An Immediate Sense of Historical Importance

I ask because I suspect this sort of thing happens in retrospect 99% of the time, and that it is very difficult and rare to spot a massive shift at the moment it is happening. In 1991, Bandwagonesque won as many year-end polls as Nevermind did; it was only a year or two later when everyone latched on to how much the record changed things.

I can't think of any. I think that's because anything capable of changing history is generally not accessible to the masses. So while it may be totally new (...and Nirvana was anything but new. I love 'em, but the first time I heard them I thought, "Replacements already did that." As if the Replacements were revolutionary...) it's not expected to change anything because chances are no one is going to hear it. It isn't until later, when some event(s) shove the "new" sound into the mainstream (...even if it's the college mainstream, hardcore mainstream, techno mainstream, etc...) that anyone realizes its impact (which may be just a result of its popularity, RE:Nivana.) The only exceptions I can think of (and I don't even know if they were or weren't) were Pet Sounds and Sgt. Pepper. Seems as if people were blown away immediately by it. But I was in diapers at the time, so I don't have firsthand knowledge here. I think these had immediate impact because they were released by mainstream artists - although there were probably many other experiments going on at the time that were not recognized until later (VU).

Er......possibly sticking my neck out, but Kylies "Can't get you out of my head" surely is going to affect how pop music is made.

But Bandwagonesque was better than Nevermind!

Anyway, spotting trends is like picking stocks: much easier to see in retrospect, with success predicated on luck as much as anything else.

Part of the problem is that, even when you hear something really new and wonderful, it's really hard to distinguish between a unique novelty and the kickoff of a new trend. One tends to look a lot like the other, and only time sorts the two out.

What was the last record or trend that made you think, "This is going to change things"
Spice Girls - Wannabe. While I think it was one of the best pop bands since ages... it sadly caused an avalanche of mediocre girlbands to *pop* up.

But Mark, you presuppose that feeling like there's a shift means that there is a shift, which isn't always the case: my post in the other thread wasn't an argument that massive musico- historical sea-changes aren't happening, just that I don't think much this year made its listeners, right or wrong, feel like it was. Actually, no, this is personal, so let me rephrase: not much, Prefuse and CanOx excepted, made me feel that way, and while I can't think of a whole lot of records I imagine did that for others, I won't be presumptuous enough to say that it wasn't the case. I am also painfully aware that I may not have a good enough background in dance or hip-hop to have a sense of how important their developments are -- I've been listening and liking, but without some history behind that, it's hard to feel like "This is it, this is what I've been waiting for."

I think this is an essential point to clarify. There are countless records that, while they prove to be "historically" unimportant, still make listeners feel that thing, that sense that something just happened and they were lucky to have heard it. I felt that way about maybe 10 records this year, but then again I didn't buy a whole lot of records this year. What made you guys feel "that thing" -- not just "this is a spectacular record" but "holy geez, it's a whole new game from here on out," not just "this is the best record in this genre in a while," but "this sound, in and of itself, makes everything else seem silly by comparison?" Let me know, and don't feel like you need to defend your choices: what I'm saying here is that it's not necessarily big-picture true, it's just that it feels that way while it's playing.

Nitsuh -- Nice clarification. I think I had that sense a bit with both Endless Summer and the Clicks + Cuts 2 compilation. With both releases I sensed a shift from noise to melody, & hearing artists come at this from the avant-garde side (as opposed to the pop side, like JAMC or MbV) seemed like it might lead to something quite interesting indeed. I should say that I felt "this is a new game" with these, and not "everything else feels silly after hearing x". I never feel the latter about music, as far as I can remember.

Mark -- really? (Re: the "everything else seems silly" thing.) My favorite records are always the ones that, for the duration of their playing time, can make me feel as if the artist is doing precisely what needs to be done at that moment, and that all else is just a pleasant diversion. A feeling of certainty, perhaps -- a feeling that I could in all honesty say "This is the best thing going," without hesitation or allowances for anything else. Something like making a top-10 list and knowing, without doubt or agonizing, what goes at number one.

As above, this is obviously just a momentary feeling, one that typically ends as soon as the record in question does. But this year I've felt that way, at various points, about "Blacklist" off of the Prefuse record, "Romeo," My Morning Jacket's "Lowdown," and, curiously enough and yet most strongly, Life Without Buildings. Among plenty of other things I'm probably just not remembering right now. Again, not a logically defensible thing, just brief moments of "Why is anyone bothering to even try anything else when this is just so right?"

But Bandwagonesque was better than Nevermind!

Raise was better than both. ;-)

At least in the punk rock scene, I think I had that revelation upon hearing Fugazi's first EP.. "This is going to change everything." And for awhile, it did, though mostly for the worst. Punk rock lost all the greasy glitz (i.e. the fun), and shows became austere, backpack-wearing "dialogues." Things are starting to change back, and today's young kids have a lot more glamour to latch on to.

I guess I felt that way about the first NWA... it's easy to joke about it now, but that record spawned ALOT of violence in SoCal and beyond, and became a benchmark for how "hard" one can be. Fortunately, rap started as party music and I think it's heading back that way.

Nitsuh -- I see what you are getting at. Something about the "silly" part of the phrase threw me, like other music seemed stupid and not just irrelevant. I did have that feeling last year, yeah -- first few times I spun Mouse on Mars' Idiology, in fact (much more so than the other two records I listed above – I just forgot.) Also, a few years ago, when I first heard Boredoms' Super Ae, I was overpowered by the feeling of "This is exactly where rock should be going." The Boredoms themselves stopped going there, unfortunately, on VCN (though that is a really great record.)

The flip side of this question is: how often have you been wrong?

For me, it's all the time. After hearing "Bombs over Baghdad", or the Avalanches "A Different Feeling", I was thinking now this, this is what music shold be like, could we have more like this, when they sound like they're having fun, and they don't give a fuck? And of course, nothing.

Also, how often have you been wrong, on a personal level? What have you heard that's made you think "Yeah, this is what I'm going to be measuring music against", and a year later, your eyes light on the tape/cd/minidisc and you go "oh yeah, that."

Oh aye, I'm consistently wrong about these things. For example, I still can't understand why Disco Inferno didn't trigger off a deluge of similar bands, rather than being nothing more than a minor influence on Hood and Piano Magic.