Okay, let's see how things had shifted, in terms of the canon, slightly more than a decade after the 1974 appraisal by the critics of the New Musical Express (said to be the first time anyone had ever done such a look-back summation of Rock's Achievement So Far).
Here's NME re-adjudicating the 100 All-Time Greatest Albums in November 1985.
Right away, we have a possible contender for Dropped Away - at the very summit of the chart!
1 Marvin Gaye - What's Going On - 1971
I know, I know... sacrilege, "what are you thinking Reynolds?" And yet, and yet, I do not think this record, once considered an imperishable classic, has much currency for today's listeners.
This, despite the fact, that young hip listeners are generally more likely to listen to R&B and treat it as a genre inhabited by auteurs. They listen to Frank Ocean, Childish Gambino, FKA Twigs....
But strange as it may seem, love of R&B does not necessarily imply any knowledge of or liking for soul. (Even though the contemporary artists they're into often themselves love 70s soul, replicate its sonix, sample it as Ocean did with a clip of Stevie Wonder doing a vocoderized cover of "Close To You")
One of the classes I teach is "Headphone Soul and Album-Oriented R&B". And I came away with the sense that things like "Papa Was A Rolling Stone" or "Pusherman" or "Shaft" were unknown to the students... There's A Riot Going' On too. Stevie Wonder. Al Green. Philly.
And then if '70s soul, with its lushness and orchestration and even the odd synth seems long-long-ago, just imagine what Otis Redding or Stax sounds like. Positively antediluvian.
For this generation, R&B starts with... maybe Aaliyah. And even that is a quarter-century ago now.
(Another reason What's Going On may have slid is also that it is a bit over-rated. "Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology)" - c'mon! I prefer Gaye in sensual-not-sententious mode: "Got To Give It Up")
6 Tom Waits - Swordfishtrombones 1983
A classic example of the parochialism of the present - there was such a BUZZ about this album (was it NME's Album of the Year? I think so) that it must have seemed inconceivable to the crits that the artist's stature would rapidly plummet. But #6 Greatest Album of All Time - what were they thinking?
I don't think I've listened to Swordfishtrombones all the way through since the year it came out, when I esteemed it highly; I did play a few tracks from it recently though in a class titled the Blues: Uses, Abuses, Mutations. Back in the mid-80s, Waits lost me with the next few, even Partch-ier albums and I've never quite got it together to get to grips with all the barfly albums of the 1970s.
My favorite at the time, "Frank's Wild Years" is kind of a nasty track, isn't it? Probably if I was to reach for a Waits song, it would be "This One's From the Heart" - but the impulse never comes.
I might be mistaking my own weak cathexis to the artist for objective standing here, but I don't think so.
17 James Brown - Solid Gold 1976
Same with Marvin Gaye - completely off the map for young listeners today. I venture also that the breakbeat connection that might have kept JB current during the hip hop era has completely gone, given that breakbeats have not been a significant element in 21st Century hip hop. As for the ballads, that kind of rasping, volcanic kind of singing is very different from R&B modes favored today, which are smoother and more poised.
18 Patti Smith - Horses 1975
A landmark record - but in that sense, rather like a historic building in a foreign city that people go to see because they are supposed to go see it. Like tourists reading up in their travel guide or listening on those headphones they give out as you go in, this is an album that requires historical back-filling and zeitgeist-reconstruction. Perhaps the pure spirit of "Gloria" leaps across time, jumps out of its own moment. "Free Money" maybe. But "Birdland" and "Break It Up" and "Landed"... inexplicable stuff, I feel.
19 James Brown - Live at The Apollo, October 24, 1962 1963
See JB above.
23 Otis Redding - Otis blue - Otis Redding sings soul 1966
26 Temptations - Anthology 1973
27 Aretha Franklin - Greatest hits 1971
More soul!
28 Jimi Hendrix - Are you experienced? 1967
Phil Knight proposed Hendrix as a Dropped Away contender in the comments to the previous post, causing me to respond in sad agreement: "It feels like the Hendrix sound and all that it represents just wouldn't compute for modern ears. Too excessive, too grand, too utopian.... maybe even too liberated. In a recent class on the Blues.... I played "I Don't Live Today" (it has the classic blues AAB structure but blown out cosmically) and I could tell that it wasn't connecting."
The blues base of much of the music is one reason Jimi Hendrix has Dropped Away... but the Experience are part of it too: the freeness in the rhythm section, Mitch Michell's jazz background.
From the guitarist on down, the virtuosity required is beyond anyone's aspiring, but also, even more, beyond anyone's desiring.
Yes, they don't know what they are missing. But they don't care.
29 Pere Ubu - The Modern Dance 1978
Fantastic album, as is the one after it, and the Datapanik collection of early singles. But as much as postpunk seems to be quite hot... still firmly on the listening-list of young people... what they think of as "postpunk" has significant gaps... areas of droppage... I think Ubu are one, whereas Devo (the group I paired them with in Rip It Up) are not.
30 Robert Johnson - King of the Delta blues singers 1961
The blues in general, really.
31 Elvis Costello and the Attractions - Imperial Bedroom 1982
I feel like the function of Elvis Costello - in his time, in his prime - is one of the most unrecoverable things for a modern listener. What even is this music for? It's sort of pop, yet simultaneously sniping at pop... pop and anti-pop combined in some combustible, internally unstable blend of catchy vitriol... I can't imagine what a modern ear would make of the verbosity.... the puns and wordplay.... perhaps, most of all, the tone of voice. A seriousness, or sneeriousness even, that just doesn't travel across time.
The run from This Year's Model, through Armed Forces, Get Happy!, Trust, (let's forget about the country album), to this record, Imperial Bedroom, is the astonishingly sustained peak of something, but also the ending of something. The last blast of Dylanism-Lennonism: the idea that words - finding the exact right formulation of language - have an inherent power. Words as weaponry against the Powers That Be.
Around "Oliver's Army" you can still believe, in part because EC believes it... by "Pills and Soap", belief is tottering... "Tramp the Dirt Down" is just an impotent whimper, as ineffectual and silly as "Margaret On the Guillotine".
32 Smokey Robinson and the Miracles - Anthology 1973
Soul, again.
34 Dexy's Midnight Runners - Searching for the young soul rebels 1980
Meta-soul! So doubly inexplicable.
37 Bobby Womack - The Poet 1981
The apotheosis of Womack, by the criterati of the NME, is one of the stranger episodes in UK music journalism. I mean, for sure, he's a great singer... he's written some good songs... but even in his mid-1970s heyday Womack was not really a soul superstar. He had a few big Billboard R&B Chart hits, some solid-selling albums... but we're not talking Al Green here.
At the time, though, I totally bought into it. Went to see him at Oxford Apollo (pretty great - but then again, I'd never seen a full-blown soul revue, so there was an element of first-time blown-away syndrome). Bought The Poet II and some of the '70s albums.... enjoyed them... honestly cannot remember anything much about them. For some reason I never heard and still haven't heard The Poet, the '81 album, on which his elevation was constructed. Perhaps that was because it was an import?
At any rate, I feel in the annals of artists who have Dropped Away, few have Dropped Away more precipitously. Perhaps precisely because of this mystery about the Rising Up in the first place. I think the framing was to do with him being the last of the Soul Greats still standing.... a '70s survivor. Part of it had to do with his contiguity to the Greats: guitarist for Sam Cooke, accomplice to Sly Stone during the coked-out making of There's A Riot Goin' On.
The warm feelings during that Eighties moment seemed to extend to anyone with name "Womack" - e.g. Womack & Womack, the duo of Bobby's brother Cecil and his wife Linda (Sam Cooke's daughter). I suppose it's the dynastic thing - people do seem to love that.
40 Elvis Costello - This Year's Model 1978
See the entry on Imperial Bedroom.
44 Parliament - Mothership Connection 1976
Pretty certain none of the P-funk stuff was on the 1974 List... another sign of the huge transvaluation made as a knock-on of postpunk, the anti-rockist discourse, and soul-boyism. I feel fairly confident that this is not music on the radar of young listeners or music-makers today.
45 Al Green - The Cream of Al Green 1980
46 Marvin Gaye - Let's Get It On 1973
50 Impressions - Big 16 1965
More soul.
52 Alan Vega & Martin Rev - Suicide 1980
Debatable, but I think Suicide have faded in the hip memory. A great shame, but the Canon is cruel in its ever-shifting reconfiguration.
55 Madness - Mad Not Mad 1985
Christ on a bike, talk about the parochialism of the present! I'm frankly amazed that this, out of all the Madness albums, would be chosen as a Top 100 contender - 7 or Rise & Fall are surely far better, and the first of their greatest hits albums would be better still. I shouldn't think even Madness rate this record.
58 Various - The Harder They Come (soundtrack) 1972
Generally surprised how much reggae music has dropped away. If there's any continued currency, it would be the dub side of things. Even there, it's much diminished as a force of influence, compared to the 2000s and even more so compared to the '90s.
61 Isley Brothers - 3+3 1973
Soul, but also black rock... Not part of the conversation, more's the pity.
66 Captain Beefheart and the Magic band - Clear Spot 1972
Trout Mask Replica retains some of its "can you handle this?" avant-cred - one of the canon of "out" records. But Clear Spot, comparatively "in", is low down on the list of things a young hipster would check out. Far and away my favorite Beefheart record.... they don't know what pleasures they're missing...
67 Elvis Costello - Get Happy! 1980
See entry on Imperial Bedroom.
70 Lou Reed - Berlin 1973
The Velvet Underground remain in hallowed elevation, I think, but I can't imagine any Reed solo outing having much allure to the younger sort - maybe Transformer, for its Bowie connection and the queer aspect... perhaps Metal Machine Music for the same reasons as Trout Mask Replica...
71 Buddy Holly & the Crickets - 20 golden greats 1978
77 Chuck Berry - Chuck Berry's golden decade 1973
Rock'n'roll seemed old even when I first heard it, which must have been the early '70s. Give or take a "Summertime Blues" or a "Shakin' All Over", whose starkness still cut through, the songs and the legends - Holly, Berry, Haley, Little Richard, Presley, Fats Domino, and especially Jerry Lee Lewis - just seemed to come from another era altogether. The olden days - golden but long-gone. The music sounded creaky - even next to contemporary records, like T. Rex or Glitter that drew on early rock'n'roll.
Oh it's great obviously - all this stuff that has dropped away is, for the most part. But History is cruel. Cruelest to that which is Historically Important, in fact.
78 Jackie Wilson - The very best of Jackie Wilson 1995
More soul.
82 Magazine - The Correct Use of Soap 1980
C.f. Pere Ubu and the things that have dropped-out of a beginner's guide to post-punk.... Magazine - once enormously fussed about, discussed about, taken seriously, seen as central.... have drifted to the outside of everything. I really liked Correct Use of Soap at the time, but in retrospect this music's claim to newness is not as starkly achieved compared with other groups considered to be Magazine's fellow travelers.
88 Howlin' Wolf - Chess Masters 1981
See Robert Johnson.
89 Elvis Costello - Armed Forces 1979
Even more EC. See Imperial Bedroom.
91 John Cale - Paris 1919 1973
What I said about Lou Reed solo, applies doubly to Cale solo.
92 Abyssinians - Forward On To Zion 1977
As per the comments on Harder They Come, the vocals-forward style of roots reggae is lost to time, unlike the dub side of things, which still has a weak grip on present ears.
I feel that skank as a riddmic mode - the ambling mellowness, the warm keyboards, the gentle bubble of bass, the chick-a-chick smallness of the guitar - is something that the modern listener would find it hard to get their heads around. And then you factor in the cooing softness of the harmony vocals. The disjuncture between the mellifluousness and the militant / millenarian lyrics would confuse.
Mind you, lover's rock seems to have won a small contingent of hip support (part of that self-correction poptimistic revisionism thing - a formerly demeaned young women's sound, bright and treble-toppy and syrupy sweet.... almost the hyperpop of its own time). Maybe this could lead some listeners through the back door into the non-secular and solemn sort of roots-vocalism.
93 - Elvis Costello - My Aim Is True - 1977
You know the drill by this point - see Imperial Bedroom.
94 Lloyd Cole and the Commotions - Rattlesnakes 1984
Love this record... I cannot imagine it coming into the earshot of contemporary music-discoverers. Like, what would the mechanism be... how would you know it exists, even?
I thought about passing the same verdict on another inclusion in this Top 100 - Prefab Sprout, Steve McQueen, also a record I adore and still dig out now and then. But I feel like the Prefabs have just a smidge more of a cultural half-life. Feel like it's come up in things I've read recently. The ultra-detailed, super-pristine production would appeal to the modern ear.
99 Undertones - The Undertones
Dunno why ... but the Undertones's brand of simple punk-pop perfection is not as widely known as rough equivalents like the Ramones or Buzzcocks... Perhaps because they weren't quite as much the pioneers as those two bands... they came along that little bit later... they had bigger hits in the UK than either, but haven't lingered.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
So that's 38 Dropped Away - quite a bigger chunk, nearly 40 percent, than with the 1974 list.
Once again, here's the list in full - check if there any droppers-away here that I have missed. I am already having second thoughts about letting through The Scream, Strange Days, Darkness on the Edge of Town...
1 Marvin Gaye What's going on 1971
2 Van Morrison Astral weeks 1968
3 Bob Dylan Highway 61 revisited 1965
4 Clash The Clash 1977
5 Television Marquee moon 1977
6 Tom Waits Swordfishtrombones 1983
7 Band The Band 1969
8 Bob Dylan Blonde on blonde 1966
9 John Lennon John Lennon/Plastic Ono band 1970
10 Joy division Unknown pleasures 1979
11 Beatles Revolver 1966
12 Elvis Presley The Sun sessions 1976
13 Sex pistols Never mind the bollocks, here's the Sex pistols 1977
14 Love Forever changes 1967
15 David Bowie Low 1977
16 Velvet underground Velvet underground + Nico 1967
17 James Brown Solid gold 1976
18 Patti Smith Horses 1975
19 James Brown Live at The Apollo, october 24, 1962 1963
20 Beach boys Pet sounds 1966
21 Miles Davis Kind of blue 1959
22 Bob Dylan Bringing it all back home 1965
23 Otis Redding Otis blue - Otis Redding sings soul 1966
24 Doors The Doors 1967
25 Rolling stones Exile on Main street 1972
26 Temptations Anthology 1973
27 Aretha Franklin Greatest hits 1971
28 Jimi Hendrix Are you experienced? 1967
29 Pere Ubu The modern dance 1978
30 Robert Johnson King of the Delta blues singers 1961
31 Elvis Costello and the Attractions Imperial bedroom 1982
32 Smokey Robinson and the Miracles Anthology 1973
33 Beatles The Beatles (= the white album) 1968
34 Dexy's midnight runners Searching for the young soul rebels 1980
35 Velvet underground White light/white heat 1968
36 David Bowie Young Americans 1975
37 Bobby Womack The poet 1981
38 Kraftwerk Trans Europe Express 1977
39 Bruce Springsteen Darkness on the edge of town 1978
40 Elvis Costello This year's model 1978
41 Brian Eno Another green world 1975
42 Captain Beefheart and the Magic band Trout mask replica 1969
43 Kraftwerk The man machine 1978
44 Parliament Mothership connection 1976
45 Al Green The cream of Al Green 1980
46 Marvin Gaye Let's get it on 1973
47 Sly and the family Stone There's a riot goin' on 1971
48 Ramones Rocket to Russia 1977
49 Sly and the family Stone Greatest hits 1970
50 Impressions Big 16 1965
51 Bob Dylan Blood on the tracks 1975
51 Bob Dylan Blood on the tracks 1975
52 Alan Vega & Martin Rev Suicide 1980
53 Buzzcocks Another music in a different kitchen 1978
54 Joy division Closer 1980
55 Madness Mad not mad 1985
56 Roxy music For your pleasure 1973
57 Siouxsie and the Banshees The scream 1978
58 #s The harder they come (soundtrack) 1972
59 Gang of four Entertainment! 1979
60 Velvet underground Velvet underground 1969
61 Isley brothers 3+3 1973
62 Joni Mitchell The hissing of summer lawns 1975
63 David Bowie Heroes 1977
64 Smiths Meat is murder 1985
65 David Bowie Station to station 1976
66 Captain Beefheart and the Magic band Clear spot 1972
67 Elvis Costello Get happy! 1980
68 Talking heads Fear of music 1979
69 Iggy Pop Lust for life 1977
70 Lou Reed Berlin 1973
71 Buddy Holly & the Crickets 20 golden greats 1978
72 Band Music from big pink 1968
73 Beatles A hard day's night 1964
74 Roxy music Roxy music 1972
75 Ramones Leave home 1977
76 John Coltrane A love supreme 1964
77 Chuck Berry Chuck Berry's golden decade 1973
78 Jackie Wilson The very best of Jackie Wilson 1995
79 Miles Davis In a silent way 1969
80 Roxy music Stranded 1973
81 Talking heads Talking heads '77 1977
82 Magazine The correct use of soap 1980
83 Bruce Springsteen Born in the USA 1984
84 Joni Mitchell Court and spark 1974
85 Doors Strange days 1967
86 Talking heads More songs about buildings and food 1978
87 Doors L.A. woman 1971
88 Howlin' Wolf Chess masters 1981
89 Elvis Costello Armed forces 1979
90 Prefab sprout Steve McQueen 1985
91 John Cale Paris 1919 1973
92 Abyssinians Forward on to Zion 1977
93 Elvis Costello My aim is true 1977
94 Lloyd Cole and the Commotions Rattlesnakes 1984
95 Beach boys Best of 1968
96 Augustus Pablo & King Tubby King Tubby meets Rockers uptown 1976
97 Beatles Rubber soul 1965
98 Suicide Suicide 1977
99 Undertones The Undertones
Bonus beat: David Stubbs from Monitor magazine writes in to the NME to take issue with the Top 100 and attendant discussion, which continued sputtering on into January '86:
I was inclined to agree with you about "What's Going On", but I took a look at the most recent Rolling Stone list of 500 greatest albums, updated last year, and you'll never guess what's at number one....
ReplyDeletehttps://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/best-albums-of-all-time-1062063/marvin-gaye-whats-going-on-4-1063232/
Of course Rolling Stone is a million miles away from anything that you could reasonably call young or hip taste. But it does suggest someone is still listening. Or at least, wants to claim they are still listening.
One thing I wonder is whether there is some endogeneity there. Whether the NME having declared it the greatest album ever made, even all the way back in 1985, still has some sway over the "more than 300 artists, producers, critics, and music-industry figures" polled by RS.
How funny!
DeletePerhaps a sort of self-perpetuating thing among the kind of people who make these kinds of lists and care about these kinds of lists.
These kind of lists didn't exist when Marvin recorded What's Going On.... but it sounds like the kind of album recorded to get to the top of this kind of list. Bit like how the Great American Novel became a genre.... something people still take a crack at, even though the forum in which that signified as a thing to do has pretty much crumbled away.
Looking at that RS list.... it's an old person's list, an old rockist person's list. You get to #17 before there's anything from the 21st Century.
I do not agree at all with the contention that golden-age soul has somehow dropped off. Or are you suggesting that singers like Beyoncé and Adele, who beamingly avow their debts to their soul ancestors, aren't that popular? If anything, what has diminished the impact of Motown, Stax etc. is the music's ubiquity. Nowadays it's tricky to appreciate the Beatles' innovations as innovative; likewise, the emotional resonance of classic soul has perhaps suffered because classic soul is bloody everywhere. Is the conclusion that hipsters, rather than young people per se, view declaring a fondness for soul as a bit too obvious?
ReplyDeleteBy the by, would you thus consider Young Americans (no. 36 on the list) to have dropped off for similar reasons?
https://www.discogs.com/lists/The-Guardian-100-Best-Albums-Ever/10967 Jumping ahead to 1997, this greatest albums list by the Guardian has at no. 1... What's Going On.
Also from the Guardian, from a 2004 article suggesting overrated bands and albums, we have David Stubbs slamming What's Going On:
What's Going On
Often cited as the all-time greatest album by music critics sent into convulsions of overpraise by any modicum of political awareness on the part of their black heroes. Borne on a tide of blathery sax, hotel lounge-bar cooing and light orchestral strings, What's Going On is the very inessence of wishy-washiness. Set against the backdrop of the continuing Vietnam war, it's replete with astute observations: "Brother, brother/There's far too many of you dyin'", coupled with bullet-hard, imaginative prescriptions to end the carnage that wouldn't embarrass a greetings-card copywriter: "You know we've got to find a way/To bring some loving here today." On Right On, Marvin invokes Jesus as the ultimate solution, religion as we know having been the surest antidote to war since time began. Mawkish, handwringing idiocy that vaporises on aural impact.
David Stubbs
(Full article here: https://www.theguardian.com/music/2004/dec/04/popandrock)
This is a website where users listen to and rate all the albums from the book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die. These are the stats showing the 20 top- and bottom-rated albums. Curious that near half of the bottom 20 consist of groups focused on in Rip It Up and Start Again: https://1001albumsgenerator.com/stats
Stubbs on the money there!
DeleteI dunno... I wonder how many people listening to Beyonce or Adele trace it back to the sources... Adele was a retro throwback was she started, when she really broke through (2011 was 'Rolling in the Deep' right?) but that's 13 years ago, since then she's really sounded more and more like any pop singer... the rasp smoothed out with Auto-Tune...
At a certain point I thought that Motown's function had been displaced by Disco i.e. as the universal, everyone-likes-this, nostalgia-trigger, the kind of music that would be on the soundtrack of a certain kind of feelgood movie... But now I wonder if disco too is going the way of Motown. When doing a class on disco, I had to explain a LOT.
Post-Saltburn and the revival of "Murder on the Dance Floor", it feels like 90s/2000s pop-House has replaced 70s Disco as the classic dance music of choice.
DeleteI was shocked recently to discover that the staples of the Radio 2 playlist these days are Kylie Minogue and D:Ream, S Club 7 and Rozalla. I had remembered it as the station that played Perry Como and Glenn Miller.
Yes I can remember when Radio 2 was the Frank Chacksfield Orchestra and things like that. It was quite a surprise to hear R2 again in the late 2000s and it was playing I dunno Del Amitri and softer indie stuff... sort of Kid Jensen / Janice Long evening-slot fodder of the 1980s...
DeleteBut now it's 1990s dancepop you tell me!
Mind you I can remember once with a shock hearing "Boy With the Thorn On His Side" on Radio 2 in 1986. I'm not sure why I would even have been listening to Radio 2 but I distinctly remember it.
Re highest rated albums of the 1001:
DeleteIt's basically Beatles, Beatles, Beatles, Led Zep, Pink Floyd, Beatles, Beatles, Led Zep, Led Zep, Pink Floyd, Pink Floyd, Beatles.
Weirdly, no Queen.
Also great quote about Born In The USA:
"After listening to the album I ate at a McDonalds, read a Ronald Reagan biography and punch a commie in the dick. MERICA!"
So what do you think your students would select for a list like this?
ReplyDeleteNot much before the 21st Century - but probably Queen, Bowie, Beatles, would make it.... The Cure, the Smiths.... Nirvana maybe.. and probably certain postpunk groups. Kate Bush, Bjork for some
DeleteRolling Stones, Astral Weeks, other typical rockcrit (50-years-plus) things would not.
Shoegaze, though, does seem to be really popular.
Fiona Apple and Lana Del Rey also seem to be 2010s-onwards contenders for the canon
DeleteWHAT'S GOIN' ON: the choice of people who want to challenge the dominance of rock music in the canon in the most rockist way possible.
ReplyDeleteExactly!
DeleteI tried to say this in the last Dropped Away post, but Blogspot kept eating my comments, so I'll try it here:
ReplyDeleteThe Internet has created this weird bifurcation in youth - the curious kids know everything, the uncurious kids know nothing. If you have any interest in discovering cultural history, you more or less have the entirety of it at your fingertips; if you don't, you only have the most readily available eternal present, whatever it is. I would really like to know what kind of kids make up the students in your classes, and what kind of reaction they have to all this
The "Play For Forever" channel on YouTube has put dozens of '70s British TV movies from the Play For Today series. The official South Korean Film Archive has a YT channel posting restorations of films which have probably never been shown in the U.S. But the algorithm isn't recommending these to anyone out of the blue, and if you don't have an interest in seeking them out to begin with, you won't know they exist.
DeleteExactly - the uncurious only know what's put in front of them, and if that's games and influencers and memes, then that's all they'll know
DeleteThe curious and the uncurious - there might be truth to that division.
DeleteBut while the curious can *potentially* know about everything, in practice nobody does - nobody can. It's not possible to distribute your knowledge and your attention that evenly across the field of all music. So in practice, even for the curious and those aspiring to be widely listened, listening tends to form into patterns, to cluster in certain areas and neglect (or simply not be aware of) other areas...
I suppose that clustering is what I am unscientifically trying to get a fix on... it's speculation based on a sense of what would be attractive and meaningful and sonically legible to a modern young-ish ear... that sense built up partly from the actually relatively quite large number of young people I've spent time with in class over three years now... my own kids, and their friends... the kids of my friends.... and just a general sort of antennae-out feeling for what new-ish bands are citing or obviously drawing on in their sound... what music writers reference too
Far from scientific, but not complete guesswork either.
Well, I speak both figuratively and hyperbolically - I've long since butted up against the impossibility of knowing everything myself. I just mean that they tend towards those extremes more than previous generations.
DeleteFair point about clustering - I suppose I might simply be pushing back based on what my own outwards antennae say....
In some ways having the 'entirety of it at your fingertips' perhaps discourages rather than encourages curiosity. It’s a daunting task for a young person these days wanting to get even a semi decent outline grasp on rock and pop’s 65 year history. It was different in pre-internet age of the 70s 80s and 90s when you could reasonably quickly paint in the big brush strokes of the key eras, scenes developments etc on the giant white canvas, and then over the subsequent years slowly but surely continue to accumulate the knowledge on the more arcane nooks and crannies, allowing you to eventually colour in a lot the remaining white bits. That kind of analogue powered knowledge building is impossible now with the myriad directionless infinities of content within Youtube, Wikipedia entries, streaming sites, over-stuffed bookshelves covering every nook and cranny of music history, the thousands of archival sites and archive related podcasts.... It’s all there but where the hell do you even start? I know in recent years a lot of these kind of flattening of history themes have been discussed at length, via ‘Retromania’ as well as numerous blog posts and newspaper features but those days of being able to even semi organise it all into neat digestible chunks are long gone. I mentioned before here on another thread about the admirable attempt at comprehensiveness Nick Logan and Bob Woffinden achieved with their 1978 New Musical Express Encyclopaedia of Rock. Lots of missed stuff but a fantastic starting point for a musically curious teenager at that time.
DeleteI can't imagine what it's like. There's no systematic way of doing it - and people don't get into music systematically, anyway, you stumble and feel your way into it... with multiple historical points of entry.
DeleteThe flattening out of the archives into this atemporal mush does create a weakening of a sense of chronology - like a student of mine who thought Joni Mitchell's descendants included Bob Dylan.
"the myriad directionless infinities of content" - that's a great line!
Re: Suicide. 'Cheree' is used on the current Marc Jacobs ad, so maybe they'll get a mini-revival of interest. Interestingly, given your comments about shoegaze, the other song that the campaign has used is Sonic Youth 'Teen Age Riot'. Here's a speculation: the soundtrack to 'Lost in Translation' has turned out to be a key, slow-burning influence of the last 20 years.
ReplyDeleteRe: The Decline of Elvis Costello. Sadly, Noel Gallagher's jibe about "no one listens to lyrics" has provided correct. Even in rap and its off-shoots, being 'into' the lyrics has become a niche sub-genre e.g Battle Rapping.
I don't know about - I think indie-music types still listen to lyrics. If you set store in emotions like sadness, in being sensitive, then the words are very important.
DeleteAnd then you have the popularity of those lyrics videos on YouTube.
I went to see 21 Pilots with my youngest son several years ago - and what really startled me was that everybody in the audience sang along to every single word of every single song. And 21 Pilots songs have a LOT of words in them. The audience also rapped along to the rap sections - similarly wordy - too.
It's partly to do with the intense fandom around the band, but also the lyrics videos - kids have them playing while doing homework, as they are not distracting as the proper videos, but you must just pick up the lyrics line by line, word for word.
At the risk of indulging in whataboutism, I'm extremely surprised at the omission of Stevie Wonder's early '70s output in the 1985 chart, given its general privileging of Black music with a message. Maybe Stevie's rep suffered following I Just Called and Don't Drive Drunk etc. Also, I assume Fleetwood Mac - who were no doubt gleefully ignored in 1985 - would feature in a contemporary chart. And maybe even Steely Dan ( who I've read are popular with Gen Z) - ?
ReplyDeleteYes: Songs In The Key Of Life and Rumors are both in the top ten of the recent Rolling Stone list, which seems like as good a place as any to get a snapshot of contemporary rockism. Melody and accessibility generally were suspect in 1985, but are essential today.
Deletehttps://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/best-albums-of-all-time-1062063/the-beatles-abbey-road-2-1063228/
Yes Steely Dan have returned slowly to the kind of esteem in which critics held them pre-punk. And appreciation of slickness has become something that hip listeners can do simultaneously with enjoying roughness, abrasiveness, sloppiness, lo-fi.
DeleteI'm a bit surprised there's no Steely on this list, because NME was very into the Donald Fagen solo record The Nightfly.
Fleetwood Mac definitely Risen Up stealthily to be canon fodder.
What seems amazing to me, from today's perspective, is the gender balance in that list. Particularly given the clear attempt to correct for the racial bias in the the 1974 list.
ReplyDeleteThey have just four albums out of 99 by women: Patti Smith, Aretha Franklin, and Joni Mitchell twice. That's actually fewer than in the 1974 list, if you count Janis Joplin as the creative force / leader of Big Brother & the Holding Company. That list had Cheap Thrills, plus Carole King's Tapestry, Aretha Franklin's greatest and Joni Mitchell twice.
There must be quite a few records that were available in 1985 that could get on a greatest albums list today. Kate Bush, Donna Summer, Grace Jones, Siouxsie and the Banshees, the Slits, the Raincoats, Diana Ross, Dolly Parton, Alice Coltrane, Yoko Ono, Annette Peacock. A few of those, at least.
Yes, that is striking - jarring to a modern sensibility.
DeleteThey almost seem to have been like "let's solve one disparity, one imbalance, one injustice, at a time".
More likely, they didn't even see it.
Not having any insight whatsoever-- zero, zilch, none-- into what "an entry-level aspiring-to-be-informed young listener would feel some kind of pressure to hear" in 2024, but feeling a bit cheated of the promised contentious disagreements, I'll just gently release this as a trial balloon:
ReplyDeleteThe Clash?
In the aughties, with "Paper Planes", Joe's passing, and their induction into the RNR Hall, The Clash's legacy seemed assured. Everyone loved to namecheck them as influences.
And now? Not so much, right? Again, I'm not so clued in on the Kids, but do younger bands actually feel that way about The Clash anymore? I suppose, as with the Pistols, emerging bands will always engage with early Clash in some way or another. You have to. There's canon and there's *canon*. If that's the necessary "pressure" to listen to them, well, I guess they must stay.
But in any meaningful way? I don't know. The Clash suddenly seem very remote. I suspect it has to do as much with changes in politics as it does with music. And the reliably doled-out praise by Rolling Stone and the rest, over the years, always felt perfunctory and unimaginative. Even this list smacks of it. "The Clash"? Why? Despite the historical significance of "The Clash" the songs have nothing on "London Calling" (or my dark horse fave, "Sandinista"). Rolling Stone made a daring pick with "London Calling" as the best album of the Eighties, but as far as I can tell that's the exception that proves the rule.
The critical attitude toward The Clash has ossified, become a cliche. I'm reminded of one of my favorite throwaway lines in "Eternal Sunshine of The Spotless Mind". Stan and Mary are stoned. He's in older brother rhapsody mode:
Stan: The Clash...the only band that mattered. They called themselves that for a reason.
Mary: It's amazing, isn't it?
Stan: Like social justice...
Mary: Yeah, it's totally incredible. What Howard gives to the world.
The last line is the joke. Mary's not even listening to Stan. They're having totally different conversations. Throw a rock and you'll hit a music nerd having a conversation with himself about why The Clash mattered. Meanwhile, the rest of the world has moved on.
*Don't interpret this as Clash-bashing from me. They're great. Stan is probably my spirit animal, which is exactly why I find Charlie Kaufman's joke so perfect.
That scene from Eternal Sunshine reminds me of a feminist friend of mine who had a story about going to see The Clash with a boyfriend when she was a teenager - and falling asleep for most of the whole concert. She just intuited that what was happening on stage was not aimed at her at all. It was like an involuntary somatic response to be on the sidelines of the battle.
DeleteYes, the circumstances in which a statement like "the only band that matters" could be made and felt to be not just true in this particular case but a meaningful statement - those are long gone. So it's not just The Clash in themselves who have dropped away, it's the Clash-type band. As with the comment about Costello, it's the function of that kind of band in the scheme of thing. Which people tried to fill in over and over again in the decade or so after Combat Rock - The Alarm... Lightning Strike... S.M.A.SH.... Manic Street Preachers...
Maybe M.I.A. was the last gesture in that direction... both in terms of artist aspiration and critical positioning
I can't remember if they made the list at all (if not, that's kind of surprising) but alongside The Clash, another Dropped Away and for similar reasons would be The Jam. Not even for the role they had, but just the sound - I think it would incomprehensible to modern years, that fussy uptight urgency, the way Weller vocally projects.
DeleteYeah, there isn't a need for the white-guy messiah strutting around on stage spitting out social justice screeds. That feels out of place in 2024. Probably a healthy development. I think politics has gotten more personal and intimate, too, which is one way in which "Paper Planes" maybe signals the shift, since it grafts the widescreen Clash vision to a more personal narrative.
DeleteLet's not forget, also, that Strummer, Weller, and other "conscience of a generation" icons, like Bono in his "Rattle & Hum" phase, were openly, one might say pointedly drawing on their black musical influences. I doubt any of them would be vilified, today (except Bono, who always draws a kicking for whatever he does), but maybe their musical styles wouldn't be as warmly accepted, to the point of being an influence you'd cite as an up and coming artist.
Of course I'm speculating. I've yet to encounter anyone calling The Clash's use of reggae and dub "problematic". They were always, I think, seen as true allies in today's parlance. But then again I've not heard The Clash spoken of at all, lately. They've...y'know, kind of dropped off.
The Jam didn't make the list, so they can't drop off. Which is shocking for a 1985 list, I suppose, although I think they're best appreciated on Greatest Hits packages. They put out a couple of decent LPs, just nothing to crack an all-time Top 100. The compilations are fantastic.
Along the same lines as Weller & The Jam: where are the Kinks/Ray Davies on these lists? Seems like a surprising omission. Is Davies too a casualty of the end of "Dylanism-Lennonism"?
DeleteI love the Kinks but I feel like they belong in the category of Great Groups Who Are Not Quite "Important" Groups.... I don't think there's a song in their catalogue that is equivalent to "Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall" or "Instant Karma", let alone "Imagine". The songs are too wry, too subtle maybe... Ray Davies is not speaking behalf of a following, it's either personal (but quite oblique) or the songs are character studies.
DeleteDid the fact that the Kinks continued on right through the 70s and into the mid-80s lesson their legacy credentials by 1985? Although I think Jon Savage released a Kinks biography in that year. They've always seemed a bit hard done by in the sixties legends league table and in America they were stopped in their prime with an unjust two or more year ban from touring there. Wasn't really till the the mid-90s that they finally got their due in the album recognition stakes -- Village Green'. Arthur.....Muswell Hillbillies....
DeleteThe Stones commodity price on the legacy exchange had also dipped to a new low by 1985 (only the one entry here), and it wasn't until the hype of the Steel Wheels tour and the 25X5 doc that they came roaring back into the limelight again, and have remained ever since! The Paul Gambaccini Top 100 albums book from 1987 does however include three of the Jimmy Miller produced albums.
Not much from the recent past really bar Rattlesnakes, Steve McQueen, Imperial Bedroom. No New Pop / New Romantic or Prince albums.
Yes and the only Stones chosen is Exile on Main Street, i.e. the total rockcritic move. As opposed to Let It Bleed / Beggars Banquet / Sticky Fingers, which seem to me far more the sort of Stones albums that people would actually play for enjoyment, play all the way through.
DeleteThe website Rocklist.net had an explanation about the 1985 list and the Jam:
ReplyDelete"NOTE! There Were Actually Only 99 Albums Listed. For Some Reason There Was No Number 45?
For Ease Of Compilation I’ve Numbered Them 1 To 99
STOP PRESS - From Graham Stuart, Glasgow.
If You Looked At The Cover Of The Issue, All The LPs That Were Featured On It Were Also In The List, Except One. This Was Pointed Out In A Future Issue. The LP Was (Drum Roll, Trumpets, Etc)......"All Mod Cons" By The Jam.
PLUS - From Jon Lawton
NME Writers Only Listed Their Top 99 Albums In The 1985 List, Leaving The 100th Spot Free For A Competition In Which Readers Were Encouraged To Suggest Their Own Choice For The Album Which They Believed Would Complete The List.
About A Month After The List Was Published One Lucky Reader Won All 99 Albums, After Their Suggestion - 'Songs For Swinging Lovers' By Frank Sinatra - Was Deemed The Best Entry By The Magazine Staff."
https://www.rocklistmusic.co.uk/nme_writers.htm#100_85
Danny Baker kind of excuses the glaring omissions on the voting techniques used. Seems like it was the British first past the post system rather than the more European orientated Proportional Representation! Bands with numerous albums in the running failed to even get one in by the final cut.
DeleteIntriguing... I wonder if the All Mod Cons mystery was the NME writers having their little joke.
DeleteA few years before this, the Jam had a vice-like grip on the affections of NME readers. The Jam fans would dominate every poll, in defiance of the sophisticated and varied selection that the paper's writers would put in front of them every week. It was like Simon's time at MM, when he and his cohorts would try to sell Arthur Russell and AR Kane to legions of Sisters of Mercy and Mission fans.
So the NME writers may have thought that if they left one space in the Top 100 free for readers to fill in their own choices, the spot would naturally go to a Jam album.
Danny Baker kind of excuses the glaring omissions on the voting techniques used. Seems like it was the British first past the post system rather than the more European orientated Proportional Representation! Bands with numerous albums in the running failed to even get one in by the final cut.
ReplyDelete"Swordfishtrombones" reminds me a bit of "Screamadelica" which was universally hailed at the time (an NME (10) if memory serves) and well overshadowed "Loveless" - before everybody realised that for all of Andy Weatherall's tricks, Bobby Gillespie is still singing.
ReplyDeleteSlightly surprised to see Joy Divisions "Closer" ranked so low - it would do far better in subsequent decades, as well as the preponderance of soul/jazz/blues/Buddy Holly (!) - I suspect anything pre Beatles/electric Miles is largely only of academic interest these days.
A major revival is the post-"Pet Sounds" Beach Boys. Completely absent here, their stuff after "Smile" fell apart is a touchstone of psychedelic pop.
I agree with the majority of these choices. Curiously, I think some Costello-isms have survived via King Krule, who is still incredibly popular to the average Millenial/Gen Z music enthusiast. Although he definitely leans towards a slacker rock/Mac Demarco adjacent sound, he has an unapologetic Britishness and punky urgency that brings to mind a kind of Stiff records-type singersongwriter (to my ears at least)
ReplyDeleteInteresting. On the most recent album I heard a bit of an A.R. Kane flavour but maybe that's just the really slow, diffuse tracks, which I got fixated on.
DeleteMac Demarco is a figure that's completely bypassed me
Yeah, I never considered that comparison but in terms of his last album I think an AR Kane comparison is apt. Perhaps I'm thinking more about his earlier, breakout songs ("Easy, Easy", "Dum Surfer", "Biscuit Town") rather than his slower, more recent stuff. Moments from the first couple of albums definitely have a wordy, acerbic kind of edge that brings Costello to mind that feels slightly out of step compared to other '10s indie artists ("As TV sports the Olympic Ebola, I think we might be bipolar, He left the crime scene without the Motorola, Still had dreams of being young Franco Zola").
DeleteAs for Mac Demarco, I personally am not a fan but if you are interested in musical zeitgeists I'd give him a listen considering his enormous influence on music, fashion, culture for a certain subset of millenial/gen z. He's even been blamed for making smoking seem cool (one of his most well known songs is an ode to a favorite cigarette brand)
How about doing 1993 as well which was the last of the three Top 100 polls the NME did pre the internet age?!
ReplyDeleteYes I might do that - probably next week.
DeleteI was also thinking about doing a Totally Personal and Subjective Dropped Away - groups that were central and supreme to me once and are now much less so.
"The only band that matters" mentality moved into hip-hop with Public Enemy - and white rock critics' enthusiasm for them - but Run the Jewels look like the end of the line there.
ReplyDeleteDavid Stubbs complained, in his dismissal of What's Going On, that critics egregiously overvalue political content within music made by black performers. The apotheosis of this is surely Public Enemy, whose utterly vile anti-Semitism seems to get treated as a kooky peccadillo.
DeleteAlso, some critics laughably herald Dre's The Chronic as a "political" record, despite being far closer to a minstrel show. I'd put them in the category of "artists who haven't dropped off, but should have".
If you want an example of gangsta rap handled well, I nominate Ice-T. Not the best rapper, but what a storyteller.
Desperately trying to keep my fist in my mouth and not comment, as I feel I spouted off a bit too much on the previous thread, but alas I have to yield to the impulse.
ReplyDeleteSo, yeah I agree about Patti Smith in particular having dropped away, and even though I've got all the albums from the first period, for some reason I can't bring myself to go near them any more. I think you had to care about her, about her biography, in order to listen to them, and time has made that less compelling,.
With Costello, I think that "This Year's Model" still towers above all his other records, and the reason, as so often, was Martin Rushent. It's the only Costello album that is a rock record, rather than a songs record, and Costello made the same mistake as the Human League, the Buzzcocks and (yes!) The Stranglers when he switched to different producers.
I think there is a big divide between those artists whose popularity depends upon their active presence in the culture, and those who can still maintain interest even when they have retired or died. There definitely seems to be some "X" factor at work where some careers are buoyed up by the active charisma of the person or persons concerned, whereas for others this is not so much of a deal-maker or deal-breaker. On first glance this seems to be pretty random (I mean Bowie and Hendrix were both awesomely charismatic), but I do wonder if we can tease out if there is any underlying pattern that is present.
(The best Bobby Womack album is "Understanding", btw)
Patti Smith is an interesting one. I don't really agree that her biography has become less compelling over time. Her years with Robert Mapplethorpe in the late 60s and early 70s make for a great story, and they seem to fascinate people still. I keep seeing her being referenced. But it is all based on Just Kids, her interview clips on YouTube, and her Instagram account. As a personality, she seems bigger than ever. But as you say, I don't get the impression that anyone listens to the records anymore.
DeletePhil, with regard to the big divide you mention, it seems like you're talking about an artist's cultural longevity (or lack thereof) after their primary burst of relevance and popularity.
DeleteI think the staying power has almost nothing to do with the intrinsic qualities of the artist or their work. Whether they're survivors or drop-offs seems to be decided wholly by others. There's no hidden pattern. They're lucky or not lucky. Those who come after them, whether individual artists or ever-changing audiences, find them, pick them up, and carry them forward or they don't. That's all.
Bowie's a perfect case. In my own span of listening to pop, I first encountered him during his early 80s MTV peak, watched him lapse into total irrelevance, and then saw him re-emerge for a late career high that pretty much canonized him forever. The world curved back around to him, but not because the high quality of his last few albums made everyone forgive and forget Tin Machine. He became a beloved cultural institution for other, bigger reasons you'd have to look elsewhere than Bowie himself to find.
(If anything, maybe the X factor for an artist is: just shut up, wait for the next generation's knock on the door, and when it comes, answer it humbly-- and get your agent on the phone.)
What these discussions have shown, to me at any rate, is that the question of why some artists dropped off between 1975 and 1985 seems somehow invalid when applied to the span of time after that period. Something fundamental outside of the music changed. It's worth another peek at the "Turning Japanese" chapter in "Retromania". Simon wrote that he noticed a gradual change in the mid-80s-- so right around the time this list was published-- from "strong" artists fueled by the anxiety of influence to "weak" ones "flooded by the ancestor's vision"; he sees the change as not limited to pop, but "culture-wide". Off that I'll venture to say that (at least in the present context) the whys behind an artist's "dropping off" should be seen in the light of Simon's Retro Virus. Asking what changed between the mid-70s and mid-80s calls to mind a culture that doesn't exist any longer. Looking past that point, all the way to our own retro culture, it's clear that we live in very different circumstances. More than ever, artists of the past are at the mercy of today's curators, their status determined more by mass-culture fashion cycles than intrinsic worth.
Yes, it may be due to the sensibilities of subsequent generations, or at least the sensibilities of particular taste-makers and influencers in subsequent generations. It seems to be the case that influential young people today favour a certain softness, femininity and gender-fluidity in their cultural icons, which is maybe why Bowie, Freddie and Kate Bush have come more to the fore, and the likes of Springsteen have faded somewhat.
DeleteYeah, and I think that it's interesting to consider if "sensibilities of subsequent generations" isn't a different animal now than it was in the 70s-80s period.
DeleteIt's certainly plausible that Bowie, Freddie and Kate Bush are beloved today because of the reasons you cite. I'd basically agree. However, I think those reasons are less decisive than the impact of cultural curation (per "Retromania") and the way music is consumed now. You can correctly point to certain intrinsic qualities in those artists which makes them popular today. That has to be part of the story. Yet you can just as easily point to their endurance as being the result of random oddities in pop culture, in how their work was used by others, and not always musicians-- as with "Wayne's World" (Queen) or "Stranger Things' (Kate Bush), two obvious examples.
Or with Bowie, consider "Heroes". I checked Wikipedia and there's a standalone page devoted to the track which tells an interesting story about the song's amazing longevity. Over the years Bowie licensed it for lots of commercials (e.g. Pepsi, Walmart, Nike), movies, TV shows, etc. In the handful of years before his death, when Bowie basked in full sainthood, the song got into the public's consciousness from a variety of sources: a Peter Gabriel cover, an X-Factor charity cover, the 2012 London Olympics, and on and on. Suddenly everyone seemed to remember how great he was, probably influenced by the virality of the internet. And who's to say that flurry wasn't a result of earlier hipster appropriations in "The Life Aquatic" (2004) or Flight of the Conchords, which devoted a whole episode in 2007 to Bret's obsession with Bowie?
None of it would have happened without Bowie's talent or the genius of "Heroes"; it's sacrilege to suggest Bowie's stuff is liked for reasons other than his excellence. I just mean that the better part of the explanation of his explosion in the mid-2010s has to do with a series of unconnected, zig-zagging, leap-frogging curatorial choices made by ad execs, designers, filmmakers, and other cultural influencers over the previous few decades. I don't think that dynamic existed in the period 1975-1985, or at least not even close to the same degree.
Well, I would argue that advertisers, film producers and directors etc. are part of the cultural tastemaking fraternity.
DeleteLots of music does get recycled within the culture without its original makers becoming iconic. For example The Sopranos ending with "Chicken Town" and Breaking Bad ending with "Baby Blue" did not particularly elevate John Cooper Clarke or Badfinger. I think there has to be some deeper resonance, the gestalt translating across the zeitgeists, as it were.
Glad someone brought up the Stranger Things / Kate Bush phenomenon as had been mulling over that for a good while meself. Has there ever been a more disproportionate boost to an already well known hit on the back of single TV scene. It’s almost a highly unjust cultural event as there were thousands of other songs they could have chosen that would have been as equally deserving for that scene and the millions of accolades that followed. Kate Bush hardly needed the impact as like Bowie she was already long basking in sainthood on her cosy sofa as Nick S alludes to about Bowie above Would it have been more charitable or egalitarian to have picked something from the low selling but great mid 80s indie repository and made that the global story?
DeleteSo going back to the dropped off or relevant being at the mercy of 21st century curators, I pick a semi random example like Husker Du. A band that has pretty much completely dropped off for younger listeners as they’re practically the only toweringly influential 1980s act that have had zero reissue programmes since their almost unparalleled run of records from ‘Zen Arcade’ through to ‘Warehouse…’ were first released. Nothing whatsoever when countless inferior bands have had overflowing boxset after boxset rolled out on red carpets of praise. Yes some of the early pre SST thrash punk stuff has come out recently but their imperial phase remains stuck in a legal quagmire. Even the likes of Pitchfork has never bothered to review any of those records, which again seems like purgatory for Husker fans desperately wanting them to reach younger audiences. All those Sunday reviews Pfork have published over the last seven years or so. Surely they can make room for even one Husker album which would at least free them from the black hole of anonymity and provide the shot of recognition they surely deserve, as has been the case for The Replacements with their extensive reissue programme and numerous write ups over the last decade.
The Running Up That Hill effect has had precedents in earlier decades. The 1985 Levis ad songs with Sam Cooke and Marvin Gaye became huge sellers. A better comparison however might be The Doors in the 80s as they essentially became the only ‘sixties’ band to namecheck for teenagers, and that mainly came about from getting played in Apocalypse Now which was a huge video store pick for years after and the Danny Sugarman ‘No One Here Gets Out Alive’ book which followed on shortly afterwards. That seems to the only rock biography I can remember seeing on the shelves of my town’s main book shop back then. The bright yellow and red cover with Morrison on the cover helped as well to sell the myth. In 1985 / 6 it was all about The Doors as proper legends! Doors of perception literally as a band like The Stones seemed a bit of a joke by comparison – heavy rotation of crap singles from ‘Dirty Work’ on MTV, Jagger on Spitting Image and him prancing around with Tina Turner on Live Aid. Wasn’t till 1989 that I went ‘ah so there’s a lot lot more to them than that!! And who’s this then, The Byrds….etc. Think it was Keith Richards who commented on the Oliver Stone film something like ‘heh heh, they’ve maybe gone a bit far with old Jim’.mainly came about from getting played in Apocalypse Now which was a huge video store pick for years after and the Danny Sugarman ‘No One Here Gets Out Alive’ book which followed on shortly afterwards. That seems to the only rock biography I can remember seeing on the shelves of my town’s main book shop back then. The bright yellow and red cover with Morrison on the cover helped as well to sell the myth. In 1985 / 6 it was all about The Doors as proper legends! Doors of perception literally as a band like The Stones seemed a bit of a joke by comparison – heavy rotation of crap singles from ‘Dirty Work’ on MTV, Jagger on Spitting Image and him prancing around with Tina Turner on Live Aid. Wasn’t till 1989 that I went ‘ah so there’s a lot lot more to them than that!! And who’s this then, The Byrds….etc. Think it was Keith Richards who commented on the Oliver Stone film something like ‘heh heh, they’ve maybe gone a bit far with old Jim’.
DeleteThat one particular moody picture of Jim Morrison looking directly at the camera has much the same iconographic effect as that one moody picture of Che Guevara looking away from the camera.
DeleteYou can never underrate the boost that being photogenic gave an artist trading in the popular culture. It's a point I've made umpteen times previously, that the main reason why Phil Collins was less cool than Peter Gabriel is that he's uglier.
One of the reasons that the later Stones were so naff is because they looked an absolute disgrace, like cadavers who picked their clothes out of litter bins. This matters a lot less nowadays because pretty much every pop and rock artist has hung around way past their prime and now looks terrible, so the Stones don't stick out as much as they used to.
I think this is one of the underlying reasons for the great levelling out of reputations, and why the once despised (hello Elton!) have been subject to re-evaluation.
Also Simon, what is your students' take on The Police, if any? The impression I get is that they are still massive. Over a million views for a two month old Rick Beato interview with Andy Summers(!):
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V67Fq47U4ng
But not sure if this is a Boomer/Gen X hangover.
I did a class on reggae and mentioned the Police as part of the unique UK relationship with Jamaican music.... they looked a bit blank, whether that's because they barely have heard of the Police or that they had no idea the group started out so reggae influenced. Everybody knows "Every Breath You Take", its become a wedding song, but beyond that I should imagine most young people are unfamiliar with them. Playing "Walking On the Moon" and trying to explain why this was such an amazing soundscape-song to get to Number 1 was difficult to convey...
DeleteI enjoyed this article + it gave me a few ideas so sorry for the splurge! I get a bit tangled up in writing
ReplyDelete-im 29 so no spring chicken but most (per)formative years of using music taste as social standing tool aren't so far behind me - can maybe speak for a certain demographic of nts listener types that went to university in the uk in the 2010s + still make an effort to go out every now and then
-my main idea here is that it seems to me like the canon has shifted to bangers not albums
- by canon, I mean particularly in the sense of consensus, in-group 'if you're in to music you should know '
-i mean bangers in a broad sense - so bangers youd put on on a Friday night having a drink but also a second type of bangers, soft ones that'd fit in a more downbeat/feelings centred (dare i say chill?) playlist <-- for this second sense I'm thinking Arthur Russell, Cocteau twins - the kind of stuff you hear Maria somervile play on nts breakfast
- meanwhile it's rare that I'll actually stick a whole album on - and therefore rare that I'll actually think to discuss/rate/ *evaluate someone else's taste on the basis of* what albums they listen to
I think the canon's still there in the sense of what ppl are listening to in (often public) playlists, sharing on social media, playing at parties or on radio shows - just that it's artists or tracks that are the point rather than the releases they came out on or albums in general. You might be judged as hopeless if you didn't know about the magic of Everywhere but noone cares if you haven't listened to Rumours
A second thing - I agree that funk/soul album namedrops aren't necessarily an arbiter of good taste these days. However when I was a student you couldn't move for 'funk and soul' rare groove nights. And while people might not listen to the whole of e.g. Maggot Brain all the time, they may well be doing the dishes to Can You Get To That on a daily basis and linking their mates to it. Everyone loves al green
As a side point, Im also thinking that my generation (1992-1996ish?) fits awkwardly between our albums-focused parents/older siblings and ppl younger than us who had Spotify/yt their whole teenage years. When I was say 13, i was albums-focused. Didn't have internet connection for streaming/torrenting til about 15 --> still buying CDs and caught tail end of nme (didn't know about music blogs - could have saved some pocket money there). And even when I was more into dance music,, I was still studying the fact lists from around 2012,https://www.factmag.com/2012/09/03/the-100-best-albums-of-the-1990s-100-81/ which I can't imagine the face putting out today. So I've experienced a bit of a change in the value system, especially in the last 10 years. L loads of us probs put ourselves through Horses as teenagers, it's just that now noone cares 😿
A Few exceptions:
ReplyDelete- albums where the mood of the whole album is cohesive enough to whack on - and almost has the function of a good set or playlist or a really long track. The main time I can think of sharing albums (or rven tslking about them) with mates rather than just tracks would be like Alice Coltrane journey in satchidananda, haroumi hasono albums you used to only be able to get on YouTube, old Latin/afrobeat albums
- experimental/challenging boomkat/rewire/modern classical type stuff - nyege nyege - from pre-80s, krautrock or reissued early electronic pioneers etc
-my gendered taste and listening habits. It seems like my girl mates are more likely to embrace a whole album? E.g. weyes blood, Lana, erykah badu, Latin music + singer songwriters (mainly from 70s). Would have to ask em though 👻 dunno if many off this list would make it into their canon
-drivers - I don't drive but my mates who do are more likely to properly hear out and play full potter payper/d block Europe mixtapeswhen they're in the car, where I'll just scan for the bangers. But then this stuff has its own hierarchies and canons and these mates weren't overly bothered about completing the top 500 albums you have to listen to before you die in the first place
Dunno what ppl make of all this or whether it already went without saying?? Also interested in what context you'd actually listen to Horses or an Elvis Costello/Jimi Hendrix LP in 70s/80s. Did everyone have their own record player? Were albums something you'd listen to with mates, even experimental ones and ones with boring filler tracks or was this more of a private thing?
Thanksssss
“Did everyone have their own record player?” This makes me feel very old! The answer is that not everyone had one, but many people did, at least in my world. Often there was a family record player in the living room, and for teenagers having your own record player in your bedroom was a bit of a status symbol. I had to wait until my parents were out to put Horses and Marquee Moon on the family turntable. It was a big moment in my life - aged maybe 17 - when I got my own first record player. Until then, most of my music consumption would have been on the radio in my bedroom.
Delete“Were albums something you would listen to with your mates?” Yes, absolutely. We would often listen to a complete album, side one followed by side two. Sometimes as background music, sometimes as a conscious act of appreciation. Someone would buy the new Frank Zappa album, or whatever, and you would go round to listen to it. The scarcity of music meant that if you had invested in buying an album, you would put a lot of effort into trying to like it. Buying an album and then finding out it was a dud was a disaster.
At parties, people would put an album on the family record-player and play the two or three bangers, and then take it off and play something else. Acting as the DJ in that way was a good way to keep occupied if you were socially awkward.
Many people had their music on cassette, because the players were relatively cheap and compact. For a while most of my collection was on cassettes, both pre-recorded and albums taped from friends or the library. I had only my most prized favorites on vinyl. With cassettes, selecting tracks was a real chore, so they definitely pushed you towards listening to an entire album at a time. Which was why mixtapes became such a big deal. It took time and effort to make them, and they were the only way to get a curated selection of highlights like a modern playlist.
well nowadays you can find any shit you want but in the past you either listened to the radio or bought or borrowed physical records, CD's or tapes and play them. so your listening was kinda limited. Especially if you don't live in a city. So with the internet and streaming you can pick and choose, browse I guess people listening to mixes and playlists more than albums and usually are consumed passively. in the past you would actively listen to the album or single you bought. Albums would be absorbed without skipping the bad tracks. Each record bought would be consumed until used up, the ones you loved would never be fully consumed, the crap ones would get one listen, you'd regret the purchase. Buying records always carried the danger of ending up with a dud. That's where radio and magazines come in. They were a vital part of record buying. You could hear the singles released from the album so you'd get a taster, and reviews in magazines helped a great deal in deciding what to buy. Friends too helped, you could borrow their copy of Astral Weeks and after a week buy your own. I've still got it!
DeleteCassettes were the cheap option for younger kids - both the format was slightly cheaper, and the playback mechanism was much cheaper. And it took up less space, was more portable. Then you had the Walkman and its cheaper rip-offs coming in.
DeleteCassettes were selling more than vinyl, I think, by the end of later years of the 1980s and carried on being a big format in the '90s - it was something like tapes > vinyl > compact discs. Then the CD definitively squeezed out vinyl and you started out the phenomenon of too long albums - artists filling up the extra space on a compact disc, losing the focus of the trad 40 minute LP. Long sprawling albums, especially hip hop, approaching double vinyl LP length - that no one would want to listen to all the way through. You would boil them them to a favorite set of tracks within that compact disc.
Cassettes / cassette players - I remember this being gendered as well as age related. At university, the men would more often have a record player; girls tended to have cassette players in their student rooms.
That's a good point about how much of a pain it was to try to skip tracks when listening to a cassette. With vinyl, it was always annoying - but it was easier, you could see the blank groove between tracks on the LP. You still tended to listen to records all the way through - at least one side in one go.
DeleteI remember at one point, having a slightly superior cassette player as much of a hi-fi set up, and it had a feature where it could whizz through the tape and identify the break between tracks. So that made it easier, but it was fallible - sometimes it would mistake a pause, a bit of silence within a track, for a track break. And although you weren't having to press 'forward 'and 'play; yourself, you still had to wait there as it rolled through the tape. So far from a perfect solution.
One thing I've noticed with my younger son, who's now 18, and who grew up totally with Spotify etc (well there's a few compact discs from very early on in his pop fandom), is that even with his absolute favoritest artists, he won't listen to the album all the way through in sequence. He always puts it into shuffle mode, even within that one single album. And mostly he just likes to do playlists and shuffle within that.
DeleteSo the whole aesthetic of the sequenced album, that builds and goes somewhere, that seems to be a dying thing.
Compact discs, when they start to sprawl and get baggy and bloated, that really destroyed that thing you had with the vinyl LP where each side was sequenced - the weirder, longer song at the end of the first side. The second side mirroring the first side by starting with the catchiest, most instant songs.
Usually - you had your clever-clever bands who would start the whole album with a weirdo instrumental. But mostly bands started each side of the record with a single or single-like tune on.
That's also my recollection on cassettes being more popular than vinyl from the early 80s on. Seem to remember even as far back as 1980, big Christmas stocking smashes like Abba's 'Super Trooper', heavily TV advertised K-Tel Hits Collections, the obligatory Richard Clayderman album for Granny, all being bought by a lot of people on cassette! As Ed points out record players were more of a parent's rarely used 1970s object in the 'good' room but not something that mid 80s teenagers really craved -- it was predominantly the Ghettoblaster that was the cool thing to own, groups of kids walking around in the summer evenings with one between them, not playing hip hop tapes as such but just the big chart albums of the day. Bootleg cassettes of live stadium concerts were also very popular despite the crap muffled audio. The twin cassette player was the best way to tape albums of friends -- doing it with a record player was generally more cumbersome. The extra track or longer version was more often than not on the cassette rather than the vinyl, sort of a precursor to the CD trend of doing same.
DeleteIf you then subsequently got more into music and wanted the LPs you could get a cheap enough hi-fi with a turntable in the likes of Woolworths or other big general department store. My parents got me one in the local TV shop in late 88 for my 19th birthday but by the CD dominance of the early / mid 90s, turntables were primarily just being stocked by specialist audio shops like Richer Sounds, and pricey at that.
True as well about the increasing CD bloatedness of albums as the 90s progressed. Some of those Wu Tang and single artist jungle or electronica albums went on forever and that started happening with rock as well with sprawling releases with a lot seven minute plus tracks.
All the talk of formats reminds me of one aspect of music-buying which I often found annoying, back then, but now sort of miss.
ReplyDeleteWith LPs and singles issued on the three main formats, CD, vinyl and cassette, record companies would often slap on extra tracks or slightly alter the track listings to get people to buy multiple formats. CDs would sometimes have different artwork, if you cared about that, and you could collect the longboxes.
On the one hand I hated the fact that I might have to fork over extra cash to get a B-side, alternate version, or remix stashed away on a cassingle or whatever. Often they'd be worthless, but here and there you'd find a gem to fuel the next round of cash-wasting. And some bands, like The Smiths, really took advantage of the various formats to release some of their great songs as side quests.
Formats differed by country, sometimes, too: a track added, a track left off. Those were the worst because import records always cost double. If I ran across an import version of a favorite record I already owned in its domestic format, I'd read the track-listing with dread, hoping there wouldn't be a reason for me to part with more money. I wince to think of the records I bought twice solely for an extra track-- and positively ashamed to think about the ones I paid a handsome price to buy because they had *fewer* tracks. As a teenager my taste for UK bands left me in a state of (happy) impoverishment.
I think lists are everywhere now. There's a site called RateYourMusic where the main feature is list making, it seems everyone has at least a dozen lists of their own. Then you have discogs which has lists made by members. So there's no shortage of lists. But lists such as the ones in the NME, Mojo, Record Collector for example, had a dedicated readership, and such lists would be influential or at least provide an index of albums to checkout for those readers.
ReplyDeleteSo while lists are everywhere they hardly influence taste as they may have done in the past when the media was more concentrated.
Marley is another surprise omission from the '85 list. I thought that one record at least - whether Legend or a more hipster selection - would've been included, particularly in light of the wider issue around re-balancing the canon. Strange. I presume he has currency among younger listeners today, but who knows . . .
ReplyDeleteThere's been a biopic made just recently about Bob, but it looked a bit low budget, and the lead actor didn't look remotely like him.
DeleteThis was not the only such list in 1985. Shortly after the one in the NME, there was another in Sounds: https://www.rocklistmusic.co.uk/sound100.html. At a glance I think there are fewer dropped away.
ReplyDeleteAh, interesting. I wonder if Sounds did one in the mid-70s?
DeleteBob Marley is a surprise too actually but I have a feeling that's about to change with the success of his biopic (which looks very mediocre). My wife is a school social worker with a student body that is largely POC and she's conveyed that that movie has been a hit with them (keep in mind many kids, hell many people in general now, just watching things on streaming so they have been going out to see this in theaters). Whether this actually leads more to a worship of Marley a la Jim Morrison over the actual music / potential reggae revival remains to be seen but there does seem to be a lot of genuine interest.
ReplyDeleteAlso the Reggae & Revolution film series on the Criterion Channel right now is pretty popular. It's not completely marginalized.
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