Worst Musical Argument

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What is the worst argument you have ever had about music? Purely about music mind, not one of those arguments with your boy/girlfriend that was going to happen anyway and you just happened to be playing DJ Assault to spark it off. Arguments which end in violence particularly welcome. Arguments over the interweb acceptable.

― Tom, Friday, 9 February 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Good one, I've calmed down so much in the last few years but I've had my share of arguments that bordered on violent, as a teenager of course and thus very embarrassing. I once had an endless discussion with a friend about which Motorhead live album was better, I eloquently put forth all arguments why "No Sleep 'till Hammersmith" is the motherfuckin' shit, my friend supported the idea that some late period shite album was better because they had an extra guitarist. Far worse though was an argument I had with a sort of psycho friend I had at the time about which band was better (you're not going to believe it): The Stone Roses (his choice) or Happy Mondays (my choice). :) It ended with us shouting down the halls of the school threatening each other with unspeakable violence. On the Net I once had a particular nasty argument on alt.techno with some psychopath who claimed all techno was shit and only Wendy Carlos was deemed worthy of making electronic records, it got to the point I started to post fantasy scenario's involving said person in a nuthouse. Let's hope he never finds this board :(

― Omar, Friday, 9 February 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

This seems to be a teenage preoccupation; militant taste in what is 'good' music and what is 'shite'! I went to a party when I was 15 and put Oasis on the stereo, it was promptly thrown out and across the room to be replaced by Pearl Jam 'Alive', the ensuing argument was intense, considering the alcohol didn't help 'cool down the situation' any...

(oh the pain!)

― Michael, Friday, 9 February 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I can't actually remember the last time I *really* argued about music. But since it was almost certainly with you Tom, I won't try too hard. I do remember accusing you and John of liking David Bowie and The Pet Shop Boys purely to piss me off. :-)

― alex thomson, Friday, 9 February 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I've had some great ones over the years. Apart from the most recent, most of them are characterised by the fact that if I were to have the same argument today, I'd be on the other side. In other words, I'm usually wrong. However I've never changed sides and then gone back to my original point of view again. So far, at least. I'd better give some examples. Back in around 1985 I was listening to a lot of 'dificult' music (Throbbing Gristle/Nurse With Wound and beyond) amongst other things. I remember a good friend arguing that this kind of music was essentially crap because there were no limits and you could 'do anything'. Therefore it couldn't be judged critically, because there was no established 'form' and it was impossible to decide whether it was any good. I argued strongly along the lines you would expect - 'there are no boundaries to what form music should take' etc. The argument ended up with beer being thrown and a fist fight in a flower bed. All I can say is that for the last ten years or so you'd need to pay me LARGE amounts of money to even think about listening to Throbbing Gristle, and that largely I was wrong. Enough for now, I'll think of more.

― Dr. C, Friday, 9 February 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Do a deja.com search on alt.music.alternative, find me in interaction with Geir, Persi and Rev. Jack Godsey, and have at it.

― Ned Raggett, Friday, 9 February 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

in the rain outside the london astoria, queueing for a one minute silence gig. trying to explain to a drunken powermetaller [like metal but worse - fantasy based, all dragons and fair maidens and so on] that it was perfectly acceptable for me to be into both the smiths and metal. i was simultaneously trying to hit on him, but with no success, and i also ended up losing the argument.

― jess owens, Friday, 9 February 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

i was a stoned and angry 17 yr. old, driving alone in the suburbs of minneapolis at 3 o'clock in the morning. Listening to the radio and Feeling Powerless. 'Zone 105',the local AAAlternative station(owned by ABC(owned by Disney)), was taking requests. I pulled my mom's Geo Metro into the nearest gas station , got out, trudged through the snow to the pay phone, and for the first time in my life, I call the fucking request line. DJ: Zooooone 105? Me: I have a request DJ: ok Me: you're not gonna to play it though. DJ: try me. Me: no, i mean, you really aren't going to. DJ: try me. Me: i wanna hear break my body by the pixies. DJ: that's not in our playlist. Me: see? DJ: what? click....

― gabe, Saturday, 10 February 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

fistfight in a flowerbed!!!

― gabe, Saturday, 10 February 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I can't tell how serious people are about this one. I can't imagine having a real argument about music where voices are raised and feelings get hurt; it doesn't seem that important. I will say, though, that the I Love Music discussion on Led Zeppelin raised my blood pressure a few notches. I just couldn't imagine how all of these smart people who allegedly care about music could be completely ignorant about the appeal of Zep.

― Mark Richardson, Saturday, 10 February 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I once kicked a guy in the nuts for saying that Siouxsie and the Banshees sucked. Granted I was tipsy and stoned at the time but that's a very serious statement where I come from.

PS We actually went on another date, too. Guys are pathetic.

― Ally, Saturday, 10 February 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

a few weekd ago... i put in Versus-Dead Leaves into the car cd player while my friend chris was in the passenger seat. chris:what the hell is this? **this is where you turn the volume to unbearable levels me:versus chris:mopey gay rock me:gay? you listen to queen **chris realizes that i am the master and changes topic...

― Kevin Enas, Saturday, 10 February 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Oh, I just remembered another time I got into a screaming match with someone over whether or not Shania Twain was prettier than Faith Hill (she is, damnit). But this has nothing to do with music when it comes down to it.

Can I pull the a.m.a answer too? My favorite fight on there was with Heather the Garbage Fan.

― Ally, Monday, 12 February 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I argued with an ex once about whether the Placebo version of 'Bigmouth Strikes Again' was better than the original. She said it was and I said it wasn't. Of course, I won, and now enjoy reminding a now embarrased ex about the whole thing...ah, happy days.

― DG, Monday, 12 February 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

At a recent party at my house, a DJ was playing terrible techno for free. Nobody was dancing. So we fired him. Then I provided the first Britney Spears album, the Romeo Must Die soundtrack, the Pink album, Destiny's Child, the best of Tommy James and the Shondells, Public Enemy, and other danceable type stuff. People packed the floor. Then I went outside, stood on a bench, and proclaimed myself the Queen of Pop Music, and started quoting Britney lyrics. This drunk ass mutha' started yelling at me about Led Zepplin while I tried to lead a singalong to Oops... I Did it Again. Then I started yelling at him (just coz I was pissed) about how Zep sucked and were ridiculous and depressing compared to the enjoyment provided by Backstreet and N'Sync, who at least didn't go all hippy psychadelic. We almost got into a fistfight, until some friends of mine chilled him out.

― Stering Clover, Monday, 12 February 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

People are entitled to their opinions... that said, if I met anyone who stopped techno *anything* for Britney Spears, I'd knock their block off.

― Inukko, Tuesday, 13 February 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Then remind me not to go to one of your parties.

― Ally, Tuesday, 13 February 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

CLEARLY it would be much more fun to play, for example, "Oops!... I Did It Again" and "Ventolin" at the same type.

Pop + inappropriate techno = happy Dan.

I think the worst music argument I ever got into involved me attempting to leap across a campfire in an attempt to strangle someone who had the nerve to say that Prince looked a little gay in all of those lacy shirts and high-heeled boots. I wasn't drunk, either. (I _was_ 11, though.)

― Dan Perry, Tuesday, 13 February 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Apparently the great "AC/DC - Rock or Metal?" debate consumed many column inches in the early '80s.

― Pihkalboy, Wednesday, 14 February 2001 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

two years pass...

I want to revive this but I don't have an answer just yet.

― Cozen (Cozen), Saturday, 19 April 2003 16:52 (twenty-two years ago)

Any argument involving Geir Hongro

― Dadaismus, Saturday, 19 April 2003 17:16 (twenty-two years ago)

Ned's dead baby. Ned's dead.

― Andrew (enneff), Saturday, 19 April 2003 17:30 (twenty-two years ago)

I once got into a prolonged argument with a total twunt who switched off the Aphex Twin that We Were All Quite Enjoying Thankyou Very Much and pulled out his guitar and started to play Summer Of '69. When I confronted him over this,

he said "JEEZE! You obviously have never been to a live gig before."
I said "Eh?"
he said "Anybody who's been to a concert before knows that live music is better than any recording."
I said "The noodling of a halfwit egomaniac such as yourself is not more enjoyable than any recording, ever.
he said "Oooh. Someone wants to get punched in the face."

Fight ensues. I won.

― Andrew (enneff), Saturday, 19 April 2003 17:39 (twenty-two years ago)

Aye, but Andrew, Summer of 69. COME! on! "I got my first real six string..." D00d was right.

― Cozen (Cozen), Saturday, 19 April 2003 17:43 (twenty-two years ago)

This is kind of an embarassing little thing to argue over, but a friend of mine and I are having an ongoing disagreement over whether or not Radiohead's The Bends is truly an "essential" album or not. I maintain its not. We get drunk and yell at eachother. It's really pretty stupid.

― hep j, Saturday, 19 April 2003 20:08 (twenty-two years ago)

I was on the mailing list for a band that disappeared for several years and then finally reappeared with a record I found intolerably lame; obviously 75% of this is that I was young and my tastes had changed considerably during the interim, but it was also sort of a suck-ass record either way. Anyway, I got all strident about denouncing the record, which everyone else on the list was pretty much fine with. But it was less an "argument" and more just me being irritating for extended periods of time.

I never have arguments about music now. I just shrug. I've had to develop this because people I know will be like: "Oh hey, you know about music, what do you think of [this band that I obviously just learned about, am really taken with, and would appreciate having your pseudo-official validation of]?" And obviously you just have to go: "Oh, right, Coldplay -- I'm not a huge fan, but I can see why you'd like them ... You know, you might like these bands Travis and Doves as well."

I know one guy who really likes to argue about music and is always trying to get me started on it, but I just can't anymore. Last time I saw him this weird "Zeppelin are better than New Order" thing started happening, which isn't exactly something I can argue for more than five seconds, cause I'm just completely uninterested in the former of the two.

― nabisco (nabisco), Saturday, 19 April 2003 20:18 (twenty-two years ago)

Good god, Andrew, there was an obscurity to dig up. (Needless to say I have not 'come around' on the vile idiocy that is Gene.)

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Saturday, 19 April 2003 21:51 (twenty-two years ago)

at a party i was at over a decade ago, this really drunk guy was bent on starting a fight with another really drunk guy. he started trying to argue that the la's had better harmonies than the housemartins. anyway, to recall just one of the absurdities from this scene, they were both standing in the front lawn outside of a house...so instead of saying the machismo-classic proposition "do you want to step outside?", the instigator of the fight instead says, "do you want to step inside, do you want to step inside?"

it was fucking great.

― Dallas Yertle (Dallas Yertle), Sunday, 20 April 2003 02:12 (twenty-two years ago)

Two letters. Just two letters.

U2.

'Nuff said.

― Kenan Hebert (kenan), Sunday, 20 April 2003 03:48 (twenty-two years ago)

Argument:|
Dave and Krist were merely sidemen to genius and deserve no money from the Nirvana empire.

Ha! What a crock!

http://images.google.com/images?q=tbn:pkyeaOK58pIC:www.washingtoncitypaper.com/archives/indc/td/smart/logo.gif

― Pleased to meet me, Sunday, 20 April 2003 03:53 (twenty-two years ago)

The memory of my dead husband belongs solely to me, and the years you two spent together are meaningless.

― Yoko (kenan), Sunday, 20 April 2003 03:56 (twenty-two years ago)

My grandfather insisted that Michael Bolton wrote "(Sittin' on) The Dock of the Bay." For TWO HOURS.

― M Matos (M Matos), Sunday, 20 April 2003 04:15 (twenty-two years ago)

Hahahaha! Oh, I've had those too. Someone was once con-fucking-vinced that "Cruel to be Kind" was a song from the sixties. I kept telling them very calmly, look, I'm absolutely 100% on this one.

― Kenan Hebert (kenan), Sunday, 20 April 2003 04:17 (twenty-two years ago)

Grandpa: "He wrote it back in the '60s, but Otis Redding recorded it first, and now he's recording it himself, just like he did with 'How Am I Supposed to Live without You?'"
Me: "That isn't true. Otis Redding wrote it with Steve Cropper, the guitar player."
Grandpa: "No, Michael Bolton wrote it."
Me: "He couldn't have written it! He was EIGHT YEARS OLD!"
etc.

― M Matos (M Matos), Sunday, 20 April 2003 07:02 (twenty-two years ago)

My grandfather insisted that Michael Bolton wrote "(Sittin' on) The Dock of the Bay." For TWO HOURS.

-A high-school classmate insisted that the middle part of "Bohemian Rhapsody" was AN ACTUAL REAL OPERA THING and not merely a goof.

-Someone else insisted that the female voice on "Battle of Evermore" was Grace Slick and wouldn't even LISTEN to me any of the five times I said "Well actually that's a singer called Sandy Denny." She would just be like "Anyway yeah so as I was saying I LOVE Grace Slick's backing vocal on 'Evermore'..."

― Jody Beth Rosen (Jody Beth Rosen), Sunday, 20 April 2003 09:16 (twenty-two years ago)

i know ILXors are by and large never wrong...but what about arguments when you were?
(i can't think of one instance meself)

― gaz (gaz), Sunday, 20 April 2003 09:33 (twenty-two years ago)

i once got into an email fight with a classmate who lived on the next hall over. he was insisting in some fashion that rap wasn't music. it ended in a lot of insults being hurled. just when i put the argument aside and resumed doing homework i hear a knock on my door and its him wanting to know if i wanted to get some dinner and continue our 'discussion.'

― Amateurist (amateurist), Sunday, 20 April 2003 09:36 (twenty-two years ago)

An Argument with Kirk DeGiorgio

so bad that I used for a 'zine article/.

Jerry Beeks has beef with me as well, 'cos I dissed his album by saying it would soon only be available in bargain sections of second hand record shops.

― Nik (Nik), Sunday, 20 April 2003 09:39 (twenty-two years ago)

i got punched for dancing funny once, but i don't remember there being any argument. i sure do dance funny.

― gaz (gaz), Sunday, 20 April 2003 09:40 (twenty-two years ago)

i don't remember having any REAL fights about music. It came to outkast vs the bare nakes ladies once. i suggested we accept our aesthetic differences and never speak of this again (sorry dom!)(ps it wasn't actually dom i was arguing with at the time).

last night me + friend + friends of friend went to this club. DJing was fine, yknow, a little out of date, but all the great crowd-pleasers of recent months - 'in da club', 'lose yourself', 'mundian te bach ke', 'boys of summer' etc - were there. so we get out the club and one of the friend's friends says: they only played two good songs tonight. me: which two would those be? him: u2 and puddle of mudd. me: i'm going to have to disagree with you there. it didn't go any further, but i think i would've been justified in at least some light throttling around the head and neck.

― mitch lastnamewithheld (mitchlnw), Sunday, 20 April 2003 10:00 (twenty-two years ago)

i don't remember having any REAL fights about music. It came to outkast vs the bare nakes ladies once.

B-b-b-b-but Ying & Yang! We need both!

― Daniel_Rf (Daniel_Rf), Sunday, 20 April 2003 10:57 (twenty-two years ago)

Who was the best Beatle?

I have had millions of arguments about this - mostly because I take the controversial "John was the worst" stand.

― dog latin (dog latin), Sunday, 20 April 2003 11:32 (twenty-two years ago)

The only time I get seriously pissed is when someone dismisses country music altogether. Unfortunately, this happens all the time.

― Catherine (Catherine), Sunday, 20 April 2003 11:37 (twenty-two years ago)

With one of my best friends: Are Kraftwerk funky or not? I was the affirmative side. It nearly got violent. We were drunk and I was trying to remember those 'so black they're white' quotes.

― Keith McD (Keith McD), Sunday, 20 April 2003 11:47 (twenty-two years ago)

once I insisted to a friend who'd written a piece saying that the drummer on "Cold Sweat" was Clyde Stubblefield, that it was actually Jabo Starks. I was wrong. I've since learned not to question that particular friend's fact-checking--he's very thorough, which I'm not always.

― M Matos (M Matos), Sunday, 20 April 2003 19:41 (twenty-two years ago)

I can't think of anything particularly heated, but I can think of a few so dumb yet insistent that they still plague me occasionally. Worst was a high school friend who became outraged when I innocently referred to the Pixies as "rock and roll," and he insisted that they weren't rock and roll but "alternative." If I remeber correctly, he also thought Operation Mindcrime by Queensryche was the greatest album ever recorded.

Then there was another friend in high school who insisted that the Gladys Knight version of "I Heard it Through the Grapevine" was superior to the Marvin Gaye version, which made me outraged. I mean, is anything more WRONG than that?

And I won't even get into the constant arguments I got into with college radio colleagues in the mid-Nineties who were certain that "song" was dying and was being replaced by "soundscape." If I remember correctly, most of them thought rock and roll began with, um, the Pixies (or maybe Esquivel).

― chris herrington, Sunday, 20 April 2003 20:29 (twenty-two years ago)

Depends whether you mean in real life or on the Net.

On the Net, I think the worst arguments I have had were with a Norwegian hip-hop-producer who used to participate in the Norwegian music newsgroup. And then, a couple years later with a Swedish hip-hop/R&B-fan who seemed to think that all music made by white people was a work or the Devil (or something like that....)

― Geir Hongro (GeirHong), Sunday, 20 April 2003 21:18 (twenty-two years ago)

I once got into a prolonged argument with a total twunt who switched off the Aphex Twin that We Were All Quite Enjoying Thankyou Very Much and pulled out his guitar and started to play Summer Of '69.

Andrew in hanging-out-with-Ally shockah! That's exactly what I would do when confronted with IDM. LET THE FITE ENSUE.

I've never gotten into a vehement argument about music, I don't think. Patch Adams, on the other hand...

― Ally (mlescaut), Monday, 21 April 2003 00:11 (twenty-two years ago)

High school graduation theme song fight:

White Stoners wanted the Kansas song "Dust in the Wind" while the African Americans wanted "Bustin Loose" by Chuck Brown and the Soul Searchers.

― bladderwort, Monday, 21 April 2003 01:01 (twenty-two years ago)

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