Beatles vs Rolling Stones

[Rit]

those kids couldn't even scare a kitten. this will be easy.

[RocDoc]

Good weekend everyone?

Well...
<sub>In The Court Of The Crimson King - King Crimson (1969)
Electric Ladyland - Jimi Hendrix (1969)


these two are simple and elegant? you'll have to explain that one, RocDoc.</sub>

You have a problem picking out even the 'elegance' in either of those two?
You have a blaring bent hole in your soul then...and no explanation of mine is going to make a difference. I'll shed a tear for you, OK?
Simply carry on, rit.

In terms of 'simple', Hendrix was a master at playing and recording the sounds he heard in his head. He did not complicate things against his own nature.

To him, 'simple'. See?
He likewise makes it simple for those of us with the least bit of a musical bent to understand what he was about.
To a person who considers Britney some sort of musical apotheosis, well they're going to have a problem with Jimi and with Fripp & Co...

...and Edward The Mad Shirtgrinder on Quicksilver's Shady Grove, with Nicky Hopkins going polyrhythmically MAD for like 9 minutes, does not bowl us over necessarily with it's complexity, but that the PATH to where it's going IS simple to anticipate IF ypou know music.

~

'Don van Vliet is a charlatan.'

A simple factual statement. Why all the folderol?

~

...Zappa spun on in a cyclical universe with very little relation to mentoring future rockers...

Not simplistic 3 chord indie rockers, no. But you're totally unaware of the incredible players that came though Zappa's bands?? Jazz players who he influenced with his polystylistic mania...Jean Luc Ponty, George Duke among many others....the Bozzios, Howard Kaylan and Mark Volman(who already had been popstars in their own right)...

Adrian Belew, Steve Vai.
That they maybe don't fit in with your preference for this pure intuitive idiot savant childlike discovery of 'music', take nothing away from how wrong you are that FZ mentored no-one.

But again there's active mentoring and there's admiration inspiring an emulation of a musician's style and feel. How is it FZ's problem that his vast and encompassing and sincere interests in a huge variety of genres makes it difficult for the average indie rocker to follow and understand?

Far from the simpletons of hip-hop muttering simplistic couplets about ho's n'shit...and giving every barely literate kid on the street the idea that 'Hey! I'm clever as shit! No I can't play, but I can rap. I can rap; I can be a STAR!'

Zappa honestly truly gave MUSICIANS a honest target to achieve, to WORK for....to hone their musicality.
His talent was far more dense than the lightweight bullshit which most music 'fans' feel is perfectly fine to cheer for.

If this society, the make money fast, be a 'star', get rich quick-society of our hasn't valued the sort of work which Zappa put in, how is/was this his 'problem'? This 'mentoring' osmosis which you seem to think is critical.

[RocDoc]

Do you value Brian Wilson at all, rit?
Has he done any worthwhile work?

Is 'Smile' trash to you?

I've GOT to anticpate 'yes' to both, since all you've said so far make those antithetical to what it is you find 'of worth'.

[Rit]

There's a place for Zappa's setting of a standard for music to aspire to, but this is too teleological for my tastes.

true, i'm a simple 3 chord indie rocker, so i miss the boat on Zappa.

and hip-hop'ers are hardly simplistic. They're remarkable artists, as far as i'm concerned. and it takes considerable skill to be able to immerse what's important to inner-city kids and grownups in sheer rhapsody... isn't that what it's about? making the world more palatable through celebration and shared values?

hip hop is considerably artful.

Zappa is a self-absorbed, preening, technically proficiant virtuoso with pretensions to cultural bohemianism. you know it, too, RocDoc

You're trying to impress upon the Zappa nay-sayers that his talent was more dense than the normal musician... Dense? what sort of value is that supposed to convey? That the best things in life are difficult, removed from the average person, rationally honed to intellectual precision? This is not a criteria for the Good.

[Rit]

i have Pet Sounds which every indie rocker is supposed to love, so say the critics.

Well, I actually do like it, and i can appreciate the musical arrangements. I like the general mood of it, and it pleases me. But i don't consider Brian Wilson to be any sort of genius, as the general consensus seems to be.

[Kensterberg]

I think I'm as big a proponent of "untutored" musicians as anyone, but I've got to agree with some of the points that RocDoc just made. Just as there's nothing that says you've got to have a degree in music performance to create great rock and roll, there's also nothing that says you can't be a great musician AND a great rocker. Zappa's musical chops and intelligence certainly do count for something -- and the fact that his bands were routinely regarded as proving grounds for up and coming musicians says a lot for his mentoring abilities. Adrian Belew alone makes a fine case for Zappa's ability as a mentor.

I've only heard a handful of Zappa's recordings, and nothing (knowingly) from Cpt. Beefheart, so I really don't have a dog in this fight. But as someone who was a mohawked tubist in a brass choir in 1984, I want to attest to the fact that great music can be created by both schooled and intuitive performers. There's no monopoly on creativity and talent, and their are some musical statements that can be made with three chords, and others that require years of practice to even come close to attaining.

(And speaking of years to attain ... I was listening to parts of Smile the other day, and I have to again state that I am simply in awe of the complexity of the sounds that Brian Wilson first heard very nearly forty years ago. If I heard this stuff and was stuck in a studio in the sixties, with the expectation of more "Fun, Fun, Fun," I'd have gone right out of my mind, too. Brilliant record.)

[Rit]

yeah, those Beach Boys singles are fantastic. you're right.

and perhaps i'm making too much of a polemic about my Zappa vs Beefheart posts. I just happen to think that Zappa is overrated (though natrually quite talented). and that Beefheart is unfairly dismissed - sometimes even going unlistened too, such as by you, Ken.

[Kensterberg]

Rit -- Like I said, I really don't have a dog in this fight between Zappa and Beefheart. My perception is that both are more than a bit overrated by their most zealous fan(atic)s, but that there's more than some merit to each. Of course, I've also read some just devastatingly brutal critical dissections of Beefheart, so I have to simply state that I haven't heard anything by the man (at least not knowingly), but I can respect that others (who obviously HAVE heard him) really think he's great.

From what I do know about the recording of Trout Mask Replica (again, I haven't heard it, but I've read critics who have!) the whole thing was much less "spontaneous" than what the good Captain might have you believe. Great rock and roll isn't necessarily about actually being spontaneous or improvisational, it's about the appearence of spontaneity. When Bono or Springsteen perform, it can SOUND like their discovering new things in the music right there on stage. (I once heard a bootleg of the Boss doing "And Then She Kissed Me" that sounded like the whole song had just burst into his and the E Streeter's heads that evening, fully formed, and was being played for the very first time ever. It's an amazing feeling, but it's not "the truth," right?) Of course, most of their performances are carefully scripted out, or at least well considered beforehand.

Oh well, I've expended too much time on two artists that I've barely even listened to ... such is the life of a rock and roll geek.

[Rit]

I once heard a bootleg of the Boss doing "And Then She Kissed Me" that sounded like the whole song had just burst into his and the E Streeter's heads that evening, fully formed, and was being played for the very first time ever. It's an amazing feeling, but it's not "the truth," right?

you summed up why i feel uneasy with much of rock and roll. i want the truth, goddamnit! i can handle the truth!!

but searching so puristically for the truth can be a madman's game, so i'll try to be less intense about it, heh.

[Kensterberg]

Rit -- if you want the musical "truth" then I'd suggest getting into improvisational jazz. That's about as close to true spontaneity as you can get in a musical setting. Sometimes it's brilliant, other times ... well, I'm sure you can imagine.

But every form of musical expression relies primarily upon certain agreements between the performer, even improv. "I'll take the first lead, then it'll go to the piano player ..." etc. And when you're actually playing songs, particularly the simple verse-chorus-verse blues and pop structures at the heart of rock and roll, it's hard to effectively veer far from the script. Now someone like Springsteen (particularly before he became so god-damned famous) can sometimes make something new and original right before your eyes, but it's not common.

All this said, there are obviously some artists who are much closer scripted than others. Dylan used to be notoriously quick to call a track finished (which worked with Like a Rolling Stone (a second take), but was disasterous on Desire (where every song on the LP was weaker than subsequent live versions)), and Lou Reed's New York is the next best thing to "learn the songs, play it to the tape, release it" with almost no additional overdubs or edits. But ultimately, virtually every performance is largely scripted, and a lot of the unscripted stuff (frankly) sucks. It is the illusion of spontaneity that counts -- the experience with the musician and the rest of the audience. Truth is subjective, truth is illusory, truth is ... well, anything but simple.

Did that make any sense at all?

[Rit]

hell yes, that made sense.
that's probably why i won't stick with improv jazz for any length of time. its too extreme a position to take.

So, compromise is best. I want cutting edge, exciting rawk bands, mixing that instinct in improv with basic bare bones building blocks. like the Stooges or even the Yardbirds, the Who in the 60s (i don't like any of the rock opera stuff), much punk (though i'm a bigger fan of the post punk genre).

so how to explain my love for Joy Division/ New Order? dunno, because there's nothing spontaneous about their music.... i would put that down to an attraction to the alienated feel of most of it. which appealed to me once strongly and still does.

So: no improv jazz, but unpredicatable rock stars are fine - i'm cutting my cake and eating it too. Syd Barrett, Nick Cave, and Jack White (from the White Stripes) are all acceptable. Iggy Pop moreso, and Bob Dylan most of all.

[phil]

Ken ~ Jazz, by its own definition, is about improvisation !

Were you talking about Free, avant-garde or Modern Jazz maybe ??

[JACkory]

How is Joy Division's music NOT spontaneous?

[Rit]

The songs are fairly pre-meditated, and the live shows were supposed to be mechanical affairs, in-theory.

of course, Ian Curtis' epilepsy put a wrench in that ethic, but the underlying pose of Joy Division was nonetheless supposed to be enclosed and restrictive.

the lyrics too, they're very archaic and laboured sounding, sometimes.

[Rit]

if any of you want a real debate, one where chairs and tables are likely to be thrown, and the sun and moon go all out of sync, then we should discuss Syd Barrett vs Roger Waters.

i'll make it worth your while, we should even start a new board for that ;D