bury me in a treasure trough

[brendan62442]

- Be Kind Rewind was very sweet; I don't want to see it again but I loved it the first time. The word "quirky" sort of just means a movie is full of gimmicks, but Michel Gondry's gimmicks are all scene-stealers.

- Slow songs don't mix great with fuzz-pedals, and most of them are boring in the first place. Sorry, Distortion. Stephin Merritt drops

Comments

[brendan62442]

A lot of the discussion about pop stuff that's interesting is the stuff surrounding it. Not what it means, etc. but how it gets used, how it gets shaped, how people react to it. It can become a placeholder discussion for broader cultural or societal conversations and assumptions.

This was my favourite part. I did completely overlook that side of pop music criticism.

The wheat/chaff ratio is probably not substantially different from any other genre, and the conversation is there once you're willing to go for it.

Be careful what you call "pop". I don't know the technicalities of music, but "pop" to me means that the Magnetic Fields and the Backstreet Boys are mostly doing the same things (which is true). And under that roof, pop music does look the same as any other kind of music.

But I think the other way you have it, the Now! spectrum of pop music, that isn't exactly a genre -- or else it's not a genre the same way rap or folk are genres. It's married to marketability, and to calculating how the audience reacts. Sometimes they nail it and make Thriller or whatever, but other times it gives people an incentive not to experiment. I'll listen to a whole Hilary Duff CD, and it will be three singles and then ten imitations of the singles, just because that's what her fans probably want. The drop isn't as sharp on an Outkast CD or a Broken Social CD, because those guys are more self-indulgent, less willing to get bored with themselves.

I think it's like the difference between early and late Beatles music. Their popularity got to a point where they didn't have to impress people; they got to screw around and make "Revolution 9". And that stuff has aged better, "A Day in the Life" and everything, because it's more creative, because it wasn't made for radio.

I looked up the lyrics to "See You Again", and I thought for a while about how the old west standoff vibe fits in with having a crush on a boy. But in two weeks, I'll probably be sick of the Miley Cyrus song, and I'll still be into all the Joanna Newsom songs that do the same thing.

I think I came down harsh. I love the fluff music, but I don't take it all that seriously. Maybe I picked an argument for no reason just now; ignore this stuff until you finish the paper.

I dug up the Eurotrip mix just to show you listening to the top 40 before your January experiment. I guess I didn't realize the level of kitsch you had in there.

Sometimes when people complain about hipsters, I think they're giving me a hard time just for liking cool bands. Other times I hear "cooler before the hipsters found out about it", and that sentence is ridiculous for a lot of different reasons. For what it's worth, Chris thought most of the complaints reminded him of Kai.

[weasel_seeker]

I mean, I was certainly listening to top 40 to some extent at that point, but there was a lot of stuff that I wrote off solely on the basis of stuff external to the music. I dunno. And yeah, the Magnetic Fields and the Backstreet Boys ARE often doing the same things. It's all pop. It was late and I wasn't being accurate with my language.

Viz. hipsters. That sentence is always ridiculous and sometimes people are giving you a hard time about cool bands. However, and I don't know what Ottawa's scene is like, but in Montreal there is a certain nature inherent in parts of the music community that can be rather tiresome. Namely, a tendency to care less about the actual music than the value of being seen to like the music, overemphasis on style over substance, basically, "it was good until everyone else found out about it" syndrome (see: Vampire Weekend, Cold War Kids, Tokyo Police Club, etc.),...A lot of knee jerk tendencies within music discourse that just get annoying over time. As Fall Out Boy would say, it "Ain't a Scene, It's a God Damn Arms Race." Who has more music, who has newer music, who has more experimental music. Music as used to signify rather than as used to listen to. But like I said, whining about hipsters is the new hipster thing, so take all that with a grain of salt.

Also, see you again is awesome most of all because it's not just about some chick with a crush. At least as read, it sounds like the narrator has an intense social anxiety disorder. "The last time I freaked out, I just kept looking down, I st-st-st-stuttered" etc. Freaking out is a regular occurrence, can't breathe, need to redeem herself. I mean, I get what the song is aiming for and that "the last time" is supposed to be like...the last time she saw him or whatever, but that's not how it's written/sung/parses and it makes it hilarious.

Where's Chris at school right now?

age-appropriate

[dustyasymptotes]

[brendan62442]

I like it. Why is it age-appropriate?

that kind of age

[dustyasymptotes]

I'm living in an age
that calls darkness light
thought my language is dead
still the shapes fill my head.

[dustyasymptotes]

what's funny is that kind of age I tried to refer to is actually also the kind of age you mean. so that other kind of age. (age of empires III age)

[brendan62442]

I thought of the "until everyone else found out" people as the ones who complain about hipsters, instead of as the actual hipsters. Probably it's just that the word is flexible. It will be hilarious if it turns out I actually don't like hipsters.

I don't think I am part of an Ottawa scene. I read stuff on the Internet, and then sometimes I talk to Jiayi about it.

Your "See You Again" theory is a lot of fun. The song should pause after "last time" but it never does. Chris is home from Queen's, listening to a lot of City and Colour.

Remember that time you told me about Kepler?!!!!

[dustyasymptotes]

I think zoolion's in a band. except he's uniconr now.

I think I've listened to dragostea tin dei at least 30 times in the last three days. I can even sing along now with phonetic English equivalents!

Happy Earth Day!!!