LJ Idol Week #2 - Topic: Follow Me

[prog_schlock]

This is my entry for Week #2 of therealljidol.

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National Obscurity

But what I need is not cut cost
What I need is a life where I've won
All the times that I've lost
What I need is not ways to go on
What I need is to slit my wrists and be gone
- Scott Miller, "Slit My Wrists"

In his liner notes1 for Game Theory's greatest hits album Tinkers to Evers to

Comments

[favoritebean]

Thank you for introducing Game Theory. I must admit that the songs I listened to in the follow up post do remind me of what the Beatles might have sounded like had they formed in the 80s.

In answer to your postscript, I'm pretty certain I would have a very long list. Perhaps I'll limit it to 20th century works.

1. For the classical genre, I feel that Amy Beach is a very unsung heroine, particularly for the piano. It's light music, sure, but it definitely has its place.

2. Mid century features my absolutely favorite jazz musician, Clifford Brown. He played with all of the greats of that era, and there are a few choice standards that were penned by him. Brown sadly died at 22 in a car accident. I fear that because of that, he will have faded into obscurity completely within the next fifty years.

3. 90s era Meat Beat Manifesto is considered by many in the industrial/elektro genre to be the musician's musician. Sadly, I think anything published after the album Actual Sounds and Voices to be rather dull, but their sophomore album 99% is one of the greatest industrial albums of all time. I have students who are professional musicians in their own right, but they were kids when Industrial was in full swing, and no one would expect them to remember the birth of trip hop and jungle. Still, I may introduce them to MBM when the time comes- their influence is subtle, but vast.

[prog_schlock]

Yeah, the Meat Beat Manifesto were fantastic. They deserved a lot more attention - I only have Mindstream in my music library.

I'll look up both Amy Beach and Clifford Brown. I'm woefully underexposed to jazz in general and to classical post-Leonard Bernstein. Thank you for sharing!