Be Excellent To Each Other

Oh, thank you for saying that. I really dig "Bottle Rocket" lots, especially the last bit of it. 2 - 4 - 6 - 8 - 10!.

But beyond that, I found it to be embarassingly overrated and a mite rubbish. Same with the 2nd album - the 2nd track, 'Doing It Right', I really like. I have no time for the rest of it.

Still! Queen's first two albums were shite, so there's hope yet.

That's exactly why I like it!

And the third was gold.

Bump!

As an apology.

I'll atom smash the other thread!

Stuff I love at the moment:

OLD
Orbital - Brown Album: Absolute classic, can make you cry on the right concoctions.
The Cramps - Songs The Lord Taught Us: Monstrous Psychobilly Punk Rock.
Snuff - flibbiddydibbiddydob: Punk covers that will have your toes a tappin' and your face a grinnin'

NEW
Thom Yorke - The Eraser: I keep banging on about this but it great, also I find Radiohead meh, weird.
Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - Dig, Lazarous Dig!!!: Not as heavy as Grinderman but still rocks, and indeed rolls.

Can anyone suggest anything else I may like based on these lovelies?

I am going to see The Long Blondes tonight. I'll be sure to let everyone know how great/rubbish it was.

Well?

Erm.. Tom Waits's's's' Bone Machine is fucking fab. Dunno whether yow'd loike it though.

Zardoz, you might like the Horrorpops, or they might be too fragile for your Cramped style.

Lately i've been eager to try some progressive rock classics. Any recommendations? What are the best albums by Rush and Camel?

Fans of the genre "house-music-with-great-production-and-real-instuments" would do well to check out an intimate gig that Hybrid are doing this weekend in Brixton.
Here's the gig: http://www.ents24.com/web/event/1487728 ... Audio.html
And here's a little bit of Hybrid: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4z0CiLbUvi0

Rush fucking rule. Definitely get hold of Moving Pictures and Signals. They are both fantastic albums.

Other classic Prog:

King Crimson - Red
Yes - Close To The Edge
Goblin - Suspiria Soundtrack

That's a good starting block, it gets even weirder and better (IMO) when you get into European avantgarde stuff like Amon Duul, Magma and Univers Zero. Also modern bands like The Cancer Conspiracy (total King Crimson worship), Upsilon Acrux, Orthrelm etc are also superb.

Talking of King Crimson (one of the few prog groups I like), you should also get In The Court of the Crimson King and Starless and Bible Black as well as Red

ever get one of those moments where you instinctively dislike a band but then you hear a song and it's good enough that you can't dislike them anymore?

currently:

Laser Hannon by Cutting Pink With Knives

hardcore/noisecore (what?) mixed with 80s style synth pop with screamo (look I'm sorry okay?) vocals. I really like it and I'm not sure why.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x-52EP7XAzs

did take a couple of listens though.

If it's punk covers you're after, Me First & The Gimme Gimmes and Oizone should do the trick.

The Long Blondes were great. They hit the ground running, and sounded brill live. They played a lot of new stuff which I didn't know, but it was really good. I ordered the CD.

There are some super-blurry phone camera pics on my flickr.

Kate is gorgeous.

Moonmadness is a good Camel album. Nice and chilled out, a bit Dark Side of the Moon-ey in places. I've only got 2112 by Rush, but that's also a good one.

I'm currently listening to Broken English by Marianne Faithfull. It's a very short album, but there're some good tracks on there. Her voice was completely fucked by this stage, so it's very much an acquired taste.

I quite liked that, for the synths. They gave it a pleasing oddness.

Three choice cuts I'm listening to at the moment from me, Mr Music Librarian.

St. Vincent - Marry Me

Discordent, weird but beautiful hurtful pop from Polyphonic Spree backing singing. The song Apocalypse is just awesome with its jagged stop-startiness and novel use of strings. The title track is cruel and funny ("Marry me John, marry me John, I'll be so good to you - you won't realise I'm gone, you won't realise I'm gone...") and the album tricksey but compelling.

Darjeeling Ltd - soundtrack

Lots of really good early Bollywood music on here. Takes a while to get used to but ultimately on a par with the other Anderson soundtracks. Lots of excellent Satyajit Ray and that awesome Peter Sarsdadt song 'Where Do You Go to My Lovely'. Perfect stuff for summer picnics when they come, basically.

Yo Yo Ma & The Silk Road Ensemble - New Imposibilities

Yo Yo Ma is pretty much always a no-brainer when it comes to choice. With The Silk Road Ensemble he becomes even more irresistable. Great sweeping epic music ala Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon - but a bit more playful and fun. One of those albums that suddenly makes whatever your doing seem stupidly epic, even if its just washing the dishes.

This one sounds interesting. Thanks for the recommendation.

yes. Knights of Cydonia. Never heard of that song before GH3.

I agree with RuySan. Although, I still fucking hate Muse otherwise.

i have the same issues with them as i have with Radiohead. The vocals are just too whiny and pretentious.

I just think he's a dick who only knows how to write one kind of song; and sadly, it's a song that seems OMG TEH FUTURA to far too many people.

I like Radiohead, but I get why you might dislike the vocals.

ah.. The Muse debate.

reasons I don't like them:

I first became aware of them on The Big Breakfast or RI:SE. They were being interviewed as sort of 'the next big thing' and they, or at least that twat singer of theirs, was so fucking arrogant and up himself that I literally wanted him to choke to death there and then.

Then I had to put up with his horrible fucking vocals. He sings like a horrible girl.

Then I got told by everyone that I should, as a guitarist, check him out as he's apparently amazing. He's fucking shit. Those horrible single note riffs ugh... so rubbish. For an apparently heavy, technical band they fall short in terms of heaviness and technicality by some margin. I've never heard anything by him that isn't stunningly average and that rhythm section might as well not exist.

So, then another guitarist was mewling about them so I said right, show me the best thing they've done and he put on some concert DVD. The song was some horrible punk attempt that sounded hideous. I noted at the time that their crowd was full of 17 year old indie chicks. Yeah, that's their fucking audience. They couldn't move a proper crowd.

Also, in that video the singer starts jumping around and throwing his guitar about but only once he nearly trips over and he tries to style it.

Muse are essentially a band of maths teachers who are unable to feel emotion so they ham up what they think passes as emotion and instead it just sounds like music for chess computers.

I like Muse.

On balance, I don't like Muse.

I like the Muse song where he wails in an emotionless, cynical falsetto about how things aren't very good and stuff. The music included a twinkly little keyboard arpeggio, an unmemorable rhythm on bass and drums that was y'know, a bit rock and that. The guitar went loud on the choruses, if it helps.

Muse have made 4 albums.

I just learnt to play this song on bass.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ysfrrAibjnM



I don't think I'll ever play it again. Thanks, B'ianncaaaaaaah, thanks.

And they are all very good.

I am always amused (*ahem*) when people who don't like a band will often decide that they have no emotion in their songs, despite all evidence to the contrary, such as selling out Wembley and generally being one of the biggest British bands over the past decade, something that you would hope engenders some emotion (obviously size <> emotion, but it's a horrible, lazy and inaccurate thing to say). Equally, they moved the crowd at Glastonbury well enough when they headlined the festival, and well enough again when I saw them at Earl's Court.

Muse write some fantastic guitar riffs. Every time I have seen them interviewed they have been nice, friendly and very humble. Matt Bellamy is exceptionally talented and has a fantastic voice. One thing that sets them apart from the majority of their contemporaries is that the vocals are different. It's refreshing to have a band playing rock music without having to have a big, gruff bloke basically yelling at a microphone... instead Muse have someone who can sing really well! Woohoo!

I was tempted to end with a sweeping statement that anyone who doesn't like them is probably against them as they're popular and famous and talented and hyped and critically acclaimed... but that would be a horrible generalisation.

In summation,

Muse = excellent.

I don't like Muse very much. I don't give a monkeys about how famous they are or how they come across in interviews, I just find their music bores me (apart from 'Knights of Cydonia' which is a fantastic song).

Indeed. I didn't like them when I saw them third on the bill to The Donnas and 3 Colours Red in 1999, and I still don't like them now, but I admit that it's because they're "not my bag" rather than because they're rubbish.

Shyeah, towards the rear exits!!!!

I said he has no emotion in his singing.


That has nothing to do with how a man sings.


Also known as the James Blunt argument, for liking a band. "I can't stand his music, but he's a ver y personable chap, so I shall buy his album." Except you do like Muse. I find myself lacking for the rolleyes emoticon.


He can play the guitar a bit. He's not an exceptional talent. Your opinion of his voice is your own.


You need to buy some Rush albums, Curiosity. And some British Sea Power albums ( have I mentioned how much I like their recent single NO LUCIFER?), more recently. Actually, basically, you just need to buy some rock albums, it seems.


As would any resulting generalisation that I could make, that anyone making such an argument doesn't actually have a good argument to make, beyond being upset that something they like has been dissed. But, as you say, that would be horrible.


4AD Fanboy-FTFY.

edit: Meep, that's a far longer post than I realised, sorry.

Knights of Cydonia is a cracking song despite Matt Bellamy's vocals, not because of them. There's about a thousand vocalists who could have done a better job.

i take bug,gruff blokes yelling blokes over muse vocals anyday.

I still think that for such an huge mainstream bands they have plenty of qualities. Some of the guitarwork is pretty good. And altough they're often accused of being pretentious, i like some epic-ness in rock, which is lacking in mainstream rock for 25 years.

I think there are a few Ben Folds fans here, so here's a presale link for his forthcoming tour:

http://www.artistticket.com/benfolds/

I haven't decided if I'm going to go yet - I love Ben Folds, especially live, but it's a bit pricey.

A Glastonbury crowd isn't the same thing.

That's the kind of crowd that will tolerate the likes of Starsailor or The Kooks. They're the fucks that made Robbie Williams a successful solo artist.

Non-big, gruff vocals over rock can definitely work though. Shudder To Think for example have proper singy vocals and it works for me every time.

they were definitely arrogant on that first interview. if they've chilled out a bit, that's all good.

In terms of bands that I don't like but are apparently well-respected I think I've got more time for Radiohead but I literally would switch off the radio if they came on. Which is why XFM is dead to me.

(sorry if this comes across as aggressive or anything, I just really hate Muse!).

Bluce_Ree said they had no emotion, period. My reply was more aimed at Bluce than thee.



True, though if you asked the thousands upon thousands of people there what they liked about the band, a lot would say "Matt Bellamy's voice". It's certainly what drew me to the band upon hearing 'Sunburn' (along with the delightful juxtaposition of the guitar and piano in the song, and the great video).



Again, this was a response directly to a point made by Bluce, who said he seemed arrogant. I've never seen them come across as anything other than self-effacing.



It's pretty well known that Matt is basically the band. A band that has sold in the region of ten million albums. He writes the songs. He's a talented pianist. Despite what you think, he's an excellent vocalist. He's sufficiently good at playing the guitar to be voted 29th best player by readers of Total Guitar magazine, and rated as the #1 current player by Kerrang magazine (neither of which is anything definitive, but surely implies talent to some degree). He's also a better bass player than the bassist in the band, but can only play two instruments at the same time (three if you count vocals). Whenever 'greatest riff' polls are made, Muse are invariably featured. Riffs that he wrote and played.

In addition to these personal tributes, the band has also won numerous awards from both the public and critics, including 'Best Live Act' awards in 6 of the last 7 years from various sources.

To be able to do all that, for me, takes exceptional talent.



Since when were Rush their contemporaries? I know they still make albums, but so do the Rolling Stones...

I know they are far from unique in using falsetto in vocals, but for every band that you list who do sing in the same general style, I could name ten who do not.

And I can't think of many popular bands who have carved out a niche in the rock scene who would then come back and lead off their latest album with a single lacking in most of what made their music good and loved by millions of people, yet filled to the brim with fantastic otherness influenced more by Prince than any of their regular work.

Also, since most music I listen to would be categorised as Rock (or at the least Alternative), I think I'm doing okay in that genre, thanks.

Whilst I will check out the new British Sea Power song, I must admit that I was very underwhelmed when I saw them supporting someone a few years ago, and don't recall them being that interesting, musically.




Which is why I didn't. It is a well known fact [citation needed] that popular bands inevitably get a backlash against them where all the 'cool kids' never liked them anyway.

That aside, I think I've clearly made a decent argument above. You may not like them, but they're clearly a good band by pretty much any definition other than your own taste.

I cannot stand Muse.

I cannot stand Muse.

[picture of a polar bear]
I CANNOT STAND MUESLI

Curiosity, I would be interested to learn your opinion, whatever it may be, of this, yo:

I have just remembered Suede and Placebo.

Muse are okay.

I like Placebo. Well, liked.

The only good thing the NME did in the last few years was completely rip the piss out of Brian Molko for his hilarious twattiness, after one of their journos went to do a 'At home with' piece, and found him deliberately setting out things to make him look more interesting.

I like neither Muse nor Placebo in general. 'Plug In baby' and 'Nancy Boy' I love though.

and on the 'prog' tip, check out The Rotter's Club, by Hatfield and the North.

I saw Ash at Wembly (the little Wembly). They were opening for The Darkness. They were okay.

Ash, Whitehaven, December 2000. Second best gig ever.