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

Of course it’s arguable. His sound, phrasing, and sense of orchestration/arrangement all evolved and changed dramatically in the ensuing decades.

― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Saturday, June 9, 2018 5:07 PM (one hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i don't think it's arguable at all that say 'bitches brew' somehow represents a greater swath of his career than Kind of Blue! certain fundamentals are consistent across his career (minimal melodic style primarily), KoB was an inflection point where he shifted from traditional jazz compositions to modal styles, highlighting those career-long consistencies ... birth of the cool sounds nothing like bitches brew but kind of blue kinda sounds a little like both

KoB strips down miles' style to the essence of his performance, of his fingerprint sensibilities ... stuff like 'the cool' and incorporating rock/R&B were just changing the canvas...

you're right, it does suck when ilx weighs in on kind of blue

yeah

Ween's one of those bands where I'll hear a song on Spotify randomly come up and go "Oh shit, this is cool. I should get around to checking out more of their stuff."

And then when I do, I'm all What is this, I thought I had heard something cool?

yeah

they probably have lots of other stuff that's like the things you hear, make sure to come here for unimpeachable advice each time

It's the only use I have for this board.

One of the design guys at work told me he met his wife online and then sheepishly told me it was through some sort of Yahoo! Ween Group. "Have you even ever heard of Ween?" he asked me.

I looked at him and said, "Yeah, I've heard of Ween. Ever heard of the Silver Jews?"

Steely dan.

I owe Aja but I find it ducking tedious

Drink your big black cow? Lame.

I looked at him and said, "Yeah, I've heard of Ween. Ever heard of the Silver Jews?"

― pplains

man i haven't thought of them in ages. used to have a copy of "starlite walker", don't remember shit about it besides that it existed. listening to "american water". i guess that makes them a band i'm trying to like but can't get into!

I don't get people who don't get Steely Dan

Completely understandable... and I like them.

I'll listen to pretty much anything to check it out. There is music that I find more interesting in context but doesn't have a sound I want to check in on very much. The music is interesting and I'm glad I checked it out, but I got to be in a very certain mood to want to have a listen again.

There is also plenty of music I do like to listen to because it was of a type or particular era as I just like that sound, even though by context it might be dreck or at best obscure by most audiences. I'm sure part of this is because of nostalgia.

gonna try to get into steely dan again, i'm probably wrong

I love I See a Darkness, but I have never been able to get into anything else by Will Oldham.

The Hope EP by Palace Songs (iirc) has a similar feel.

Did you try Master and Everyone? I think it is different from the others. Low-key production - that's nothing special for him - but gorgeous melodies. Imagine Nick Drake without the dark clouds and the never-ending rain. Something like that. My fave album by him. I don't know most of them though.

When you say you love I See A Darkness, I take it you mean the song and not the album? Ease Down The Road is quite accessible. And on Spotify etc as of last week

Have you tried “Days in the Wake” and the Palace singles comp (“Lost Blues”)? I’m not a big Will O. fan, but those are classics...

Will Oldham's huge output makes it near impossible to keep up

I’d recommend listening to the “West Palm Beach/Gulf Shores” single (which he describes as his version of Jimmy Buffett) and Superwolf.

Viva Last was my into into Oldham. probably still my favorite. but i do really like those first 2-3 Bonnie Billy records.

*intro into

I’d recommend listening to the “West Palm Beach/Gulf Shores” single (which he describes as his version of Jimmy Buffett)

Yeah this is pretty much one of the best singles evah (and it’s on the Lost Blues comp)

there needs to be a godwin's law analogue for music discussions approaching a mention of fucking steely dan

They were bound to come up on this particular thread, tbf

xp "There's this great song on the new Bonnie Prince Billy album you just have to hear" = a sentence literally no one has uttered since like 2005

Which is my problem with the guy. He has a cool persona, he makes interesting choices as far as collaborators and projects, and doesn't seem to go in for the gimmicks and desperate social climbing of a lot of his lesser songwriter contemporaries--so I definitely respect him as an artist--but for a guy who's become (at least for indie rockers of a certain age) the gold standard of songwriting, he doesn't really write a lot of really good songs, does he?

yeah i haven't paid much attn to anything after the Superwolf record. i picked up a couple post -'06 CDs used and listened to them on a car ride from nashville to atlanta. once each. haven't felt compelled to dig them out again.

saw him live in like 2015 though and it was a really fantastic show. would recommend.

also, Godwin's Law has basically become its own Godwin's Law around here. I never hear this term anywhere other than ILX

The song “Lay and Love” (from The Letting Go LP and also a CD single with a few great Dylan covers) is a song I liked so much that I bugged other ppl to listen to it...

That was 2006. Any since then?

I don’t keep up with his output, so not one to ask.

His tracks were the standout on that otherwise hella-dull 2CD set of Dead/JGB covers a year or so back – that’s obviously not an example of his own songwriting, tho.

I also like his “Summer in the Southeast” live album a good deal.

I'm with sleeve. Felt is wasted on me.

xp
A lot of Will’s stuff from the past decade (glancing back at his discography) seems to be either collaborative; live or reworked versions of his own material; or covering other artists. Even my pal who’s a big BBP fan has sort of lost track.

*BPB

late to the Miles Davis party here but Kind of Blue was my entry point and wakeup call w/Miles (via that crappy Columbia reissue w/the cover photo of Miles clearly playing live sometime in the '70s.) Clicked with me immediately.

But at the same time, I don't know that it was so much the fact that *this* was the only album that would have done it, that would have turned me on to jazz, as much as it was the first one I got to. I picked up Workin' With the Miles Davis Quintet and 'Round About Midnight around the same time, and those are both beautiful, spine-tinglingly classic jazz albums in their own right. the version of "It Never Entered My Mind" on Workin' remains maybe my favorite Miles track.

After Miles it was Dexter Gordon and John Coltrane and then on from there.

When you say you love I See A Darkness, I take it you mean the song and not the album?

The album! I like the whole album. I've listened to tons of his stuff, from Palace Brothers on, starting back at his/their/its inception (queue up "I was there ...") but even the stuff that I liked while it was playing, like Master and Everyone and The Letting Go and Lie Down in the Light (iirc) and Beware, I've almost never gone back to a second time, or at least not with any regularity. With the exception of I See a Darkness. I even love that album's cover. "Death to Everyone" might be my favorite song on it. It's like dub-folk-rock.

Saying that, I just put on The Letting Go and shit like The Seedling sounds pretty great, so who knows.

I totally get why people connect so deeply with Radiohead, but likewise there's something about Yorke's warble and brainy musings that push me away. Greenwood's soundtrack work confirms that I like the bones of their approach, just not the finished product.

^ Pretty much exactly this.

i know i'm alone here, but

minutemen

i have been listening to them quite a bit due to every single song they ever wrote being nominated on the <2 minutes poll. usually with legendary bands i don't get, there's at least one song that i can grab a hold of, and over time i find my way into the rest of their catalog. not so with minutemen. i remember excitedly ordering double nickels after first reading about them in azerrad's book, along with husker du and some butthole surfers and all sorts of stuff. and just kind of listening to it with a frowny face. i haven't smiled since then. it's been 18 years.

i definitely respect their role as underground pioneers, mapping out the network of diy spaces and tiny dank venues across the country, paving the road for other bands. maybe some day i'll figure it out, but their whole style of singing and playing doesn't gel with me. even the drumming (and i usually enjoy drumming of all sorts, from sloppy to razor sharp, repetitive techno to free jazz) just reminds me of 11th grade jams

along with husker du and some butthole surfers and all sorts of stuff. and just kind of listening to it with a frowny face.

just to clarify, i didn't make the frowny face with husker du and the buttholes, just minutemen

I’m not into Minutemen either. But most ‘80s bands like that aren’t my jam. Never got into Hüsker Dü either (and have tried).

see, Husker Du i grew to like, especially after i played them loud on a stereo and pumped up the bass a bit (the CDs i bought back in the day had no low end).

this is probably going to annoy fans of one or both bands, but, i have to say it: when i listen to minutemen i get this odd nagging sensation that reminds me of when i have to listen to Red Hot Chili Peppers

well I'm pretty sure Flea was a fan before RHCP was a thing, so that seems fair (see also: Big Boys)

I love them, of course

I'm 100% with you on Minutemen. a few songs aside, they do nothing for me. I do love D Boon's playing & guitar sound, but Double Nickels is such a slog for me, I could never get into it. same with the Replacements. I tried all the bands even tangentially related to Hüsker Dü and got nowhere.

Yup, pretty much the same baffled reaction to Minutemen and (in particular) The Replacements. Living in the UK, I always wondered if there were some US cultural references that I was missing out on with both bands, whereas Hüsker Dü made sense to a UK audience immediately.