Determining who qualifies is where the controversy arises.
― Let's disco dance, Hammurabi! (Austin), Thursday, 14 April 2022 14:34 (two years ago) link
I think you mean “unclesoul”:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=69ptYXvUo7M
― middot • is • my • middle • name (breastcrawl), Thursday, 14 April 2022 14:46 (two years ago) link
Scat singing: never good, always entertaining.
― Let's disco dance, Hammurabi! (Austin), Wednesday, 27 April 2022 23:03 (two years ago) link
I think I first saw this on ilm:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nY7LHziBDcI
― brimstead, Wednesday, 27 April 2022 23:12 (two years ago) link
Two of my favorites!
― Eric B. Mash Up the Resident (James Redd and the Blecchs), Wednesday, 27 April 2022 23:32 (two years ago) link
I normally resist the urge to post “canonical thing actually sucks” in this thread, but:While it’s always still great to hear the Ronettes etc., the least great thing about it these days is the Spector sound. That wall o’ sound is not really standing strong… in fact, the production can sound like muddy shit. Maybe it was made very specifically for transistor radio speakers, I dunno.
― Hops: Mosaic, Citra, Simcoe (morrisp), Friday, 6 May 2022 01:38 (two years ago) link
"Wall of Sound" sounds great in mono on an old boombox with the treble cranked. Otherwise, I just kind of accept it as a "technology of the time" fidelity issue like I would early jazz or folk music. Maybe it would have aged better if something something recording technology . . . ?
But yeah: big agree here. I grew tired of it years ago and haven't sought out listening to any of that stuff for even longer.
― Let's disco dance, Hammurabi! (Austin), Friday, 6 May 2022 01:57 (two years ago) link
Might be a better way of phrasing it is that, say, Shadow Morton is underrated in comparison to Spector.
― Hops: Mosaic, Citra, Simcoe (morrisp), Friday, 6 May 2022 02:22 (two years ago) link
wow, i just wiki'd scatman john. what an inspirational guy. it's so sad that he passed so young
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scatman_John
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=01w-9pUsy18
― Punster McPunisher, Friday, 6 May 2022 03:17 (two years ago) link
seriously grateful that my childhood coincided with "the Scatman song"
― frogbs, Friday, 6 May 2022 03:19 (two years ago) link
what a great live rendition
― corrs unplugged, Friday, 6 May 2022 11:43 (two years ago) link
yeah that was great
― Deez NFTs (Neanderthal), Friday, 6 May 2022 13:06 (two years ago) link
You're all being ironic right, right ?
― Nabozo, Friday, 6 May 2022 13:48 (two years ago) link
we don't do irony on ILX
― Deez NFTs (Neanderthal), Friday, 6 May 2022 14:26 (two years ago) link
Highly recommend the Scatman John episode of Todd in the Shadows. Even if you've already seen it, watch it again; it's one of his best episodes.
― Let's disco dance, Hammurabi! (Austin), Friday, 6 May 2022 14:34 (two years ago) link
Honkin' on Bobo is the best album title of all time.
― Let's disco dance, Hammurabi! (Austin), Saturday, 7 May 2022 16:17 (two years ago) link
It will never be topped. All hail Aerosmith.
― Let's disco dance, Hammurabi! (Austin), Saturday, 7 May 2022 16:19 (two years ago) link
kurt elling went to my alma mater, and the school wouldn't shut up about it, i became convinced people only know who he is because this college talks about him all the time
― global tetrahedron, Saturday, 7 May 2022 16:34 (two years ago) link
I like him.
― DAMAGED by Black Flat (Boring, Maryland), Saturday, 7 May 2022 17:45 (two years ago) link
― DAMAGED by Black Flat (Boring, Maryland), Saturday, 7 May 2022 17:47 (two years ago) link
lmao @ HOBB
― flamenco drop (BradNelson), Saturday, 7 May 2022 19:09 (two years ago) link
"Baltimore" is often-cited as an example of Prince being "bad at political songs" but I think it's really good
― a legible shriek (flamboyant goon tie included), Saturday, 28 May 2022 17:21 (two years ago) link
otm
― in places all over the world, real stuff be happening (voodoo chili), Sunday, 29 May 2022 13:25 (two years ago) link
Radio Song is an excellent opener, the KRS-One part is good
― Chuck_Tatum, Sunday, 29 May 2022 17:34 (two years ago) link
Now that's a controversial opinion
― Muad'Doob (Moodles), Sunday, 29 May 2022 18:17 (two years ago) link
Have you heard Too Much Joy's Good Kill?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ewcun8LL4g
― peace, man, Sunday, 29 May 2022 18:26 (two years ago) link
Also really like "Radio Song", but enjoy it more as a novelty.
― Let's disco dance, Hammurabi! (Austin), Sunday, 29 May 2022 19:17 (two years ago) link
*campy novelty
― Let's disco dance, Hammurabi! (Austin), Sunday, 29 May 2022 19:18 (two years ago) link
I also kind of like the q-tip one on around the sun but that might be going too far
― Chuck_Tatum, Sunday, 29 May 2022 19:29 (two years ago) link
Nope, legitimate like on that one from me. One of the only good songs on that album.
― Let's disco dance, Hammurabi! (Austin), Sunday, 29 May 2022 21:01 (two years ago) link
add bowie to my list of good grifters. cool image ≠ cool music.
(berlin trilogy + outliers excepted. that stuff is great.)
― I'm ANTIFA and I vote. (Austin), Thursday, 23 June 2022 19:33 (one year ago) link
I'm not his biggest fan, but his music was both undeniably cool _and_ good. Looking back on his career, one can see how he reads as a bandwagon jumper, but he was always early enough to do so that it didn't come off as just some rich pop star glomming onto cool scenes after the fact. The bottom line is that he backed it with good-to-great songs that still resonate. I also feel like on any Serious Music Fan board, the controversial take would be that the Berlin trilogy was his least interesting work.
― beard papa, Friday, 24 June 2022 00:02 (one year ago) link
The guy could write and sing hooks.
― Malevolent Arugula (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 24 June 2022 00:07 (one year ago) link
I’ve never been a fan, both his music and “presentation” have always left me cold... I know I’m in the minority there, among rock music fans. I’m into Phillip Jeffries, of course.
― Bunheads Pilot Enthusiast (morrisp), Friday, 24 June 2022 00:17 (one year ago) link
I can't separate David Bowie from the story Debbie Harry tells about him in her (very readable) autobiography. I hope that will fade with time.
― immodesty blaise (jimbeaux), Friday, 24 June 2022 00:20 (one year ago) link
I’ve never been a fan, both his music and “presentation” have always left me cold...
Sometimes even intentionally.
― Salvador Dalí Mini-Me (PBKR), Friday, 24 June 2022 00:43 (one year ago) link
His body leaves me cold
― Doop Snogg (Neanderthal), Friday, 24 June 2022 01:00 (one year ago) link
I used to have this awful "History of rock n roll" book that i bought for $3 at the supermarket, it had a section called "legends" which profiled several artists including Bowie. It said he had no talent and couldn't sing, attributed his success to a "well timed revelation that he was gay" and even took a cheap shot at his sax playing. But it went on to say that none of this mattered because "he had an indefinable something else". Basically they made him out to be the archetype of a rock star whose music is not as important as "the other stuff", this slightly pathetic figure who had the right look and attitude but couldn't write a song to back it up and that's a hypothesis looking for evidence if they can't find a better fit than Bowie.
― The 25 Best Songs Ever Ranked In Order (Deflatormouse), Friday, 24 June 2022 01:06 (one year ago) link
Bowie had a lot of good ideas, decent taste in collaborators, and a great eye for things worth stealing, but he botched the execution about eight and a half times out of ten. There's a whole great album spread across Low, Heroes and Lodger, and the two live albums from that era are astonishing, but Blackstar was his first great record in 35 years; anybody who reps harder than "yeah, OK, I guess" for anything he did between Let's Dance and Blackstar is delusional.
― but also fuck you (unperson), Friday, 24 June 2022 01:10 (one year ago) link
decent taste in collaborators,
anybody who reps harder than "yeah, OK, I guess" for anything he did between Let's Dance and Blackstar is delusional.
I quite like Reeves Gabrels, Outside and Earthling
― The 25 Best Songs Ever Ranked In Order (Deflatormouse), Friday, 24 June 2022 01:15 (one year ago) link
unperson I am of the entirely correct opinion that Outside is, discretely, the best album in Bowie's discography; "discretely" meaning removed from the zeitgeist-y impact of his 70s albums or the eulogistic qualities of Blackstar, Outside is a masterwork
― flamboyant goon tie included, Friday, 24 June 2022 01:30 (one year ago) link
Basically they made him out to be the archetype of a rock star whose music is not as important as "the other stuff"
Oh, I thought of a good one! The Grateful Dead.
― The 25 Best Songs Ever Ranked In Order (Deflatormouse), Friday, 24 June 2022 01:34 (one year ago) link
That's It For The Other Stuff
― an icon of a worried-looking, long-haired, bespectacled man (C. Grisso/McCain), Friday, 24 June 2022 01:36 (one year ago) link
I've tried with it a few times. All I hear is "I say, Brian, have you heard this Trent Reznor fellow? He's quite good, isn't he? Let's try some of that, but I still want to do some of the dramatic crooner-in-the-spotlight stuff, too."
― but also fuck you (unperson), Friday, 24 June 2022 12:56 (one year ago) link
even took a cheap shot at his sax playing
i like bowie but tbf his sax playing is really awful
― nobody like my rap (One Eye Open), Friday, 24 June 2022 13:58 (one year ago) link
I like the sound of it, especially half-buried in the mix. He probably doesn't play more than three drawn-out notes on "TVC 15", but they're the right notes. And I don't know if it's Bowie or one of the other sax players, but the last chorus of "Time", when the flute and sax suddenly break in, is deeply emotive to me.
― Halfway there but for you, Friday, 24 June 2022 14:16 (one year ago) link
frankly the industrial/nin influence on outside is wildly overstated and pretty much everyone realizes it when they actually listen to it
― flamenco drop (BradNelson), Friday, 24 June 2022 14:34 (one year ago) link
it would be cooler if it lived up to that though
― ufo, Friday, 24 June 2022 14:38 (one year ago) link
as it is i can't think of another record that sounds like outside so i disagree
― flamenco drop (BradNelson), Friday, 24 June 2022 14:39 (one year ago) link
I don't hear NIN much in Outside. Listeners may not like it, but it doesn't sound like much else in 1995: mutant cabaret Scott Walker with Pixies guitar squalls.
― Malevolent Arugula (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 24 June 2022 15:12 (one year ago) link