A quick note ahead of tomorrow: @GoatersLeftShin is busy in the day and so this week's clues/selection won't appear until tomorrow evening.
I feel if I was listening to this for the first time I’d be scoring a lot lower.
It helped that I know the album of the back of my hand as mates would play it alot back in day when we’d sit in a garage and smoke weed all day, they all loved rap/hip hop which I never really did - but when they put on The Streets I could get onboard with that way more than rappers singing about dollars, hoes and cars etc , I suppose it’s a bit of nostalgia more than anything hence I enjoyed the gig the other week.
Technology has not just helped the diy side of production and home recording etc. It has also helped in the self-teaching (learning?) with so many tutorials and things readily available. Resulting in so many new bands now being technically excellent at their instruments, despite being at an early stage, unproven ir inexperienced. Which previously was reserved for the masters of their instrument, people that dedicsted themselves to it, picked things up on tour from others, came up with their own styles etc, and really stood out. Now anyone in their teens in their bedroom seems to go straight into complex pieces and by the time they are forming bands, they seem damn capable at their own instruments, which makes the overall outcome maybe that bit more sterile. Also think the recent wave of newer bands seem more obsessed with defining their 'sound' from the outset, rather than just saying what they feel they want to say and letting the sound come from that.
Maybe they should turn to their Dads for the lyrics. We've all got plenty of life experience so surely it would work if they wrote the music and we provided the words.That's an excellent point and I'd not really thought about it in those terms despite the fact it's under my nose most days. Vocal range aside, I don't think my 16 year old and his mates would have any trouble being a fairly adept Smiths, New Order (sans some of the tech) or Beatles tribute band but creating your own music in your own voice is another kettle of fish entirely. Now they've stopped fixating on which pedals to replicate what sounds, they've eventually got round to trying to write their own material and that's when you see the current gap between their seeming adeptness and maturity and where they might more truly be. In fairness it's hard to find your voice at that age when you have little life experience as you rightly point out, that is gained by going and having experiences beyond your bedroom.
Slight aside, said son has got a bass/baritone voice so when they play early New Order it's this slightly dislocating experience of hearing it as it might have sounded had Ian Curtis not died, increased further by the fact that they don't have the same level of electronics as NO so it has a more traditional rock band sound to it. Unsurprisingly the Ceremony stuff makes sense but hearing Age of Consent onwards sung more like Curtis than Barney is interesting.
I think the obsession with bands defining their sound can't be helped by the massive atomisation and discussion around sub-genres some of which is commercially driven - "in this video I'm going to talk about the best pedals for shoegaze and if you like what you hear checkout the amazing offers available from my good friends at mufftwats.com"
Because Sumner, Morris and Gilbert are just as hooky — which is why they still make music I like without him. But Paul Weller is decidedly not. Foxton wrote The Jam’s best song IMO: Smithers-Jones.I think Foggy has never made a secret of the fact that he is a hook junkie and has quite exacting standards for what qualifies.
One thing I've never quite sussed though is Foggy's love of Hooky's hookiness (which I thoroughly agree with) but his seeming lukewarmness to Bruce Foxton's.
Definitely not punk. Like this record, it’s difficult to pigeonhole.Are you going punk with your choice then?
@threespires brutal week in the chair comes to an end.
You can hardly accuse him of not fighting valiantly for his nomination, but six "one" votes and nothing higher than a 7.5 gives The Streets' A Grand Don't Come For Free an average of 4.06. Interestingly, it did pull in 16 voters, which is well above average, and I think the pages of discussion for this album make it one of the more interesting nominations.
And yes, it's enough for bottom spot. The man replaced at the bottom, @GoatersLeftShin, gets an immediate chance to wrest back his "crown". Or maybe he's aiming for something a little higher? Whenever you're ready (which may or may not be much later today).
Maybe they should turn to their Dads for the lyrics. We've all got plenty of life experience so surely it would work if they wrote the music and we provided the words.