A polite, rational and calmly considered discussion of the "Jewish-o-Meter" as it regards different genres of music

oh man, I was going to post this intensely Jewish album cover of this intensely Jewish young man canoeing (I think) down the Hudson (I think) with a saxophone and an intensely Jewish expression on his face. On the back, he's submerged. I know this record is floating around in my parents' music collection somewhere, but I absolutely forget the name of the album/musician. It would've been very relevant, though!

― babyalive (babyalive), Friday, 15 April 2005 04:08 (twenty years ago)

http://www.airmassive.com/wasabi/archives/043004_1_beasties_checkito.jpg

― Bobby Peru (Bobby Peru), Friday, 15 April 2005 04:18 (twenty years ago)

http://perso.wanadoo.fr/hard-rockcity/images/dico/dicor/rothdav.JPG

THAT SUIT IS YOOOOOOOOOOOU

― Stupornaut (natepatrin), Friday, 15 April 2005 04:23 (twenty years ago)

http://www.bobgruen.com/files/asst/R.261%20MARC%20BOLAN%201971.jpg

"Thanks, or should I say TANX, ha ha"

― Stupornaut (natepatrin), Friday, 15 April 2005 04:24 (twenty years ago)

http://www.catholicboy.com/catholicboy.com-asp/images/kaye.gif
http://images-eu.amazon.com/images/P/B00005QCNW.03.LZZZZZZZ.jpg

― These Robust Cookies (Robust Cookies), Friday, 15 April 2005 04:54 (twenty years ago)

http://www.theologianrecords.com/images/jerks1.jpg

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Friday, 15 April 2005 05:00 (twenty years ago)

wr2 the 2 live jews: the dude on the left (w/ the ugly checkered pants) looks like an older version of my old boss. the dude on the right looks like the ACTUAL version of one of my law school professors. and yes, the both of them are jewish.

― Eisbär (llamasfur), Friday, 15 April 2005 05:01 (twenty years ago)

i heard somewhere that walter becker actually isn't jewish. (disappointing, i know.)

― jody the country girl doll (Jody Beth Rosen), Friday, 15 April 2005 05:15 (twenty years ago)

my dad has a theory that the best songwriters of the 20th (and 21st?) century are/were jewish, and the really good ones who aren't still have a lot of jewish friends.

― jody the country girl doll (Jody Beth Rosen), Friday, 15 April 2005 05:18 (twenty years ago)

he's also really into the whole "ashkenazic jews are the smartest people in the world" bell-curve thing.

― jody the country girl doll (Jody Beth Rosen), Friday, 15 April 2005 05:21 (twenty years ago)

http://image.allmusic.com/00/amg/pic200/drP000/P003/P00397PV0F9.jpg

through the roof. that might as well be a shofar he's playing..

― poortheatre (poortheatre), Friday, 15 April 2005 05:29 (twenty years ago)

ihttp://www.cesnur.org/2004/madonna.jpg

Currently 3/10 with a bullet (but subject to change in a year or so.)

― Myonga Von Bubbaleh (Myonga Von Bontee), Friday, 15 April 2005 06:01 (twenty years ago)

20/10
http://agualisa.blogs.sapo.pt/arquivo/woody_allen_plays_clarinet_std%5B1%5D.jpg

[Hey, what's the deal with this page? All those defective images?]

― Myonga Von Bontee (Myonga Von Bontee), Friday, 15 April 2005 06:12 (twenty years ago)

Let's try it again:

20/10
http://blogia.com/trashmusica/upload/woody.jpg

― Myonga Von Bontee (Myonga Von Bontee), Friday, 15 April 2005 06:37 (twenty years ago)

The interesting thing about all of this to me is how many Jewish artists I never was aware were Jewish for a really long time. I would have had not idea that anyone in KISS was Jewish, for instance. I didn't really start paying much attention to who was/wasn't Jewish until I started spending more time with Jews in a very consciously Jewish cultural context (since that's so vague I'll just say it: Israeli dancing), and I found that there was a lot of discussion of who was and wasn't Jewish. (Also, since I look like I could be Jewish, people sometimes said things around me on the assumption that I was. I heard all about those orgies where you ritually drink the blood of Christian children!) I'm not saying it's a good or virtuous thing not to think about people's ethnic background, just that I am sometimes amazed at how much this is part of people's background awareness about performers, when for a long time I had little clue about it in many cases.

― RS_LaRue (RSLaRue), Friday, 15 April 2005 13:18 (twenty years ago)

^^^^ more evidence that Goyim are generally clueless about the world

― Jewish observer (Robust Cookies), Friday, 15 April 2005 16:59 (twenty years ago)

i think jews in particular are very obssessed with who is and isn't jewish. my parents certainly are, to the point that my dad became interested in beck after he found out he was jewish.

― Sym Sym (sym), Saturday, 16 April 2005 00:48 (twenty years ago)

Yeah, what is it about us Jews? Maybe it's that, unlike with say, Blacks or Asians, you can't IMMEDIATELY tell who's Jewish, but you can find out or figure it out, so we have to talk more about our potential sources of cultural pride. I do think Catholics were pretty obsessed with Kennedy being Catholic, weren't they? And maybe Italians and Irish are like this about people too? Anyone?

― Hurting (Hurting), Saturday, 16 April 2005 03:08 (twenty years ago)

According to Jewish law, Beck is Jewish. DNA-wise, his mother is half-Jewish, so he's one-quarter Jewish, but his parents were both Scientologists when he was growing up and they weren't much into Jewish life and culture or anything.

Maybe it's that, unlike with say, Blacks or Asians, you can't IMMEDIATELY tell who's Jewish, but you can find out or figure it out, so we have to talk more about our potential sources of cultural pride.

Of course you can tell who's Jewish, just like with any other people. Many non-Asians can't tell the difference between Koreans and Japanese, but the Koreans and Japanese certainly can. Maybe not 100% of the time, and it becomes harder once they've become assimilated into the culture of a third country, but many of them can still do it.

When a minority culture achieves a certain measure of success in their home country, people of that culture will see their status as a source of some pride. For instance, Italian MP's are more well-known in the Italian community than in other communities. That doesn't mean they automatically support them just because they're Italian, but they are more aware of who they are and what they do compared to non-Italians.

I'm probably babbling here, but basically -- nobody ever celebrates the achievements of the majority culture in a city/country. Rather, every minority -- no matter how "visible" they are -- celebrates the successes of their own and gives greater credence to issues that dispraportionately affect them.

― MindInRewind (Barry Bruner), Saturday, 16 April 2005 03:38 (twenty years ago)

I've known Jews who have disagree with the idea that you can tell who's Jewish just by looking. I don't think it's as visible as whether someone is Black or Asian. Since Jews have been dispersed all over the world, a lot of variations have been introduced. (Even if intermarriage has been rare or almost (?) non-existent in some times and places, there's been enough time for lots of variation to develop.) Also, recent converts have to be factored into it (although I guess the conversion rate isn't all that high).

But I maybe agree with you more than I disagree because I think that even though Jews can come from different regions of the world (and obviously some more than others, so there's already a limited range of typical variation that way), you can still have several distinctive looks that are still typically Jewish.

(I have sometimes found people utterly convinced that I am Jewish, though the cases I'm thinking of have either been African-Americans or Arabs. Someone I know from salsa dancing also gets this a lot, and in fact, I thought she was Jewish. Maybe we are the pseudo-Jews.)

― RS_LaRue (RSLaRue), Saturday, 16 April 2005 10:25 (twenty years ago)

five years pass...

A radio show about Jewish heavy metal:

http://beyondthepale.org/episode/2011/01/16

― xhuxk, Monday, 17 January 2011 17:38 (fifteen years ago)

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