Darkness = Hearsay

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This is the thread where doomie can share his neat story about Hearsay and The Darkness without fear of reprisal.

― stevie (stevie), Thursday, 19 February 2004 12:46 (twenty-two years ago)

Hear'Say, get it right.

― Dom Passantino (Dom Passantino), Thursday, 19 February 2004 12:50 (twenty-two years ago)

maybe this fabled Darkness story is just hearsay...?

― stevie (stevie), Thursday, 19 February 2004 12:51 (twenty-two years ago)

Did they have sex

― Silly Sailor (Andrew Thames), Thursday, 19 February 2004 12:56 (twenty-two years ago)

It's Menswear all over again - people were told to like them by he NME before even hearing them. Did you see Glastonbury on TV? ...constant references to this amazing new band, and they turn out to be a spoof standard heavy metal band with inappropriate Billy Mackenzie vocals... Come back Mike Flowers, all is forgiven.

― Jez (Jez), Thursday, 19 February 2004 13:06 (twenty-two years ago)

um. no.

― stevie (stevie), Thursday, 19 February 2004 13:11 (twenty-two years ago)

who are all these people loving the darkness ironically, and why have i never seen them at a darkness gig?

― stevie (stevie), Thursday, 19 February 2004 13:11 (twenty-two years ago)

I like it that every time The Darkness gets mentioned someone who doesn't like them (I'm pretty ambivalent - a couple of decent singles, not heard the album) say they are spoof. Virtually all my favourite bands have an element of 'spoof' about them: Aphex Twin, Bonzo Dog, Captain Beefheart, the cod-funk lounge music I've been obsessing about recently, The Beatles, DFA, The Sex Pistols, The Muppets, lots of Velvet Underground etc etc etc.

― Jim Robinson (Original Miscreant), Thursday, 19 February 2004 13:13 (twenty-two years ago)

I have a couple of friends who are a couple, and they love the darkness enough that they collect boots of their gigs, but their love is very ironic, and one of the things they dig is that the darkness seem to be taking the piss etc. I once got a lift somewhere w/one of them, and he insisted on playing this terrible live tape. Man, it was excruciating!! Next time, I'll get the bus.

― Pashmina (Pashmina), Thursday, 19 February 2004 13:16 (twenty-two years ago)

The most OTM thing I've seen on ILM is the idea that ALL bands are comedy. Eg the Pet Shop Boys, Eno, NERD, the Smiths, Joy Division, Jamelia, Roxy Music, St Etienne, Outkast, and other corny indie fuc (=me) faves. I enjoyed the Darkness LP. I don't really 'follow' music or have a 'favourite' band any more; and the Darkness was, I think, the only new guitar record listened to in my flat last year. People who don't like humour, or think that it's antithetical to seriousness are weird.

― ENRQ (Enrique), Thursday, 19 February 2004 13:46 (twenty-two years ago)

jim & enrq otm

― stevie (stevie), Thursday, 19 February 2004 13:50 (twenty-two years ago)

ENRG, they're the type of people who forget Johnny Cash sung 'Flushed From The Bathroom Of My Heart' and 'Egg-Sucking Dog' to the inmates at Folsom Prison. I did a rather rubbish and overwritten article on this subject for Freaky Trigger (I suppose - the article actually conflates a number of different points but c'est la vie) but can't seem to find it on the site.

― Jim Robinson (Original Miscreant), Thursday, 19 February 2004 14:03 (twenty-two years ago)

how come there aren't 50 threads about them?
-- Fritz Wollner (fritzwollner5...), August 6th, 2003.

be careful what you wish for

― zebedee (zebedee), Thursday, 19 February 2004 14:10 (twenty-two years ago)

I like it that every time The Darkness gets mentioned someone who doesn't like them (I'm pretty ambivalent - a couple of decent singles, not heard the album) say they are spoof.

Hang on a mo'; there's a big difference between a witty band (like those you cite) - the best music has an element of humour, imo - and a novelty group, which I believe they are.

― Jez (Jez), Thursday, 19 February 2004 14:13 (twenty-two years ago)

As much a novelty as Queen were.

(but not as much a novelty as Queen are now, though)

― mark grout (mark grout), Thursday, 19 February 2004 14:14 (twenty-two years ago)

I take it no-one knows the hearsay story then?

― mark grout (mark grout), Thursday, 19 February 2004 14:14 (twenty-two years ago)

Evidently not :(

― Pashmina (Pashmina), Thursday, 19 February 2004 14:24 (twenty-two years ago)

Explain the difference Jez. It seems like it's either the degree of humour or the lack of 'we're taking this seriously' poses or the fact that I guess you don't like The Darkness.

― Jim Robinson (Original Miscreant), Thursday, 19 February 2004 14:47 (twenty-two years ago)

Last time I saw Alan McGee in the Dublin Castle he told me that Justin Hawkins and Myleene Klass had a brief but torrid affair not long between Christmas. Apparently they used to freeze each others turds and then roger themselves with them.

Don't tell Doomie I told you though.

― Matt DC (Matt DC), Thursday, 19 February 2004 14:52 (twenty-two years ago)

I heared that story was Lisa Stansfield, from Ian Lee.

― mark grout (mark grout), Thursday, 19 February 2004 14:55 (twenty-two years ago)

She may have been involved as well. And David Byrne.

― Matt DC (Matt DC), Thursday, 19 February 2004 14:57 (twenty-two years ago)

Jim: You know what I mean ;-) Maybe I'm wrong, but I'd just assumed they were a sort of comedy/cabaret act (daft Christmas single etc.)...a kind of latter day Spinal Tap. The other bands you mention made witty songs without being novelty acts. They don't get on my nerves; I just find it odd that people are taking their act at all seriously...

― Jez (Jez), Thursday, 19 February 2004 22:44 (twenty-two years ago)

Sorry Jim I've not updated the archive page in an age - it should be on there. It's here.

― Tico Tico (Tico Tico), Thursday, 19 February 2004 23:28 (twenty-two years ago)

i love all these darkness threads, but i wish there were more darkness love on them. i don't care if its lame, but justin hawkins' sound-like-a-soprano vocals just sound fucking weird against those rocking riffs and it sucks me in every time. particularly on "i believe in a thing called love", cos the chorus sounds clunky/busy to me, its odd and i like it is all. yeah i know freddy mercury did the falsetto-over-rock thing, but when he went into that register he sounded like a man doing falsetto. when hawkins hits the high notes, he sounds like what i would have wound up sounding like with a few more years in the soprano-factory.

on other threads, people such as ned have mentioned similar bands to the darkness who "do it better". i doubt i will ever come round to hating the darkness but i am really innarested in those bands.

― The Lady Ms Lurex (lucylurex), Friday, 20 February 2004 00:52 (twenty-two years ago)

"Sorry Jim I've not updated the archive page in an age - it should be on there. It's here.
-- Tico Tico"

Reading that article... I've never been told 'great' music is emotional or meaningful. I've grown up being told that 'great' music is entertaining and to just shut up and laugh like everyone else. I guess that's why I appreciate emotion in music...

― Stupid (Stupid), Friday, 20 February 2004 00:58 (twenty-two years ago)

also any band featuring animal print is a good band. so there.

― The Lady Ms Lurex (lucylurex), Friday, 20 February 2004 01:01 (twenty-two years ago)

The idea that all bands are a joke, sort of appeals because it mitigates the horrors of popular music, but it also sounds a bit like, 'What, don't you get it? No sense of humour. Whinger/killjoy' etc etc.

― maryann (maryann), Friday, 20 February 2004 01:29 (twenty-two years ago)

(re ENRQ)

― maryann (maryann), Friday, 20 February 2004 01:33 (twenty-two years ago)

hawkins' sound-like-a-soprano vocals just sound fucking weird against those rocking riffs and it sucks me in every time.

Hey!!!! You might like early-to-mid 70s Sparks then!!!!!

(Does this explain why many of the oldies in newespapers refer to The Darkness as a "glam rock"!??!?!?!)

― Old Fart!!! (oldfart_sd), Friday, 20 February 2004 11:58 (twenty-two years ago)

maryann -- fair dos. ver 'ness will start to cloy, or perhaps have already started to, for me, but with all these 1979-alists around (1979 is *so* 3 years ago) in their charcoal gray (making it up here -- ed) and cheesewire guitars (or whatever -- I just hate the Rapture okay?) humour is a necessary corrective.

― ENRQ (Enrique), Friday, 20 February 2004 12:04 (twenty-two years ago)

The most OTM thing I've seen on ILM is the idea that ALL bands are comedy.
Yes, but sadly some bands don't buy that idea (or don't realize it's a comedy).

― nathalie (nathalie), Friday, 20 February 2004 12:07 (twenty-two years ago)

I dunno the Darkness just aren't CAMP enough for me, unlike Queen/Sparks/etc. They don't seem to be able to both acknowledge their JOKENESS and still rock, it's like you have to (on yr side, the listener's) bear the jokeyness in mind FOR THEM while they do their thing straightfaced. Seems like too much effort, and kinda halfassed, those aforementioned bands already demonstrated how to do this properly. Course I haven't actually HEARD THE RECORD, so who cares

― Silly Sailor (Andrew Thames), Friday, 20 February 2004 12:09 (twenty-two years ago)

They don't seem to be able to both acknowledge their JOKENESS and still rock: Indie Guilt: C/D

― nathalie (nathalie), Friday, 20 February 2004 12:11 (twenty-two years ago)

Well that's dependent on their being a joke obv, but y'know Page/Plant don't come on stage in flowing white robes anymore and they're PAGE/PLANT! I might've missed yr point, tho. Prob did.

― Silly Sailor (Andrew Thames), Friday, 20 February 2004 12:13 (twenty-two years ago)

(A joke so far as their presentation goes anyway, not the music, I like the chorus to "I believe in a thing called love" fine)

― Silly Sailor (Andrew Thames), Friday, 20 February 2004 12:14 (twenty-two years ago)

Er, I would have thought there's a difference in the type of comedy employed by, say, the Pet Shop Boys, and The Barron Knights!!!!!!! I reckon The Darkness are a couple of steps up from the "Pump Up The Bitter" type parodies, and more like a pretty good novelty band that can also Play Their Instruments pretty well, but haven't yet got the run of well-known distinctive tunes to be remembered more for their tunes than their jokes!!!!! ("... Thing Called Love" is still a pretty good single tho!)

― Old Fart!!! (oldfart_sd), Friday, 20 February 2004 12:14 (twenty-two years ago)

i dunno, 'growing on me' is one of those great pop singles that will never lose its joy for me.

― stevie (stevie), Friday, 20 February 2004 12:16 (twenty-two years ago)

And 'Get your hands off my woman' gave birth to a catchphrase...

― ENRQ (Enrique), Friday, 20 February 2004 12:21 (twenty-two years ago)

what, "Mind my bike"?

― mark grout (mark grout), Friday, 20 February 2004 12:22 (twenty-two years ago)

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