Television #3 Vs. Van Halen #73 Vs. Indie Music Cred Conditioning

no, he wants us to think that we all are just hair metal/low-brow movie freaks and won't let ourselves admit it.

i mean who actually listens to Television, right? Especially when you can rock out with Diamond Dave!

And to all those people who say I'm throwing out insults, um, if you read the thread, I tossed out an idea (perhaps roughly), but I didn't start throwing out anything until it was thrown at me, and I find the whole vicious sarcasm trend on ILM to be far more tiring than an IDEA (even if it's half-cocked in your mind).

For example, play "first thought" with someone: TV or VH? "TV"

Ok, that's the immediate truth.

Take the same game, same person, sleep deprivate them for 4 days, give them only limited food, loud noises, bright lights (yes, US military prisons) and ask same question: answer is the closest you get to the ecstatic truth.

Not my intended point, but I think that it's funny that, on a similar level, the likes of Van Halen are reduced to mere "cock-rock" on this thread when it's possible and even likely that to some portion of us that it was VH or a similar band that introduced us to rock music in the first place, and that the experience somehow takes a backseat to the later, artier and more cerebral discovery of Television. And one scoffs when I throw out words like "poseur" and "elitist"?

Pop art, on the other hand, is art that has the cause and effect in itself - the viewer's reaction is built-in. Anyone watching a teen movie knows when to laugh, when to cry, etc. People watching a more complex art film often have to put more cerebral thought into how they react.

Of course, this isn't to say that Van Halen is trash and TV is art for art's sake. But it's a useful illustration, especially in light of jsoulja's post about his film buff friend.

A better example might be found in their 80's list. For instance, putting Talking Heads "Remain in Light" over albums by the Smiths and R.E.M.

cheerleaders, man, cheerleaders!

(This is where I also say that jsoulja's a spiff feller, having met him a few weeks back.)

I thought high art/low art was consigned to the wastebasket of the 17th century. I suppose there's Mr. Adorno and mass art. But I think we all know what he'd say about Television.

James

But by the same token, don't you think that people are also conditioned to like or say they like their ostensibly "direct" childhood pleasures (which are, invariably, hugely popular and heavily marketed mass media products)?

Once again, there is no magic barrier separating Van Halen from Television, but if you're going to tell me that putting a band whose lead guitarist doesn't even tune up half the time next to a band that consciously strove to be cerebral and artistic (never mind if they failed or if YOU don't think they're cerebral!), I'd have to disagree. VH is accesible, easy, fun. Television might have been accessible to you but how many people have you met that have even heard of it? More people know Van Halen than Television. Van Halen didn't strive to intellectualize its music. Television did (the allmusic review says this, so it must be true).

Interesting art? Well, a retro kitsch item is interesting now but was utterly banal when it served a purpose in the 50s, 60s, or 70s. And "interesting" changes with individual preferences, so it's not so much a convenient category as a recipe for cultural anarchy.

I would rank them higher, but I've never understood the point of ranking everything.

For me, tho, it does seem somewhat more defensible to like "Marquee Moon" more than a Van Halen album. It does seem a little more thought-out to me. Whether or not "thought-out" or subtle is a positive virtue is something rock and roll has made us all think about. But that's just me and I have to agree that this is kind of a tired thread--c'mon, haven't we gotten beyond this point? Van Halen is a nice populist something or another with, I must say, no discernible content, whereas "Marquee" does appear to be about walkin' around in New York or something, good. Van Halen, OK, it appears to be about riding in a convertible in San Diego or something, so I guess that's all right.

Slim Pickens OTM w/r/t everything he said in the last several posts! See, for whatever reason, I can't come out and make that kind of point without some inner tourettes (sic?) blurting out "yeah, and you an indie rock punk, too!" But I'm working on it.....

Cheers for the props, Ned!

The problem with that Pitchfork Top 100 is their lack of soul, funk, and reggae. But those indie guys did a decent list. They gave props to Sly's Riot, but to exclude Curtis and Marley in a 70's Top 100 is sorta stupid.

Low and Marquee Moon are some of my favs from that decade though. It was a fun Top 100 to read to me.

OK, Slim, but can you tell me what makes a bond "intrinsic"?

And what's up with the racial slurs? I understand the context, but still totally inappropriate.

Any list or compilation of lists that drops Marquee Moon as a #28 ALL TIME album is evidence enough that these "best of" lists are inaccurate and stupid. I don't really care about TV or VH to be honest, I was just interested in starting a thread exploring people's transitions from mainstream music to more left-of-center music and how it is that the latter ends up replacing the former in terms of preference.

But of course, as I suspected from the start, the whole idea of indie music cred posturing DOES play a major part in this, as we can see by so many people on this thread jumping all over me to dare to challenge the significance of a band as insignificant (in the grand scheme) but conveniently as indie as Television, while the more mainstream (but granted, equally insignificant) VH supporters take a more passive stance, because they're not worried about the POSE.

* Everyone's own taste will be paramount for them and them alone, though they might wish to communicate otherwise

* Lists will either be made or voted on

* Nobody has to care about them, but they're there anyway.

*shrug*