creatively bankrupt newish chillwave/post-AnCo bands whose names are just '80s ephemera

see also the Simpsons

i mean the culture that produced the chillwave generation is the same culture that produced an audience for SCARY MOVIE 4 despite being opposite ends of the coin

I think it makes sense that early childhood entertainment had such a strong effect on this generation. They were the first to experience 24 hour cable networks devoted to kids. When I was a kid you could watch cartoons on Saturday morning and for a couple of hours in the afternoon after school. But people who grew up with Nickleodeon had this whole range of soap opera, game shows, and targeted advertising running 24 hours a day.

It's kind of like how the boomers were the first generation to grow up watching TV, and so they ended up dressing up like cowboys and indians in the '60s. These kids grew up in an atmosphere saturated with intensely focused pre-teen marketing and it made a big mark on their brains. They were also the first generation where "tween" was identified as a unique demographic, much like how the boomers were basically the first "teenagers." So I guess maybe these dumb ass band names are a reflection of that.

100% totally

before the Beastie Boys/Gen-X defined our generation's reference-happy version of irony. which all the 20 y/os in chillwave bands grew up seeing as the dominant aesthetic in the post-nirvana landscape and are savvy enough to use quicker shorthand to get the same effect, but not creative enough to do much else with it imo

I'm really not getting your point here. How is Eve's Plumb smarter or more creative than Abe Vigoda or something (yeah, I know, not chillwave)? How were these references any harder to make in the '90s? That weezer video was already pretty eye rollingly obvious in 1994. It looked cool though, and certainly took a lot of work to make. But I'm not sure how it was filled with any more meaning than naming your band Ducktales.

I mean, beyond the obvious "I know it when I see it" quality of Ducktales being a really dumb ass name.

I'm sorry but Ducktales and Eve's Plumb are pretty equivalent to me in terms of creativity vs bankruptcy in the band name department

exactly

What is this Ducktales you speak of?

i think the main diff is that Eve's Plumb or Sandy Duncan's Eye or whatever were subverting/detourning the pop culture of their youth to make a punk(-ish) statement on B-level iconography and killing yr childhood idols. And shit like Schoolhouse Rock Rocks or "Buddy Holly" were elevating them.

This whole Ducktales/Reading Rainbow/Pudding Pop stuff is just like the watered-down version of what these bands were doing 15 years ago done for quick internet-era lols and easy paths to "nostalgia". It's references for the point of referencing.

And i question whether Bava films or Barbarella were popular in the same way that some of these contemporary and post-slacker era band names are, but i don't know for sure. Like there was intially a trend of naming bands after cult ephemera, and now there's a lot more pop culture detritus band names that solely rely on being aware of "mass culture" as opposed to being in the know about something a bit off the beaten path

definitely! like White Zombie filled their stuff with references, but it was all paths to dusty parts of the video store instead of stuff in the collective consciousness.

well, White Zombie were just kinda copying the Misfits in that department

like if the Misfits lived in the chillwave era, they would be called The Munsters

xpost
I think there's a more genuine, psychedelic approach though that's distinct from the lazy '90s "lol brady bunch" nostalgia crap. It's that thing when you're a teenager and you drop acid and realize that stuff from your childhood is actually pretty strange/interesting/fucked up/funny in a non ironic way. You can see this in Willy Wonka and Alice and Wonderland references, or back to Syd Barret making Wind in the Willows references, and this is kind of a dayglo cartoon version of that. It's like the realization that the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are genuinely kind of bizarre and surreal.

actually if the Misfits lived in the chillwave era they would be called Are You Afraid Of The Dark?

xpost to myself
ok, that was mostly B.S. because obviously Golden Girls or Reading Rainbow don't fit...

did Eve's Plumb have a song called "Marcia Marcia Marcia!!!?

xpost hahaha... "i remember when i had the realization that those Ducktales were such bizarre and surreal Tales of Ducks."

i will bet hard money there will be a band called Are You Afraid Of The Dark? by 2011

I mean, what relation does the band name have to the music? Pretty sure there were plenty of bands in the early 90s that were like "lol-Brady Brunch" in a similar vein to what you're describing

And i question whether Bava films or Barbarella were popular in the same way that some of these contemporary and post-slacker era band names are,

So the gripe is more that their references aren't obscure enough? That's kind of interesting in itself though and part of the point I would think. It turns the gen-x, hipper-than-thou pop culture referencing around and says I'm not going to reference some obscure japanese instructional video to prove that my video collection is bigger than yours. I'm going to reference the dumbest, pop-est, most obvious signifiers of my childhood.

I forgot Mogwai was a lol pop culture name until I saw the Gremlins tape.

xp - wk - yeah, i think that's what was going on.

The Happy Days and Brady Bunch references seemed different in my era (I was 19 when the Buddy Holly video came out), in that everyone grew up watching the same syndicated reruns, but you didn't know that everyone all over the country was doing the exact the same thing. Referencing these things felt like a shared secret history of some sort, which seems impossible to have post-internet when even obscure stuff isn't really obscure anymore.

Is this the thread where I confess that I never got that Ducktails (the band) were named after Duck Tales (the TV programme)? Because, you know, ducktails are an actual thing. So much so that the TV programme name is a play on words based on them. Or is this all a massively recursive joke?

"i remember when i had the realization that those Ducktales were such bizarre and surreal Tales of Ducks."

Well they are referencing a bizarre piece of capitalist propaganda featuring pantsless ducks. Then subverting it by changing the spelling of the name to reference a hairstyle that was popular among '50s juvenile delinquents. As if to say "we're not going to fall for your Randian indoctrination. we're going to flip it back around into a symbol of youthful rebellion."

That, or they randomly flipped through an old TV Guide.

once again the name of the band is ducktails

wk - you and i are the same age

So what we are saying is that the process is thus:

ducktails (tails of ducks) -> ducktails (haircut) -> Duck Tales (programme) -> Ducktails (band)?

I mean, what relation does the band name have to the music? Pretty sure there were plenty of bands in the early 90s that were like "lol-Brady Brunch" in a similar vein to what you're describing

― sarahel, Friday, July 30, 2010 4:41 PM (6 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

At least Eve's Plumb or REO Speeddealer made rudimentary attempts at a pun where as Golden Girls is just the word Golden Girls.

Golden Girls is two words.

emil.y, if you are under 30 if someone says the word "ducktails" to you there is exactly one thing you think of, and don't try to pretend otherwise

does the phrase "narcissism of small differences" mean anything to you Whiney?

emil.y is british.

even if dude named his band after the tails of ducks, he's like 24 and there's no way it wouldn't have crossed his mind that that everyone his age watched a show called Ducktales, come on

So the gripe is more that their references aren't obscure enough?
― wk, Friday, July 30, 2010 3:42 PM (9 minutes ago)

i think that's a good point, cuz noize stuff like 0PN which is firmly rooted in nostalgia and is not really considered creatively bankrupt gets a free pass. i guess late 70s, 80s new age mysticism and retro futurism is obscure enough

I'm under 30 and the first option is the one I assumed they were named after. Old before my time, obviously.

(And although I am British, I did get to see the TV programme. It wasn't very good.)

yeah, i'm sure all 24 year olds everywhere watched the tv show Ducktales - and now, even in Pakistan, they're riding in cabs that all play the Beatles

i mean, the name oneohtrix point never isn't the obscure reference but the aesthetics otherwise would be xxp

The Happy Days and Brady Bunch references seemed different in my era (I was 19 when the Buddy Holly video came out), in that everyone grew up watching the same syndicated reruns, but you didn't know that everyone all over the country was doing the exact the same thing. Referencing these things felt like a shared secret history of some sort, which seems impossible to have post-internet when even obscure stuff isn't really obscure anymore.

― joygoat, Friday, July 30, 2010 4:49 PM (5 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

This is also true. Sarahel, my basic point re: Reading Rainbow vs. Mogwai is that the 90s were a very different time.

wk - you and i are the same age

! how can you tell?

At least Eve's Plumb or REO Speeddealer made rudimentary attempts at a pun where as Golden Girls is just the word Golden Girls.

OK, B- for effort. Problem is Golden Girls is a 1000x times better band name than either of those other two.

you mentioned how old you were in 1994.

emil.y, Ducktails is music by and for internet-savvy, media-saturated twentysomethings, so when I say "everyone" I obviously mean "their intended audience."

oh whoops - that was joygoat's post - joygoat & i are the same age.

I think that might be more directed to sarahel - I realise that Duck Tales is well known. Hell, I wasn't even trying to say they WEREN'T named after it, just that I was surprised by how everyone else but me KNEW that they were.

xpost to Whiney

The Happy Days and Brady Bunch references seemed different in my era (I was 19 when the Buddy Holly video came out), in that everyone grew up watching the same syndicated reruns, but you didn't know that everyone all over the country was doing the exact the same thing. Referencing these things felt like a shared secret history of some sort, which seems impossible to have post-internet when even obscure stuff isn't really obscure anymore.

OK, I guess this is the problem for me because I don't feel that way at all. I was 17 when that video came out. Never watched the Brady Bunch (thought it was old/dumb/for girls), but I would have assumed that everyone across the country was watching the same stuff anyway. And I do think these new names have a bit of that "shared secret history" to them simply because they are generational signifiers. Some of this stuff I'm only vaguely aware of due to younger relatives, but older people would certainly never get some of the cartoon and video game references.

and yes, i do think a crucial diff is that the bands used more obscure references. Like they found poetry inside junk culture to exploit ie,

in the chillwave era a decent band name like Dash Rip Rock would just be called The Beverly Hillbillies. Toad The Wet Sprocket would be called Monty Pyyython and Eve's Plumb would be called Brady Bunch

these new names have a bit of that "shared secret history" to them simply because they are generational signifiers

but if you're on the internet as much as these guys, you start to LOSE the generational signifier because TMNT references start to belong to everybody, all the fucking time, constantly.

I was too old for Pokemons but I know SO MUCH ABOUT THEM just from being on the internet.