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

I like 'Age of' quite a bit for OPN too.

I have some thoughts on his newer records, all positive, but need a minute to think about them.

ummm, I listened to Replica and while I like the idea of making music from tiny snippets of TV ads, there's still this nagging feeling (same as I have with Actress) that anyone with a computer and a bit of time on their hands could knock something like this together. I think I prefer Garden and Age Of to this

I really think you need to listen again, maybe you were distracted

Like, what do you think of the title track?

but anyway show me how to do it, dog

sorry for confrontationals

Title track is nice enough. Bit different to the rest of the album. I mean it's fine as an ambient piano piece, or at least a piano sample and some subtle sawtooth synths to help it along. But too many of the tracks sound like someone just mucking around with a loop pedal.

Also, this made me think of someone else i don't get: Tim Hecker. Why distort everything in such a horrible and uninteresting way? The album I heard sounded like someone playing big held chords but with the mic turned up way too high so that it clips in a really unpleasant way. I don't see why that's good or smart or enjoyable...

ok i'm halfway with you there.. because i love tim hecker up to and including mirages. but don't like anything after. cleaned up his sound, got into organs and shit.

I like the concept of Thundercat a lot more than I want to listen to him

Harmony in Ultraviolet is an album I absolutely love, but I don't feel strongly about any other Hecker album. It's kind of weird to me. For instance I was certain I'd love Ravedeath, 1972 given all the praise, but it never hit me. Ultimately I only idly "like" every other album by him.

His Dropped Pianos EP may well be my favourite.

What is the concept of Thundercat? It's technical disco-funk from what I've heard?

It's basically 70s George Duke with more noodly bass playing and indie sadboy lyrics.

okay cool

thats not correct, its bootsy collins but anime

Yeah, there's a lot of Bootsy in there, too, but Bootsy's about 1000 times more fun than Thundercat.

I don't really 'get' Thundercat either but his music is pretty fun

thats what i qualified it with "but anime" which is usually not fun

*why

but thundercat is fun "friends zone" is v funny

I don't hate Thundercat at all, I just love the idea of dollar bin fusion records for hipsters in theory more than in practice

I wasn't trying to say he was bad, otherwise I wouldn't try at all

I don't hate him either, obviously (wrote a cover story on him for The Wire and had a blast interviewing him), I just don't listen to his records that much now that I'm no longer on deadline.

I like Thundercat, but there's a samey-ness to a lot of his music, as well as Flying Lotus tracks where he's featured, that causes me to tune out after a little while.

Scritti Politti. On paper there's a lot to draw me to them - Marxist intellectuals who slid from post-punk to pop? What's not to like? But whenever I try to listen to them, I just... don't enjoy it at all.

yeah wish i liked them more than i do

lol, just put Cupid & Psyche in my sell pile yesterday

"Skank Bloc Bologna" still rules, though, it's on my Wanna Buy A Bridge comp LP and is probably all I need

I'm glad it's not just me. I often feel like I'm somehow deficient for not getting it, but they really don't grab me at all.

i only have Songs to Remember, and about once a year i give Cupid & Psyche a digital spin, but i also have completely failed to get into scritti politti

I love Green Gartside on that Eurythmics song! "Wrap It Up"? His voice sounds like the way velvet looks

The pop stuff is a bit saccharine. I have to be in the mood. But Skank Bloc is so great

In a similar vein (is it acceptable for me to say it?), Prince’s Sign of the Times: the sounds that he uses and that digital bass motif, they all just sound real displeasing to my ears. Also, his vocal performance fails to convince me that he truly cares about the things described in the lyrics. In fact, I’ve tried 3 times to listen to that supposedly universally loved stone cold classic but I’ve never made it all the way through. For the record, I own Parade and think it’s great, a lot of fun, his best album by far in my own unpopular opinion.

oh man I love green’s voice and lyrics so much. Total hero. Took a while for me, though.

oh man I love green’s voice and lyrics so much. Total hero. Took a while for me, though.

cupid & psyche is just a staggering achievement to me, exciting and blinding every time i listen to it, was a huge 420 unlock for me last year.

lol OK OK I'll try again

there might be something to the 420 idea

wait a second, i didn't try that last bit. i feel like an unattempted unlock is warranted before giving up

xp haha, exactly

it's a new option in the toolbelt

The track 'PAs' was my way into early Scritti stuff, such a lovely vocal melody welded to itchy, badly recorded craziness.

derrida is a much more salient reference point re the borderline-religious subterfuge in his lyrics than marxism imo.

c&p made me very afraid there for a while with the synth sound and all but my god the programming is just so idiosyncratic yet perfectly pop it can bring me to tears.

Cupid and Psyche is more of a champagne album

“the sweetest girl” otoh...

oh didn’t see your post map, didn’t mean to neg your 420 unlock!

xp actually I have that 12" as well and am keeping it, forgot abt that one but it's great

it's kind of this essay on why and how commercial pop can be transformative. it's brainy but also surprisingly funny and humble. also the ranking ann version of "flesh and blood" is like super dope and positive. lol.

xp no worries haha

lol, I don't do 420 listens b/c I mostly have a bad paranoid time rather than a fun chill time, but I could definitely see it working.

What's the 420 thing?

w33d

420-enhanced listening can definitely be key in “getting” this or that band. For instance, Grafeful Dead whilst high I was able to find a way in by focusing on Lesh’s basslines. Also, never was able to get into reggae before I started partaking of the herb.

Aha, of course. Getting st0ned and listening to music should be available on prescription.