> for dads who buy 3 records a year.
the 40-50 year segment is the age bracket spending the most on music
- even more than teenagers (for the first time in history).
I hate the whole lot of these new touchie-feelie-guitar bands (from Codplay to Slow Patrol),
I guess it's the same lot who likes U2 and REM who are into these?
Ie old "indie"-kids and new ones? And that scaringly seems to be a hell of big market ...
I would not put Franz Ferdindand, The Bravery etc in with the above lot.
They might come from post-punk (Coldplay etc clearly does not) - but not the postpunk of
of Gang of Four, Wire, Joy Division, but rather Teardrop Explodes, Echo and the Bunnymen
and even a band like Martha&the Muffins.
And while I am it: Interpol - not the new Joy Division, but if they are the new anything
it's the new Psychedelic Furs.
I see K-Punk hate FF - I have my "suspicions" about all these new "clever" bands
- but I find myself liking some of them.
If nothing else because there is some traction (as mentioned, good expression) and
crucially because I liked the Teardrop Explodes and mid-period Blondie the first time
around ... I haven't finished listening to Bloc Party's album yet - but on first hearing it
does not really deliver ...
I think we have to wait a very long time before we get anything like
Joy Division, Television or early Ultravox! (or say Young Marble Giants/Wire).
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tangent (parental advisory - it mentions the unmentionables: prog-rock, country and white blues)
I read K-punk's top-100+ list the other day:
if I was to list the top 100 British albums, then "Jesus of Cool"/Nick Lowe would easily be in the
top-50 ... not to mention the odd prog-rock album (say "Red"/King Crimson and "Green"/Steve Hillage to sort of theme it).
But bless Mark for having Virginia Astley's wonderful "From Gardens Where We Feel Secure" in there.
I guess the advantage of living in remote part of Europe is that we didn't know
what we were "supposed" to listen to
- even if we saw ourselves as "punks" in the late '70s we would
listen to _anything_. That included Krautrock, Prog, Pop and *cough* even disco.
And pure crap from the continent like Focus (discarded, but I would still try it).
When I speak to British friends who were punks in the '70s there seem to be an
intense dislike to _anything_ prog (prog seems to always mean ELP and Yes etc ) and that the only reason they ever listened to Kraut was that Julian Cope (?) wrote a book about it.
I am generalising here of course (and I know for a fact that several member of Diss does not fall
into this category) - but it seems like the "musical borders" are/were much harder in the UK than in Scandinavia.
Cases in point: I ventured into those two small record shops in West Croydon the other
week and was stunned when the first one said he "really didn't do grime"? The sign on the outside
says "Garage" though. The second shop had plenty of white label 12"s (I picked up two - at
8 quid a pop it's bloody expensive ... at least compared to Aim High and Run the Road).
Back home you will have Deathprod working with modern jazzers like Jaga Jazzist,
electronic genius Biosphere and modern-prog rockers Motorpsycho (who plays C&w in their
spare time). And Ralph Myerz Band wearing Death-metal T-shirts ...
Although Brits are extremely open minded it does not seem to last?
If I mention country ("those first two Lyle Lovett albums were rather good")
to anyone they will just laugh hollowly or mention that they listen
to Johnny Cash (but only after those late "trendy" albums ...).
Oh well. We are all different ...
Some people get touched by U2 and Coldplay and even Snow Patrol -
some of us does not.
(I'll write a long piece of why Johnny Winter's "Fast Life Rider" matters sometime.
Bless Hendrix, but as Mr Strong mentions in his big discography bible thingie -
Winter was probably the most talented of all those white guys trying to play the
blues (and that includes Clapton/Beck). I know shit all about how good guitarists are "technically" -
seeing Bill Nelson last year I was horrified by this guy behind me going on for minutes on
"is he as fast/good as Eddie Van Halen?" - who fekken cares?)
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Ahh - The Libertines. Overrated in deed.
Ay-man. Dissensus-vortex sucking me in again ... Apologies if you made it this far ...