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[ataxi]

Cabaret is dead to me

I've been watching a tape of the band Sons and Daughters programming Rage* that I stuck on to record just before collapsing into the sack last night.

Sons and Daughters played a lot of stuff I'm going to call "cabaret-ish" where the focus narrows in on singer as icon, idealised as a replacement for some set of virtues. They

Comments

[tredecimal]

Hey, I HAD a passport...from 24 years ago when the USAF C-130'd me and my fam to the PCZ to make my parents and big sister miserable for a couple of years. I, on the other hand, being 8 years old, had a ball

[ataxi]

*nod* Yeah, the economic factors had crossed my mind. But trust me, if you can get by with your McJob, you can travel somewhere like Laos or Cambodia where the cost of living is very small for someone travelling (probably about US$800 a month), and insanely small for someone actually living there.

We saved enough to travel in SE Asia when we were both on social security and earning about $40 a week on top of it.

I sort of agree with your comments about Morrissey being the Omega of Frontmanism. I think 83-90 was about the End of Frontmanism As We Know It. As far as singers who don't play anything else, yeah, you're right. It takes a serious amount of lyrical talent to outweigh that, or mad skills on the tambourine. Actually, not the latter.

But aren't you even more suspicious of frontmen who just want to fade into the band, and pick up their acoustics for a bit of a strum even when the group has three other guitarists already?

[tredecimal]

I'm not suspicious of the superfluous player, but I do insist on having some control of their volume.
Richard Ashcroft was at least good as the frontman of the Verve until he fucked it all up with their last album.
On the other hand, I like Primal Scream alright, but Bobby Gillespie needs to be replaced with a sample, but quick. Preferably triggered by whoever he's dating that's not buried under a pile of yayo.

[strangedave]

I remain obstinately fond of Bobby Gillespie. It just wouldn't be the Scream without them. I think its because I followed the band through the first 4 or so complete changes of musical direction. And Bobby Gillespie was on Psycho Candy. Which probably means almost nothing to anybody who wasn't listening to indie music in the 80s (one of those albums that I am sure people now just wonder what all the fuss was about).

Cabaret is dead to all

[johjohjoh]

As far as I see it, 'cabaret' (as you deem it) IS dead, not just to you. There is no industry at the moment for musicians who are the 'charismatic lead singer in focus'. Venturing outside of standard pop culture, I think the movement is tending to be towards music with a saturation of sound - multiple voices, none of which 'rules'; and if not, then it involves mass instrumentation, where the vocals is merely another instrument of no greater value than the bass (for example). Polyphonic Spree, Sufjan Stevens, Arcade Fire, Broken Social Scene (hello... I may just be residing in Cahnahdah...) etc. I am not 'over' this sound yet. Look at Radiohead (Tom, I can see you rolling your eyes at me already) - They prove my point exactly, moving from Thom Yorke: Icon, to Thom Yorke: Instrumentalist, where his vocals are merely another instrument, contributing to the overall ambient sound.

OK, my rant is over. :)

(p.s. I am very excited that I discovered this thingamyjig of yours)

Re: Cabaret is dead to all

[ataxi]

I agree. But personally I think a lot of the current bands you mention - the "Canada Crop" if you like, and you can throw in Frog Eyes, Wolf Parade, etc. - are a bit overrated. Your point about Radiohead had actually already occurred to me.

Since the move away from "cabaret" frontpeople allows a different sort of psychological engagement with music - one in which the listener neither desires nor identifies with the singer, this new music has become more accessible to the mainstream. Because you don't have to engage with the people, just the sounds. Particularly artists like Sufjan Stevens. If Sufjan Stevens were Morrissey you'd have to be a Christian to be a fan, if you catch my drift. This is neither a good thing or a bad thing, but if the music becomes MOR or mediocre because of its accessibility it's a problem. And that isn't just elitism ... it's a general truth of existence (proof by Kierkegaard) that when the majority thinks something it becomes wrong.