Fun Loving Criminals: like Bush in reverse?!?!

E.g., some University of Chicago activities group just managed to book Stereolab for a show here. The music writers for the campus paper get all excited; the front page writers say they've booked an "obscure avant-garde rock band" called Stereolab.

Stereolab are indeed an obscure avant-garde rock band (Merritt calls them a rock band, come to think of it, in the as-yet non-existent PAPERCUTS 5) - which I intend as no kind of criticism.

I don't like its application by non-music people to music, though. For example, I am not a philosopher of science, so Imre Lakatos is somewhat "obscure" to me. But I don't think I'd ever call him "obscure," because he's not "obscure" in his field. Similarly, President Obasanjo of Nigeria is an "obscure" world leader to most U.S. residents, but we'd never call him "obscure," because he's obviously not "obscure" in the limited Nigerian-statesman sense.

Thus, while Stereolab are "obscure" in terms of the total population of Americans or University of Chicago students who know anything about them, I don't think it's fair to call them an "obscure" band, in that people who actually follow music are more than aware of them.

I say this all to tie into my big complaint lately, which is that so many people refuse to acknowledge that music can be a sort of specialist hobby. For instance, people are usually willing to admit that if they don't, say, collect stamps, then a stamp collector is going to be much more of an authority on stamp collecting than they are. But people who buy 2 records a year a don't even listen to them frequently like to think that their opinion on musical issues is just as informed and authoritative as that of someone who actually listens to music. (I'll agree that it's equally valid, in that it's a subjective aethetic judgement and all, but please. Who would get into a big stamp argument with a stamp collector?)

I'm just noting that you'll rarely hear anyone say, "I don't really know much about music," which I find interesting. For example, people will actually go pay money to take classes to learn how to "appreciate" wine -- which is a perfectly reasonable way to go about learning what's what in the wine world. But you never see people doing this with music (apart from classical) -- the fact that it's considered "pop culture" sometimes leads to the erroneous assumption that there's no scale of knowledge or "acquired taste" or whatever other complexities we assign to "high art."

Does that maybe make more sense? I dunno, I feel like I might be expressing this poorly.

I.e., calling Stereolab an "obscure" band is like calling Sophocles an "obscure" tragedian. Like, yes -- he's obscure in the very general sense of not everyone knowing his work, but so far as tragedians go, he's pretty damn huge.

(a) I suppose this is in part a defense of snobbery, but I do think some folks are more "qualified" to talk about music (not pop specifically, but music in general) than others. We all experience politics, for instance, and yet a discussion on Nightline is going to consist of "qualified" experts/insiders and not people off of the street. (Similarly, Tom gets to talk about Bowie on the radio, not me.) That's not to say that the opinions of "experts" are necessarily more right than the opinions of laymen, only that there is a different and usually broader perspective to them. My comments are only meant to point out that that difference isn't as recognized with music as it is with more specialized hobbies and interests. (Same for politics, actually.)

(b) Stereolab can only be considered "obscure" if you consider like 98% of the bands in existence "obscure" -- which seems to defeat the purpose of the word "obscure." This is what I mean about specialization -- Stereolab may be obscure as a phenomenon, but you'd be hard pressed to find anyone who actually followed music as a specific interest who hadn't heard quite a bit about them. I mean, if Stereolab is "obscure," what the fuck is Muslimgauze or something? I think my complaint is that they're completely unobscure within their field -- and judging them on some other basis seems suspect, like saying Smirnoff was an "obscure" vodka just because a bunch of teetotalers hadn't heard of it.

I saw them recently at Wolverhampton Civic Hall and were pretty damn cool. As far as I'm concerned, if they are not so popular in the States then they are less likely to play at large venues. When bands get too famous you have to go to some huge stadium to see them play - and you might as well just stay at home and watch them on the telly for all that you can see of them.

Nope - obscure rock band is ok by me!

As far as I know, they don't play here at *all*. They might as well just emigrate.

I think they have more "best-ofs" on the market here than actual albums, though, already.

what about now?

"WAAHAHAHAHARGL I'M GOING TO F$£% MY SISTER!!!!!!!!! WARARGGAGGLLLGL!!!!!!! I'M GONNA BREAK YOU IN THE FACE!!!!!!! WHAARARARALRLLGLL!!! etc"!!!!!!!

It took me a couple posts to realize that this wasn't about the band that did "She Drives Me Crazy". I've never knowingly heard FLC.

(Was Bush really similarly obscure in the UK?? I kind of imagined that at the least coverage in Spin and Rolling Stone would ensure a certain level of name recognition even in the UK?)