US versus UK - FITE!

Do American ILMers find themselves listening to more UK music?

I think it was Iggy Pop who said English bands seem to be more obsessed with melody, whereas American music is more rhythmic.

My knowledge only extends as far as Rolling Stone Mag vs Q Mag:

Wilco, Magnetic Fields, Ryan Adams, Elliot Smith, Mercury Rev, Sparklehorse, Grandaddy, Lambchop, The Eels, The Strokes , Bob Dylan

vs

David Gray, JJ72, Groove Amada, Chemical Brothers, Idlewild, Boards of Canada, Tom Mc Rae, Badly Drawn Boy, The Streets, PJ Harvey Radiohead

The US by a country mile for me.

British music has been pretty stale over the last few years compared with it's innovations of the early - mid 90s. American music seems to have taken the opposite trajectory: dull as hell for much of the 90s but much more interesting over the last few years. Is it coinicidence that these periods of creativity coincided with recessions, and times of staleness with economic growth and stability?

I can tell you this much, Nick -- A have done shit over here, though at least a couple of albums did get released.

Though there certainly haven't been many new UK rock bands to catch my fancy in recent years (dance, garage and the like, that's something else entirely), I'm not necessarily praising new US bands much either. At this point I seem to be waiting for things to shakedown a bit, if that makes any sense -- to see who can catch my ear in the end. The recent shows I've been to and will go to soon all involve acts that have been making music for years now, like Tool and the Super Furry Animals, or decades, practically (the Church, Spiritualized-as- extension-of-Spacemen 3, Peter Murphy). Certainly that's the buzz of familiarity and experience in my case, and maybe I'm not taking as many chances on new bands live, a fair assessment (and to be sure, I rarely have gone to seen new groups on the basis of an initial live reputation only). The newest band I'm looking forward to seeing is Landing later this summer.

And my current listening habits in general? Mixed, as I think I've muttered elsewhere on a thread. The AMG work means I'm regularly listening to old and new albums in my collection, which makes for its own particular logic. Listening music just to listen to music in contrast has never been more magpie-like for me -- I'm digesting new albums and moving on after barely a couple of listens. I think it's partially due to the amount of music out there, but I can't really notice any trend in my habits to any country or scene, however ill- defined.

I like the Streets better than Eminem, but I wish more British bands sounded like Bush.

US alt-rock is currently streets ahead, and has been since the late- nineties. The Flaming Lips, Pavement, Wilco, Mercury Rev, Low, Yo La Tengo, Grandaddy, Ryan Adams - even the better British records of late (Doves, Elbow, Boards) can't compare. For the record, JJ72 are from the Republic of Ireland, which hasn't been part of Britain for some time. Sorry to be pedantic (and I do understand that they are affiliated with the British "scene")

If A aren't actually shifting units over the pond, but they are here, does that mean that they are selling records to us by pretending to be trying to sell American music back to America? Up until about five months ago I was convinced they were American, till my girlfriend put me right. Is it a bit like As You Like It where the girl (who would have been played by a boy in Shakespeare's time anyway) dresses up as a man to seduce a man but a woman falls for her insetad or something? Or am I just really fucking confused now?

I forgot Belle and Sebastian. On of the best UK bands of the last ten years. But they were not exactly original. Nick Drake meets The Smiths meeting the Field Mice.

The final audiogalaxy board FITE! its clear that the UK wins unless you are a smelly indie, Mexico and the UK are the countries that put out the best pop music evah

Nick's interests are clearly very focussed on rock, and I pretty much agree that the last 15 years have been poor ones for rock in the UK. I think that a lot of the young white musical talent that would have naturally gravitated 99% to pop-rock has instead in large part gone into dance music instead, so we've had loads of great white groups there - Underworld, Chems, Orbital, Prodigy - as well as the increased number of solo acts. I think the UK produces at least as much fabulous music as it ever did, but not much of it has been rock lately. Not that I think the '90s were among the better decades for rock in America, either - I have no suggested explanation for that.

I guess my tastes are largely guitar-orientated, but that's not to say that I don't like dance / electronic music or hip hop, etcetera. I've been a big Orbital fan for about six years now, ditto Aphex Twin for about four years, and I like Underworld and the Chemicals too. All pretty standard 'rock-boy-trying-to-be-eclectic' fare though.

So, is most UK musical talent these days being siphoned into music other than rock / indie? And if so, who's making the best records in this country?

Or/ Convince me to buy The Streets record and / or anyone else who's good at the moment...

As an interesting aside, I no longer read much (or any, really) of the UK music press, don't even bother checking nme.com for news anymore, and so ILM has become my recommendation / review service.

So, thanks to everyone for talking about great music.

Shucks, that drink went straight to my head...

UK:

The UK scene is pretty dire - in LONDON but not elsewhere. In London you have yer typical CAREERING INDIE POSH KID DRESSED IN HIPSTERS CLOTHING pushing whatever M.E.D.I.O.C.R.E shite that is being hyped. This the influx of garage bands, etc. They are responsible for the current down the dumpster music scene very prevelant in London. Thus - you have yer mediocre shite, which is pushed down everybody's throat. So, the 'scene' is non-exsistant. 'Cept...'cept if you look a little further and a little left field away from the a & r guys vision and at the independant NON-LONDON scene you can find bands and people pushing the boundaries of music, past whatever crap some shitty arsed NERD in HIGH SCHOOL now official CORPORATE BULLYING PARANOIC careering type DUE TO HAVE A NERVOUS BREAKDOWN BECAUSE NO ONE *really* LIKES THEM.....is pushing.

i.e. look at capital k, minotaur shock, kinski, lone pigeon, mum and dad, alfie, badly drawn boy, john tehadja, blue states, jane weaver for the experimental electosis rock'n'roll and stop looking at whatever vomit L.O.N.D.O.N. is pushing on the kids. It's out there just a little bit more underground.

in u.s.a., los angeles has a healthy scene with the warlocks, the tyde, brian jonestown massacre, court and spark, the pattern, shannon wright etc.

it's there but you have to look at little harder.

Boards Of Canada (who, perversely, I always think of as being American, even though I know they're not)
As a public service announcement, I'd just like you all to know that the band Boards of America are actually not Canadian, but Australian.

I met a guy from Liverpool lately who told me there was a lot of good stuff going on there musically these days. I don't know. I just want to wash my shower curtain, but someone is monopolizing the laundry as usual.

Do American ILMers find themselves listening to more UK music?
No, but I betcha alot of kids that grew up on New Wave music are born anglophiles.

sorry for the above named rant, I have met so many of the above described, that I swear, they make them in a factory in shoreham somewhere, each coming out saying: im unique and different and i love (insert meaningless platitudes about music).

Well, we all know that in the end its not the quality of your music that matters...its the size of your...um...tactical thermonuclear arsenal.
So let that be a lesson to the Gallagher Brothers. The next time they come over here, they better friggin' BEHAVE themselves or else their hometown will look like end up like Afghanistan.

This public service announcement brought to you by the Council of Annoying Psuedo-Patriotic Right Wing Jerkoffs.

So let that be a lesson to the Gallagher Brothers. The next time they come over here, they better friggin' BEHAVE themselves or else their hometown will look like end up like Afghanistan. So you're going to improve Burnage? Won't that cost too much?

It's nothing decent ping-pong facilities couldn't fix

PJ Harvey being an exception but she is not a band isn't she?

Actually, PJ Harvey *is* a band. Last I heard from them, they had a singer named Polly Jean Harvey.

Used to be true for the first two albums, but all recent data indicates that PJ Harvey now refers to the woman herself.

I just recently started getting more new albums instead of old ones, and most of the old ones I get are from the UK, but most of the new ones are from US.

Historically, my favorite rock groups are mostly British. They are the usual suspects from Beatles to Elvis Costello to Massive Attack, so no need to delve too deeply. If we are talking about music, generally, the US has the nod with the vast catalogue of Jazz, Blues, Soul, Hip-hop and Country artists. Louis Armstrong, alone, tops the musical output of most countries. For the first time since the early 90's, I think the US has more interesting groups than the UK. The Elephant 6 groups, the Pernice Brothers, underground hip hop like Canibal Ox, DJ Shadow and Blackalicious, as well as the aforementioned Flaming Lips, Lambchop and majestic Queens of the Stone Age rate over most UK output. Now, I think the best band in the world right now is the Super Furry Animals and they are Welsh. Supergrass is a close second, so it's not like the UK is doing horribly in my view. PJ Harvey, Badly Drawn Boy, Doves and older stalwarts like the Charlatans and Blur are still kicking, so I wouldn't cry for Albion-a, or whatever, just yet. Outside of Radiohead, few really good bands from the UK, or the US are going to sell many records at all in the US, so I don't think the lack of a high selling UK act in the US charts is indicative of a fall in quality, either. Ebb and flow, yo.

spice girsl are bettah than everyone mentioned on this thread so far, which i didn't bother reading

girsl is what i meant to write

spice girsl are bettah than everyone mentioned on this thread so far, which i didn't bother reading
Thanks Mark for reading my post at least. But you just confirm it. If the Spice Girls are the best band mentioned here the current UK rock scene is even duller than I thought.

southall is allergic to so solid crew, i seem to recall: nothing much like this exists in the states currently (i am right now taking off ORIGINAL PIRATE MATERIAL and putting on F**K IT)

are spice girls ROCK? (heh)

I'm not allergic to them, they just make me twitch and want to go to the toilet.

i am right now taking off ORIGINAL PIRATE MATERIAL and putting on F**K IT)
He may be fu(n)ctionally illiterate, he has four arms and thus can do multi-tasking.

I am now judging bands based on the barcode. If the number 6 or 9 are mentioned three times, it is rock. If the number 0 is mentioned three times it's nihilistic pop. El-P is the latter.

What do you do with awkward bastards who have no bar-code? I'm thinking Godspeed, Pearl Jam, etcetera...

do barcodes in fact "mention" numbers? i would suggest rather that they DISCUSS them...

judging by yr examples nick, it means that the barcode gods have thrown up their palps in despair that humanZoR have such terrible taste, and made what feeble protest they can

are spice girls ROCK? (heh)
Of course not, I never said that. But that doesn't prevent them from being utter shite.

throbbing girsl

southall is allergic to so solid crew, i seem to recall: nothing much like this exists in the states currently

mark s, on another thread someone suggested so solid as being rather like three6mafia. does this hold any water anyone? i have one of their albums somewhere that i got cheap, but its been a while since i've played it.

yes i saw that gareth, erm ans = i haf totally no idea, i'm afraid

Three 6 Mafia is much darker than So Solid Crew (and much more boring (and obviously not reggae)); SSC sounds like party music to me, especially when that girl is singing; the rapping is terrible. I don't know what the implied similarity could be, I don't think there is anything American that sounds remotely like the So Solid Crew.

What do you do with awkward bastards who have no bar-code? I'm thinking Godspeed, Pearl Jam, etcetera...
I throw them in the non-generick pap section.

No, Marky Mark, the barcodes are a reflection of our i-Ego. I project my own narcistick cyber Ich on it. Hur hur, all that feedback at Trail Of D(r)ead has left me completely devoid of inner feelings. I was stuck in Retro Hell. The crowd made me zap back to Grunge Blergh. I am now voting for UK as best muzak cuntry (sick!).

One last word: Muse

God Bless America