Urban75 Home About Offline BrixtonBuzz Contact

Bands with a big reputation that are (musically) shite

savoloysam said:
Won't get fooled again, substitute, the seeker to name a few of my personal favourites.
Click to expand...
Listening to the Who as a teenager, I had difficulty distinguishing their early stuff from most 'beat groups' (man) of their time, although I liked them. On repeated listenings, I found that what they did with the R&B genre was actually extraordinary. You only have to pick out Moon's drumming to realise that something quite exceptional was going on. As they moved on musically, the same applies: this was an exceptional band with often overlooked musical complexity.

Unfortunately, the second half of their career saw them lapse into mediocrity. More or less everything they did from about 1978 is anonymous. The warnings were there with the last album on which Moon featured (although on the whole it's OK.) They should probably have called it a day when he died.
 
Wilf said:
The Doors are a good example of a band that would probably fail or at least only get an average pass on the blind taste test. I do think The End is an immense track and Break on Through a decent song (if itself overrated), though after that you'd be struggling to get a really strong Best Of album together. Beyond those few good songs you really get to thinking is that it?

In terms of the New York Dolls, my motivation for the thread was nothing too high minded, just finding them on various playlists I've listened to on Spotify - and noticing that I've removed them over the last few months, a visceral reaction. Spotify/the music industry's use of genres is highly conservative and certainly leads to musicians who fit the template being promoted (Adorno, 'pre digested' culture iirc). We listen to music for all kinds of reasons, particularly the emotions evoked, but sometimes I just get an emperor's new clothes moment... 'hang on, this is shit!
Click to expand...

Yeah OK I get it. I had that experience recently listening to the first Beatles album reviewing music for the 1963 aoty thread. It really is just poor, but viewed in its time and context its a curious British spin on older and frankly much better American rock'n'roll complete with an inferior version of the Isley Brothers Twist and Shout. But it has a certain character and I can understand the growing excitement around the band just as something homespun and a bit underground with a bit of energy. How it speaks to the (then) audience versus how it satisfies you or I many decades later kicking back to a Spotify playlist.
 
Wilf said:
The Doors are a good example of a band that would probably fail or at least only get an average pass on the blind taste test. I do think The End is an immense track and Break on Through a decent song (if itself overrated), though after that you'd be struggling to get a really strong Best Of album together. Beyond those few good songs you really get to thinking is that it?
Click to expand...
I have mixed feelings about the Doors. Again, they are a band who did something different with the basics of rhythm and blues, and had some sublime moments. 'Riders on the Storm' is positively cinematic in its scope and imagery. And they had some great pop moments buried in the mix. Morrison's pretentiousness and insufferability, along with the legend/suffering genius hype, can distract from all this, and I agree that generally they have probably been overrated.

The first Doors album I listened to was actually 'Other Voices,' which a schoolmate conned me into buying off him for about 50p circa 1978, without telling me it was post-Morrison (the clue should have been in the title, but I was only 15...) However, although Doors purists seem to slate it, it's far from bad, and you can imagine Morrison singing on every track. I still play it occasionally.

I've always admired John Densmore for resisting the other two in allowing the band's music to be used for advertising, to his own financial detriment.
 
RD2003 said:
I have mixed feelings about the Doors. Again, they are a band who did something different with the basics of rhythm and blues, and had some sublime moments. 'Riders on the Storm' is positively cinematic in its scope and imagery. And they had some great pop moments buried in the mix. Morrison's pretentiousness and insufferability, along with the legend/suffering genius hype, can distract from all this, and I agree that generally they have probably been overrated.

The first Doors album I listened to was actually 'Other Voices,' which a schoolmate conned me into buying off him for about 50p circa 1978, without telling me it was post-Morrison (the clue should have been in the title, but I was only 15...) However, although Doors purists seem to slate it, it's far from bad, and you can imagine Morrison singing on every track. I still play it occasionally.

I've always admired John Densmore for resisting the other two in allowing the band's music to be used for advertising, to his own financial detriment.
Click to expand...
Yeah, I'd forgotten Riders on the Storm. Definitely gets onto my (non-existent) Doors playlist.
 
Anyway, the Velvet Underground. I like them, and recognise their genius moments, but I often think that their influence has been to the detriment of wider experimentation, from punk through to the '90s indie scene.

I seem to remember Noel Gallagher (clearly a very minor talent) being asked about Oasis's supposed ripping off of the Beatles, and he said something along the lines of it being a change from ripping off the Velvet Underground. He was right.
 
Knotted said:
Yeah OK I get it. I had that experience recently listening to the first Beatles album reviewing music for the 1963 aoty thread. It really is just poor, but viewed in its time and context its a curious British spin on older and frankly much better American rock'n'roll complete with an inferior version of the Isley Brothers Twist and Shout. But it has a certain character and I can understand the growing excitement around the band just as something homespun and a bit underground with a bit of energy. How it speaks to the (then) audience versus how it satisfies you or I many decades later kicking back to a Spotify playlist.
Click to expand...
It's a bit knockabout but I think that first album has a lot going for it. Probably my favourite before Revolver onwards. It's the tightness of the early beat sound, the harmonic vocals and the teenage experience that they tapped into at that time/place, as you say. And yes a fair few covers but some crackers of their own imo.
 
He might have had a knack for surrounding himself with great musicians, but Captain Beefheart was just a tone deaf pub singer. His best tracks are the instrumentals that he's not actually on.
 
Would the Undertones first album have been played nightly in its entirety for ages by John Peel if they'd had a less distinctive singer than Feargal?

I like the album but can't decide if it was all that much better than a lot of other stuff that was around at the time. It definitely broke no new ground instrumentally.
 
Went off The Doors for a few years when the Oliver Stone film came out , but got over it and lot of time for the albums. That American Prayer doesn't match up to the original stuff. Prefer the post-Jim albums to it, Tbh.

(If you like Rothschild's production on the albums and the bluesy feel, listen to East -West by The Butterfield Blues Band. )
 
RD2003 said:
Listening to the Who as a teenager, I had difficulty distinguishing their early stuff from most 'beat groups' (man) of their time, although I liked them. On repeated listenings, I found that what they did with the R&B genre was actually extraordinary. You only have to pick out Moon's drumming to realise that something quite exceptional was going on. As they moved on musically, the same applies: this was an exceptional band with often overlooked musical complexity.

Unfortunately, the second half of their career saw them lapse into mediocrity. More or less everything they did from about 1978 is anonymous. The warnings were there with the last album on which Moon featured (although on the whole it's OK.) They should probably have called it a day when he died.
Click to expand...

Aye they outlived their shelf life after quadrophenia I think.
 
The only thing I have to add is it's hard going on impossible to really understand the impact of music from before your time. Some things hold up and translate to the present but a lot doesn't. And even if you think you know you cant ever truly know how it felt.

The Doors for example, if you were dropping acid in that time and place when they were peaking I can imagine them blowing everyone away....I get why people don't relate to it now though.

There's so much old music that does next to nothing for me but I can appreciate how impactful it must've been for others at the time. That's very different from Musically Shite though.
 
Last edited:
Old music is fascinating. Often obsess about certain bands, artists, genres. It's a voyage of discovery , just like checking out new music and falling in love with it.

That's why am always impressed by the year threads, usually many new old sounds to get into.

During youthful days , was often dismissive of certain types of music and bands but that's all changed over the years. It's like a revelation or epiphany or whatever you call it.

Still undecided about The Fall, though.
 
Nirvana. It's not that they were bad, I just don't understand how they were so huge. It seems to me in retrospect that it was more to do with Kurt Cobain personally than with the band's actual music - which is mainly repetitive two-chord garage rock with the lyrical content of a whiny thirteen-year-old. IMO it was Steve Albini's production that made Nevermind the monster it was, not Cobain's songs which were, on reflection, pretty shite.

OTOH their Unplugged set was brilliant - not for the songs, but again for KC's presence and intensity: the cover of Where Did You Sleep Last Night may be Nirvana's greatest moment.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

savoloysam
Unpopular Bands - An Amnesty
Replies
4
Views
252
ATOMIC SUPLEX
ATOMIC SUPLEX
ska invita
All the festivals that are closing down
Replies
10
Views
502
pbsmooth
P
mojo pixy
Bands / artists you own the most music by
2 3
Replies
64
Views
2K
Serge Forward
Serge Forward
Bus Honeygun
Bands You Like... But Do You Really?
Replies
7
Views
305
Idaho
Idaho
The39thStep
Zoot Money The Big Time Operator RIP
Replies
4
Views
165
hitmouse
hitmouse
Back
Top Bottom