The XX

altho i will say that i think call all destroyer is shirking his journalistic duties to ilx

really really liked that Sasha Frere-Jones piece - explored the strengths of the band without relying on the same old shorthands.

I don't disrespect people for liking it, it is an appealing style, it's just that I think the press aren't doing their job if they don't realize how many artists are currently mining the same turf and have been for about ten years.

― US EEL (u s steel), Monday, January 25, 2010 11:22 PM (21 minutes ago) Bookmark

not even sure why i'm bothering BUT -- clearly this isn't the point. "how could anyone like this band that plays the musical instrument electric guitar?! they've been playing guitars for 60 years now!"

they sound like radiohead (when they don't sound like chris isaak)

what Radiohead songs do you think they sound like?

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kudos

xpost that one with the bleeps and the bloops? and lots of reverb?

that's their best song imo

I stormed out of the ilx thread unexpectedly cross

<3 hoos

this part is better imo: "Why is it so important to you?"

uh, i dunno, because this is a message board about music

w this thread & vampire weekend i find myself spending time defending shit that i only kinda like

also Girls

all the ILXOR yaysayers will hate this in a year. Just u wait.

does that matter? surely that's all the more reason to be a yaysayer while a person still can.

'oh no i like a band that one day i might not like i'd better just not listen to music then'

all the ilxor yeasayers

was just going to zing based on similar bands being so ubiquitous it's impossible to name names but I am genuinely curious, pls?

I think the thing with The XX is that they are such a blank canvas that people can, and are, projecting wildly onto them in terms of reading influences, references, meanings, emotions, etc. I quite like the album but I'm certainly not that blown away.

it says something about the current state of rock/pop music that a dullish band like the xx is so much in the limelight. in the 80s they would have been nothing special and nobody would have talked about them. i kind of like them but don't get all the fuss about them. on the other hand i don't know a new band making more exciting music than the xx right now. my main problem with them is their minimalism, stereolab eg were minimal too but somehow there was more to them, maybe because of the groove?

I don't think the xx are particularly exciting, their appeal isn't excitement or novelty

lol I don't even like them all that much - think they're ok but a bit like the music ur little brother wd make after he got into ur low records

Dunno whether anyone has said this yet, but I can hear quite a big Interpol influence in there. I'm guessing Turn On The Bright Lights was a big record for them in their early teens - timing would be about right I think? Hearing the same thing on the Wild Beasts record too.

Now i feel old. Up there with Sum 41 citing Nimrod as the album that got them into music.

I don't think being young automatically means "no depth". A lot of the younger people I encounter online listen to classic rock, progressive rock, or oldies. These problems are as old as the eighties (hyped band being held up as "representative" of trends), maybe older.

I am not a Radiohead fan at all, but I tolerate Radiohead fans because I think that as a group they can handle all the attention.

I loved the Low reference, another group I don't think is terrible but I wouldn't go out of my way to buy just because it's the one alterna-group everyone has seized upon.

imo xx have been caught in that magical stage before they've started worrying about what they're doing and that's a nice thing to hear in a record in an age where lots of stuff tends to sound super self aware. i like that comment on thequietus where mpc dude is like "i don't think anyone else is rocking an mpc like me" and cites rjd2 as a major influence. i guess some people will be all like omg haven't you heard of hiphop and btw rjd2 sux didn't you read the resident advisor review u noob. other people will enjoy the fact this dude has such enthusiasm and self believe in what he's doing. i'm def in the latter camp and think that innocence/enthusiasm is one of the things that makes this record pretty special in 2010 especially when presented in an indie/hipster context.

I loved the Low reference, another group I don't think is terrible but I wouldn't go out of my way to buy just because it's the one alterna-group everyone has seized upon.

I know I'm out of touch but Low "the one alterna-group everyone has seized upon"? o_O

I am curious as to how can I find this "innocence" and "enthusiasm" in the actual recordings, as opposed to the band's background or press. All the self-belief and RJD2 fandom in the world isn't going to make your CD not suck.

It would be nice if people didn't bring issues here that they got in some flame war on some other forum.

x-post: Low - you had to be there, I guess. Or not ten years old in the nineties.

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I assumed you were talking about nowadays.

I wasn't ten years old in the nineties, and I don't remember Low being anything more than the odd small article in NME once every couple of years or so.

us eel u really think they sound too packaged and expen$ive? that's insane.

u are wrong. this album sounds like a bunch of myspace demos tarted up for cd release. using a *really* basic sound palette- lovingly. hence the innocence and enthusiasm.

this album is really easy to critisise but u are doing a really bad job of it. you want to focus on how the songs don't go anywhere, the vocals have lame 09 singer songwriter affectations, that they take themselves really seriously, the drums are really thin like he's downloaded a sample pack of freedrumsamples.org, there is automated spaceverb on everything etc etc

i'll never understand why "taking oneself seriously" is so often used as a diss - that's a GOOD THING imo

I'm sorry I am doing "such a bad job" at it I'll work harder to impress you next time since you take this little thread so seriously.

By "expensive", you ought to know what I mean, they sound like groomed talent, they do not sound spontaneous. If School of Seven Bells is opening for you, perhaps you think too highly of yourself. Or someone thinks too highly of you. How can you be this naive about the industry?

How can you say they don't sound Xpensive when that last track someone posted sounded more like Alanis Morissette (whom I like) or some other commercial chick singer nonsense than any alterna-shit.

Taking oneself "too seriously" is a problem when you expect others to take you as seriously as you do yourself.

ok alanis morissette is pretty much the most, uh, leftfield comparison to the xx in a thread full of leftfield comparisons

Bizarre.

THEY SOUND LIKE GREEN DAY

WHOM I LIKE

Ironic

is alanis morrisette one of the artists in the bunch that are so ubiquitous as to be not worth naming?

I don't like it when female singers are marketed or presented (or received) as they are with this group. It just seems like there is a perpetual market for "inoffensive alterna-pop with female singer". It's like you are selling femininity as an ingredient. I think the female singer would be better off trying her hand at jazz or real singer-songwriter styles, clearly she has talent, the canned nature of the music and underwhelming songwriting don't do her justice.

x-post: cozen, what is your point? It is creepy you can't get over a post I made last night. You seem more interested in my opinions than in discussing the actual music.

I'm just interested in hearing about this rich seam of bands who are currently doing what the xx ('lazy singing and minimalism') are doing but are going unhyped

actually scratch tht I'm not even that interested

c u l8r xx

A woman's place is opening for Duffy. The indie scene is not befitting a true female sensibility.

This album was a huge grower for me. I think the melodies are really beautiful (esp. on the first half of the album) and would stand up in any kind of arrangements (and with any kind of singer, to be honest). I don't really hear almost any of the bands mentioned thus far (def. not Beat Happening at all outside of the superficial spareness; not really Interpol; I suppose Low, but the xx stuff is so much more torch-y).

prinzhorn dance school?

the xx are nothing like 'em.

i don't think they are either but they do sound like lazy singing and minimalism.

i like this record but i find it the opposite of a grower.

someone convince me that doing another lecture on what "minimalist" means in music is a bad idea

Maybe "grower" isn't the right term. I just thought it was terribly dull at first superficial glance, and then when I got a vague urge to put it on again I was suddenly completely overtaken by it.

Dan, I would welcome your lecture.