My girlfriend succinctly puts the smack down on rock music

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New York magazine this week has an article on The Bravery, labeling them "The Next Really Big Thing" or something along those lines. I remarked that this was a bit silly, since rock music itself is no longer the source of "next big things" in the grand scheme of music.

"White people need to come up with something else," she said.

― Hurting (Hurting), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 07:59 (twenty-one years ago)

No we don't

― Stupornaut (natepatrin), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 08:04 (twenty-one years ago)

PWNED

― provvoe, Tuesday, 22 March 2005 08:06 (twenty-one years ago)

Your bitch is tired

― Mr. Harvey Weinstein (mr harvey weinstein), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 08:06 (twenty-one years ago)

Certainly something else than The Bravery.

― Hurting (Hurting), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 08:07 (twenty-one years ago)

The Bravery are just a poor man's Killers

― provvoe, Tuesday, 22 March 2005 08:09 (twenty-one years ago)

Sometimes I think bands like the Bravery exist merely to provide amusement for easily bored rock-weary cynics. (And the bastard of it is, I heard a Bravery song a while back and thought 'this is incredibly unspecial, WTF's the deal?' OH NO I AM ONE OF YOU NOW)

― Stupornaut (natepatrin), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 08:11 (twenty-one years ago)

I'm sure they're doin' it for Chuck Eddy.

― Mr. Harvey Weinstein (mr harvey weinstein), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 08:13 (twenty-one years ago)

I mean, he puts out, right?

― Mr. Harvey Weinstein (mr harvey weinstein), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 08:14 (twenty-one years ago)

How about "all people need to come up with something else?"

What next big thing has there been lately that was considered a big deal to anyone with some experience? Next big things are about keeping the industry alive when it's boring. Robyn Hitchcock to thread!

Unless you're talking about a very strict style of rock music, to me, it is the most wide open territory for popular music that will never get boring as long as there are talented people creating it. It is about the least limited "genre" of music that includes anything from Captain Beefheart to Bryan Adams, as interesting or boring as you want to make it. It's not defined by as rigid a format as jazz, funk, blues or hiphop, for instance, as it can incorporate elements of all the above and still be more "rock" than anything else.

― Eleventy-Twelve (Eleventy-Twelve), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 08:37 (twenty-one years ago)

"it's true! we're so lame!"

― Amateur(ist) (Amateur(ist)), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 09:08 (twenty-one years ago)

I'm imagining this thread's creator going up to strangers in bars and showing them a photo of his girlfriend, with a speech bubble saying "WHITE PEOPLE NEED TO COME UP WITH SOMETHING ELSE"

― DJ Mencap0))), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 09:31 (twenty-one years ago)

It's not defined by as rigid a format as jazz

Acker Bilk and Ornette Coleman to thread.

― Ferlin Husky (noodle vague), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 09:45 (twenty-one years ago)

What next big thing has there been lately that was considered a big deal to anyone with some experience?

Ummmm, grime, click-house, carioca funk, screw, desi, meatl and experimental horse music.

― Jacob (Jacob), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 10:10 (twenty-one years ago)

i heart experimental horse music.

― irrigation can save your people (irrigation can save your peopl), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 10:19 (twenty-one years ago)

Acker Bilk and Ornette Coleman to thread.

There is experimental jazz, but it isn't anywhere near as experimental as experimental rock can be. If it stretches too far, it will most likely be called "rock". I mean, jazz is basically a variant of blues that is recognizable due to it's "jazzy" qualities. Rock is also a variant of blues but is so wide open that dozens of subgenres are used to describe it.

― Eleventy-Twelve (Eleventy-Twelve), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 10:24 (twenty-one years ago)

Ummmm, grime, click-house, carioca funk, screw, desi, meatl and experimental horse music.

We see things differently. For me, the flash has gone out of the pan already on these tiny little niches. And I never considered any of this a "big deal" to begin with.

― Eleventy-Twelve (Eleventy-Twelve), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 10:27 (twenty-one years ago)

My fellow caucasians: this womans words, though they may seem intemperate, ring true. Let us take them not as a chastisment but as a challenge. At a minimum we could agree to abandon the guitar.

― J Paul Calhoun, Tuesday, 22 March 2005 10:28 (twenty-one years ago)

Hm. Rock music without a guitar? Does Morphine rock? Other examples?

― Eleventy-Twelve (Eleventy-Twelve), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 10:30 (twenty-one years ago)

Morphine has a bass guitar.

― NickB (NickB), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 10:35 (twenty-one years ago)

b-b-but white people didn't come up with rock music...

― I got the job because I was so mean, while somehow appearing so kind. (AaronHz), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 10:38 (twenty-one years ago)

or jazz. or blues. or rap.

― I got the job because I was so mean, while somehow appearing so kind. (AaronHz), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 10:40 (twenty-one years ago)

or soul. or funk. or disco.

― I got the job because I was so mean, while somehow appearing so kind. (AaronHz), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 10:42 (twenty-one years ago)

Hey, my girlfriend was reading about some uber-lame new r&b act. "Black people need to come up with something else," she remarked. Pretty cool, huh?

― not hurting, Tuesday, 22 March 2005 10:42 (twenty-one years ago)

She's definitely cool! She's misanthropically cool! She's right on both counts I reckon.

― moley, Tuesday, 22 March 2005 10:46 (twenty-one years ago)

Wow, amazing coincidence. I just happened to be listening to some frothy new J-pop group the other day. Guess what my girlfriend remarked? "Asians need to come up with something else," she said.

― random dude, Tuesday, 22 March 2005 10:49 (twenty-one years ago)

You're being sarcastic! I can tell!

― moley, Tuesday, 22 March 2005 10:51 (twenty-one years ago)

You're girlfriend seems to be a moron. Perhaps slightly racist, too.

― Popular Consensus (Eleventy-Twelve), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 11:00 (twenty-one years ago)

Your

― Popular Consensus (Eleventy-Twelve), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 11:00 (twenty-one years ago)

Naah she's on it man. She's TOTMFM.

― moley, Tuesday, 22 March 2005 11:02 (twenty-one years ago)

Play your girlfriend some Burzum.

― Dik Wessle, Tuesday, 22 March 2005 11:10 (twenty-one years ago)

I don't know what offends me more; The Bravery or people's reactions to The Bravery. I find the single quite catchy and cute in it's own way though.

― Sven Bastard (blueski), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 11:16 (twenty-one years ago)

"This is.....huh, wahwer!"
x-post

― I got the job because I was so mean, while somehow appearing so kind. (AaronHz), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 11:17 (twenty-one years ago)

Did white people invent music?

― Jacob (Jacob), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 11:20 (twenty-one years ago)

Where do people even hear the fucking Bravery enough to get annoyed by them? I've managed to avoid that shit, more or less. I think I heard one song that I don't remember anything about...

― I got the job because I was so mean, while somehow appearing so kind. (AaronHz), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 11:21 (twenty-one years ago)

The originators of music were furred creatures from the continent of Lemuria.

― TJ Hooker, Tuesday, 22 March 2005 11:23 (twenty-one years ago)

This might not be entirely on topic, but someone just came into my office and claimed he was the only Asian in the world to have a record contract

― DJ Mencap0))), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 11:25 (twenty-one years ago)

It was that dude from the Neptunes, wasn't it?

― I got the job because I was so mean, while somehow appearing so kind. (AaronHz), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 11:26 (twenty-one years ago)

Who gives a fuck what genres a phenotype comes up with? Popular music is popular music.

― James Slone (Freon Trotsky), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 11:35 (twenty-one years ago)

Or to clarify, considering the enormous pool of music out there, why generically associate whiteboys/girls with some flavor of the month rock band?

― James Slone (Freon Trotsky), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 11:37 (twenty-one years ago)

"Girlfriends should come of with better rhetorical questions"

― James Slone (Freon Trotsky), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 11:38 (twenty-one years ago)

Make that statement! "Questions" doesn't quite fit the bill.

― James Slone (Freon Trotsky), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 11:42 (twenty-one years ago)

He's right, Mencap. Only one Asian has ever had a record deal. I read that somewhere.

― moley, Tuesday, 22 March 2005 11:44 (twenty-one years ago)

OK it was William Hung, then.

― I got the job because I was so mean, while somehow appearing so kind. (AaronHz), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 11:49 (twenty-one years ago)

having considered Hurting's GF's analysis, i would counter that it's the music press that has to come up with something new, not the musicians, white or otherwise. The Bravery would not exist in a world without lazy music journalism.

equally, the Bravery would not exist in a world that didn't frown upon violent axe crimes. provided that, in said world, i had access to an axe.

― Lee F# (fsharp), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 12:51 (twenty-one years ago)

This might be the funniest fucking thing I have ever read.

― Ferlin Husky (noodle vague), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 12:54 (twenty-one years ago)

If laughing has been replaced by pounding your head on the very corner of a metal table until you can't spell "cretinous" any more then yeah, very funny.

― A / F#m / Bm / D (Lynskey), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 12:58 (twenty-one years ago)

people, who cares, it's just pop music for christ's sake

― anx, Tuesday, 22 March 2005 13:03 (twenty-one years ago)

Oh sorry. Right everyone, put the message board away, it's time for tea.

― A / F#m / Bm / D (Lynskey), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 13:04 (twenty-one years ago)

The moral of this story is "Don't tell certain stories to people outside of your circle of friends because tone and intent do not translate."

― The Ghost of Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Tuesday, 22 March 2005 13:08 (twenty-one years ago)

Skipping 111 messages at this point... Click here if you want to load them all.

Obv. David Byrne invented rap. duh.

― Sterling Clover (s_clover), Thursday, 24 March 2005 13:57 (twenty-one years ago)

xpost shookout yr. right -- ppl. with money should not concern themselves with societal inequality.

― Sterling Clover (s_clover), Thursday, 24 March 2005 13:58 (twenty-one years ago)

This thread is just completely baffling.

― Pashmina (Pashmina), Thursday, 24 March 2005 14:06 (twenty-one years ago)

I guess the smack down was just that thorough.

― The Good Dr. Bill (The Good Dr. Bill), Thursday, 24 March 2005 14:09 (twenty-one years ago)

it couldn't hve been *that* good -- white people can't throw a decent smackdown.

― Sterling Clover (s_clover), Thursday, 24 March 2005 14:12 (twenty-one years ago)

shookout, i agree that 10k may be a lot of money to someone, but i think your point is a little off target because so much is relative to one's general social situation.

you can always argue that there is someone in a worse position so you should just aware of just how good you have it AND, by implication, keep your complaints to yourself.

but inequities exist in all societies at all levels. sometimes those with education and free time can also see social problems very clearly. sometimes these are also the people who are in the best position to lobby for a more equitable world.

BUT let's get real here: this is a site where people complain about pop songs! In the schema of real survival, how you feel about pop music isn't very relevant. That it can be a pre-occupation says a lot about one's position in the world and, in a better world, perhaps we'd all be writing our public officials and rating countries' human rights records with the fervor that we give to pop music.

― mono.mono (mono.mono), Thursday, 24 March 2005 14:20 (twenty-one years ago)

I love how this thread started off as a joke, got offensive, got serious, got jokey again, got really offensive, and then got sociological.

It's like listening to Air America! (ducks)

― J (Jay), Thursday, 24 March 2005 14:49 (twenty-one years ago)

It's all in good fun!

― James Slone (Freon Trotsky), Thursday, 24 March 2005 15:34 (twenty-one years ago)

Roffle ... headscratch ... frown ... roffle ... headscratch ...

― Hurting (Hurting), Thursday, 24 March 2005 15:58 (twenty-one years ago)

maybe that's what great about pop music after all: it intertwines with everything from the frivolous to the heavy...and often in the same song.

― mono.mono (mono.mono), Thursday, 24 March 2005 17:18 (twenty-one years ago)

http://www.girlpower.gov/AdultsWhoCare/images/Otherlogo/nbc.jpg

― deej., Thursday, 24 March 2005 18:51 (twenty-one years ago)

The more i read through this thread, the more willing i am to believe that experimental horse music actually exists.

― ken taylrr (ken taylrr), Thursday, 24 March 2005 19:43 (twenty-one years ago)

http://www.sitcomsonline.com/difftitle.jpg

― mono.mono (mono.mono), Thursday, 24 March 2005 20:13 (twenty-one years ago)

i don't think i remembered the "e" was replaced with an apostrophe.

― mono.mono (mono.mono), Thursday, 24 March 2005 20:15 (twenty-one years ago)

I like the meme about middle class white people being the only people who worry about race.

― Ferlin Husky (noodle vague), Friday, 25 March 2005 03:26 (twenty-one years ago)

Race is the tasty new dipping sauce spreading across America!

― James Slone (Freon Trotsky), Friday, 25 March 2005 03:29 (twenty-one years ago)

lol! self-defeating inverted snobbery! lol! the left is fucked for another 30 years

― fcussen (Burger), Friday, 25 March 2005 03:34 (twenty-one years ago)

The left is fucked every time they self-identify as "the left".

― Ferlin Husky (noodle vague), Friday, 25 March 2005 03:40 (twenty-one years ago)

life would be more interesting if instead of "the left" everyone said "the vanguard of the righteous will of the people."

― Sterling Clover (s_clover), Friday, 25 March 2005 04:19 (twenty-one years ago)

The left is fucked period.

*self-identifies with the left*

― James Slone (Freon Trotsky), Friday, 25 March 2005 05:46 (twenty-one years ago)

White people need to come up with some new politics.

― Jacob (Jacob), Friday, 25 March 2005 07:34 (twenty-one years ago)

lol! i have fallen victim to the very slave morality i was decrying lol! an aporia, call Derrida

― fcussen (Burger), Friday, 25 March 2005 07:35 (twenty-one years ago)

The vanguard of the righteous will of the people prefers to dance to hip-hop anyway.

― Sterling Clover (s_clover), Friday, 25 March 2005 12:55 (twenty-one years ago)

11t12, have you even listened to avant-garde jazz?

Sure have.

Ever notice how people not real familiar with jazz can't tell the difference between smooth jazz, jazz, free jazz and avant-garde jazz? To many people, it's just "all over the place," as the stupid Carrie Bradshaw described it on Sex In The City once, to which my girlfriend said, "Yeah, that's how I feel" and laughed. Since then, I've had fun comparing the BET Jazz Channel to the Jazz and Smooth-Jazz music channel. She now realizes it is not all the same, but it took a while.

"So long as it still has a rock beat" is a huge fucking restriction that's way bigger than what exists in avant-garde jazz.

What I said was, "All rock needs is a rock beat and sometimes not even that." Jazz can never be as simple as rock, but rock can be as complex as jazz.

― Lemonade Salesman (Eleventy-Twelve), Friday, 25 March 2005 13:13 (twenty-one years ago)

The more i read through this thread, the more willing i am to believe that experimental horse music actually exists.

Spacemen 3.

― Lemonade Salesman (Eleventy-Twelve), Friday, 25 March 2005 13:15 (twenty-one years ago)

wow, I hadn't looked at this in a bit...er, I think you folks read too much in what I was saying. I'm all for combatting injustice and all that--I was just commenting on what I see as the humor value of identity politics. If you went to a liberal arts college in the early-to-mid '90s, you'd know what I meant. It was just plain funny. Earnest, but also funny. Lots of white people running around calling each other racist, sexist, whateverist. It was a spectacularly unproductive era for the so called left, though it didn't seem like it at the time.

― shookout (shookout), Friday, 25 March 2005 19:18 (twenty-one years ago)

The vanguard of the righteous will of the people is no laughing matter!

― Sterling Clover (s_clover), Saturday, 26 March 2005 02:10 (twenty-one years ago)

I get it shookout!

― James Slone (Freon Trotsky), Saturday, 26 March 2005 13:08 (twenty-one years ago)

I find it hard to believe that even the most naive listener wouldn't be able to tell the difference between "Anything Goes" and "Jitney No 2".

― sundar subramanian (sundar), Saturday, 26 March 2005 16:52 (twenty-one years ago)

two months pass...

That Spacemen 3 joke upthread is CLASSIC.

― Spencer Chow (spencermfi), Monday, 6 June 2005 23:11 (twenty years ago)

Hip-hop is polluting the pure, virginal, Aryan airwaves.

― Cunga (Cunga), Monday, 6 June 2005 23:54 (twenty years ago)

three months pass...

George Bush don't care about black people.

― G. W. Bush, Friday, 30 September 2005 20:57 (twenty years ago)

six months pass...

yer girlfriend is a commie

― jfdslkljfdsk lkjdsfjfdslk, Wednesday, 12 April 2006 00:43 (twenty years ago)

i want to know if Hurting's girlfriend likes Steely Dan.

― A|ex P@reene (Pareene), Wednesday, 12 April 2006 01:07 (twenty years ago)

i think we all want to know that, alex

― gear (gear), Wednesday, 12 April 2006 01:08 (twenty years ago)

So the Bravery ended up not being The Next Really Big Thing, huh?

― Michael Daddino (epicharmus), Wednesday, 12 April 2006 01:14 (twenty years ago)

I think it's because The Bravery actually managed to sound authentically mid '80s... or because Sam Endicott foolishly denied the overtly obvious influences that are right there in The Bravery's music. Nevertheless, The Bravery sounded much more '80s than Franz Ferdinand or, speaking of hilarities, Bloc Party, who are a good group but are so totally NOT '80s-sounding (which is why they got all those rave reviews -- their late '70s sound is more critically acceptable than any revival of mid '80s synth wave).

― See Me, Repeat Me (Dee the Lurker), Wednesday, 12 April 2006 02:28 (twenty years ago)

Anyway, I'm all for "white people" NOT "coming up with something new". Not at this moment, not when I can see a mid '80s synthpop/synthfunk revival coming in the foreseeable future. Come on baby, Mama needs a band who'll namedrop Scritti Politti and Wang Chung.

― See Me, Repeat Me (Dee the Lurker), Wednesday, 12 April 2006 02:31 (twenty years ago)

The Bravery weren't the next big thing because their elaborate Rube Goldberg machine failed to operate properly.

― Eppy (Eppy), Wednesday, 12 April 2006 04:54 (twenty years ago)

did we ever find out what the girlfriend thouht white people should come up with?

― ambrose (ambrose), Wednesday, 12 April 2006 07:45 (twenty years ago)

Tax fiddles.

― Chewshabadoo (Chewshabadoo), Wednesday, 12 April 2006 08:48 (twenty years ago)

So the Bravery ended up not being The Next Really Big Thing, huh?
-- Michael Daddino (epicharmu...), April 12th, 2006.

thankfully, the answer was a resounding "NO".
now, if we can get Ultragrrl to stop pluggin the Killers we can put an end to this 'next really big thing' thing.
maybe...

― eedd, Wednesday, 12 April 2006 12:08 (twenty years ago)

Someone link that NME cover about the Killers dude growing a beard and "what it means."

― mike h. (mike h.), Wednesday, 12 April 2006 13:59 (twenty years ago)

worst thread title ever.

― s1ocki (slutsky), Wednesday, 12 April 2006 14:10 (twenty years ago)

White people need to steal some new music. But what's left?

― js (honestengine), Wednesday, 12 April 2006 14:44 (twenty years ago)

Chinese opera!

― Eppy (Eppy), Wednesday, 12 April 2006 14:47 (twenty years ago)

OMG NME COVER NOW

― Fight the Real Enemy -- Tasti D-Lite (ex machina), Wednesday, 12 April 2006 14:59 (twenty years ago)

Stephen Merritt to thread.

― Neil Stewart (Neil Stewart), Wednesday, 12 April 2006 15:08 (twenty years ago)

http://images-eu.amazon.com/images/P/B0009K7RLQ.02.LZZZZZZZ.jpg

― Neil Stewart (Neil Stewart), Wednesday, 12 April 2006 15:11 (twenty years ago)

two years pass...

― Pantheism F. Mohair (res), Saturday, 1 November 2008 18:25 (seventeen years ago)

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