Kelley Polar - Love Songs of The Hanging Gardens (Environ CD05)

no, honestly tell me, spare me from reading the whole thing... i skim the thread and it seems like lots of micro-micro-genre-positioning.... there must be something that resonates about it

let's just say it's got a good beat, and i can dance to it.

what else makes it great: it's hummable!

i hate genres. i really could give a flying fuck what genre something fits into and whether its politically correct to like that genre based on its imaginary relation to some other genre at this point...

i hate the way genre words are endlessly used in music criticism like no other criticism

-- justsaying (jus...), December 5th, 2005.

I posted my frustration with ILMers about this exact issue on the Richie Hawtin thread, but you have to understand that this is I Love Music, and therefore identifying genres and picking apart the music as it applies to such is part of a valid discussion.

That said, it is annoying that the tendency here with posts discussing dance/electronic music, which contain enough absurd esoteric genres (folktronica, microhouse, etc.) to drive one batty, is to dismiss the content of an album in favor of academic muscle flexing intent on proving that the author's argument is superior, whether or not it's correct.

But it's still fair game in this arena. If you want to know about what an album sounds like exclusively, check allmusic or amazon or one of the many dance record store sites that offer up snapshot reviews. Or jump in the fite with a good argument.

Or just trust everyone here (these people know better than most) - it's a fantastic record, regardless of what genre it falls under...

I know when I talk about IDM I'm thinking way more about early Warp stuff than anything else, because that's where all my reference points (stuff I've listened to enough to internalize) lie. I stopped buying when it got boring, and a lot of other people did too - more people understand IDM in terms of the Richard D James album than in terms of Chocolate Strawberry Fuckstick or whatever Venetian Snares' new one is called.

People tend to anchor to the golden age of any genre. When people talk about "classical music" in generalities, would you assume they're talking about something more like Beethoven or more like Philip Glass? When you say "punk", do more people think of Rancid or the Ramones?

i don't get it.
-- vahid (vfoz...), December 5th, 2005

=

I, being among said culprits of this exact tendency in the last several 200+ post dance threads will now attempt to mask guilt and throw subtle wink/nudge to my accomplices by inserting dismissive comment.

Get that, smart-ass.

but the golden age of IDM as you talk about it lasted about 6 albums worth. I go with whatever the largest amount of people agree on. The difference between Rancid and Ramones, sonically, isn't really enough, your analogy would work better if you asked "when people think of punk, do they think of Television or do they think of Blink-182" and unfortunately, the answer is Blink-182. You can even replace Television with the Voidoids and it still works.

Not really. Odd dichotomy here: pure sound description vs. genre classification. Still leaves plenty of other stuff to talk about, in my opinion.

Of course I'm fine with hearing about genre. And hey, I like retro-disco too. One would just imagine that, with a 500 post thread, the album must have touched some nerve. I guess the nerve it touched was the classificatory one. What this says about dance music right now I won't dare to speculate.

"In a year when electronic dance artists such as Jamie Lidell and Roisin Murphy have made a good fist at innovative pop, along comes Croatian-born Kelley Polar to steal their thunder."!

+ omg "nefarious rave rumble"!!

(um, & anyone have any suggestions on what I could stick on a mixtape between "Here In The Night" & Pulp's "Seductive Barry"?)

Have any videos been released?

but now I love it

;-)

it's f***ing rude to retitle the thread when KP is actually posting, joining in the conversation. Can a mod change it back?

http://i34.photobucket.com/albums/d148/jonwilliamspwn/JonWilliams.jpg

-- ha (idon...), December 27th, 2005.

i disagree

I AM KELLEY POLAR

I AM KELLEY POLAR

no offense intended to vahid but will someone please change this thread back to it's orig title? who the hell changed it anyway?