Say something nice about another ILXor

Of course!! A noncompetitive duet!!! If it were competitive, I would 100% lose and it would be embarrassing for everyone. This thread is a perfect example of something I wouldn't trouble anyone with irl but I enjoy talking about asynchronously with ilxors i'm over here in the green section, see you by the hats

OL and Karl Malone are delights on the political thread.

You are too.

i like Alf's book recommendations as well, just finishing that excellent J jackson book on the Vichy regime.

i didn't mean it as backhanded! it's more like, idk, you were one of the people whose bad side i was specifically terrified of getting on the bad side of. ilx was just a super intimidating and scary place. oh, i don't know, that almost sounds more backhanded, doesn't it?

what i mean is that everybody here is great and/because everybody here has gotten better over time

it's cool! i can relate! you are a rad person, too!

It's a good spot, this place.

i like Alf's book recommendations as well, just finishing that excellent J jackson book on the Vichy regime.

― calzino, Friday, August 2, 2019 7:58 PM (three hours ago

oh thanks! I hope someone's read his De Gaulle bio.

i don't recall the era when sarahell claims she was sometimes trolling? she's always been a+ unless it involves semiotics, about which i'm unqualified to comment

so i woke up thinking about this (no i don't have an ilx problem) and i'm sorry if i get kind of personal here but i do want to talk a little about how ilx has grown and developed and what that means to me

i get frustrated when i see people being nostalgic for Old ILX because, particularly when one of those threads gets bumped, it was something i was always kind of conflicted about. the people here were really smart and really well-spoken and, well, the reputation was that it was sort of a critics' hangout, right?

that was kind of difficult for me. partly because i'd had some pretty terrible interactions with a music critic on usenet (he will not be named and as far as i know was never here, but he was super into kink shaming), and partly relating it to my own life

all the trauma work i've been doing the topic of the "inner critic" comes up. it doesn't mean quite the same thing as someone being a professional critic, but i don't see the two usages as being entirely unrelated. writers are people who tend to have a pretty poor self-image in the first place (one of the misguided reasons i never really pursued being a professional writer - i feel like i sort of confused correlation with causation, which i've done in other areas of my life), and then you add in a sort of work which tends to magnify the critical voice and at worst critics can become these "boys in the band" types who are utterly merciless and lacerating both of themselves and of others

well that was sort of how i saw Old ILX, and for whatever reasons - i'd prefer to accentuate the positive ones - i feel like ILX has become kinder, more compassionate, its posters more self-accepting. that makes me happy.

at the same time that experience and growth, this is the paradox, means that i feel like people here don't necessarily say as much stupid shit. people give the impression of having thought before speaking. certainly that's what i try to do, and the flip side of writing things and not posting them is that i've written some stuff where not posting was absolutely the right decision. there's less viciousness but it's still an environment where if someone talks shit, i mean speaks ad ignorantum, they stand a good chance of being called on it. it's been helpful and hopefully i talk less shit than i used to!

i feel like people here don't necessarily say as much stupid shit. people give the impression of having thought before speaking. certainly that's what i try to do

i love the 'posts you had second thoughts about posting' thread for this reason

just listened to all 50 of the songs brad has considered as being the best ever

i don't agree of course but it's an amazing list

is that a real list? because if so i'm so down.

yes when did i miss that? always have time for brad's enthusiasm.

01 The Blue Nile - The Downtown Lights (6:31)
02 Fleetwood Mac - Everywhere (3:47)
03 Machine - There But for the Grace of God Go I (5:19)
04 Van Halen - Panama (3:32)
05 Soft Cell - Say Hello, Wave Goodbye (5:23)
06 Evelyn 'Champagne' King - Love Come Down (6:15)
07 The Jets - Crush on You (6:20)
08 Patrice Rushen - Haven't You Heard (6:45)
09 Mariah Carey - Always Be My Baby (4:20)
10 Saint Etienne - He's on the Phone (4:08)
11 John Martyn - Small Hours (8:45)
12 Womack & Womack - Teardrops (5:04)
13 Luomo - Tessio (12:07)
14 Tears for Fears - Everybody Wants to Rule the World (4:11)
15 Sade - By Your Side (4:34)
16 Underworld - Jumbo (6:57)
17 ABBA - Knowing Me, Knowing You (4:02)
18 Prefab Sprout - The Sound of Crying (4:43)
19 Boz Scaggs - Lowdown (5:17)
20 Cyndi Lauper - Time After Time (4:03)
21 Steely Dan - Sign in Stranger (4:23)
22 Cameo - Candy (5:39)
23 Scritti Politti - Oh Patti (Don't Feel Sorry for Loverboy) (4:23)
24 Amy Grant - Every Heartbeat (3:33)
25 Janet Jackson - Escapade (4:43)
26 Taylor Swift - Treacherous (4:00)
27 Kylie Minogue - Get Outta My Way (3:38)
28 Prince - Mountains (3:57)
29 Anita Baker - Sweet Love (4:26)
30 Moloko - Forever More (7:22)
31 George Michael - One More Try (5:50)
32 Fall Out Boy - Disloyal Order of Water Buffaloes (4:17)
33 Maze - Back in Stride (7:06)
34 Maxwell - Pretty Wings (5:10)
35 Rickie Lee Jones - We Belong Together (5:03)
36 Luther Vandross - Never Too Much (3:49)
37 Little Big Town - Lost in California (4:47)
38 Van Morrison - Summertime in England (15:37)
39 Michelle Branch - Breathe (3:31)
40 Orbital - Halcyon + On + On (9:27)
41 Mama - Unmask Me (Ashley Beedle Vocal Mix) (9:17)
42 Sarah McLachlan - Sweet Surrender (4:00)
43 Jennifer Paige - Crush (3:20)
44 Force MD's - Tender Love (3:55)
45 Aerosmith - Combination (3:39)
46 Genesis - Keep It Dark (4:35)
47 Madonna - Take a Bow (5:21)
48 DeBarge - I Like It (4:39)
49 Annie Lennox - Why (4:54)
50 Tori Amos - Raspberry Swirl (3:58)

I'm rarely interested in ilm lists but I am def checking this one out

ooh yes

rickie lee jones was my top discovery

I love that Brad shares my love for "Panama"

Taht debarge track is a nice one

i was like "what a weird list how did i assemble that" and remembered at least part of it was made by searching for old ilx posts where i called a song "the best song ever"

also thanks y'all <3

23 Scritti Politti - Oh Patti (Don't Feel Sorry for Loverboy) (4:23)
24 Amy Grant - Every Heartbeat (3:33)
25 Janet Jackson - Escapade (4:43)
26 Taylor Swift - Treacherous (4:00)
27 Kylie Minogue - Get Outta My Way (3:38)
28 Prince - Mountains (3:57)

^^^ helluva sequence

there are ppl who don't love Panama?

Disgusting savages imo

There's people who've never heard it.

They were never that popular over here.

hmmm interesting. England's relationship to pop metal is sort of interesting to me, because it's completely absent from any narrative I've seen about the 80s music scene there, yet I presume there were arenas full of people that were going to see Def Leppard and Bon Jovi

Pop metal has generally done OK in the UK, I think? Bon Jovi were massive and Def Leppard are British, but, when I think about it, American hard rock bands have never done particularly well in the UK. I'm not sure American rock in general was ever been that popular.

was ever that popular ffs. Cue tons of examples proving otherwise.

KISS did quite well in the eighties

whenever i've noted that lep and lange's pyromania fits right alongside ztt's frankie i've had pushback from uk pop and nu-pop gatekeepers but i'm not going to stop saying it

(KISS weren't especially big in the UK i wouldn't say)

kind of interesting
so mid 80s, Crue is playing arenas ontge Theater of Pain tour here, two nights at Hammersmith assuming sold out, so I guess maybe 10K total for 2 dates....GnR seemed to be playing similar sized places

still 2 nights at Hammersmith for Crue in 85/86....could the Smiths have done more?

looks like by the end of the era it's caught up with the world, Crue and GnR in their imperial periods (Feelgood/UYI) both headline Wembley, which means for whatever the British press says there was a pretty large overlooked audience

Even Def Leppard's UK sales certifications were nowhere near what they were in the US and Canada, e.g. Hysteria was 2x platinum in the UK and 12x platinum in the US.

https://www.bpi.co.uk/brit-certified/
https://www.riaa.com/gold-platinum/?tab_active=default-award&se=def+leppard#search_section

xps

fair but the uk is actually a bit smaller

source?

Jordan Peterson was talking about that on Rogan

for UK population stats?

Award thresholds are proportional to population. It went diamond in Canada by 1988.
https://musiccanada.com/gold-platinum/?_gp_search=def%20leppard
3xp

why does British people never want to rock?

Selling out massive venues in London has never been an indication of popularity in the UK as a whole tbh and still isn't.

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/44/90/4d/44904d250e58549330527181505f1a38.jpg

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/44/90/4d/44904d250e58549330527181505f1a38.jpg

British rock and metal bands have done pretty in the UK over the years.

doubling back to say i'm stoked for brad's list, i generally think of them as an excellent poster with whom i have some taste alignment, and the songs i know from that list i definitely like! including "panama" for sure, tho it's never sounded quite as good as this one summer day in 2001 that my friend and i heard it blasting out of a convertible in downtown athens GA.

Whitesnake, Alice Cooper, ZZ Top and Aerosmith all had a bunch of uk hits in the 80s. Meat Loaf was probably way more popular here too if he counts.

dow is a quality poster

Big second to that

indeed

Karl Malone makes me smile every time he posts when I don't wanna wring his neck.