Melody Maker's review of Kula Shaker's "K"

This reviewer is so ageist he should never have been allowed to be one.

The 90s was badly in need of retro music. Hip-hop and house/electronica was about to destroy music, and Britpop was needed to re-estalish the tune ass all that mattered again.

Kula Shaker may not be particularly good but they should not be critized for being retro and writing proper tunes, because that's just a positive thing.

the tune ass

I heard Geir Hongro wants to kill all black people. Confirm/deny?

you've made a good start, but SFG are small fry

Scouting for Girls have the number 12 album this week unfortunately.

Dom, Monster Magnet are great!

I used to go to school with a girl who had a... that guy from Monster Magnet (Dave something) poster on all of her workbooks and folders. She was about 6'3". They sucked.

Covering ALL yr folders in MM is going too far I admit. You have to leave some to cover in Kyuss posters.

It's a satanic drug thing, you wouldn't understand

xpost

I heard Geir Hongro wants to kill all black people. Confirm/deny?

This is not about skin colour. Black people should also write proper tunes, and when they do they do it just as great as white people.

http://content.answers.com/main/content/wp/en/thumb/e/ea/200px-Aabf09.jpg

"And that's the end of that chapter"

Kula Shaker weren't that bad in retrospect. Oasis were actually worse than Kula Shaker, I think (worse tunes, stupider lyrics - some achievement! - more derivative, dreary plodding feel) Athlete are far worse than Kula Shaker, Scouting for Girls are are worse than Kula Shaker by a distance as great as the distance between the 2 farthest points in the galaxy. I suspect most 2nd division britpop and nearly all lammo music is not only worse than Kula Shaker, but actually much worse. (this is not saying much I know)

<i>Kulkinari is the only writer from the mid 90s NME/MM axis that I would still bother going back and reading, _but_ his musical taste was dreadful and Sleeper were actually better than any band he used to plug of his own accord (lol monster magnet lol).</i>

i have just discovered that jw locked the 'RONG' thread on nb, so let me just say RONG, and that monster magnet>>>>>>sleeper, and that kulkarni is deathlessly genius. his musical taste was fucking dead sharp, and i own many fine albums thans to his advice.

Man, if ONLY we still had an ILXor who was capable of starting Sleeper vs American rock band threads....

Kula Shaker should be judged by the only criteria that matters, their melodies, which is were they fall short of - among others - Oasis by ripping off old Stone Roses songs and calling them their own.

ripping off old Stone Roses songs

How dare they steal those original Roses tunes.

"...fashion journalist Alexis Petridis in The Guardian..."

Ha ha ha 10/10 Dom.

Oasis entire career has been based on lifting other bands' songs, Geir!

Oasis are lifting riffs, Stone Roses are lifting actual melodic lines. Important difference. "Into The Blue" is an entire lift of "Bye Bye Badmen". Oasis were only influenced by, say, the piano theme from "Imagine" without ever copying it note for note.

Lots of hip-hop tunes are based upon lifting riffs or tunes from older tunes note for note though. Which is one of the reasons why hip-hop is inferior.

Surely a great tune stays a great tune? In fact, copying an extant magical melidy is the best thing to do.

melody, obv.

Surely a great tune stays a great tune?

But when it is composed it is composed and it doesn't need to be recomposed.

It's better to compose a new tune in the exact same style, and chances are it may be a great tune too.

Geir is on his hobby horse here and shouldn't be encouraged (I kinda thought he'd grown past some of these ideas but I guess getting misty-eyed for britpop has reawakened the zealot in him), but I can't help myself: Geir between the sort of "theft? tribute!" melodic cribbing that Oasis does and sampling, I know the latter seems more creative to me. Oasis picks your pocket and tries to look innocent; hip hop folds your dollar a half-dozen times and hands in back to you in a shape you wouldn't have guessed at. Lifting a riff honestly and recontextualizing it = writing; aping a style or two as Oasis did = pastiche.

Pastiche is musical genius.

And a good tune shouldn't be changed or "shaped" it should be kept the way the composer intended it.

And a good tune shouldn't be changed or "shaped" it should be kept the way the composer intended it.

most composers, including Beethoven, Chopin, and all the romantics you claim to like, disagree strongly with you on this point, as the use of a theme by another composer is a time- and tradition-honored practice; the only constant is that one does not keep the melody "the way the composer intended it," as to do so would be pointless. That is to say: most composers would say your assertion there is nonsense.

ban geir

but Oasis used the stolen melodies in a real kind of interesting way by bolting them to a shoegaze / drone rock non dynamic tempered with the first wave of over compression made them more than whatever parts they were a sum of. maybe. i wrote a proper piece about this, but it's bad form to link yr own pieces on ilx isn't it. it's like oasis changed the form but not the content or something.

BAN GEIR BAN GEIR BAN GEIR BAN GEIR BAN GEIR BAN GEIR BAN GEIR

i wrote a proper piece about this, but it's bad form to link yr own pieces on ilx isn't it

Let's hope no-one tries to do this on this thread

in all seriousness, ban geir

Wellllllll...

Oasis reduced the whole of the alternate/indie sector to "top ten hits, anything else isn't good enough" and all the inventive / quirky / etc bedrock disappeared.

He's still only 34? Fuck me.

His age hasn't prevented him from still talking bollocks though, I notice.

bang eir

http://i10.ebayimg.com/06/i/000/a4/91/6908_1_b.JPG

It is strange how disagreeing with the typical ILM-opinion that "hip-hop rules, "white" music sucks" can stir so much emotion.

the typical ILM-opinion that "hip-hop rules, "white" music sucks"

yr evidences, let me see them

but Oasis used the stolen melodies

Oasis didn't steal melodies. They pastiched styles. Which is a lot better and actually a sign of musical genius.

Do you like Neil Innes?

[It is strange how disagreeing with the typical ILM-opinion that "hip-hop rules, "white" music sucks" can stir so much emotion.

-- Geir Hongro, Monday, September 24, 2007 2:35 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

no emotion here, chief.

xpost (or, actually, better response = )

Talent Borrows, Genius Steals.

Hip-hop and house/electronica was about to destroy music, and Britpop was needed to re-estalish the tune ass all that mattered again.

http://www.mediabistro.com/unbeige/original/shock.jpg

I take in then Geir that you have no response to the use of themes by other composers in classical music

kinda figured as much

i regret reviving this thread.

fucking geir.

dude, such threads give oxygen to the fires of ignorance, bigotry and stupidity that ultimately consume all of geir's arguments, don't sweat it.

LOL, groundhog day.

The point in case here is the reviewer should never have reviewed that album at all. If the reviewer dislikes then entire idea of a bunch of white guys with guitars making old-fashioned tuneful music influenced by 60s and 70s music, then let someone else review them instead, and let this guy stick to his hip-hip or house instead. Those of us you like tuneful music aren't interested in the opinions of those who don't.

let this guy stick to his hip-hip

...hooray?

Geirhog Day

I like how Neil is getting it in the neck for dissing "a bunch of white guys with guitars making old-fashioned tuneful music influenced by 60s and 70s music" and also for liking Monster Magnet

no way, geir: half the fun of music reviewing is watching someone tear chunks out of an album they were always going to hate. and half the fun of writing reviews is finding new ways to hone yr invective. in fact: i'd argue that people should only review things they don't think they'll like. (well, okay: i wouldn't really. but i might in this instance.)

also, as i always like to point out at times like this: following the legendary 0/10 review of "hippopotamomus" in the NME, i rushed out to buy it.

The point about reading a review is finding out "Is it likely that I will like this album or not?". If the album is in a genre you don't like, then you skip the review and don't read it at all. And then, if the album is in a genre you like, then you expect the reviewer to like the same genre, and tell you whether this is a good album judging from that genre's set of quality criteria.

That is: Kula Shaker should have been judged by their tunes and their musicianship, not by their "originality", as none of their fans were looking for "original" or "groundbreaking" music anyway.

http://www.scaredmonkeys.com/fun-images/PotKettle_small.jpg

I couldn't find a .jpg of three pots and one kettle, sorry.

http://www.encircling.us/photoplog/file.php?s=81e3599dee7c9ece39484a1c18e56897&n=296&w=o

TS mr idée fixe vs the holy trinity of lazy, adolescent snark.

(ha, xposts)

That looks like a Yello video that never was.

Personally I think their comeback album is indeed better than any of their two 90s albums. They have stripped away all of the "indie" elements and gone fully fledged hippie-pop with quite a hint of 70s softrock/pomp pop. Which fits them greatly.

I like "Tattva."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqncFetwku0

Yeah, they sucked

I'm happy to say that KulaShaker never graced my stereo - I thought they were bollocks.

this DG guy OTM

Mr Snrub OTM 2 posts ago

I've just been informed by that porridge-faced wanker, Simon Mayo,

lol

still basically feel that -- from this distance in time, and his value as a naysayer* notwithstanding -- kulkarni said NO to britpop in a very britpop way: the same one-note grab-you-by-the-lapels bellow

*his deep value was always as a yaysayer, to all kinds of things not britpop

best melody maker cheerleader for hip hop, metal and R&B. But I did love his angry polemics to Britpop

i know you do -- i'm just saying with a bit of distance the angry polemics are less distinguishable from what's being polemicised against than they were at the time

that is quite astute

you should write about music!!!

perhaps the 90s were a good time in general to grab lapels and bellow, utterly confident in the righteousness of whatever it is you were bellowing. they strike me as a time of plenty, where one didn't have to second-guess oneself because Everything Was Turning Out OK, especially in The West

this is only a vague notion I have, though, and I'm willing to be disabused

i am slightly astute sometimes but actually it's someone else's insight

you should write about music!!!

:)

this wasn't a bad album really. cute in a way

Seems appropriate. RIP.