Artists who are at once the most common denominator and also considered the best in their field?

Bit of a thought-bubble on a Tuesday lunchtime...

For want of a better way to phrase this, here's an example:

As a horror fan, I realised I'd never actually read any Stephen King until recently.

Why? Well here's an analogy: He's the Bob Marley of horror. He is pretty much considered the greatest in his field.

And yet there's always been something so obvious and prevalent about him that I'd somehow ended up avoiding his work in favour of authors like Thomas Ligotti, Clive Barker, Paul Tremblay, and countless other renowned but lesser-celebrated authors.

It's only recently that I told myself how ridiculous it was that I'd spent so long not reading King. So I got a copy of Pet Sematary, and lo and behold it's fantastic! Why should I be surprised?

And I think the Bob Marley analogy works: I've spent the last 25 years immersed in reggae and Caribbean music. And as a fan of Jamaican music, when it comes to Bob Marley, have I listened to all his albums? Do I even know much about his work? No. I mean, I've absorbed the whole of Legend through pure osmosis, and at one point or another I think I've heard Exodus and Natty Dread, but somehow when it comes to the King of Reggae, this absolute titan, I know comparatively little.

And why is that? When I put on a Bob Marley record, I'm nonetheless blown away by the quality of the music. So why am I opting to listen to lesser-known singers like Horace Andy or Johnny Osbourne instead of the guy whos' largely considered the best?

Likely answer: Snobbery. Or at least, it's the feeling that if an artist or author is the biggest selling and most critically acclaimed in their fields, then the rule must be that their oeuvre must somehow be dissipated through the lens of commerciality: a watered-down or defanged version of the "real thing".

It happens a lot elsewhere: "True" rock fans commonly tend to dismiss such major-selling acts as Foo Fighters, Nickelback, Coldplay etc, for a reason: They're making bops for mainstreamers and part-timers - not for the true afficionados etc...

So what other artists, authors, bands etc could be said to come under the Stephen King / Bob Marley category of being at once the most commonly-regarded example in their field, but also live-up to those stakes?

There is an entire list of obvious names here: Aretha Franklin, Stevie Wonder, James Brown, Miles Davis, Ella Fitzgerald, The Beatles, The Beach Boys, Led Zepplin, Marvin Gaye, Chuck Berry… pick pretty much any well-known legacy artist who has really been enshrined in the pantheon and listen to them without your preconceived notions of what they are doing and by and large you will be astounded by them. It’s hard to imagine a world where they aren’t the default answer of many to “who is the greatest ___ of all-time” because that is what we’ve grown up with. Remove that and think about how wild it must have been to have these artists putting this music out there that strikes us as almost invisible because it’s so baked into the cultural fabric BEFORE they were the obvious choices.

Steven Spielberg

As I get older, this is one thing that irritates me about the “new is always better” mindset; I strongly disagree with the idea that you get diminishing returns from listening to something you already know. In fact, deeply engaging with things you already know sometimes highlights facets of the the performance or arrangement that deepen your understanding of the music. I feel music as a general thing we invite into our lives is important enough that we should strive to approach it with a “fresh ears” mindset regardless of how many times we’ve heard it before.

sondheim

I think Spielberg is a good answer to what I'm thinking here. Unlike, say, Stanley Kubrick, his commerciality often prevents him from being rated as one of the all-time great movie directors by "serious" cinema fans. It would almost be like a music critic saying The Beatles are their favourite band: It might be true, but do you want people to think you're that basic?

Shakespeare?

Works for sport too, by the way.

I don't agree that King is the best in his field at all! But I get what you're going for and will concede that he is an important figure and it sort of works (in which case Foo Fighters, Nickleback and Coldplay don't work at all - I don't know that many people would argue they're the best at what they do).

Shakespeare works despite me not really liking much of his oeuvre, got to allow that. Maybe Agatha Christie for mystery novels?

*Nickelback, I do apologise.

As to why, yes, there's definitely snobbery at play. There's also saturation - you feel like you know it already so you don't have to spend as much time on it.

The thing about Nickelback is that “How You Remind Me” is great and I think that song has buoyed the rest of their career

Stevie Wonder was the first that comes to mind

was also thinking in terms of guitar players, Eddie Van Halen?

I have definitely argued that the "big names" in Krautrock are in fact the best Krautrock acts - you're much better off listening to Can or Faust than Wallenstein or Emtidi, but I'm not sure that it's quite the same thing as the initial thread premise. Maybe a bit too micro-level, or that I'm not arguing for a single act's supremacy? Also the fact that I insist that La Düsseldorf are my favourites might fuck up the argument... yeah, probably doesn't work.

... no, I almost made the exact same post! I've been saying it for years, including on ILM.

I don't agree that King is the best in his field at all! But I get what you're going for and will concede that he is an important figure and it sort of works (in which case Foo Fighters, Nickleback and Coldplay don't work at all - I don't know that many people would argue they're the best at what they do).

No, that's what I mean - the latter bunch are more common examples of multi-million selling artists who are absolutely middle-of-the-road and most serious people wouldn't consider the best. Whereas I don't think it would be controversial to call Stephen King one of the best horror writers of all time: even if you might personally prefer other people, it would be weird to leave him off of a top ten or even top five list.

There's also saturation - you feel like you know it already so you don't have to spend as much time on it.

Yeah exactly. I didn't watch Alien for so many years because I'd seen so many parodies and pastiches over the years, "Yeah I know what happens, chestbursters, people trapped in webbed ziplocks etc", but until I actually sat down and watched it I just had no idea what a tremendous film it was.

Similarly, while I did grow up listening to Nirvana a lot, their legacy became so all-encompassing, and the sheer amount of times Unplugged got wheeled out following Kurt's death - that I would often forget how much they ROCKED! If I'm going to listen to music from that era these days, I'm much more likely to listen to Alice In Chains, Soundgarden, Screaming Trees or whatever because, well, do I need to listen to Nevermind again? But then I do listen to Nirvana and I'm kind of blown away by how great it sounds

I have definitely argued that the "big names" in Krautrock are in fact the best Krautrock acts - you're much better off listening to Can or Faust than Wallenstein or Emtidi, but I'm not sure that it's quite the same thing as the initial thread premise. Maybe a bit too micro-level, or that I'm not arguing for a single act's supremacy? Also the fact that I insist that La Düsseldorf are my favourites might fuck up the argument... yeah, probably doesn't work.

― emil.y, Tuesday, 29 April 2025 14:46 (thirty-eight minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

I think you're onto that here - like, you can dig deeper if you love that sound, but it would take a special kind of contrarian to tell someone who's interested in Krautrock not to listen to Can.

Like, with the Bob Marley thing, I'm still much more likely to listen to, and recommend, other reggae music. But there is something undeniable and even transcendent about his music that sets him apart and arguably above the genre his associated genre. There's a reason he's revered, and it's not because it's necessarily a sop to mainstream audiences (there are definite rock influences in some of his music, but it doesn't feel watered down)

Eno's ambient series

(xps) Years ago I dug very deep and came to the conclusion that I never want to listen to another crummy prog/jazz rock outfit, even if they do come from Baden-Wurttemberg.

the latter bunch are more common examples of multi-million selling artists who are absolutely middle-of-the-road and most serious people wouldn't consider the best. Whereas I don't think it would be controversial to call Stephen King one of the best horror writers of all time: even if you might personally prefer other people, it would be weird to leave him off of a top ten

Oh, ha, sorry for misreading that. My brain is weird today. I can agree with all of this.

Aretha Franklin, Stevie Wonder, James Brown, Miles Davis, Ella Fitzgerald, The Beatles, The Beach Boys, Led Zeppelin, Marvin Gaye, Chuck Berry

It's hard for me to imagine any afficionado of the genres these acts represent suggesting a potential listener "skip" them...except I can imagine some real psychedelic snob suggesting Mutantes or something over the Beatles. I'm sure there are jazz, R&B, rock fans who wouldn't name these acts as their favourites, but in most cases they would be doing that from a position of (over-)familiarity.

As I get older, this is one thing that irritates me about the “new is always better” mindset; I strongly disagree with the idea that you get diminishing returns from listening to something you already know. In fact, deeply engaging with things you already know sometimes highlights facets of the the performance or arrangement that deepen your understanding of the music. I feel music as a general thing we invite into our lives is important enough that we should strive to approach it with a “fresh ears” mindset regardless of how many times we’ve heard it before.

― my favorite herbs are fennel and Drake (DJP), Tuesday, April 29, 2025 7:37 AM (three hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

DJP I love you
This is basically my credo for music listening

Wasn't the whole thing with Marley not so much about the quality of the music but that when international fame began he stopped paying attention to what was going on in Jamaica and as such his records felt a bit "behind", like if bands were still doing British Invasion style pop in 1968?

Yeah I do feel that Bob Marley is a bit unadventurous, when you think about everything else that went on with reggae in the 70s, he instead went in this roots singer songwriter direction, which, yes, often made for great music, but "the best" seems like a stretch.

xxp That said, even on ILM, a lot of people like to snipe on The Beatles. I can imagine a situation where, if asked the question "Who was the best band of the 60s", answering "The Beatles" would elicit a few groans. But just because someone might prefer The Byrds or Os Mutantes doesn't really mean The Beatles weren't worthy of their place as simultaneously a huge-selling act and objectively one of the best acts of their time.

On the other hand, Miles Davis is unquestionably one of the greatest jazz artists of all time, if not the greatest. But in terms of commerciality he is rivalled by people like Norah Jones and Kenny G: The former is well-regarded in certain ways but not usually held up as a ne plus ultra example of great jazz. The latter is considered a bit of a punchline, akin to Thomas Kinkade as an artist

A few years ago I dove deep into Louis Armstrong's catalog after only knowing "What A Wonderful World" and his 1920s recordings with the Hot Five and Hot Seven. I was amazed by the records he made in the 1950s. Albums like Satch Plays Fats and Louis Armstrong Plays W.C. Handy are some of the greatest music you'll ever hear in your life. And while it's common knowledge that he was an incredible trumpet player, when you actually listen, you can't believe what he's doing. Flawless execution, impeccable melodic sense, and raw power. Armstrong was a Bach-level composer in terms of how his solos fit together, and he was doing it on the fly. Just incredible. And the live recordings from the mid-50s are as good as the studio albums, often even better.

People might call it "basic" if a reggae or jazz critic said their favourite record was Legend or Kind of Blue, but less so if they said "the early Wailers singles" or Miles Smiles, etc.

It's much easier now to start your discovery of a genre with obscure artists without that having been a conscious decision, partic if you're delving into less well known stuff - like if I was getting into Tropicália now there's artists that are absolute huge million sellers (Caetano Veloso, Gilberto Gil), artists that are not as well known but have a high profile (Marcos Valle, Hermeto Pascoal) and total obscurities like Spectrum, and all these would be theoretically equally easy to get on streaming or download.

I can imagine a situation where, if asked the question "Who was the best band of the 60s", answering "The Beatles" would elicit a few groans.

Not really that hard to imagine tbh.

bad bunny is by far the most popular musica urbano artist of the past decade or so and probably also the best one, tho i am sure aficionados might disagree. nobody else from his generation (or previous generations, tbh) has his level of commercial success and critical acclaim

nobody else from his generation (or previous generations, tbh) has his level of commercial success and critical acclaim

Cynic that I am, I think the second followed the first. "Oh wow, this guy rapping and singing in a language none of us speak is selling a fuckton of records! We better start raving about him so people don't think we're out of touch."

there are plenty of others who sell a lot of records and don't get that level of critical acclaim, simply because they are not as good

"Oh wow, this guy rapping and singing in a language none of us speak is selling a fuckton of records! We better start raving about him so people don't think we're out of touch."

― Instead of create and send out, it pull back and consume (unperson), Tuesday, April 29, 2025 11:47 AM (ten minutes ago)

i think there is a seed of non-cynical truth in this statement insofar as journalists aim to cover stories/subjects that matter to the public, and i think a general music publication that turned a blind eye to the explosion of latin music would rightly be seen as out of touch, or at least derelict of duty. even putting the language barrier aside i find bad bunny's music inscrutable so i don't have much of an opinion on the merits of the critical acclaim but i do think this cynicism -- that white editors lavished praise on an artist for cool points -- actually misses the more interesting truth, which is that endeavors to diversify staffing across journalism publications led to latin music/pop culture journalists having an actual voice inside white editorial spaces for basically the first time, and because (for various reasons) these staffers tended to be young, a lot of authentic love and admiration for bad bunny was pushed to the forefront of latin music coverage. now, whether the white editors in question allowed such admiration to pass their desks w/o the same level of critical thinking they might apply to artists moreso in their wheelhouse i guess is an open question, but to construct a narrative about bad bunny's critical acclaim and not tie it to obvious efforts to diversify staffing and bylines is, to put it kindly, really missing the forest for the trees, and, perhaps less kindly, white-centric myopia that says more about the person making the argument than anything else

To me when the best also happens to be the most popular (and also someone whose best output is well in the past), that's kind of an indictment on the genre. King's Dark Tower series is well received, maybe even an essential King read, but you wouldn't call him the Bob Marley of Fantasy.
It's a little disconcerting since I'd prefer reading horror to fantasy but to be honest can't remember ever reading a horror book that wasn't King.

No mention of Hendrix yet?

Someone like Ansel Adams, maybe?

Van Gogh might be a good example. Seeing his paintings at a museum is so compelling. But we’re all more likely to see poor resolution reproductions that he fades into the wallpaper. And he’s kind of universally popular so not the cool choice for fave artist

(I'm thinking of a lot of dorm art here, lol)

haven't seen any rappers mentioned ... biggie and tupac are perhaps the two most famous/iconic/revered etc names in the genre and if you polled 10 million people on the greatest rappers of all time they'd probably finish 1-2 in some order

endeavors to diversify staffing across journalism publications led to latin music/pop culture journalists having an actual voice inside white editorial spaces for basically the first time

This is true but not to the degree it should be — you're basically talking about one or two writers at Pitchfork and Rolling Stone. The overall landscape is still white and monolingual, and the assigning editors almost all are (Puja Patel at Pitchfork was a huge and very welcome exception, but she's gone now).

Chaplin maybe?

or to break it down even further if you polled people on the greatest new york and LA rappers of all time biggie and tupac would each finish no 1 and though there are many other great rappers from either city that one could reasonably argue are a bit better, nobody sane would say that you're wrong for putting those two at the top respectively

So is this also kind of a monoculture discussion?

you're basically talking about one or two writers at Pitchfork and Rolling Stone.

well sure but that's because there's like five music publications left that employ like 10 people full time so.....

Sergio Leone for spaghetti westerns. I’ve never known a serious spaghetti fan to disparage Leone, but such a person probably doesn’t spend that much time watching Leone simply because there are five Leone spaghettis and hundreds of non-Leone ones.

bruce lee.

kind of thinking that answers to this question are basically whoever is on those posters of people playing pool in heaven.

haven't seen any rappers mentioned ... biggie and tupac are perhaps the two most famous/iconic/revered etc names in the genre and if you polled 10 million people on the greatest rappers of all time they'd probably finish 1-2 in some order

― slob wizard (J0rdan S.), Tuesday, April 29, 2025 11:29 AM (seventeen minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

yeah but i guess the answer for "most commercially successful" rapper would prob be someone like eminem or drake

dr. dre would likely be in any layperson's list of top 3 or so rap producers of all-time and is probably the most commercially successful rap producer who didn't fully crossover to pure pop or r&b like timbaland or neptunes

xxp "playing pool in heaven" OTM

i guess the answer for "most commercially successful" rapper would prob be someone like eminem or drake

― gestures broadly at...everything (voodoo chili), Tuesday, April 29, 2025 12:47 PM (two minutes ago)

this specific discussion gets muddied bcuz it's hard to compare two artists who died in their early 20s to two others who were allowed to have full careers, but yeah neither biggie or tupac were the highest selling artists of their time though biggie was definitely getting there bcuz of diddy's pop instincts & ambition so i think he fits the bill in a way tupac maybe doesn't

here's a better one, tho

the fugees 'the score' was the highest selling rap album of 1996, and then when lauryn hill went solo she became the first rapper to debut a song at no 1 on the hot 100, the first women rapper to ever hit no 1, the album sold like crazy, she cleaned up at the grammys in an unprecedented way, and any "best rap albums of all time" list is very likely to have that album as the best rap album by a woman ever, the best rap album of 1998 etc ... the rest of her career obv really complicates how people think canonize her overall at this point but there was a real era there where she was checking both boxes of highest selling artist in her genre while also being considered the best

Shakespeare?

Never was considered as "the lowest common denominator" during his time or since.

so, gonna need you to re-read this thread title...

Rapping/hip-hop feels closer to a sport where it would be uncontroversial that the winningest boxer in the world is also the best. Turntablism holds literal competitions, though for the general public, the Bruce Lee of DJs would be... Bruce Lee?
https://i.pinimg.com/564x/76/4a/c5/764ac54eef96d3df8165aa196221fc80.jpg

Sonic Youth for ‘American indie rock’?

it would be uncontroversial that the winningest boxer in the world is also the best

i think this holds true for early hip hop but once rap became a pop concern it became less true, or in cases like mc hammer, vanilla ice etc not true at all. in fact diametrically opposed

Tarantino

is the field you're talking about foot fetishism?

tolkien/the lord of the rings

still the most popular epic fantasy, and the stick by which all others in the genre are measured

gonna need you to re-read this thread title...

yup, no "lowest". in which case I have no idea what idea is being conveyed by "most common denominator", which in maths would be 2, but in the arts would be...?

I think it just means the omnipresent, most commonly engaged-with artist in a genre who also happens to be the best in field.

I think for progressive rock music, for example, you could point to Pink Floyd. For country rock, you could point to Neil Young.

I think it’s a bit of a chicken/egg situation, so many of these artists fit the bill because they are so completely excellent that they drew a lot of people in.

Tolkien is a good shout.

Shakespeare a bit of a weird one because, like, who has read enough of his contemporaries to judge?

Miles Davis is an interesting one because the average casual or non-jazz fan might take his top-of-the-mountain fame to mean that he's the best trumpet player ever, but that's not really his strength. He was a stylist, he had the best bands and made the best records, he set many of the trends, and he was a master of context. All the most important things. But there are plenty of situations he probably wouldn't have shined in.

I think the point gets missed on both sides, "so-and-so could play higher and louder than Miles" doesn't factor in all the more abstract but vital things that made him so important, but it also annoys me when "Miles Davis" is used as shorthand for amazing trumpet player.

Also when reading the Impulse Records book the other night, there was an interesting bit about how Columbia didn't have a separate jazz department and gave him the same marketing resources as their pop acts, while for most other labels it was very much a separate niche thing.

i had this with ravi shankar, i avoided him for ages, thinking he was some kinda "vanilla" option. i mean nikhil bannerjee, imrat khan etc are great, but seriously ravi shankar was something else

Ravi rules, was lucky to him live and forever changed, like John Coltrane

Aphex Twin and..... IDM? 90s electronic music?

How about Billy Strings selling out arenas with bluegrass?

DJP OTM with first response HOF-tier reply

Hard to think of infomercials and ignore the legacy of Ron Popeil

She doesn't get her own Weird Al song but Hazel came in and consigned Ron to the ashtray of history
http://www.infomercial-hell.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/05/hazel_magic_bullet_garlic.jpg

João Gilberto and bossa

And I think the Bob Marley analogy works: I've spent the last 25 years immersed in reggae and Caribbean music. And as a fan of Jamaican music, when it comes to Bob Marley, have I listened to all his albums? Do I even know much about his work? No. I mean, I've absorbed the whole of Legend through pure osmosis, and at one point or another I think I've heard Exodus and Natty Dread, but somehow when it comes to the King of Reggae, this absolute titan, I know comparatively little.

And why is that? When I put on a Bob Marley record, I'm nonetheless blown away by the quality of the music. So why am I opting to listen to lesser-known singers like Horace Andy or Johnny Osbourne instead of the guy whos' largely considered the best?

Likely answer: Snobbery.

I kind of disagree with this thesis. I mean, I would never argue with someone who insists the Beatles are the greatest rock band that ever lived — by a lot of measures they are! But I never really put on a Beatles record. Why is that? Not snobbery, its just I've heard so much of their music in the atmosphere that there's not a personal connection. The Beatles are the sound of the outside world and Nihilist Spasm Band or whatever is the sound of my interior world. Nothing to do with snobbery, just with the function of music itself

I think this disconnect really happens for me when I'm outside and hear a Motown song — something that I was inundated with as a child of the Big Chill '80s. More and more, I hear these things that have been played ad nauseum in movie trailers and commercials my whole life and am just dumbfounded by how pure and perfect and timeless they are. I can't tell you the last time I put on some Motown as opposed to a Numero Eccentric Soul comp though.

It really bums me out that the last 5 years of music list-making have been so focused on canonizing pop music of the past 20 years at the expense of something that seems so intuitively brilliant, but what can you do

Comics: Crumb for undergrounds, Tezuka for manga, Herge for BD, Kirby for superheroes, Schulz and Watterson for comic strips, Clowes and Ware for alt/indie.

Obviously this can be broken down further. Gilbert Shelton in his prime was probably as popular as Crumb and Freak Bros, Wonder Warthog are still funny. The big names of shojo manga like Moto Hagio are best-sellers and considered the pinnacle of their field.

In anime, Miyazaki.

i'm sorry i didn't read the OP too diligently but dl have you not listened to marley's early scratch-produced stuff?????????

Kurosawa for samurai.

To dog latin’s point: I spent decades chasing down all sorts of esoteric Japanese movies, yakuza films, pink movies, ATG stuff, direct-to-video horror, New Wave, but never watched any Mizoguchi film in full. Why? For exactly the reasons DL and others laid out: “so obvious and prevalent”. Then last year I watched Miss Oyu on Tubi and was completely blown away. Every frame stunning. Felt dumb of course for having avoided him for so long (“oh, so this is why everyone raves about him”).

Ivy, yeah I've heard a few things - mostly on comps like Lost Ark etc. It's not that I've not heard Bob Marley, it's that I always avoided really getting involved in his work for a range of reasons, but mostly because I guess I assumed it was going to be a compromised listen

i mean here’s the thing: he was a really amazing songwriter

Yes

And while it seems he was practically groomed to be a star, both by white record execs and the Rasta movement, along with the fact he became perhaps one of the most influential rockstars in all of history, that doesn't take away the fact he was an exceptionally amazing songwriter. Which is all too easy to forget, perhaps, when his music started getting absorbed into the world of coffeeshops and campus dropouts

I was going to point out this reggae radio show as an example of one that seemed to make a point of excluding bob marley every time I happened to tune in, but by random I picked one where he's almost the entire show:
https://kfjc.org/listen/playlist?i=75560

Bob also had the fortune of coming up the Wailers, all insanely talented musicians.

I think Spielberg is a good answer to what I'm thinking here. Unlike, say, Stanley Kubrick, his commerciality often prevents him from being rated as one of the all-time great movie directors by "serious" cinema fans. I

Disagree. Spielberg has gotten plenty of love from critics. It's the step below them -- the semi-serious film fans, the film equivalent of rockists -- who have a problem when schmaltz appears ("marrs") his work as if sentimentality + schmaltz weren't in film's DNA since its beginnigns.

Also: Spielberg's oeuvre at this point is pretty vast. If you can't something you like, it's on you.

Isn't Spielberg the exemplar of Blockbuster Guy more than general cinema guy? Fabelmans was pretty well-received, but you wouldn't call Spielberg the Spielberg of that kind of movie, if that makes sense.

Kubrick's really weird -- 2001 and The Shining will always be in the running for top SF or horror, but Kubrick's not really an SF or horror guy.

Disagree that all Spielberg doubters are "a step below" critics - Godard hated him, for one.

For casting Truffaut instead of him in Close Encounters no doubt.

Also: Spielberg's oeuvre at this point is pretty vast. If you can't something you like, it's on you.

― the talented mr pimply (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 30 April 2025 03:05 (six hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

I agree. A big part of this thread is about subjectivity and the preconceptions we have about certain artists dependant on their popularity, credibility, and where they sit in their field, and how they're perceived. And this can change over time.

I'm reminded of my last haircut; they were playing an 80s playlist and Phil Collins came on. "I love Phil Collins" remarked the barber, who's about ten years younger than me. He was surprised to hear that for a good chunk of the 80s and 90s, he was considered extremely naff, uncool and played-out - the equivalent of someone like Ed Sheeran, maybe. But these things have a habit of coming back round. US R'n'B and hip-hop groups started taking him more seriously by the turn of the century, his chops as a musician and songwriter started getting reassessed. And while a lot of people might still shirk at calling themselves Phil Collins fans, it's harder to deny his credentials and what he means to a lot of people.

Tony Hawk

US R'n'B and hip-hop groups started taking him more seriously by the turn of the century, his chops as a musician and songwriter started getting reassessed.

This is kind of misleading imo - yes that R&B tribute album is from that era but it wasn't doing any reassessment really, Collins was just well liked by that demographic since his 80's stardom. As so often with acts derided as square or lame, this was mostly a white thing.

Might have been different in other countries, but in the UK media he was largely seen as a shorthand for MOR blandness for a long time. Again, it's all subjective and ephemeral of course. Even bands like Coldplay, another bunch who've been tarred with a similar brush, have started to get critically reassessed here and there (especially in the lead up to their Glastonbury 2024 performance)

You're forgetting the Tory aspect too.

Yes I know he was considered as such by the UK media what race do you think most UK journalists

anti-Phil Collins also seemed to be more of a UK than a US thing afaict? Resentment at other British people who make it big in America (particularly if they're not 'posh'), combined with music press hostility (that the drummer from Genesis had become one of the 80s most successful pop stars made a pretty incontrovertible case that Punk Had Failed, and even for the more prog-sympathetic he could be seen as a sell out for leaving all that behind him)(as well as a general UK music press tendency to side with the kids over adult-orientated artist singing about adult orientated concerns), him supposedly vowing to leave the UK if Labour won in 1992 (I think he says he was misquoted?). But all much more about what he represented than the music himself.

I think it's right that the R&B tribute album wasn't seen as part of a reassessment by the artists who contributed to it - I remember reading a contemporary interview with Brandy by a British music journo who was incredulous about the whole concept, and Brandy being like "how could anyone not like Phil Collins?"

xxps

lol got cut off there

What race do you think most UK journalists of the 80's and 90's were?

I don't have strong opinions on Collins either way, just pointing out he was always popular in a R&B context.

xpost

Yes soref that mostly seems right - but think US critics mostly went along w/ it because of anglophilia and (justified!) hatred of yuppies.

David Attenborough

xp Collins himself seemed to attribute his status to some as hate figure to snobbery and the UK class system, tall poppy syndrome, which I think is some of it, but also there's a more specific thing where his obvious desire to present himself as just an ordinary bloke, one of the lads etc clashed awkwardly with a slightly prickly, anxious quality that always seemed palpable with him (and in his music he specialised in this wounded, mournful type of performance which emphasised those aspects of his personality), I imagine the blokeishness reads differently from a US perspective, though?

Chuck Brown for go go music

Yes I know he was considered as such by the UK media what race do you think most UK journalists

That comment was for dog latin btw.

But then it seems he's not the only one forgetting the Phil Collins, Tory Wanker aspect to his lack of coolness in the UK.

Disagree that all Spielberg doubters are "a step below" critics - Godard hated him, for one.

― a ZX spectrum is haunting Europe (Daniel_Rf)

My point exactly.

That comment was for dog latin btw.

So was mine!

Soref mentions the toryness in their post.

By the way, I've certainly never thought of Phil Collins as being especially working class - I don't believe he is in actual fact - and I'm not aware of it being considered a common belief. Obviously Collins himself would be aware of his relative class status having been in friggin' Genesis!

lol Alfred you can hate as much as you want but I don't think a case can be made that Godard was not a film critic. If he was good at it is another question, sorta irrelevant to your assertion tho.

why would snobbery and the British class system be a significant issue for Phil Collins, particularly in regards to music criticism? his background is pretty middle class? he wasn't as posh as the rest of Genesis, sure

xp basically what Tom D said

Also didn't Collins inform one of his wives he was leaving her by fax? And then run off with a 20 year old au pair? I remember it being all over the tabloids

I was Collins's own subjective opinion of why people had a problem with him, not necessarily the objective reality (tbh I might be misremembering him attributing all this snobbery, but I had an idea I'd read an old interview where he intimated this). Apparently his father was an insurance agent for London Assurance and his other worked in a toy shop and later as a booking agent for a stage school? I got the impression that he came from the same kind of upper-working-class/lower-middle-class interzone as someone like Paul McCartney, certainly not from poverty but conspicuously a different background from most of the people in positions of power in UK media, music business etc. McCartney also has a similar compulsion to present himself as anormal down-to-earth guy, mug and clown about in music videos etc

(l to r) Banks, Hackett, Collins

https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/images/ic/1200x675/p02c9b6t.jpg

I’m just glad others have taken care of the revisionist history re: Phil Collins’ reputation in Black America

Fairly sure King has a massive chip on his shoulder about how he isn't considered the best in his field or rated at all as a writer. And I don't think that's imaginary on his behalf.

Has Bob Marley done a Cujo?

Is he "not rated at all" within the field of horror fiction? Think it's more that horror fiction wasn't rated at all by literary types when King was at his peak.

I've never read any King, but my impression was that the current consensus that the earlier books that were dismissed at the time as trash have some value, but that the more recent books, which are more self-consciously 'literary' are bad? Kind of like John Le Carre, this idea that the point at which people started taking him seriously as a writer after years of dismissing him as genre fiction coincided with the point at which the books stopped being much good?

lol Alfred you can hate as much as you want but I don't think a case can be made that Godard was not a film critic. If he was good at it is another question, sorta irrelevant to your assertion tho.

His films are his film criticism; his published and spoken views are garbage.

Plenty of film criticism is garbage, doesn't really make it not film criticism.

Fair points both, xpost, I guess I'm just saying more he doesn't fit the model for the thread or the description of his status in the first post. I don't think he is considered the best in his field.

That's not me criticising him, just don't think it's true.

xpost

Beyond that... everyone who prefers one artist over a more popular artist is lying due to snobbery is a truly strange take.

Oh yeah I mean if "his field" means literature period saying King is the best guy working would be a truly wild challop.

I guess even in horror there would still be a debate. As there would be with saying anyone was the best at anything. Which is why I guess the snobbery argument lands flat for me, at least one of the reasons.

I'm reminded of my last haircut; they were playing an 80s playlist and Phil Collins came on. "I love Phil Collins" remarked the barber, who's about ten years younger than me. He was surprised to hear that for a good chunk of the 80s and 90s, he was considered extremely naff, uncool and played-out - the equivalent of someone like Ed Sheeran, maybe. But these things have a habit of coming back round. US R'n'B and hip-hop groups started taking him more seriously by the turn of the century, his chops as a musician and songwriter started getting reassessed. And while a lot of people might still shirk at calling themselves Phil Collins fans, it's harder to deny his credentials and what he means to a lot of people.

See also Michael McDonald in the US.

I guess with people like Collins (and Ed Sheeran and Coldplay and all these other huge stars that white rock-type people like to dunk on because they perceive them as bland, commercially compromised, omnipresent etc), is that they remain generally well-respected in Black spaces where, my guess is, the idea behind "selling out" isn't such a big deal

By the way I doubt anyone has ever denied Phil Collins' chops as a drummer, you'd have to be a fool to do that.

Xpost do they? Do we have any evidence for this?

I also don't think Coldplay or Sheeran ever "sold out", it's not like ppl champion their early recordings. I wouldn't even say criticisms of them center around being "too commercial", I'm sure some think that way but tons of critics who love lots of mainstream stuff still hated them. It's just their entire shtick that is fundamentally embarassing, and I guess the further away you are from the culture that spawned them the less bothered you'll be about that.

Yeah exactly. People dislike music for the music, they're not all delusional and incapable of listening to it. In any case the idea being proposed itt repeatedly is that the most popular artists are all in fact "the best", as if this is measurable, and that anyone saying otherwise is lying and knows they are. Or doesn't know and needs to read this thread. Just an unbelievably weird and corrosive way of thinking about other people's opinions.

I think there could be some sociological interest in seeing when normie consensus and critical consensus align and why that is, but "because it's objectively great" obv doesn't cut it for that purpose.

For sure. Half this board is prob people debating their opinions about canonical artists or whatever.

We’ve drifted a bit from the early part of this thread but I think originally snobbery was given as a possible reason for *assuming* something won’t click with you because of its starter-pack status which is a different thing to engaging with it & it just not clicking

Isn't Spielberg the exemplar of Blockbuster Guy more than general cinema guy?

Scorsese for general cinema guy IMO

I would like to suggest politely that dog latin stop speculating on why Black Americans like things unless he would like for me to start rudely suggesting he stop

Based on the discussion so far I think I'm beginning to see the premise of this thread, but in my own mind I think I'd phrase it as "artists often viewed as the height of middlebrow, who are/were more innovative and talented than their reputations".

I think it's basically "artists who are widely considered canonical, and are also admitted to be canonical by ILXors like ourselves, who ordinarily balk at canons and canonized artists, or feel we outgrew the mainstream Top 20 Essential lists early in our personal journeys."

This thread is a bit like 'there is some vague concept here, help me identify what it might be'.

Well here's an analogy: He's the Bob Marley of horror.

^^ the concept probably starts to come off the rails here

Kubrick shot The Shining 🎵
but he did not shoot Misery

Well here's an analogy: He's the Bob Marley of horror.

Bob kind of covered that area with "Mr. Brown".

Herbert von Karajan and Eugene Ormandy is like this for me in the realm of conducting.

Well here's an analogy: He's the Bob Marley of horror.

^^ the concept probably starts to come off the rails here

― Bob Six, Wednesday, April 30, 2025 3:56 PM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

but i would bet Legend has sold > 10x as many copies as the second biggest reggae album ever, whatever that is (probably another Bob marley cd)

it wouldn’t surprise me if Steven King has a similar market share

His films are his film criticism; his published and spoken views are garbage.

He was a good (if incredibly idiosyncratic ofc) critic in his Cahiers days, but that obviously predates his takes on Spielberg.

Two of the most prominent Spielberg skeptics (and sometimes haters) in the 80s and 90s were Hoberman and Rosenbaum, who are definitely not “the semi-serious film fans, the film equivalent of rockists”. But I’m not really sure who the latter are – the types who love Nolan, Fincher, and the like?

dreadlights

When I was young two of the biggest pop stars in the world were Michael Jackson and Madonna. They were fantastic! They both had a run of classic pop singles and pretty decent albums as well. One of my earliest memories is the video of "Billie Jean", with the steps lighting up.

One thing that struck me was that there were plenty of other pop stars, and plenty of other pop stars who had been moulded by their record label to sound like other pop stars, but there was no-one quite like those two. You'd think there would have been floods of Michael Jackson clones in the 1980s, but there weren't.

Ditto Madonna. The closest "clone" was Cyndi Lauper, but she was really completely different and their paths never directly crossed. In the case of Michael Jackson you could say that he was so good at his job that making a clone would have been the pop equivalent of the Manhattan Project, but the major criticisms levelled at Madonna were her ordinary voice and simplistic songwriting. I realise this is a bit circular - "Madonna was the best at being Madonna" - but in both cases I can't think of another artist who scratched the same itch in the same way.

It must have felt odd to be a fan of either one of them at the time. It would have been like supporting oxygen or food. There's a kind of underdog element to being a fan which didn't work at all in their case. Imagine circa 1985 saying that your favourite musician was Michael Jackson. People would either think that you weren't interested in pop music at all or that you were plain. Although I note that the NME rated it as the fifth-best album of 1983 so presumably it wasn't pooh-poohed too much by early-80s hipsters.

I suppose the video game equivalent would be someone like Shigeru Miyamoto. Super Mario Bros was hugely popular, it was great fun, it looked good, it has aged well, widely cited as one of the best games of its year and all time. Saying that you're a fan of the Mario games feels too easy. But what's so bad about relaxing and letting the alien bodysnatchers take over your mind? What's so bad about being part of an immortal collective that isn't ruled by lust and anger?

Imagine circa 1985 saying that your favourite musician was Michael Jackson. People would either think that you weren't interested in pop music at all or that you were plain.

By and large what actually happened is people said “me too!” and then everyone sang the chorus to “Beat It”

Merzbow

Heino

Maybe Metal Machine Music as example of pisstakes that are considered the best of the field?

I suppose the video game equivalent would be someone like Shigeru Miyamoto. Super Mario Bros was hugely popular, it was great fun, it looked good, it has aged well, widely cited as one of the best games of its year and all time. Saying that you're a fan of the Mario games feels too easy. But what's so bad about relaxing and letting the alien bodysnatchers take over your mind? What's so bad about being part of an immortal collective that isn't ruled by lust and anger?

Widening out the thesis to other restaurants/food, I guess what seems potentially wrong with the thesis to me is that its dangerously close to saying: "I had a McDonalds, after realised that I'd unconsciously avoiding it all these years, and you know what it was great! If you're in the mood for a fast hamburger and fries anywhere across the world - it's great. Is it snobbery that has been keeping me from eating at McDonalds all these years?".

Answer: Maybe, maybe not. There's also a factor that you desire variety and being surprised by new experiences.

Merzbow

isa a merbow beef? pulse yr demon

Jimi Marshall Hendrix

Keith Haring seems like an artist who was devoted to confronting the violence and marginalization faced by LGBTQ+ individuals by presenting the public with cartoon/cutout artwork that many people initially saw as simplistic, but which became really iconic

It is interesting to read about his life

The closest clones to Madonna in her early days were really Alisha with “Baby Talk” and Regina with “Baby Love.” Sorry for the history lesson. This was talked about back then.

Comics: Crumb for undergrounds, Tezuka for manga, Herge for BD, Kirby for superheroes, Schulz and Watterson for comic strips, Clowes and Ware for alt/indie.

Obviously this can be broken down further. Gilbert Shelton in his prime was probably as popular as Crumb and Freak Bros, Wonder Warthog are still funny. The big names of shojo manga like Moto Hagio are best-sellers and considered the pinnacle of their field.

In anime, Miyazaki.

― gjoon1, Wednesday, 30 April 2025 00:27 (yesterday)

Obv. Walt Disney & Pixar, too.

And Maus really is a masterpiece.

I would like to suggest politely that dog latin stop speculating on why Black Americans like things unless he would like for me to start rudely suggesting he stop

― my favorite herbs are fennel and Drake (DJP), Wednesday, 30 April 2025 18:49 (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

Apologies - it was a poorly thought-through post, and I regreted posting it after.

In fact this whole thread was thinly-conceived and should have been thought about a bit better before I posted it - more a "something I'm kicking about in my head but not really sure what it is" thought-bubble than something with a tight question around it. I'm glad we've done with it as we will though; some interesting stuff came out of it at least

Off - topic, but I just wanted to vent that I recently saw Dave Robinson, co-founder of Stiff records and music industry figure, having the incredible cheek to complain the he doesn’t get a royalty for the “Legend” album which he apparently compiled when he was briefly heading up Island Records in the early 80s.

magine circa 1985 saying that your favourite musician was Michael Jackson. People would either think that you weren't interested in pop music at all or that you were plain.

This is bollocks -- unless you wrote a typo and meant "1995."

In the UK, at least, the biggest selling acts in 1985 included Band Aid, Dire Straits, Foreigner, Paul McCartney Frog Chorus and Shakin Stevens

Has anyone mentioned Michael Jordan as an example?

Someone asked a rhetorical question of a bunch of us the other day: who had a bigger impact on the world, Michael Jackson or Michael Jordan? Almost everyone said "Michael Jackson," but when asked, who would you rather be, everyone said "Michael Jordan."

But in 1985 was MJ on the outs critically in the UK?

Josh, I can't think of many celebrities I wouldn't rather be, dude had an objectively horrible life. I'd rather be Shakin' Stevens, even.

I can't speak for anywhere else in the world but Michael Jackson definitely had a exponentially bigger impact in the UK than Michael Jordan!

Do people wear Jordan gear there?

It exists! And people know who Michael Jordan is. And yeah, people wear a lot of sportswear, so they'll be wearing that. But basketball is still a relatively niche sport here, strictly speaking

It is a niche sport, not relatively a niche sport. He is definitely well known for a basketball player but he's not a household name or anything.

he isnt?

I don't think so.

I wonder if he took that personally...

Michael Jordan has got to be the most internationally known athlete in American sports though (football, baseball, basketball, hockey), it's probably not even particularly close

Oh no doubt about that.

https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/animations/images/5/55/Prostars_title_card.png/revision/latest?cb=20150926164706

I'm from the UK and I knew who Michael Jordan was because this early 90s animated series that featured him, Bo Jackson and Wayne Gretzky as superheroes, and later Space Jam.

(I also knew who Super Dave Osborne was because they made a Super Dave cartoon. It feels like the early 90s was a singular period where they would make kids cartoons based on anything, or maybe they still do but I'm just not part of the target demographic anymore?)

I'm amazed at how often I encounter Chicago Bulls gear around the world, and it sure isn't because of who is on the team these days.

That's fashion though surely?

Michael Jordan has got to be the most internationally known athlete in American sports

Over O.J. Simpson?

whenever I go to an NBA game there always seems to be several 90s throwback elements present. both on the jumbotron and with the music they play during breaks. they play a lot of 90s dance music that you basically dont hear anywhere else these days. always got the sense the NBA thought of the 90s as its 'golden era', which I'm pretty sure is directly related to that being the Jordan championship run. it doesn't really seem possible for an athelete to get that big here again

Living athletes, I assume, otherwise there's only one winner.

The pride of Chicago

https://i.imgur.com/ScI5k1G.png

"Is it snobbery that has been keeping me from eating at McDonalds all these years?"

I think there's a generational aspect. I'm old enough to remember when my town got its first McDonalds. It was a major event. It wasn't all that long ago that having a McDonalds was unusual. I learn from the BBC that there were only 100 restaurants in the UK in 1983 and that British people had never associated happiness with meals before. I remember my first taste of a Big Mac. The beautiful, indefinable taste of the sauce. The gherkins. I remember thinking that one day I would share this with the internet.

Well, dear readers. The time is now.

My point about Michael Jackson is that none of the "tribes" in my school would have admitted to liking him. The heavy metal fans weren't interested. The NME-reading hipsters ignored him completely. Non-aligned factions didn't have anything to say about pop music. Grown-ups rated proper musicians such as Bruce Springsteen and Dire Straits. It would be like saying that you like the colour blue or enjoy breathing. That goes without saying. I have the impression that the people who wrote the NME admired him but they were not teenage kids circa 1985.

That reminds me of something - it's the worst thing ever. It's a clip of the Brit Awards from 1985 where Frankie Goes to Hollywood won the "best newcomer" award, but for reasons known only unto himself Steve Wright decided to introduce the band with the least funny comedy routine of all time, including a falsetto Michael Jackson impersonation:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tXRcsxBsW7Y

That was the worst thing ever

Did you not know any Black people or women when you were a teenager

British people had never associated happiness with meals before.

lol

Elite opinion:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NYDhjuq08Fg

Did you not know any Black people or women when you were a teenager

Not knowing any black people when you're a teenager is the norm in most of the UK tbf.

There's another interesting idea in the original question though: one of things that King is most known for (and one of the things that's tarnished his reputation) is that he became too big to edit at the same time his books became to big not to need editing. If you're talking about bands / film-makers / writers who get to the point where they can put out anything they want, some will just keep doing what got them there, and some will head to "well Paul's been taking acid, and John's been hanging out with some art people, and George's been studying under Ravi Shankar, and Ringo says he's up for whatever, let's make a record!."

For a while the advice (or the advice I received) was that if you wanted to get into Stephen King, to stick to the short story collections or the Dark Tower series (though that went off the rails as well by the end) or the stories published as Richard Bachman books. The Bachman Books are amazing, mean and lean, and in the intro he talks about hearing an interview with Paul McCartney, who said that at some point after the Beatles became world famous, they considered recording or even touring under another name, Johnny and the Juices or something. And the interviewer asked "wouldn't people recognise your voice?" and McCartney seemed embarrassed that he didn't think of that. And then at the end of the intro King mentions that as soon as the first Bachman story came out, people wrote in to ask if it was actually him.

Also lol I just watched a trailer for The Life of Chuck, which includes a section on how it's from STEPHEN KING, LEGENDARY AUTHOR OF THE GREEN MILE, THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION, STAND BY ME, and he's that guy too.

Though the reason he was writing as Richard Bachman wasn't so much that he wanted a new outlet so much as his publisher didn't want to put out more than one book by him per year!

> they would make kids cartoons based on anything ... maybe they still do

ch4 late is currently showing some mike tyson supernatural detective agency thing, voiced by him.

If you're talking about bands / film-makers / writers who get to the point where they can put out anything they want, some will just keep doing what got them there, and some will head to "well Paul's been taking acid, and John's been hanging out with some art people, and George's been studying under Ravi Shankar, and Ringo says he's up for whatever, let's make a record!."

You might say they have massive success and are given a blank check to make whatever crazy passion projects they want. Sometimes those checks clear and sometimes they bounce, baby!

xp that Mike Tyson show is more of a spoof aimed at adults though, I feel like there was this weird period in the early 1990's where the success of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles had made people realize that you could make money off kids cartoons adapted from unlikely source material, so you had this boom of short lived Saturday morning cartoons based on MC Hammer or Attack of the Killer Tomatoes or whatever

If the original concept is ever developed further, perhaps it could also cover how the ilx pantheon is agreed by consensus, how it relates to “most common denominators”, and if it’s in a holding pattern.

Bob Marley is widely considered the Bob Marley of reggae.

Maybe Metal Machine Music as example of pisstakes that are considered the best of the field?

― Philip Nunez, Wednesday, 30 April 2025 bookmarkflaglink

This is a thread about the big boys selling big and being big. Let's not consider MMM on here.

Hm... Lou Reed's a big boy, and I'm guessing it sold about as much as any noise record, why not crown him the Bob Marley of noise?