Newsgroups: bit.listserv.allmusic
Date:         Thu, 7 Jan 1993 14:05:28 EST
From:         "Michael H. Bloom" <MHB@MITVMA.BITNET>
Subject:      Cadence and cascade

From:         Ilia <CC29@IONA.BITNET>
Subject:      Re: MTV

> artistic. Sometimes mediocre bands have nice videos, like Duran Duran's
> _All She Wants Is_... (I'm all ready to jump into a cold lake) ...

At least some of Duran Duran's videos were directed by Kevin Godley and Lol
Creme, a/k/a "the smart ones" in 10cc, so a lot of the perceived good taste
comes from them and not from the Durans. (Not that the Durans didn't like
their taste of flesh-- one of the main points of agreement among the members
of the highly diverse Power Station was how much they liked the ladies...)

> In any case, for some strange reason, I still prefer to see the
> actual band playing.

I agree completely, with the accent on "playing." Miming to the track is not
acceptable.

From:         The Tape Dude <gmgettie@THAMA1.APGEA.ARMY.MIL>
Subject:      So far, so good...

> So far, these are the people that have sent me their song selections for
> the compilation tape:
>
> MHB@MITVMA                               Michael Bloom

Uh, I didn't send you song selections, I sent you the list of artists I was
contemplating-- kind of thinking out loud, y'know, refining my ideas. But
yeah, I will be a (dazzling?) presence on this compilation. It looks like
this might be at least a two tape job!

From:         Mike <MASUDA@SJSUVM1.BITNET>
Subject:      Re: MTV

> How about some classical jazz pieces?
> More footage from, say, Weather Report, or perhaps Toto (nod to Drummer)?

They used to have a segment of "closet classics," where they would show some
of that stuff-- a few classic jazz movies, some '60s and '70s footage from
European TV shows and whatnot. I remember a live-in-the-studio King Crimson
performance, with Jamie Muir, of "Larks' Tongues in Aspic Part 1" that was
breathtaking. I gather this threatened the attention span of their viewers,
because they've long since dropped the feature.

> Liquid Television is cool, if they could show more of the innovative stuff.
> "Dog Boy" bites.

Well, you remember what Calvin said was cool about Saturday morning cartoons?
"Idiots, explosives, and falling anvils."

From:         8 megs of CDs <gmgettie@THAMA1.APGEA.ARMY.MIL>
Subject:      It's gettin' late

> I also think MTV should expand their "120 minutes" and "Headbanger's Ball,"
> shoot all the VJs they have now, get rid of all their silly cartoons and
> ridiculous game shows, dance shows and soap operas, and just play videos like
> they used to. It was *OK* back when they did that, wasn't it?

No. Their VJ's were always microcephalics.

From:         SWASEY@PORTLAND.BITNET
Subject:      Re: MTV

> Well I think MTV as its own pure concept isn't necessarily a bad one.
> It potentially can give an artist an opportunity to express him/herself
> or his/her music in a new/different way.  I think the problem lies in
> what MTV has become.  It tends to be, in my opinion, a shallow,
> trendsetting, mess of conformity.  Someone like Peter Gabriel uses
> a music video for all the right reasons, in my opinion.  But then you
> have your bands/"artists" who have been CREATED by MTV.  I guess you have
> to wonder if they or their music could stand on its own without the
> kick in the pants it gets from MTV promotion.

I remember back around the Summer of Love that I thought it would be a great
idea to give the Jefferson Airplane a week's use of a video camera and see
what came of it. I happened upon a PBS spot featuring Big Brother and the
Holding Company playing live in the studio, and I remember it being superb:
not just because Janis was doing her bit, but I remember an instrumental jam
on the theme from "Hall of the Mountain King" that seemed really cogent at
the time (and no, I wasn't on drugs myself!), and put the lie to the notion
that the instrumentalists weren't up to Janis's musical level.

As for MTV making bands, they wish. Sure, they have some clout-- and the
majors, when they go out to sign new artists, are certainly cognizant of
how they're gonna look on video-- but the band MTV claims they "broke" is
Nirvana, and they had carte blanche from Polygram (plus a striking video
of a memorable tune to work with).

I note a casual use of the word "marketing" in this context-- I'm probably
one of the worst offenders myself! What it's supposed to mean is the art of
figuring out who your customers are, how to reach them better, and then how
to serve them better. If you're Sony, you're entitled to assume that your
customers are the entire MTV viewing public, and "marketing" means to cram
more tits and ass and smoke grenades into your videos. But if you're Urban
Ambience, or even if you're Alligator Records, then most of the marketing
effort is expended in locating a customer base in the first place!

From:         Russ Gelinas <R_GELINAS@UNHH.UNH.EDU>
Subject:      Re: Dizzy Gillespie - RIP (sob)

> Got any good ideas of just what this new form of jazz will be?  Perhaps
> a marriage between trad. jazz and modern synthesis (ie. MIDI, computers)
> You should be right there.  Most m.s. stuff I've heard has little to
> do with jazz sensibilities, but i'll admit to being far from the cutting
> edge of that stuff.  Anything interesting to report in that vein?

Hard to swing via MIDI. Vast improvements are needed in the man/machine
interface to make it respond to the subtleties of a good jazzman's rhythm.
If you have good academic credentials, you might want to drop by the Music
and Cognition Group (formerly known as the Experimental Music Studio) here
at MIT (it's part of the Media Lab, at the other end of the campus from me)
and discuss the matter with them.

Of course, if you have good academic credentials, you yourself probably
can't swing to save your life.

From:         Paul Heroy <HEROY@LSUVM.BITNET>
Subject:      Re: It's gettin' late

> ... I can't think of another band that consistently uses the bass as a lead
> instrument. BTW, the standard slogan for fans is "Primus SUCKS!".

Yes, before Chris Squire became a coke casualty.
Hot Tuna, whenever Jack Casady's on form.
Any band with Percy Jones in it, specifically the reunited Brand X.
Ditto Jaco Pastorius-- check out his work with Joni Mitchell.
Hugh Hopper. Jack Bruce. Steve Swallow.

With a slogan like that, how do you tell who your real fans are? :-)

BTW, I like _Suck On This_ the best of their recorded work.

From:         spideroni <REWOICC@ERENJ.BITNET>
Subject:      loreena loreena

> i recently got copies of the first three albums: _elemental_, _parallel
> dreams_ and _to drive the cold winter away_. the latter is a collection of
> christmas songs - some religious and some not - inspired by loreena's
> strong association of music with the winter holidays.

There's a remarkably similar album by the Irish trad rock band Horslips--
same title, same aesthetic, and I wouldn't be surprised if the two records
had a lot of the same songs in common. Horslips's idea was to play a kind
of rock'n'roll using the traditional repertoire as harmonic and structural
skeleton, which was a cool idea. They were almost up there with Fairport,
Steeleye, etc. in the electric trad annals-- but something went wrong, and
their fusion got didactic and stupid. And even then it might have been okay
if their records weren't ham-handedly produced. Their _Drive the Cold Winter
Away_ is primarily acoustic, though, and some have called it their last good
record.

From:         MMORSE@YORKVM1.BITNET
Subject:      Re: The 40's and 50's

>   Welcome to the wonderful world of sociology. The description of this
> (50s) pop subculture fits formations in other decades because they are
> structurally similar, not because history repeats itself. Or, if you'd
> rather it that way, then you could say that the reason for historical
> repetition is known, and is a function of social structure. If there are
> surprising, even daunting similarities between the culture, the experience,
> and the behaviour of people involved with swing, bop, r 'n r, funk, psyche-
> delic, disco, punk, new wave, alternative, and on ad infinitum, it not
> because there is some inherent resemblance in these musics, but because
> this society is constructed in a way which has changed relatively little
> with respect to the way in which it forms and treats minorities.
>   What about it? Musicology will never show you this, psychobabble looks
> for it in the wrong place (i.e. in your nerve endings), and political
> science tells you it's a plot to sell records. If you wanna understand
> the very latest, my boy, then read Max Weber.

I don't see how the above invalidates the thesis that it *is* a plot to sell
records. The Spanish-American War was a plot to sell newspapers, regardless
of its other "merits."

I choose to explain the anomie that I feel as a member of just such a musical
minority by pointing out the massive and easily demonstrable musical ignorance
on the part of the majority. Of course, there's no reason why they should all
choose to measure their sophistication, or mental prowess, or evolutionary
advancement the way I do, by listening to really difficult music. Why the
clueless consumer shouldn't get his tawdry pleasures by spending good money
on Madonna is a question I no longer worry about-- it's his prerogative. I
just wish there were true alternative channels where I could get what I need.
(Yeah, I know, Wayside Music-- but I can't always trust the descriptions in
the catalog.)

My wife says there was once a classic concession speech by a loser in an
election campaign: "The people have spoken... the bastards!"

From:         Ken Koester <MAINT2@ERS.BITNET>
Subject:      Captain, Me Impulse Engines Willnae Take Any More. . . .

> =From the Ladle to the Grave=, Boiled in Lead.  Stephen Brust cites this group
> in his SF novel =Cowboy Feng's Space Bar and Grill=, plus the name has shown
> up on the list from time to time, so what the heck.

Oh yeah? I'll have to check out that book!

I'm one of their bigger fans on this list, as is the lickable one. They've
got a superb drummer, who's highly proficient in all those Eastern European
odd meters. Their guitarist I'm not so crazy about-- he plays everything in
open tuning, which tends to make me suspicious. He does double mandolin, tin
whistle, and a couple other things...

> toss in the odd Bulgarian, Turkish, Egyptian, Russian piece now and again.
> "Pig Dog Daddy" doesn't do much for me, but I'm looking forward to some
> extended listening of the rest of the album.

"Pig Dog Daddy" is one of their live set pieces; they always introduce it
humorously, and it brings the house down. They shouldn't have recorded it,
though. I really like "The Microorganism," and the genuine Celtic numbers
are all real top notch IMDO (in my dazzling opinion :-) I have no basis to
properly judge the Egyptian tune (in the middle of "Stop Stop Stop" by the
Hollies), but I like it too.

> =Unrest=, Henry Cow.  See, Bloomdido recently sent my a tape with a cut by
> Henry cow on it & he keeps blathering about these guys, so I figured I'd see
> if there was any more good stuff where that came from.  (My only question for
> the man from MIT:  hey, how do these guys change their sock?  (In joke for
> those who know))  Can't describe this one too easily, either--I told Bloom
> that it reminded me of "Frank Zappa (=Hot Rats=) Meets Yes & Annihilates
> Them".  Certainly the alto sax, oboes, bassoons and whatnot give the sound a
> tonality similar to =Burnt Weenie Sandwich= & =Hot Rats=.  I can already tell
> that this album will really need a lot of study & that I'll either love or
> detest a given track--the music doesn't seem to allow any middle reaction.
> If you've been complaining recently about how boring music has gotten, these
> are the guys to check out.  Of course, Tower stocks them in the "C"s, under
> Cow, and in the "H"s, under Henry, so look in the one spot if the other is
> empty, as I had to do last night.

Glad you received that (I don't think I received any mail from you about it).
Very nice description, especially the part about annihilating Yes, because
that's kinda what they did for me when it finally began to dawn on me just
what they were doing! (I don't mean I stopped liking Yes, but they suddenly
weren't my favorite group any more; Henry Cow was, and remains.)

The record you've got there is half composed music and half improvised, and
the improvisations make use of studio technology-- they play something for
the tape, roll the tape back, and play something else, hopefully appropriate,
over the original spontaneous thang. There's also one other bit, I think it's
the song entitled "Upon Entering the Hotel Adlon," where they jam along with
the ending of "Ruins," a composed piece (and it seems like they're using a
different take than the production one, and slowing it down to half speed).
I like that, it gives the album a sense of closure for me. They added two
extra improvs to the CD, which don't have the benefit of excess tweakage in
the studio-- plus for some unfathomable reason they're mastered about 20dB
louder than the rest of the record-- so you're allowed to find them annoying;
I think they suck too.

>                                   ...  Also, the new Airplane anthology:
> can someone let us know if the "22 previously unreleased" tracks are worth
> $40+?  I mean, "The Other Side", "Plastic Fantastic Lover", "She Has Funny
> Cars" and the like are some of my favorites, but still the "new" stuff only
> makes up about a third of the material & =Fulton County= has got most of the
> rest, so, again, kind souls:  please review!

Still don't have this one myself-- I listened to it once at Judas & Natasha's.
The live stuff is nice but not revelatory, not as good as _Bless Its Pointed
Little Head_, but way better than the takes on the Woodstock records.

From:         Scott Hammer <SCOTH@WMVM1.CC.WM.EDU>
Subject:      Saffire Redux

>   1)   Saffire's self-conscious identification with the whole politically-
>        correct-Sociology-Department-Marxist-radical-feminist crowd.
>                                and
>   2)   The obvious inauthenticity of Saffire's music (cf. Sonia's post on
>        this subject.)

Okay, I get you. I often have trouble with politically-correct music myself,
especially the part about "You should like *me* and listen to *me* because
I'm a certified tree-hugger." That don't mean squat about your guitar pickin'.

> I agree thoroughly.  I guess my complaint is partially with Saffire:  they
> claim to be feminists, and yet most of their music is reverse sexist, and
> partially with Saffire's audience: they eat Saffire's raunchiest stuff right
> up, and yet shout down poor old male folk singers such as myself for stuff
> that's real mild by comparison: the objectionable lyric in _Cold Rain and
> Snow is apparently "I had me a wife; she's been trouble all my life."  Singing
> this really did get me booed offstage here in Richmond last year, and among
> the hecklers were many of Saffire's biggest local fans.
>
> Now you'll probably tell me to grow up and stop expecting people not to be
> hypocritical -- you're probably right.

No, I'll tell you to tell them to stick it up their politically correct
patooties. The song's a good song, it's authentic, and the Dead play it too!
And assuming all marital problems originate with husbands is just as sexist
as the premise behind the mother-in-law joke.

"So it's boys keep away from the girls, I say,
 And give 'em lots of room,
 You'll find when you're wed that they'll bang you till you're dead
 With the bald-headed end of a broom."

(I think that's a Charlie Poole song, but I got it from the Spark Gap Wonder
Boys.)
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