Yes I hate it. No I have never listened to it.

Me? Negativland. Cuz I just got SO BORED being told by people that what they did was cool for every reason you could imagine except DID IT SOUND GOOD? So I decided it obviously didn't: I have zero interest in checking them out to "prove myself wrong" — I'm NOT wrong, and I don't NEED to hear them to KNOW THAT FOR SURE.

And yes I do own the famous "U2" thingie that all the fuss was about, and yes I expect I did play once or twice back in the day, and no I completely can't recall a THING about what it sounds like WHICH JUST PROVES MY POINT.

There is already a thread about Negativland, so you'd better not start defending them. Revenge yourselve by pissing ME off when you tell me about who YOU go after "on principle" when you've never heard a note.

Frank Zappa

all rock n roll music from the 1990s.

Spherical beat me to the punch re Frank Zappa. So many people (including some wonderful people hereabouts with excellent taste) have such an irrational hatred of all things Frank. Makes a bona- fine Zappahead like myself feel like a leper sometimes or (gulp! ) a Deadhead(sniff do I smell like patchouli).

Seriously, the Zappa hatred honestly puzzles me because so many folks like other musical stuff similar to what he did or just as far-out musically. I would chalk it up to Zappa's potty-mouthed lyrics and smarmy attitude (both of which even get to me sometimes), yet there are no small number of rap fans hereabouts (Eminem, anyone?) who not only tolerate same from rap performers but actually seem to enjoy it. It's a puzzle to me, frankly.

i think em is far more intelligent with his potty-mouth than zappa is, if not more musically inventive. the lyrical equiv. of zappa is someone like Too $hort.

(Well, it isn't principle with me: I've tried REALLY REALLY REALLY HARD with Zappa, cuz I have frendz I'm fond of who worship him — but I just don't get it. His sometimes snotty attitude maybe doesn't help, but there are far more things abt FZ as a person that I admire than, jeez, I dunno, Axl Rose. So, no, it's not that. Eminem I got instantly: Zappa's music = Zappa's voice = boring and ugly. I mean, maybe the NEXT Zappa LP I hear will be the one that changes everything — but after, like, 10 [and the 10 yr friend whose taste you often share raves about] you start looking at your watch, and wondering why you're doing this to yourself...)

You didn't answer the question, tho, Tadeusz.

Zappa's music is corny, yo. Some people can't get next to that.

> You didn't answer the question, tho, Tadeusz.

Well, I kinda did (the snide aside to the Dead) but indirectly. But the Dead are too easy and while I can't say that I've spent too much time listening to them, I've heard enough to conclude that there isn't anything there that I'd like.

Them aside, I definitely recognize the "I Hate It/I've Never Heard It" principle. Negativland works for me, too, come to think of it (the Casey Kasem-going-apeshit thing was funny, but I heard that snippet first on Howard Stern). Also, all the various mutations of electronica work too -- not that I hate the stuff, but I honestly can't tell the difference between one mutation and another, what makes one genre a "progression" from another, etc.

Then there's emo ...

Not to get too long-winded on this topic, but I don't necessarily think the "I Hate It/I Never Listened to It" thing is necessarily bad. Just think of all the different sorts of music out there, all the different groups and genres, etc. And consider that within each subset, there will inevitably be slavish imitators who add little-to-nothing to what the originator of that subset already did (why does Britpop come to mind immediately?) If, within that genre you hear, say, Oasis and decide it's crap, then why bother not only with the rest of their music but anything that's like it? A person's only got a limited amount of time and money, after all. So yeah, such a person may be deliberately limiting themselves, but on the other hand why should such a person go down a dead end just to prove a point?

And yeah, if someone doesn't like, say, "Punky's Whips," then I guess there's no point in running out to buy anything else Zappa put out. (Believe me, I know how expensive and time-consuming that would be.) I might think such a person is cheating themselves and can't understand their dislike, but see above and who gives a fuck what I think anyway? :-)

i's a bad idea because genres are bad signifiers and just because you don't like the most popular artist/originator of the genre certainly does not mean you should and could not love the rest of it. all genre signifiers are rubbish anyway except for glitch-hop.

I find 'crap' a great signifier, since it applies to so much without reference to the actual kind of sound created.

The Clash.I can't bring myself to listen to them.

The short list: Neu! Can. Almost any new electronica that gets called "downtempo."

Followup question: have you ever panned something in *print* that you've never heard? I'm guilty of doing so on a few rare occasions, though never in a review of the thing itself. F'rinstance, I might say that Neu! are completely useless in a Destiny's Child review, without having heard a single note by the former. (But what I'm usually reacting to in a case like this is less Neu! themselves than their reputation or their slavish following... it's not a good tendency when it shows up, regardless.) (Thankfully, I recently checked out some of the Neu! reissues and I don't think I'm too off-kilter... first thought: what's with the exclamation mark?!)

rockcritics.com, eh? shut up.

Acts I have previously hated 'on principle', without listening to, usual pre-punk 'dinosaurs' sometimes turn out to be 'quite good shock'.

Do find something irritating and irksome about Scott Walker, but without having heard his stuff, slavish fandom in 5 years is a definitely a pos.

the exclamation mark in Neu! = pop art,Andy Warhol.As much as I like Krautrock it is a relief to see some people bag it out because it exists in that cult vacuum where no one seems to criticise it.

Led Zepplin. I've been subjected unwillingly to the Zep, but I always grit my teeth and get angry at it. Also, I think Speed Garage was a terrible idea whose only good outcome was the transubstantiation into two step.

On a different note, Too $hort is a brilliant lyricyst, and does the outrage-for-outrage's-sake far less than Em. Anyone who doubts me should hunt down his smashing track Nation Riders.

>>> Is this a principle you recognise?

Oh, I recognize no other...

I embody the cliche, "I hate people who are intolerant"! Whenever somebody claims to not like something, I smell blood, I force it on them without mercy, like a pitbull shaking a baby. Any R&B fan coming to my house is going to listen to Half Japanese all afternoon, while my elitist friends get a double dose of R. Kelly, Spice Girls and best of all, Texas. Every excuse somebody can come up with for not liking something, I will obliterate, I don't respect people's rights to have opinions on anything whether I agree with them or not. That said, I have been known to write off EVERYTHING that came out of the UK in the years 84-89. Particularly anything remotely baggy or jangly. If the first 10 seconds have a Byrdsy thing going along with the funky-drummer beat, out the window it goes and I will NOT will NOT will NOT even countenance listening to it. Also, any artist known for 'clever' lyrics as opposed to music comes under extreme suspicion from me. One of the people living in my flat at the moment is an Elvis Costello fan, the occasional arguments we have reach levels of Pope/Paisley COMPLETE lack of any point of connection.

Although my friends often accuse me of hating something without ever hearing it this is quite untrue. I hate Pearl Jam/Lloyd Cole/Zappa/Beefheart/Weller/Costello because I've sadly heard their music. Exception to the rule: Wynton Marsalis, I really hate him on principal.

The Grateful Dead. Though I feel like a sixteenth-century burgomeister advocating throwing their tracts onto a bonfire when I denounce them. Still... I just... can't, can't!--listen to them.

Tarden: re Elvis C. -- you have my unqualified support. ;-)

The Sex Pistols, J Po(o)p, Zappa and Marsalis.

Sorry - where I said 'UK Indie' music above, change it to 'US'. After seeing the Mitchell Froom thread, I am reminded of my true nature. I would rather listen to 16 straight hours of Stone Roses or Soup Dragons than even one song by Let's Active, the dBs, Guadalcanal Diary, Green on Red, Del Fuegos, X, Long Ryders, BoDeans, etc. And I can't name a single song by any of these and never wish to learn any. (So folks, if you wish to know my blind spot - here it is, served up on a plate. I quote Paul Simenon re Led Zeppelin ["All I need to do is look at the album covers and I throw up!"]) No, I'm NOT changing my mind - seriously, I had so THOROUGHLY wiped this music from my consciousness that today was the first time I was even made aware of its existence again.

Even better, in an example being somebody Sterling would call an 'idiot':) - I like 'Murmur' and 'Reckoning'. Ha ha!

Of course I mean "example OF being an idiot", i.e. only liking the exemplar and consigning the entire rest-of-genre to oblivion.

Oh, and digi-dub. Christ, what shit. Not interested in the slightest. Anything Celtic/anthemic, that's something I really have to work on stifling my gag reflex for every time I'm in a Kilburn pub. (Actually, 'Celtic' pop/rock is eerily like the whiskey that fuels some of it - taken completely straight, it works fine - and in a weird paradox, the more it is diluted the more disgusting the result. Runrig slightly more tolerable than Big Country slightly more tolerable than Travis etc) (Odd that I like American C&W then)

Zappa, Grateful Dead, Phish, Blink 182, Hootie and The Blowfish.

Zappa, of course - is it the missionary zeal of FZ converts that especially irks? (No offence meant Tadeusz - yr much more reasonable than the FZheads I know personally.)

'Wacky' pop bands (esp. ones with silly names) - BareNaked Ladies, Hootie, They Might Be Giants, Half Man Half Biscuit, etc etc. If a band can't even come up with a good name why the fuck should I listen to their records? Can never take Belle and Sebastian seriously because their name is so yuck-making.

Never listened to Coil (who I might like) or Current 93 'cos am arch-sceptic when it comes to 'magick' and the like. Don't have much time for Ministry, Whitehouse, Revolting Cocks etc. either - oooh, yr scaring me boys.

In a way, it's quite difficult to avoid some kind of exposure to music you've rejected on 'principle' - it's on the airwaves, played in shops, heard in pubs, put on at parties. Authors, even whole literary genres, SO much easier to dismiss without ever actually reading the fuckers.

To answer the question. Yes, I hate stuff on principle because I don't have much money so i need reasons for not buying discs. Basically 99.5 per cent of indie and 99.9999 per cent of 'Dance' and any of its sub-genres is hated without even listening to it. This ensures that I pick up stuff that is 'unconvential' (well, that's the idea, anyway).

I usually go for stuff like 'avant-garde' and stuff described as 'difficult' and so on because I want stuff that's different. i demand to be stunned. So Derek Bailey, Cecil taylor, beefheart, grateful Dead, Diamanda Galas, etc. were just some that were discovered by this appraoch.

Limp Bizkit, but that's too obvious (I *have* heard Korn, though, and they're terrible). Anything that looks like it would be for specialists of a specific genre only.

Fairport Convention, Richard Thompson, Gong, Lucinda Williams, Ani Di Franco, Jewel, Stone Temple Pilots.....

I hate punk rock on principle because it's idiotic, irritating, and so hard to find a punk band that can play well. The problem is that I end up liking horrible punk bands while professing my hatred for the entire movement. (No, Blink 182, Sum41, and MxPx do not count as punk.) (And I REALLY DO hate Operation Ivy.)

I hate Metallica on principle. They brought suit against Napster. I don't care what their music sounds like; I will never forgive them.

I love David Bowie and the (early) Velvet Underground on principle. I'm not sure what principle.

It's fun and fairly harmless to do, hating and loving things with no reason. Tastes change. I used to hate all rock music (until I listened to some). The biggest problem lies in trying to get other people to try out things they hate for no reason and being unable to win them over logically because I'm a hypocrite.

That new strain of Irish Country music someone started a thread about a month or so ago. I love corn but I can only take so much. And anybody that sings like Neil Young, except Wayne Coyne.

I've never (as far as I know) heard Iron Maiden or GG Allin, and I assume that they suck, or are mediocre, anyway. Unfortunately, I don't hate them. So, sad as this makes me feel, I must disqualify myself from participating in this thread.

Belle and Sebastian. It started when every anglophile English wannabe on the west side of the Atlantic declared them utter genius, solidified by monkey butlers and that god damn backing vocal to "Legal Man."

Hey, I fucking hate Belle & Sebastian on principle, even though I do actually not that infrequently listen to their music and even enjoy some of it.

(meta-question: is it possible to *dislike* something ironically?)

What I *really* hate categorically without really listening to, is that "dance" music (drum and bass? jungle? garage? fucked if I know what it's called) that just goes DUGGADUGGADUGGADUGGA so fast that no one can actually dance to it. Anything that gets British music crit boys THAT hot under the collar has *GOT* to be shite.

I kinda feel this way about Le Tigre. Couldn't tell you why. I'll probably like them just like I like all that other indie shit once I hear it.

I hate the Strokes on principle. And no, I've not heard a note of their music.

I also hated Pearl Jam (or, more precisely, I hated Eddie Vedder) on principle the first moment I became aware of them/him. And seeing their utterly useless buttload of "official boots" Beddie Wetter and the boys have shat out on the public (none of which I have any intention of listening to a second of), the "I Hate on Principle" principle still applies thereto.

You know that scene in High Fidelity when Jack Black and the skinny bald guy are listening to the demo, and they're just *pained* to admit it's really good? That's how I feel about Le Tigre. The first time I played it, my husband and I just looked at each other with these smug smirks on our faces that slowly faded as "Deceptacon" went on, and finally it was like, "can't... hold up... the pretense... must... give in... to catchy song..."

The Rolling Stones

Iggy Pop

Any other wanker who makes people believe that there's anything intrinsically cool about rock.

Jesus Christ, not another one of THOSE.

No. Iron Maiden are incredible, although the vocals don't fit the music.

I am "another one of THOSE", Patrick, and proud of it. ET said what I feel, as you can probably guess.

Runrig, Big Country, Marillion, The Grateful Dead, The Steve Miler Band, Hootie And The Blowfish, Starsailor, Muse, The Dylans, The High, Ultrasound. Interestingly I agree with Dr C on everyone but Fairport Convention.

I always thought I would despise Iron Maiden until I actually heard them. Granted, the one album I heard was _Powerslave_, but "Aces High" and "Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner" are both supreme.

Robin - In your case it's fine, I'm used to you being one of THOSE ;)

If books count, I hate Rock and the Pop Narcotic without having read it.

I heard American Music Club live once and that was enough to put me off everything like it sight-unseen (sound-unheard). The name "emo" is a very unfortunate decision; it implies (to me) that the music's so whiny and screechy and lame that it must be justified or explained - "yes, he soundz pathetic, it's cause he's all emotional." Psh - it's rock n roll; if it's lame it's lame. Pace Mark S - do not defend emo to me here.

So: I set the bar much higher for music that has to announce itself in advance, whether by label hype or by critical justification.

Little Feat (has anyone actually heard them, are they a music press trick complete with dead lead singer etc?). Solo McCartney. Yoko Ono solo. Rush.

Mark S. Wasn't it you who sent me to review Rush at Wembley Arena for NME? I still haven't forgiven you...

Yay for me if it was. But it sadly didn't work, as yore taste iz still APPALLING!! Heh.

A sadist pikachu?

I can't even think of anything I hate on principle, because I end up hearing snippets of just about everything now -- even stuff like Limp Bizkit that I intend to escape. The coverage of the Strokes has been annoying, but I don't want to condemn them til I've actually heard something. So as of now I just suspect they're rubbish.

Dr C, you've never heard solo McCartney ??

I didn't think one way or the other about the Strokes, until I saw all of their names. Now I want them exterminated. Still haven't heard a note and don't want to now!

beefheart (heard a little, too much - the earliest stuff's ok). zappa. iggy pop solo. belle and sebastian. tullycraft. the professor and maryann. miles davis and any jazz that chinstroking white guys refer to by the artist's first or nickname (miles, bird, 'trane, ornette). gershwin. mahler. most "wacky" prog rock. tortoise side projects (all). 50s rock (all). beach boys & brian wilson.

spleen vented. i feel much better.