Artists you like but can't muster up the energy to defend them

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This came to me while replying to the Pete Yorn thread. I guess in some cases, it's easy to understand why some/most people wouldn't like said artists. It's also the context; Ryan Adams gets immediate hate here, so while I might defend him to, say, a friend at a pub, I wouldn't even bother to submit a reply on ILM. On one hand, I suppose I could be seen as lazy and not ready to defend my convictions all the way through (but then again, it *is* Ryan Adams we're talking about), but on the other hand, I do have a limited sense of WHY ILMers don't like him (from what I've gathered during my two years around here). I also take into consideration that most people here are older than I am, thus have seen more and thus are less impressionable than someone my age (e.g. hearing Radiohead for the first time when you're 16 vs when you're 25).

I guess defending a band in a real-life, face-to-face conversation and on the Internet just take different roads of arguments. Personally, I'll just about defend any band I like in person, but rarely do behind a keyboard. Which is why I read ILM more than I actively participate in it, I suppose.

― alex in montreal, Monday, 6 October 2003 04:17 (twenty-one years ago)

(Sorry if this is a bit all over the place, as there seem to be all sorts of sub-questions in the question)

― alex in montreal, Monday, 6 October 2003 04:17 (twenty-one years ago)

Fiona Apple

― Melissa W (Melissa W), Monday, 6 October 2003 04:37 (twenty-one years ago)

all of them bar maybe a couple dozen

― the surface noise (electricsound), Monday, 6 October 2003 04:38 (twenty-one years ago)

I would feel awkward defending any artists I am really passionate about, because I'm so non-objective it would never convince anyone. Me: "But OMG that song touched my soul and don't you hear the *passion* and all that junk!?!" Everyone else: yeah, great argument there.

I don't like debating on the internet anymore, because I butt heads with more rationally-oriented types and it never turns out well.

― Blood and sparkles (bloodandsparkles), Monday, 6 October 2003 07:34 (twenty-one years ago)

For me its the opposite Alex - there's a whole group of bands who I think are OK, even quite good, and who I might defend if everyone did hate them but on ILM everyone likes them more than me so when a hater does come along I either think what's the point or in some senses feel a sneaking sympathy. Fritz's Nick Drake thread is a good example: I don't listen to him much any more but I do like him, I also know that lots of ppl of ILM *revere* him and would have more motivation to articulate why. And there's plenty of artists I like less than Nick Drake who I wouldn't defend either.

― Tom (Groke), Monday, 6 October 2003 07:43 (twenty-one years ago)

Artists you like but can't muster up the energy to defend them?

Oh, whoever.

― mark grout (mark grout), Monday, 6 October 2003 08:22 (twenty-one years ago)

David Gray and Jewel. But this is one or two songs each, so why bother?

― Michael Daddino (epicharmus), Monday, 6 October 2003 08:48 (twenty-one years ago)

Well I love Lou Reed even tho he is pretty indefensible in so many ways

― Dadaismus (Dada), Monday, 6 October 2003 10:44 (twenty-one years ago)

Embrace. There I said it.

― Rob Bolton (Rob Bolton), Monday, 6 October 2003 11:50 (twenty-one years ago)

Yello. Everytime I try to play it to my friends, they're like "What the fuck is this?" I've never even tried to explain their geniousity to anyone.

― Tuomas (Tuomas), Monday, 6 October 2003 12:04 (twenty-one years ago)

Swans.

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Monday, 6 October 2003 12:35 (twenty-one years ago)

I can't even muster the energy to name them.

― Nick H, Monday, 6 October 2003 13:00 (twenty-one years ago)

Nick H's answer is best...

But many, of course. Gomez, would be one. (That alone would get me disbarred around here I reckon.) I don't much bother to "defend" my tastes, tho. That's for rhetoricians, not poets...

― M Specktor (M Specktor), Monday, 6 October 2003 13:53 (twenty-one years ago)

I defended flaming lips a few times here but when the FL+chemical brothers thread came along I couldn't post after another round of attacks on them partly bcz i haven't heard the track (though there were attacks on the FL on their own).

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Monday, 6 October 2003 13:58 (twenty-one years ago)

Ash.

― Sarah Pedal (call mr. lee), Monday, 6 October 2003 14:07 (twenty-one years ago)

Blood and sparkles: I think that's exactly it for me. I like arguments about bands in person, because you can see the genuine passion with which a person will defend an artist. Yeah, there's some rational arguments, but there's also the "but their third album is SO amazing". This does not translate well written down, but when you HEAR someone say it (and see their body language while saying it), their enthusiasm becomes almost an argument in itself. In a way, I guess that's why I find music journalism too "academic" and lacking in emotion, which is what music is for me (most of the time).

― alex in montreal, Monday, 6 October 2003 14:39 (twenty-one years ago)

For me there's a lot that I at one time would go to all sorts of ends to defend but now that my true slacker-self has taken control of the asylum I prefer not to waste time trying to make people understand what's so fucking gnarly badical awesome about like Primus and Ani DiFranco and Latyrx and so forth.

― nickalicious (nickalicious), Monday, 6 October 2003 14:57 (twenty-one years ago)

alex in montreal-- exactly. I find it really hard to analyze things academically or in a way that is objective, because when I really love a record or a performer, it's just emotional. I mean I don't like music because it is scientifically sound, I like it because it bowls me over and overwhelms my senses beyond any and all reason. So when I talk about it in person, I usually get really animated, it's kind of scary. This doesn't translate too well online...

― Blood and sparkles (bloodandsparkles), Monday, 6 October 2003 18:03 (twenty-one years ago)

i second Ani Difranco and throw in tori amos, frente, autechre, coil, kmfdm, and usually radiohead (all of whom i love dearly, but can understand why someone would hate them)

― Felcher (Felcher), Monday, 6 October 2003 18:54 (twenty-one years ago)

I don't care if nobody else likes what I like.
Trying to convince anyone that something is good means you belive that taste can be objective.

― , Monday, 6 October 2003 19:01 (twenty-one years ago)

To ILM: Bright Eyes, Linkin Park (though I've tried to defend both before)
To my girlfriend: Jay-Z, Eminem, Ludacris, Lightning Bolt

― Tom Breihan (Tom Breihan), Monday, 6 October 2003 19:17 (twenty-one years ago)

Move and Everything Is Wrong-era Moby

― Curt1s St3ph3ns, Monday, 6 October 2003 19:38 (twenty-one years ago)

I must have read that "Defend Billy Joel" thread through a couple times before deciding I didn't feel like defending him, even though I think he's a great singles artist. Like the surface noise up there, there are far less bands I feel like defending than not.

― Vinnie (vprabhu), Monday, 6 October 2003 23:24 (twenty-one years ago)

b-52s and rem?

― Chuck Tatum (Chuck Tatum), Tuesday, 7 October 2003 14:34 (twenty-one years ago)

Tori Amos, REM, my ex-girlfriend.

― Dom Passantino (Dom Passantino), Tuesday, 7 October 2003 14:46 (twenty-one years ago)

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