i want the name of the one person responsible for the white dude in the old man hat voice

I blame this dude. It ain't easy being green.

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-lEXGZWAZUgk/TyLiOhV49OI/AAAAAAAAJdM/ttyIH394ZRI/s1600/Kermit-Reporter.jpg

I tend to group this stuff with other VH1 "You Oughta Know" (TM) music, like this kinda 'half-there' music so devoid of culture or any distinguishing characteristics - beyond an empty signifying at 'emoting' - that I still can't quite picture how it'll come across looking back on it

like yesterday's easy listening/soft rock/adult pop - Phil Collins, Sting - at least had some sense of culture or zeitgeist to it

other than the occasional fedora or whatever, contemporary adult pop is so remarkably featureless. although I guess Phil Collins felt this way for a lot of adults back in the day?... as a kid that stuff was actually kind of magical, in a way I can't imagine Gavin McGraw or Jason Mraz being now

well also phil and sting's music was just made better. and they'd been at it forever. phil started making music in the 60's! and sting played with jazz bands for years in the early 70's before joining the police. they had history. by the time they hit it big in the 80's (on their own) they had been through a lot. and i think you can hear that in someone's voice. young and fresh is fine for pop music, but if you are going for aching and soulful young and fresh sounds weird. or even strangely dishonest. unless you're a genius. or have a genius voice. or been through a ton of bad shit. not saying you have to have bad shit cred to sing aching and soulful sadsack songs, just that a lot of these guys sound uh ahistorical to me.

to be honest, actual teenagers do aching and soulful way better than 20 or 30-something hat dudes. just cuz they are genuinely bummed out 24/7.

yeah but scott just 'cause you're not acquainted with somebody's apprenticeship doesn't mean it didn't happen - I know people who've been making music with Bon Iver dude for fifteen years.

I've never heard a Bon Iver song. Should I?

this is Ph1l, right? I don't think you would dig it. But I think Scott would, a great deal, if the artist weren't NOTED GRAMMY WINNER AND HERO TO THE INDIE FOLK EVERYWHERE, BON IVER. And would tell other people to give it a chance.

I always quietly blame Tom Waits for the hat + young old man schtick.

i just feel like i can hear life experience in someone's voice. am i crazy? and i feel like a lot of these guys want to sound world-wearier than they are. it feels schticky. they should listen to that red house painters dude. he was young when he made those albums in the 90's, right? but he was really good at conveying supreme bummed outness and beauty for some reason. beyond his years. maybe he was just born with more soul or something. for most people listening, this is not a concern. at all. i'm just weird. and i am not an authenticity nut. i love bob dylan and the dead and they wanted to sound like 80 year old sharecroppers when they were younger and i have no problem with it. its execution in the end. how good you are at it. tom waits was good at it.

i just feel like i can hear life experience in someone's voice. am i crazy? and i feel like a lot of these guys want to sound world-wearier than they are. it feels schticky.

i get this, but almost every singer who reached greatness before the age of 25 basically did amazing things by pretending to sound world-wearier than they really were.

They all seem like they're playing Tom Waits dress-up to me. And TW was playing dress-up, so that's a couple extra layers removed from the people they were dressing up as, which is what makes them seem phony maybe?
I dunno.

"i get this, but almost every singer who reached greatness before the age of 25 basically did amazing things by pretending to sound world-wearier than they really were."

yeah they were better at it than these guys.

these guys should act their age. i'd like them better.

true, i'm just saying it's not categorically a sin

no, not at all. how old were some of my favorite rappers when i thought they were gods on mountaintops? probably a good percentage of them were my age or younger. i already feel like i've learned stuff from kendrick lamar as a writer.

i am the the same age as rakim. rakim was 800 friggin' years old when i worshipped him. i never would have known we were the same age back then.

i was so flipped out when i was doing my thing on todd terry for the emp conference and i found out he's only a year older than me. that's genius for you!

I have a weird thing with music, I love to listen to Korn, The Amity Affliction, Parkway Drive and then I just fall in love with Bon Iver. But what's not to like? :3

CoolWhhhiip 5 hours ago

kinda tempted to find out what the amity affliction might be...

seems like i'm far from the biggest hater of bon iver on here!

get in the mood for james blake & bon iver 'fall creek boys choir'

and i don't hate the guy. i listened to the album everyone loved - or parts of it - just to see what the hubbub was about and it was blah to me. and hearing the bonnie raitt thing...

and no i don't have anything against bonnie raitt. (bonnie a young white girl who dropped out of radcliffe and played in little clubs for a couple of years with people like fred mcdowell and tried to sound like an eldery black woman and almost immediately (2 years or so) got a nice deal with warner brothers and was the daughter of broadway royalty.) she had some catchy tunes.

kinda tempted to find out what the amity affliction might be...

They're a metalcore band from Australia. They're on Roadrunner. This is their new single, from their next album which will be out October 2 in the US.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g2BI3Fww1vA

i'm worried about my boy rufus. have to make sure he doesn't try to sneak any john mayer albums home.

https://sphotos-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-prn1/485700_10151233250225908_473502823_n.jpg

white dude in the old man hat voice in the top 10 right now

http://necropedia.org/jdd/public/documents/celebrities/1525.jpg

awesome, awesome picture, scott.

jack johnson!!! he is like number-one offender.

― ban drake (the rapper) (max), Tuesday, May 17, 2011 1:28 AM (1 year ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Regarding this motherfucker. Fuck, the first time I heard any Jack Johnson songs I was 22 and I was going through a really bad breakup and they played a block of his tunes on an NPR station. And I was like, "Wow, it's cool that they're giving this sad old middle-aged man a chance. He sounds like he's going through a mid-life divorce or something. You don't hear about too many new artists who are this old.

Oh, so the further point being that I was like "I'm going to go listen to this middle-aged man break-up music now" and because this was during the height of audiogalaxy, I just downloaded a bunch of his songs and listened to them in this middle-aged man context for a while and it wasn't until a few months later that I found out he was just a couple years older than me.

It's the Mike Love look.

'white dude in old man hat' is this guy to me:

http://anthropology.ua.edu/blogs/matthewgreenemeier/files/2012/09/home-improvement-wilson2.jpg

anyway, all these dudes are disgusting savages. i'd totally listen to wilson from home improvement's acoustic musings, though.

what a tragedy it is that earl hindman is dead while newton faulkner still walks the earth.

awesome, awesome picture, scott.

cosign

Regarding this motherfucker. Fuck, the first time I heard any Jack Johnson songs I was 22 and I was going through a really bad breakup and they played a block of his tunes on an NPR station. And I was like, "Wow, it's cool that they're giving this sad old middle-aged man a chance. He sounds like he's going through a mid-life divorce or something. You don't hear about too many new artists who are this old.

"He probably has to live in some sad, little apartment and only see his kids on Wednesdays or something..."

I saw a copy of Murry Wilson's album, the other day.

Thought better of it.

decided to google this (well known but i don't pay attention) cunt after hearing his voice in the pub every fucking day for the last three years - and he's english! what a cock.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UZp6dhheriM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRxccy-zcJ8

fuck. i've suffered so you should too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UZp6dhheriM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRxccy-zcJ8

it's like watching a computer generated singer songwriter

i watched 30 seconds of the first video and that was enough.

This remains one of my favorite ILM threads. I say 'young man in an old man hat' to myself all the time. It's like one of the three modern diagnoses.

I can't outright hate Jack Johnson bc when my coworker's 6 yo son was on his deathbed (fuck cancer) Johnson called him on the phone and sang his favorite song to him (kid super loved JJ). I don't ever wanna hear his music but that was a nice thing to do.

aw, that is really nice. his curious george album sucks though. i bought that for rufus years ago thinking it was gonna be songs about, you know, curious george.

I actually like "Upside Down," Jack's closing credits song for "George." Probably couldn't deal with a whole album of stuff like that though.

I thought this thread was going to be about Jimmy Durante

Thread scarily prescient in presaging the rise of the Lumineers.

old man take a look at my hat, I'm a lot like you were

http://www.yeproc.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/The-Happiness-Waltz_cover-384x350.jpg

that looks like a guy i went to high school with in an old man hat

Also looks a bit like Woody_Harrelson_stupid_hat.jpg

http://stupidhats.files.wordpress.com/2010/03/woody_harrelson_stupid_hat.jpg

Does Phosphorescent dude have an old man hat voice?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IbyFTz1m5Ac

dude outside my store harrassing people on the sidewalk for Oxfam is totally wearing an old man hat and singing in an old man hat voice. i kid you not. God is punishing me!!

don't worry - he will get his comeuppance for singing at a job that requires no singing whatsoever

http://gawker.com/only-nine-people-have-given-to-zosia-mamets-hipster-ba-510278912?utm_campaign=socialflow_gawker_facebook&utm_source=gawker_facebook&utm_medium=socialflow

Clearly it was Leon Redbone

http://i286.photobucket.com/albums/ll88/JollyvilleChick/Squidoo/LeonRedbone/LeonRedbone_JohnKnox_1.jpg

that's a v nice old man hat imo tho

I think he pulls of that look much better than these johnny-come-lately scruffamuffins

Love Redbone. Yeah his look/act is kind of a schtick, but he's so great at doing what he does. Him and Dan Hicks.

at least he appears to be aiming for the same thing the bluesmen he's imitating were aiming for, i.e. trying to dress well

I mean jfc compare with the shitsmeared mug of the happiness waltz dude