ILM's Best Shoegaze / Dream Pop / Post-rock TRACKS poll - RESULTS THREAD

10 Pale Saints (522)
9 Disco Inferno (543)
8 Jesus & Mary Chain (617)
7 Curve (622)
6 Boo Radleys (808)

5 Lush (829)
4 Cocteau Twins (869)

3 Slowdive (1,151)

2 Ride (2,358)

1 My Bloody Valentine (3,165)

Ok how about a top 100 where only the top song by each unique artist is represented?

Off the top 100 there were 47 unique artists.

I guess that's pretty definitive. I'd never have guessed Slowdive so high before the poll started. In fact I'd never even have guessed them so high until you posted your list.

Would be interesting to run a poll by *band* for the top 20 (though remove the patently non-shoegaze bands like The Cure and The Sundays) and see if the favourite shoegaze *band* showed the same result, if some bands hadn't been stymied by multiple song nominations that split their song votes.

I was thinking of doing an albums poll while this is all still fresh in people's minds. You don't have to worry about split votes so much then as you can pretty much vote for all the albums you want to. I still haven't thought of a fair way of excluding random inappropriate albums from the poll, though.

Would like to help w/ album poll.

Go for it - I think moka got it right and letting the voters decide is the best way.

is that catherine wheel thing at no. 8 a joke? god that's a wet song.

liking 'lazarus' having never heard it before, but the trumpet kind of sours it for me.

No, I think that letting voters decide has shown itself to be a pretty poor way because people vote for stuff that is utterly not canonical because they "like it better" which negates the point of restricting a poll to a genre to start with.

I know. Let's get a list of albums and I'll send them to Sonic Cathedral's Bishop of Shoegaze to get canonical approval of what is and isn't shoegaze. ;-)

But Ismael, Can we really trust the voters to make the decisions that are best for themselves? Perhaps what they really need is a firm guiding hand.

Was never much of a Boo Radleys fan, but I actually like the fact that they brought in lots of non-standard issue instruments. xxp

I will then tactically vote all 800 of my points for Chapterhouse's second album and y'all can go hang if you don't like it. ha hahahhahaha ;-)

Dude, if "letting the voters decide" ends up with the Stone Roses as "a shoegaze band" over a lot of people's objections, then seriously, fuck democracy for defining genres.

though remove the patently non-shoegaze bands like The Cure and The Sundays

stop ignoring the "dream pop" part of the poll!!!!

I dunno, we got one Stone Roses track and one Cure track, and I would quibble with the Eno as well, but that doesn't strike me as too terrible a hit rate. Also, we should remember that it wasn't just a shoegaze poll.

I think Chapterhouse were the only shoegaze band ever to use the "When the Levee Breaks" beat.

Would like to help w/ album poll.

Maybe you could solve this while I sleep: I still haven't thought of a fair way of excluding random inappropriate albums from the poll, though.

Basically, what I'm saying is, fuck this "dream pop" nonsense. Let's have a SHOEGAZE poll where if it ain't SHOE I don't have to look at it! :-P

(I didn't quibble with the Eno because it placed down so low. Had that turned up in the top 20, you can bet I'd have looked intensely askance at it.)

SHOW ME THE SHOE, THE WHOLE SHOE AND NOTHING BUT THE DAMN SHOE!!!

I think Chapterhouse were the only shoegaze band ever to use the "When the Levee Breaks" beat.

Dreams Burn Down?

NBS, I will turn it over in my head tonight while I get drunk with Robert Pollard! Actually, I gotta get going.. It's been real, ILX shoegaze team.

http://www.xxlmag.com/online/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/n-w-a-straight-outta-compton-album-cover.jpg

How about just taking 'shoegazing' literally, then?

Actually, I'm gonna start campaigning now for the inclusion of "Selected Ambient Works 85-92" as a shoegaze album. I mean, it's got the atmospherics, it's got the delay pedal abuse, it's got wispy girly vocals deeply buried under onslaughts of warm noise. It meets more shoegaze criteria than the Sundays!

Poll needed more metal tbh

I guess my sole nomination for XTC didn't really mesh in this poll (like post-rock)

Such a great song though

I've just thought of another potential problem for the albums poll, which came to light when somebody did a 'Nowhere' tracks poll: what version of the album or we talking about? For example, for me (and for the reviewers of the time) there were 8 tracks on Nowhere. People who bought the CD version had three 'bonus' tracks from the Fall EP as well. People who have bought later re-issues have even more tracks on there (I think the Today Forever EP, maybe Ride and Fall as well).

(Fall = Play in that last section)

"Chasing a Bee" didn't even chart. SMH

That must be a thing for all album polls now, though? What with deluxe reissues and all that cal. xp

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M2LhT_X9V6Q

Posting 'Grasshopper' because I'm saddest that it didn't make the top 100 and I wish more people knew it. I accidentally fired up two versions simultaneously there, the double-tracked drums were fierce.

PS there was another b-side of theirs called 'Rolling Thunder #2' which is impossible to find - there appears to be some sort of motorcycle festival of the same name, which unfortunately monopolises the search results. Anyone know where I could hear it?

"Chasing a Bee" didn't even chart get nominated. SMH

― Cunga, Saturday, October 30, 2010 6:27 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark

Had it been on the list, I would have given it 50 pts.

Shoegaze albums would be a nightmare because so often early EPs were collected and stuck together into albums for the US release (hence things like Ride's Smile, Lush's Gala - I forget the name of the Slowdive one, I'm fairly sure there was one, though. There's that pre-Isn't Anything MBV EP bonanza thing as well.)

And, like, I think of the Today Forever e.p. as pretty much a mini album in itself so counting that as part of Nowhere would just be nuts.

the Slowdive one

blue day

That's the one. Except all of that is now on the bonus disc for the reissue of Just For A Day now...

Hmmmm. I'm going to sleep on it. Perhaps we could make it an albums and EPs poll, with strict criteria that only the original vinyl version of an album counts and if you want yer bonus EP tracks you've got to nominate / vote for the EP instead / as well.

NBS, yeah, I think including EPs would be absolutely essential to organizing such a poll.

I would've voted the heck out of "Grasshopper," too.

But the E.P. collections were pretty canonical! Despite my general anti-Slowdive stance, I would totally vote for Blue Day as an album but I'm not sure I'd waste my votes on the singles/E.P.s

and omitting Gala as an album would just be wrong!

It's funny, though, how in many ways the E.P. was the natural shoegaze format.

Interesting mix, those results.

I think the one band consistently written out of shoegazing history as such still is Lovesliescrushing, probably because they were on Projekt and there just wasn't much focus on what Scott Cortez and company were doing as a result. And arguably you could say he was one of the first followers in the end. But he was creating some loud as hell, violent and beautiful stuff starting back in the early nineties and for all the MBV jones in evidence they ended up having their own impact:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6CkAVwLwSRo

Did 'Jesu' got nominated? They could fit in the metal-shoegaze.

Ok, 'tired of me' did got nominated but noone but not a single vote for it.

Thanks Moka!

I was surprised to see some of my faves finish so high (e.g. "When You Sleep" in the top ten, "Pearly Dewdrops Drops" as the top Cocteaus song, "Allison" as the top Slowdive song.), wasn't at all surprised to see "Soon" at #1.

I'm into that Loveliescrushing song. Thanks, Ned!

Yer welcome. Trust me, there's a lot there to investigate. (Check out Astrobrite as well.)

astrobrite used to open for a lot of shoegazer bands when they would play detroit. well the ones that majesty crush didn't.

Did 'Jesu' got nominated? They could fit in the metal-shoegaze.

Cant remember but I did nominate a Lycia track (and voted for it!) which is closer to gazey goth-metal, and thats a whole subgenre that - I feel - stylistically fits here better than some of the stuff that charted.

I can't be such a stickler for canon than K, though I do understand where she's coming from being in the STCI back in 91. But if we stuck to that pure "shoegaze" we'd be stuck with half a dozen bands and some limp has-been forgotten leftovers. I *like* to think the genre expanded and developed branches, as many do - metal, goth, dreampop, IDM.