that these are 'unpopular' opinions somehow got lost in the mix. Being an ultra-uncool dad and saying the best rock and pop music was made decades ago is not exactly the flavour of the month in these affirming and inclusive times in which we live!

Reverend · September 2023

Americans did punk better

Cranky · September 2023

Reverend said:

Americans did punk better

This is something I’ve been wondering about.

Wire and Gang of Four are my favorites, but then yeah I am mainly listening to American punk after that. But there’s plenty of both Brit and American that I haven’t heard.

Philly_Q · September 2023

OK, this is sparked by something I just heard on the radio.

Prince. The artist formerly known as. I can't stand him.

I'm sure he was a towering musical talent, I'm not saying all those people who hail him as a genius are idiots, I know many people on here are fans... but I can't listen to him. No doubt there would be individual tracks in his oeuvre I would like, but the general style and sound, his persona, that bloody voice of his... Just no. It's not for me.

Lewy · September 2023

I love bluegrass but Bill Monroe's singing sounded like a fire in a pet shop.

Cranky · September 2023

Psychocandy is the actual best album of the 1980s

stufisher · October 2023

Clapton is all show no go ... utter turd music ... living in some time-warped past. God is boring.

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