Bands you keep trying to like but can't get into

Ulver. I listened to 3 late-period albums without liking any of them before admitting defeat. I like the early black metal stuff though.

here's a short list of shit i've tried my damnedest to like:

Burial - yuck. what do people see in this?
MIA - this takes terrible crap to another level
Radiohead's OK Computer - this seems largely mediocre with a couple exceptions. how is this one of the greatest albums ever?
Afghan Whigs - I feel like I should like this, but I don't
Camper van Beethoven - no thanks
Smiths - 90% of it could be great but is ruined by Morrissey
Galaxie 500 - i like a lot of stuff by other groups that sound like them, but this band is just mediocre
GBV - with a couple small exceptions, this does nothing for me but i feel like it should in theory
Tom Waits - generally sounds phony and annoying and I can't get into him
Tortoise - plodding and boring
The Fall - liked the A sides but cannot get into the albums
White Stripes - dull as shit
Tribe Called Quest - i like jazz, i like hip-hop, i like other groups that combine these things, but I have no use for this.

Scott Walker, yeah. but not his 60's stuff.
Radiohead
arcade fire etc

The Doors
Pink Floyd.

I think this means I'm a bad person

both of those took me a long time to get, but now I love them both!

They seem like they should work on paper, given the amount of similar stuff I listen to, and yet....

Too many attempts to count and lots of money spent trying:

John Fahey / most Takoma stuff in general
Ricardo Villalobos
Anything Charles Mingus did with a group larger than a quintet

but David Bowie owns this thread for me

okay the mingus thing is kinda crazy. i would say the bowie thing is crazy too but what the hell i don't care if you listen to bowie. maybe you'd like the man who sold the world though you like freak folk shit. or at least diamond dogs for heaven's sake how can anyone not love diamond dogs?

I like a lot of Bowie stuff - Low especially - but I just don't really get the slavish devotion. But it's all relative - I own more records by the people I listed above than most self-proclaimed 'fans' of these folks probably do.

Mingus...man, I love his playing. I love him in small groups. I even love his autobiography. But when it gets even remotely 'chamber,' I can't hang. My wife's a fanatic, so it's not a question of exposure.

richard strauss

Cheap Trick always seem like they should be right in my sweet spot but i've had trouble finding any affection for anything besides the big undeniable hits

see its just that mingus wrote so much amazing stuff for big(ger) bands. some of my favorite jazz. saw the mingus big band at fez many times years ago and even that could shake the friggin' rafters. i love the workshop/big band stuff. i kinda love it all though. even his solo piano album.

i seen some of the beast minds of my generation etc ect ah boollocks

you just need to listen to this whole album really loud on good speakers. on vinyl. stoned. and drunk.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sQdq8bZOhmU

rachmaninoff
mendelssohn

basic channel

well since people keep mentioning classical bands, i mentioned on the classical thread that i keep trying bruckner symphonies and man i just can't get in there. his church-y stuff is fine by me.

threads you keep trying to like

Cheap Trick always seem like they should be right in my sweet spot but i've had trouble finding any affection for anything besides the big undeniable hits

yeah there's this certain corner of '70s rock that friends of mine slightly older than me are way into that I like ok but can't get that enthusiastic about

Cheap Trick, The Cars ...

even Springsteen to some extent

I mean I like The Boss but I'm not even close to a super fan

ita about springsteen and cheap trick but the cars are like the platonic ideal of a band for me.

so many bands tried to be the cars and hardly any of them could ever be the cars. good bands even. but that is some hard to duplicate stuff. their songs were carved in ice. they weren't messing around.

cheap trick are just, man, they just nailed it. american glam + power pop + hard rock roots, i can never say no to that.

but i'm kinda old...

The Roots (besides that mid-'00s Game Theory/Rising Down twofer) put me to sleep.

Scott I am with you on Bruckner
I listen to a Flaming Lips once a year to see if I've changed and it's always as awful as before-- until, that is, that six hour song! which rules! and I futilely recommended it to other Lipsophobes
I was like this with a lot of music but I eventually got it, Ludacris i.e., but I can find something to like abt just about everything

Kate Bush
Neu!
Love
Laurie Anderson

Neu! too for me.

Cheap Trick always seem like they should be right in my sweet spot but i've had trouble finding any affection for anything besides the big undeniable hits

I've just accepted that they were a singles band. It happens.

Van Morrison is another one for me, although I think all the Jann Wenner types finally stopped trying to guilt everyone into liking him about 15 years ago.

i think wedding dj's (white ones) still bust out "brown eyed girl" when they want the parents to dance.

I keep trying to like Hate Eternal, but I just don't. Their songs are so boring. But Erik Rutan does such an amazing job producing Cannibal Corpse albums that periodically I think, "There's got to be something good about his own band" and I revisit one of the albums and...nope, Hate Eternal still suck.

hah, yeah. cosign on hate eternal.

Afghan Whigs

mussorgsky

I was kinda waiting for this thread to line-up with the Joy Formidable thread, but yeah... them.

Grizzly Bear / Other Lives / Deerhunter - my bandmates love these bands, but they just sound so nothingy to me - like pale imitations of whatever continuum Animal Collective and Arcade Fire were on up to eight years ago.

Nick Cave - I like a lot of things like Nick Cave, but I find him overbearing and not that interesting either.

thread split about halfway between cloth-eared idiots and people stressing about not liking some shit

Grizzly Bear / Other Lives / Deerhunter - my bandmates love these bands, but they just sound so nothingy to me - like pale imitations of whatever continuum Animal Collective and Arcade Fire were on up to eight years ago.

Can't stand any of these bands, including AnCo and Arcade Fire. Sometimes, someone I respect - a poster or some other musician - will namedrop them in passing and I'll go listen to like 15 seconds of a youtube of one of them. Invariably, it does not cause me to waver in my contempt for this garbage. I don't know if that counts toward "keep trying to get into".

I liked the first Arcade Fire album - it had some solid songs on there - and my Animal Collective fandom has been on a steep decline since 2004's 'Sung Tongs' to the point where I can't really bear to listen to their last one at all. The other bands I mention are by comparison all surface, no feeling. The textures are imitated, but that's all - I don't hear anything to come back to at all.

Every time I have to check the iPod to see what the hell that awful track was that just came up on shuffle, it's always Brian Eno. Guess I'll persist, maybe listen to some of his albums on the proper hi-fi at home but maybe it's just not destined to be for me and Eno. Of course, it's totally wrong of me not to like Eno, right?

I've listened to four different Grateful Dead albums trying to find an 'in' but I've got nowhere beyond finding the odd song quite pleasant.

Jefferson Airplane

I don't know if this counts but... Even though I purchase albums recommended to me, new hip-hop albums I like seem to get fewer and farther between as I get older.

One thing you notice though is that a disproportionate number of the aforementioned bands have the most obnoxious fans

Every time I have to check the iPod to see what the hell that awful track was that just came up on shuffle, it's always Brian Eno. Guess I'll persist, maybe listen to some of his albums on the proper hi-fi at home but maybe it's just not destined to be for me and Eno. Of course, it's totally wrong of me not to like Eno, right?

― Supposed Former ILM Lurker (WeWantMiles), Thursday, January 24, 2013 8:07 AM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Pretty wrong, although you're talking to someone who named their cat Eno. But there's so much variety in his catalog--which records come up on shuffle? His stuff works best as album-length listening IMHO.

"I'm forever near a stereo saying, 'What the fuck is this GARBAGE?' And the answer is always the Red Hot Chili Peppers." -- Nick Cave

http://www.mediabistro.com/fishbowldc/files/original/Pot-calling-the-kettle-black-734818.jpg

Scott Walker, idgi

― sleeve, Wednesday, January 23, 2013 3:25 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

first immediate skip on the ilm top 77 spotify list

youse are missing out. but maybe try Scott 4 and then Nite Flights before Bish Bosch.

Can totally see why some people can't get into Scott Walker

I always get him confused with Scott Wyland.

I always get him confused with Scott Wyland.

― how's life, Thursday, January 24, 2013 9:55 AM (44 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

http://blogs.houstonpress.com/rocks/Scott-Weiland_Christmas-300x300.jpg