so tell me, why is Kaputt better or worse than Let England Shake?

his voice is rather distinctive!

one's man distinctive, another man's annoying. would like an instrumental version of this plz.

i think maus sounds v italo influenced. but something like "hey moon" is v like destroyer i guess.

maus prob my favourite record of last year...

x-post did anyone actually use the phrase "dinner party music" in earnest about any music? i am unsure if they did.

my overall take on Kaputt was "music for people who like the idea of Pet Shop Boys but find them too aggressive"

putdowns like this are always shit, regardless of the artist involved. "it's like band x i like but WATERED DOWN", yeah or maybe it just isn't like band x you like.

or "music for people who love Pet Shop Boys but think Al Stewart's `Time Passages' is a better idea than song."

its cool that you typed those words into a box on the internet

and then hey there they are

i dont know what any of those things are but i get the basic rhythm of the thing

this thread

concerning the vocals, his voice might be distinctive but it is a mumbling voice, it is introverted. he sings as if he would speak to himself. why should i listen to someone lost in a soliloquy?

― alex in mainhattan, Tuesday, February 7, 2012 3:28 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

some people seem to like more introverted and low-key singing styles. no big surprise. i often enjoy this approach myself, find it relaxing and "relatable", allows lots of room for conversational nuance, though it's not like i reject more extroverted singing.

everyone has ideas and feelings, then they share them here

kaputt is just....man. phenomenally good.

For the record, I walked away from Kaputt with an almost entirely neutral opinion; I didn't hate it but I didn't particularly like it either. The putdown is what you read into it; I am sure that for many an non-aggressive PSB is amazing, because a ton of people loved this album.

Furthermore, the sound palettes match a lot of the stuff PSB have been doing since Release, so it's only a shit comparison if you haven't been paying attention. Some bands do actually sound like other bands and it's not really a sin or a crime to point it out.

putdowns like this are always shit

is it even a putdown?

destroyer's kaputt....so damn good.

― omar little, Sunday, February 5, 2012 9:27 AM (2 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i get where you're coming from but i dunno i dont listen kaputt or west coast and go "oh cool 80's sounds here" i just hear awesome fresh music

― ⚓ (gr8080)

― omar little, Sunday, February 5, 2012 4:12 PM (2 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

kaputt is a wonderful album, one of the year's best

― omar little, Tuesday, February 7, 2012 11:59 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

kaputt is just....man. phenomenally good.

― omar little, Tuesday, February 7, 2012 1:37 PM (22 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

okay, i get that, and there does often seem to be a sort of unearned snobbery built into mainstream indie culture, a tendency to take pride in a sense of superiority and difference that doesn't require any special ability or effort or entail any actual risk. but it's also a generic, nuance-free objection to a reductive caricature of that culture. hardly the sort of thing we should uncritically embrace.

there's something very suspect about negatively describing music of "aspiring to niche-less universality", especially if one has any fondness for chart pop. for one thing, we can't so easy know artistic intent, and for another, all art has identity, even that which we're inclined to sneer at. furthermore, it's a huge mistake to damn art for the sins of the critical culture that responds to it.

Yes, which presumably is why Ronan said words to the effect of: "I dismissed this as X but then i heard some of it and it sounded good!"

No attempt to define music by how it is treated culturally / in the media can constitute an exhaustive statement of its qualities (or quality). This should go without saying?

This is also why I caveated my reference to aspiration by reference to how the music is presented - in truth saying what "music aspires to" is very difficult to do with any accuracy, whereas saying how music is presented in the media is both easier and more indicative of the relationship between the music in question and social groups (as opposed to between the music and you).

But above all, you should keep in mind that not every attempt to describe the listening habits of our peers is an unconscionable attack on the music listened to.

It's possible to say that e.g. The XX is perfect and archetypal dinner party music for university educated indie listeners (and I know because I've been at these dinner parties) and still really like the music (in fact my fondest XX listening experience was at a beach bar in Nice where it was played on shuffle with Sade's Greatest Hits - what does that say?), and still really like dinner parties for that matter!

I more often put on lunch barbecues, but either way I geekily really enjoy the process of working out what music to play.

But Dan its a sin!

destroyer's kaputt....so damn good.

― omar little, Sunday, February 5, 2012 9:27 AM (2 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i get where you're coming from but i dunno i dont listen kaputt or west coast and go "oh cool 80's sounds here" i just hear awesome fresh music

― ⚓ (gr8080)

― omar little, Sunday, February 5, 2012 4:12 PM (2 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

kaputt is a wonderful album, one of the year's best

― omar little, Tuesday, February 7, 2012 11:59 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

kaputt is just....man. phenomenally good.

― omar little, Tuesday, February 7, 2012 1:37 PM (22 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

― ⚓ (gr8080), Tuesday, February 7, 2012 11:39 PM (26 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

genuine pity in my heart for u guys

mixed with a tinge of contempt of course

wow the shoe is on the other foot for once

omar killing it ITT

what shoe! what foot! this thread is hilarious.

i still wanna know if tim f. digs any M83 stuff. he won't tell me. does a ronan dig any M83 stuff? who listens to it anyway?

my overall take on Kaputt was "music for people who like the idea of Pet Shop Boys but find them too aggressive"

― I spend a lot of time thinking about apricots (DJP), Tuesday, February 7, 2012 3:29 PM (44 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

cheap slam, but half fair. kaputt is p obviously a mood piece, album-oriented, not would-be chart pop in a PSB vein. aggression is hardly the point. and are we really reduced to ridiculing music for its perceived lack of aggression, like 80s alt people sneering at "safe" radio pop?

the sales staff at b&b italia, two hungarian office cleaners, the middle classes (xp)

I totally dig M83!

xp: contederizer dude, please keep up

for me dinner parties are almost always jazz then when everyone gets drunk it's house or disco.

x-post to scott, i only like those few older m83 remixes, where's that new yorker jpg when you need it?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qsC5Ecy5vio

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IR7gQV9vdTM

all the destroyer hate reminds me of the m people hatred. Destroyer = M People. Tasteful boring music that you could neither love or hate.

i just love kaputt because it takes a lot of elements of dance music and pop music like synths and "out there" production techniques but it does it with songs that are so much more *intelligent* and well-crafted than what you hear in the top 40

i hate m people

actually tho the main thing i'm realising here after putting on that m83 remix is that superpitcher is way better than any of this music.

this album is kinda like if you combined the best elements of the smiths with the best elements of katy b

so do i, ronan. But im just at the wind up now :)

It's possible to say that e.g. The XX is perfect and archetypal dinner party music for university educated indie listeners (and I know because I've been at these dinner parties) and still really like the music (in fact my fondest XX listening experience was at a beach bar in Nice where it was played on shuffle with Sade's Greatest Hits - what does that say?), and still really like dinner parties for that matter!

yeah sure, i agree with you there. i'm objecting in a general sense to the tiresome, self-aggrandizing disdain so often directed at "indie" on ILX, itt and elsewhere.

destroyer fucking wishes he could write a hook as strong as "moving on up" or "one night in heaven"

this album is kinda like if you combined the best elements of the smiths with the best elements of katy b

WHY would you feel the need to put anything to do with the smiths within a 10 mile radius of katy b, leave her alone ;_;

m people is to simply red as destroyer is to pj harvey

genuine pity in my heart for u guys

mixed with a tinge of contempt of course

like a Destroyer song

i just love kaputt because it takes a lot of elements of dance music and pop music like synths and "out there" production techniques but it does it with songs that are so much more *intelligent* and well-crafted than what you hear in the top 40

lol

the new m'shell ndegeocello album has some stuff that reminds me of kaputt, those are some of my favorite tracks on that album tbh, i wouldn't mind seeing a bejar/mshell collabo :)

The Destroyer album is like From The Choirgirl Hotel crossed with Aaliyah, only 10 times better than either.

The reason it's better is that it's not manufactured or kooky, it's really intelligent and thoughtful.

superpitcher, yeah. there's the dance thing again. its not even really a fair fight. any of those kompact dudes could make sweet 80's sounds and i wouldn't have to hear the destroyer dude singing and i would want to play it over and over again. so i guess that's really where i stand. there is just better/more enjoyable stuff out there. still would play an instrumental version of the destroyer album and probably dig it a bunch. might not play it over and over though.

Abigail's Party has a lot to answer for.

have you heard john maus, scott?

destroyer fucking wishes he could write a hook as strong as "moving on up"

― first period don't give a fuck, second period gon get cut (lex pretend),

yeah Screamadelica is awesome!

hey, tim, what do you think of M83? (third time's a charm) okay, promise i won't ask again. he probably likes the early remixes too.

xp: contederizer dude, please keep up]

pfft. i'm dancing as fast as i can...

i can't believe primal scream covered m people :(

xxpost Sorry Scott missed your first reference to this.

I quite liked the album before the recent one. Haven't heard the recent one. Should I?

Of the earlier stuff I liked it but (predictably) preferred the remixes as well.

i can't believe primal scream covered m people :(

okay lol at this.

no, i don't think so. i get him confused with deadmaus. i'll look him up.

x-post

i just love kaputt because it takes a lot of elements of dance music and pop music like synths and "out there" production techniques but it does it with songs that are so much more *intelligent* and well-crafted than what you hear in the top 40

oh boy