I Can Speak American
During the taping of the last AP podcast, Scott Heisel accused me of being elderly because I allegedly used "ancient references." He played this cultural arrogance card because I referred to Hayley Williams as "a teen Holly Hunter in a frightwig." Apparently he doesn't know who Holly Hunter is. Although I take partial blame because I totally blanked on the name of the show she stars in (Saving Grace returns mid-July on TNT), it didn't stop me from wanting to snap a microphone stand over his head. (What, nobody saw A Life Less Ordinary? Come on, people! That soundtrack has "Deadweight," my favorite Beck song.)
So while Scott was giving me crap about my seemingly arcane references, I started thinking about the cultural malady of tabula rasa. "Tabula rasa" is Latin for "clean slate," which essentially posits that all one knows about the world is what he/she experiences personally. If you were a little kid, you wouldn't know the dangers of putting your hand near a running mower blade unless an adult explained it to you. If you don't know about it, it doesn't exist.
Now I'm the first one to demand each generation must create and define their own culture. These days, it seems said culture is defined by the same five bands. Now before you think I'm merely a grumpy-assed jamoke, please realize I am not alone. In last year's podcast with Underoath, Tim McTague called me (and AP) out for not writing about bands he thought were exceptionally creative, specifically Sigur Ros. When I told him we did a multi-page feature on the Icelandic outfit in support of their Takk disc to virtually no response, all he could do was shake his head sadly. I recently hung out with an up-and-coming band who had no time for Panic At The Disco's Ryan Ross and his proclamations of maturing to the sounds of the Beatles and the Beach Boys. "You're supposed to listen to those bands when you're a kid, so you realize the possibilities of what you can do with music," said one of the members of the anonymous upstart band. "Not at 19. They're still better than Third Eye Blind, I guess." Ever wonder why certain members of bona fide ass-stompers Every Time I Die prefer Bjork and Massive Attack to some assembly-line screamo outfit?
Music listeners shouldn't just "settle" for what's given to them (that's the kind of thinking that made those assclowns in Nickelback millionaires). If you don't demand that the bar be raised, you are going to be forever saddled with crap so lame, it will drive you back toward your parents' Led Zeppelin discs. If you are in a band, you have a responsibility to not only avoid sucking, but the good sense to delve deeper into the history of your craft. Don't wait for a car commercial to show you what you've been missing: Go see what's out there!
I promise this will be the only time I blog while listening to Sky Eats Airplane.
7 Comments:
I agree 100%.
It's tiring when I talk about new music and the response is generally "Is it on the radio? If not- I'm sorry I don't have time for some alterna crap."
It's weird when people rip classic rock, saying it's too old. It's sad.
I guess I'm ancient.
For the record not every radio band is bad because they've found a way to be more popular then their contemporaries. For every Nickelback clone that my preferred hard rock station plays, it will sometimes be followed by an Against Me. Point being, that because a band has found mainstream sucess is no reason to write them off. Listen to the radio once in a while and youll hear a band you and your coworkers/friends can agree on.
Also, listening to Jason and Scott bicker on the ap podcast is the best way to star my work day. I wish you guys would put those out twice as often.
Jason, your blog this week touched a certain nerve, but in a good way. Over the past three years I've been in college I've been searching for new music - the piles of post-its, papers, stickies on my mac all filled with music to look in to.It's a tiresome task I love to do, and I promise to hold music to a higher standard.
I must admit that your Every Time I Die allusion had me befuddled, but even as I am typing this response it just clicked... So now, all of the tiresome work I have done will perhaps take a new turn to find bands that fill my tabula rosa in between the lines already there.
Any artist wishing to make new music has no need to listen to what came before. Punk rock doesn't require a learner's permit. Billy Ray Cyrus didn't make a name for himself by making music based on Hank or Merle. He owes his success in part to the motivational tapes he listened to everyday in his car (NPR interview circa 1992)
You have a point. I also remember the days when Alternative Nation was worshipping the Prodigy's FAT OF THE LAND, and all I could think was, "Jesus, these are Ministry demos minus the inspiration." The ethos of Punk clearly dictates "anyone can do it." Thing is, not everyone SHOULD.
I can only wonder how little Miley would've fared if Pops Montana would have played her, say, the Rhino Handmade edition of FUN HOUSE.
Maybe the photos Annie Liebowitz took for Vanity Fair would have been a bit more shocking.
Nobody wants to see a 14 year old rolling in glass and that's part of my (and your) point. Had they done their homework, Billy and spawn could use Iggy's inspirational fury and innovation to be uniquely creative with the unimaginable power they now wield over the pre-teen set. Maybe make something these kids might want to listen to in the future for more than looking like a corporate tool during karaoke.
And that goes double for the bands you mentioned in your original post. The counter-culture exists for many reasons including lighting the way to new ideas; building upon and challenging that which has come before.
And of course I'm dismissing Miley without hearing more than what I was subjected to in the Disney store at the mall.
I have somewhat mixed feelings about this post. I am a fan of the new Panic at the Disco album, I think it was a bold step for them to cut out their previous distorted sound and I think they've definitely made an improvement and they deserve some credit for that. I also feel that it's unfair to say that all radio bands are bad- and even though a majority of them are rather shallow and unoriginal they're a starting point for people to branch out and find the music they like.
However I'm always surprised to see how closed-minded people are to music that isn't played on every radio station in the developed world. I think everyone should be more motivated to find the best music they can, whether it's from this decade or last decades or two decades ago, whether it plays in the radio or exists only on a solitary myspace page. It's out there for people who care.
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