August 18, 2005
Brit-pop
So, I've been thinking about the big things in life recently- life, death, love, brit-pop, mainly just brit-pop. I have rekindled my love of Blur nd for the past week have been on a steady diet of Parklife and The Great Escape. It's making me strong. Also, the other night I watched this documentary about the late 70's early 80's music scene out of Sheffield. It was called Made in Sheffield. It was terrible. The sleeve made it sound like it was going to be somewhat about Pulp, which is why I watched it. But mainly it just had Jarvis Cocker talking about other bands. Cabaret Voltaire and the Human League were the focus of the film. And both of these bands were rubbish. Cabaret Voltaire is one of the alltime worst bands. I was tricked into buying one of their CD's once. Now I use it as a coaster. The Human League is just as bad. You might know them from that 80's pop hit that goes, "Don't you want me baby, don't you want me ohohohoh." Early Human League was like a sinister Kraftwerk, if Kraftwerk was a group of Brits who made terrible music, rather than a group of German robots (or maybe technically they were androids. I don't know, I'll have to ask Huffine.)
But anyway. Brit-pop, huh. Good stuff. I've been thinking about the whole Blur vs. Oasis thing, and to be honest, I don't know how anybody could think that Oasis was better. Sure, Oasis had some good things going for it, the whole Liam-Noel dynamic was fun. There were some great singles too- "Supersonic", "Cigarettes and Alcohol", "Don't Look Back in Anger". Oasis could rip off the best of 'em with the best of 'em. Take for example that new single "Layla", which is a great remake of "Street Fighting Man." And then there's that song that ripped off the Coca-Cola song.
But let's be honest about a few things. Noel has put the most awful lyrics to good tunes since Paul McCartney. "Slowly walking down the hall/Faster than a cannonball." Now that's just stupid. It employs my all time least favorite lyrical device, the nonsensical contradiction (for a textbook example of this, see Bush- "Glycerine"). Oasis also loses points in my book for the fact that the frontman is not the leader of the band. This for some reason always annoys me, which is the only reason I don't like the Who nearly as much as I know I should.
But Blur, now there's a band. Good tunes, pretty good lyrics, good style. Just out there singin' songs, livin' the dream. And sure, Damon Albarn is just a pretty boy, but he's still cooler than Noel and Liam and their contrived attempts to be bad boys.
But enough about Blur and Oasis. Pulp in my opinion was the best Brit pop band. The 1998 record This is Hardcore, is one of the most insanely underated records of all time. In fact, it's in my all time top 3. And "Common People" was the best Brit-pop single. Jarvis Cocker is a genius. If you would like to look further into Brit-pop, I have written some questions to elicit study and discussion.
1) Justine Frischmann of Elastica- Hottest rock chick ever?
Sub-Question- Too good for Damon Albarn, or, too good for anyone?
2)The (London) Suede- terrible, or just slightly terrible?
3)the Morrissey song "Suedhead" is on
a) Viva Hate
b) Bona Drag
c) Both
4) Which is a sadder comment on America- the fact that the only hit Blur had
in America was "Song 2" (that Woo-Hoo song); or the fact that Americans
actually like "Song 2".
In unrelated news, my new band The Old Guard will be holding auditions to replace a founding member who played somethin, who recently moved away. Auditions will begin tomorrow, sometime after dusk but before dawn. If you wanne be a part of rock history, be there.
Our sound is like Cabaret Voltaire.
Posted by acm at August 18, 2005 12:16 PM
Trackback Pings
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://chattablogs.com/mt/mt-tb.cgi/24900
Listed below are links to weblogs that reference Brit-pop:
Comments
1. gwen stefani - hottest rock chick ever. frischmann isnt that hot, if at all.
2. terrible, but less terrible if you think frischmann is hot.
3. both
4. the fact that blur has only had one hit in america is the sadder commentary. re: liking song 2, everyone knows lots of people like popular songs, which are often poor songs, but the fact that americans havent heard and loved more blur is proof that there arent enough americans who DO appreciate good music to compensate for the ones who do like song 2, et al.
ive been listening to blur, too, this week, interestingly enough. and of course blur is etter than oasis. i love the diatribe on the lyrics.
another thing, wasn't 'girls & boys' a fairly big hit in the US? i recall hearing it fairly often when i was first getting into rock in 94 or 5.
good luck with the band auditions, but you didnt say where.
Posted by: dp at August 18, 2005 03:31 PM
Gwen Stefani doesn't count as a rock chick. You have to play guitar to be considered a rock chick. And Girls and Boys actually did hit #59 on the American charts. DP, I give you a B+ in Brit-pop.
Posted by: ACM at August 18, 2005 11:10 PM
thank you. i wish we'd had music history classes in school. my gpa would have been a full point higher basedo n the grade i just received.
"I went to Marr School of Music, and I'm succeeding in life!"
Posted by: dp at August 19, 2005 12:55 PM