Ridiculously incorrect beliefs you had about music and musicians while growing up

Did your elementary schools not have air band competitions?

Nope, but I still learned how incorrect I was in middle school.

A Child's Cocaine Christmas in Queens

― henry s

(Over 'Venus in Furs') "He's had quite a strange career, he also wrote 'Cocaine', the Eric Clapton song..."

When I was maybe 10, I heard the son of one of my parents' friends play bass at their house. He played the breakdown from Metallica's Orion and I was absolutely blown away. I stewed over it for a month or two before deciding to make a big announcement to my dad: "I want to play bass! Do you know what bass guitar sounds like? I've got a great song right here." And I proceed to play a cassette of Guns 'n' Roses Sweet Child of Mine. Cue Slash's intro lick: "You hear that? THAT'S bass guitar!" "That's not bass guitar," says dad, to my immediate confusion and embarrassment. A few seconds later the rest of the band kicks in, along with Duff McKagan's equally iconic bassline. "THAT'S bass guitar."

I think that there are certain melodic similarities between the Orion bass line and the SCOM intro and maybe I got confused there. Or maybe it had something to do with Slash's tone.

Anyway, my dad's little brother had played bass in a rock band during high school and college, so I was not going to be fooling him! Lesson much appreciated, dad.

It also didn't help that I listened to most music on a cheap little boombox, so I didn't hear much of the bass frequencies anyway. During the incident above, I had brought my tape downstairs to dad's larger stereo system.

Hey, take it over to bass guitar through a guitar amp? and other questions from an ignorant beginner

but this amp melts FACES, dood

omg that whole contretemps was fifteen years ago.

it is older than my oldest child

i thought when a band was named after a member of the band (as opposed to a solo artist) that the guy was an asshole

I still think that, mostly.

There must be a note that feels better than any other to end a song or piece on. I have to test them on the piano, both singly, and with simple tunes.

**time passes**

It's probably E. A tune should preferably end on an E.

I thought electric guitars were mains powered via the lead, I think based on hearing a story about a guitarist being electrocuted onstage because it rained or something

^^^ seems almost certain that i thought this at some point

I thought, when listening to Sting and having little other pop music to compare it with, that Sting had this really clever technique of coming up with a catchy contrasting section of his songs. I knew about sonata form, but not verse/chorus.
― raven, Thursday, 9 September 2021 13:59

This is staggering.

I was also told the story about the Stone the Crows guy getting zapped on stage and was prang about playing outside for years

Raven, where did you grow up that you knew sonata form before hearing any verse-chorus songs like "Jingle Bells" or "Oh Susanna"?

I was also told the story about the Stone the Crows guy getting zapped on stage and was prang about playing outside for years

https://www.chicagoreviewpress.com/blog/top-5-most-shocking-deaths-the-show-wont-go-on/

I could have sworn a young singer/pianist died onstage in france in the past month or so, but I can't for the life of me find a news story about it. Pretty sure it wasn't Barbara Weldens either.

Wait, nevermind. It was totally her. I must have got linked to it as a news story and thought it was recent.

Let us not forget Beef from The Phantom of the Paradise as well.

Eryl also remembers the night that Kippington Lodge came dangerously close to losing their bass player. In addition to the ballroom tours backing artists such as Billie Davis and J. J. Jackson, the group’s most prestigious live work was their regular support slot at London’s Marquee Club. On 5 July 1969, just a few hours after the Rolling Stones had performed their famous free concert in Hyde Park, the Kippingtons opened for the organ-based trio, Village, at the Marquee. ‘Nick got electrocuted while playing,’ recalls Eryl. ‘He fell down, writhing on the stage. Faulty wiring was blamed.’

‘I had one hand on my bass strings and the other reaching for the mic, and about to say, “How’re ya doing, London?” says Nick. ‘But as soon as I grasped the mic, a circuit was created and I was in big trouble. According to witnesses, I leapt about four feet in the air and was flung across the stage where I crashed into the amps and lay writhing and twitching on the floor, unable to let go of either my bass or the mic. In my head, I knew exactly what had happened. It was very unpleasant but I was strangely calm. I couldn’t see anything – it was like looking through frosted glass. All I could hear was a deep electronic drone note.

Birch, Will. Cruel to Be Kind (pp. 60-61)

Here's another misconception that I only corrected about 10 years ago. I was browsing in a record store, picked up the 1971 record by McDonald and Giles, and was shocked to see that the store had put on a sticker to the effect of: "Hey DJs! Great breakbeat!"
See, I was naive enough to believe that if someone sampled a record as relatively obscure as McDonald and Giles, it was because they were King Crimson or prog superfans, not because a sticker in a record store had alerted them to the existence of a breakbeat on the record. I was also naive enough to be surprised that a record store would thus cater to people who make music from samples rather than "real music fans", i.e. people who look for the meaning of life in a McDonald and Giles LP.

Interesting.

That Nick Lowe story is amazing :o. xp

gimme the breakbeats
and free my soul
I wanna get lost
in some neo-soul

I crashed into the amps and lay writhing and twitching on the floor, unable to let go of either my bass or the mic.

I'd always wondered what inspired the the couplet in "So It Goes", "He got fifty thousand watts / In a big acoustic tower". Now I know!

Ha, never made that connection before!

Neither had he, apparently

I also never knew Nick Lowe's main source of income is The Bodyguard soundtrack

<blockquote> Raven, where did you grow up that you knew sonata form before hearing any verse-chorus songs like "Jingle Bells" or "Oh Susanna"?

― Sequel to Sadness (Sund4r), Saturday, 11 September 2021 7:24 AM</blockquote>

I mean, I must have heard plenty of songs with verse/chorus before mustn't I?
I think I just didn't actually engage until a certain point, and I'd already learnt some kind of music theory.
I was naïve but I was also hella young. I was late to "pop music" and voraciously accelerated - Sting/The Police was the starting point of actual fandom I think.

<blockquote>Raven, where did you grow up that you knew sonata form before hearing any verse-chorus songs like "Jingle Bells" or "Oh Susanna"?

― Sequel to Sadness (Sund4r), Saturday, 11 September 2021 7:24 AM</blockquote>

I mean, I must have heard plenty of songs with verse/chorus before mustn't I?
I think I just didn't actually engage until a certain point, and I'd already learnt some kind of music theory.
I was naïve but I was also hella young. I was late to "pop music" and voraciously accelerated - Sting/The Police was the starting point of actual fandom I think.

Ugh forgot BBcode.

The Police were especially good at bringing out a strong contrast between verse and chorus tbf.

I remember conflating the various Van Zan(d)ts. Like, there was one who was dead, one or more who were alive. And somehow one played with Bruce Springsteen, presumably one of the alive ones.

I'm not sure at what point I heard of Townes Van Zandt, but I probably tried to fit him into the same overall Van Zystem.

I used to think that 'Trad. Arr.' on song credits was an actual person's name, or possibly a writing duo.

Or a pirate.

Led Zeppelin used to think songs that were written by 20th century musicians were 'standards'

(xp) sea shanties