Most pretentious band

And what makes them so despicable is that despite their copious amounts of bullshit, they've made some really great music. Still, I think Lester Bangs would have mountains of cream pies ready to hurl at these chappies.

Either way, this act, as well as his dropping commercial viability, makes it clear U2 will have no competition for the crown of pretension. Ironically, David Bowie lost his because his devotion to aht nullified his music's ability to save lives, heal the world and Take Rock Back.

Had they released naught but SYR 4, they would still be the most pretentious band ever. Not to mention all their art/jazz/noise side projects and collaborations.

1) Claiming or demanding a position of distinction or merit, especially when unjustified.

2)Making or marked by an extravagant outward show; ostentatious. See Synonyms at showy

is that a band or the 'avant' idiot?

Me? *thinks* Tunnelmental or Bright Eyes.

Ned, good call on Bright Eyes. I really dig Conor Oberst's skills but when he doesn't have a strong collaborator (like Denver Dalley in Desaparecidos or Britt Daniel on their split EP) he painfully shoots for the moon. Though the idea of a young Dylan leading Styx excites me on some perverse level, and that seems like where Bright Eyes is headed.

It's got a ridiculously high "ooooh, look at us, we're intellectuals!" factor, AND it sucks--it would be a different story if they had pulled off the concept well.

I also think it's good, for what that's worth.

(the ad thing i'm still flummoxed by, not being one to underestimate/stand sting's ability to have and eat all the cake in his tantric pantry and still maintain whatever image he chooses, in the eyes of whoever might have been interested to begin with i.e. not me but clearly a lot of other people)

Julio, I would have pegged you for a (John) Zorn fan!

not meant to be cryptic. they are just plain bad at writing good songs (i have only heard singles BTW). Bono's interviews make him come across as someone who has spent too many years in the spotlight (which he has) but that doesn't mean he is 'pretentious'.

Oh, I love his improvising. but I do wonder abt his other 'projects' really. abt his string quartets and all (I haven't bought any of it because it is expensive but I'm suspicious a lot of this).

shift @ is " but I didn't know that for a while.

once i found out (5 minutes later) it was too late! its just a 'bad' habit now.

If this is the defn of "pretentious" then wouldn't Sting be more pretentious after doing the commercial because his environmental self-righteousness (if this is what he's being accused of - don't know much about it myself) is less justified?

I also agree with Josh about SYR4. In fact I think SYR3 and 4 are their only great albums post-'95. I could see a case for their more recent Geffen albums being pretentious though.

Now this wailing guitar solo just broke into what was a buzz and pulse.

There was this growling distortion.

And all these fragments of beats keep coming in - almost like 'primitive' 'tribal' (God, it's so obnoxious when those terms are always used to describe postpunk drumming) beats but just little fragments of them. Just now there's a deep bass drum sound and a banging-on-metal kind of pulse. And a female voice under the noise.

Why does she keep repeating "Let's go"? It's almost like an a-g/industrial cliche to have something like that repeated mechanically as a creepy effect. But now she keeps going "La la la la".

And there's this more pretty descending sequence repeating and then this other wave of noise came in. Now another.

Anyway, so I was thinking earlier that in these records they do really interesting and exciting and original things and on some of the Geffen albums they've been sort of simplifying them, setting them to lethargic 4/4 beats and sticking them behind monotonous delivery of bad poetry. This may be overly harsh because they do definitely have moments - they're Sonic Youth records, after all - but they're just not as exciting as they used to be. They don't seem as relevant anymore to anything going on in either pop or art musics.

Now one of those primal-sounding beats and another wailing solo.

Now this sound that's kind of like a bugle breaking through the noise,

There's this sort of repeated warm-sounding sequence with distortion patterns above it. Now another beat and solo. I wonder if this is the track that's supposed to have Black Sabbath quotes in it.

Now there's this nice more 'peaceful sounding' part. What makes it peaceful? Pleasant, ringing sounds, repetition - familiarity, predictability. I think it was using major pentatonic melodies and harmonies too.

The "Let's go" came back, the second time since I first noted it. After it finished, things got louder and busier.

These waves of distortion sometimes have this sort of 'edge' that delay pedals can give you. I always liked those sounds.

Now there's whistling and more "La la la". She sounds like she's drunk and scared and walking home alone, trying to make some sound to comfort herself. Another guitar solo and drums came in and she's still trying to hum.

There's this other repeated thing. It sounds guttural.

There was a loud burst and squeal.

Now another 'peaceful' section with predictability and nice tones was interrupted by a blast.

The guitar's being strummed behind the bridge I think with some effect to give it a whoosh after and a watery sound and then there were these distorted noises on top. The guitar's still there.

About 3 minutes left in the track. A lot of the time with longer pieces like this you don't notice anything until you actually force yourself to listen to specific things. This happened once when I gave a seminar on Wishart's "Red Bird", which I decided sucked in terms of overall structure and being too long. When I presented it, playing bits of it to demonstrate specific points and show why it failed, it all seemed to make perfect sense.

"la la la la la" again.

Now guitar solo, cymbals.

Now some water-like sounds.

They're pushing guitar sound on this in a way they haven't done since their first two albums.

The track is over. I hadn't intended to do this.

Julio, if saying your business is being the Greatest Rock Band In The World and calling Eddie Vedder to ask him to help you Take Rock Back isn't pretentious, my god, what is?

Also: hip hop videos, with those damned five minute mini-movies in the middle of all the songs. GOD YURKIN' HEADS DAMMIT that shit gives me the bloodlust.

Or maybe I missed something about avoiding all the obvious answers. If so, I apologize.

for me it's been pretensions ever since -- they claim to come from new york and seem at pains to align themselves with composers and artists from the nyc pecking order, which their clever name allows them to simultaneously side-step -- they claim to be cool unwittingly, grimly sticking with their art-post-rock day job, presumably because someone has to channel art, post-youth rock feeling, whatever they feel like doing -- we're always reminded that such'n'such a band actually includes special sonic youth member/connection, or such'n'such isn't just a band at all, no, it's a special sonic youth side project -- so we had 20thc. composers who always need performances allowing these generous rock stars to interpret their works on what's actually a special label special different side project thats title and marketing seem to me once again a two-way bet by sonic youth as to whether the music is good or not, whether they're serious (hey, let's be boringly extra-serious at our goodbye 20thc gigs, because we're sonic youth, that special brand that has to keep breaking new ground, looking like we're always ahead of ya)

it seems this brand is by default treated differently in the media, as sonic youth are always on the cusp, their releases checked out by lots of people wanting to keep up with the 'avant-garde', stay young, be cool and rock without using the rolling stones, being seen to sell out -- some people don't 'get' the band anymore or think they're treading water -- to me they're the refuse-to-die rolling stones type band for another generation -- by putting their music in that sacred turf reserved for the 'let's be cautious -- this music is new' stuff, haven't this band actually branded themselves as permanently relevant art ? and that's so cool in an indie way if they can slack their way through it ? and they'll be remembered as imprortant nyc art scenesters, beyond the 15 minutes ? nah, they can't just rock out forever (not enough enduringly thought-provoking material at any stage of their career), yet retirement or perhaps simply dropping the b(r)and and taking their chances like all the other vanguard musicians on the planet, how could they still be so different ?

jandek and merzbow...

i mean, COME ON!

Whitehouse is 32 times more pretentious than Sonic Youth or Merzbow. WH didn't even have an original schtick. Prince/The Residents are up there, for me, because they both seem to think their releases and aesthetic/political stances still have some huge influence, which is ultra-bull in both cases.

Please stop confusing 'most pretentious' with 'acts I really hate'.
Pretention, as noted previously, is not even a good reason to hate someone. Hate someone because they lie and steal, not because they think they're something they're not.

Maybe because they are some modern prog or faux jazz band, I can see that. Or is it because critics either have blown spooge or chunks trying to define whatever it is that they have done?

I don't know, they just seem more chess club than drama department to me.

Other nominations: Don Caballero and a seconding on GYBE!

Tantric pantry! Brilliant!

But the Thurston-and-Kim show is very sick-making. They've become the Nicolae and Elena Ceausescu of the Lower East Side.

Brilliant! Can just see them hobbling down Lafatyette Street condemning random young pretenders to their throne to death by feedback.

Beano (Bowie/Eno) are disappointed not to be mentioned in this thread, having claimed to 'start a whole new school of pretention'.

Actually, he was pretty pretentious, but no way does he take the crown, er, tiara.

But they DID, which ultimately results in them not being pretentious. If they had not, and still claimed to have done so, then they'd be pretentious. But they actually DID. Eno especially, between him & Flood & Daniel Lanois you've got just about the top ten most pretentious pop albums ever produced. Just thinking about those three together makes me kind of URK. URK... URRRK. HMMP.

Excuse me.

'When I hear Killah Priest or RZA kick their mathematics, I always wonder - is it replicatible? [sic] Whose minds are these ideas flowing through, and what codes are being transmitted? It's only questions, and trust me, I've met and dealt with both Killah Priest and RZA, and I've even had Andrew Ross over for dinner.'

'[Michael] Jackson's plate is so full that, on Thursday, he testified that he has little time for matters such as money.

"There's an overview [that I receive] of what's going on financially, but I'm in the creative department," he said.

"I'm a visionary," he added.'

If does do all 5 of these things (especially #5) he might, might, might just barely break even.
For him right now, his best case scenario still involves eating boxed macaroni and cheese or ramen noodles for the rest of his life. But hey, being a starving artist might do his art some good.

Is there some reason no one has mentioned Creed yet?

For me, pretty much anyone who doesn't seem to have any sense of humor whatsoever usually come across as "pretentious" as fuck...be they Nas or Garth Brooks or Scott Stapp or Christina Aquilera or Lenny Kravitz or Eric Clapton or the monkey-chant-asshole-from-Disturbed.

Andrew Ross is the editor of "Social Text," a journal that became a laughingstock when Alan Sokal successful published his bogus repudiation of mathematics in its pages. Ross tried to save face in a most unusual way: by suggesting that Sokal's piece (plainly and admittedly a parody) had merits and (paraphrasing here of course) that it was published primarily to give "Social Text" cred for having a physicist as an ally. Interestingly, Sokal and Ross are now allies in an organization of Jews opposing the Israeli occupation of the West Bank etc.

"Pretentious" is such a fraught concept, and seemingly one of the favorite words of the under-30 set--at least in the U.S. When I was younger I tended to use it in the sense of "uncessarily verbose" --often accompanied by purposeless name-dropping (Sting no doubt). Then there is pretentious as "embarrassingly overwrought" (Xiu Xiu, Sigur Ros). The most irksome category of pretentious musicians are those who use excessive verbiage to cast their lack of musical ideas as some kind of "minimalism" (DJ Spooky, maybe Whitehouse). What all of these folks have in common is either a complete lack of humor on an especially leaden sense of humor.

I'm troubled by the overuse of the word pretentious (or the harsh judgements associated with it) because it often conceals an anti-intellectualism. Also many artists who start out with much of the poseur in them grow into and perhaps out of their pretensions as time goes one (Scott Walker). Pretensions and poses can be invaluable.

That said, I cast another vote for DJ Spooky, whose pretensions are unbearable and uniquely self-serving.

Pretentious as in bad = PRML SCRM, FSOL ("we are the sacrificial lambs", oh whatever...)

On some recent VH1 deal the Edge (jesus christ, I'm referring to a 40-something year old man as the Edge) spoke in all seriousness about what its like to write classic songs. (take a long) Walk on (a short pier), Mr. Evans, walk on.

new band starting an all-new craze: Pretentio-Core!

I forgot to add to the list of pretentious bands Throbbing Gristle (Psychic TV less so).

Most of Pavement's lyrics strike me as thoroughly pretentious. That is, pretending to depth while being in reality shallow phrase-slinging.

I can't listen to their music because of the pretentious bullshit that emits from my speakers....

As far as "artists" who are pretentious, I think Puff "I invented the remix" Daddy takes the cake.