Artists who lowered the bar

[Hard Truth]

I'm going to slay some sacred cows in this post, so please bring your sense of humor and perspective. I'm going to harshly, but sincerely, criticize the weaknesses of some musicians that I actually enjoy overall.

 

Let's consider those rock/pop musicians who lowered the bar by becoming popular despite, or perhaps, because of, their lack of talent, skills and self discipline. Many of these artists made other musicians think "I can do that" and start playing music despite their limited abilities. I'll list a few in roughly chronological order:

 

Bo Diddley-Built a career based on one rhythm and one chord which he used in virtually every song. He didn't even invent the so-called Bo Diddley beat. Among others, Johny Otis used it in Willie and the Hand Jive well before Bo Diddley became popular. (Johny says he heard the beat used in the late 1930s)

 

Bob Dylan-He showed that a winey, nasal and often tuneless voice is no barrier to a musicial career. Later he demonstrated that a song with lyrics consisting of nothing but bad puns, lazy rhymes, non-sequitors and insider references can be accepted as genius.

 

The Troggs-sounding like they had barely learned the three chords in Wild Thing, they made thousands of teenagers start their own garage bands playing three chords in a sloppy manner.

 

Velvet Underground-They never let their very limited musical abilities stop them from churning out overly long, repetitive, noisy, out of tune songs. They were also among the first to glorify the use of heroin and have never been held responsible for the thousands of dupes who they inspired to live the glamorous life of a junkie. They also inspired countless bands with singers, especially female singers, who sound like they are about to nod off into a drug stupor before the song ends. They also inspired all those who continue to think that uncontrolled feedback over a drone is new and interesting ART.

 

I'm running out of time and I don't want to make this too long, so I won't discuss the Ramones, Jonathan Richman and others until later.

[boosh]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blasphemy

[DevilRaysFan]

Robert Fripp - Proved that staring at guitar strings trying to will them to vibrate with your mind can actually sell records

 

Nine Inch Nails - Allowed that a band's lineup can actually consist of only one member

 

ELO - Allowed that a band can have seven members in its lineup and still be just one guy

 

Grateful Dead - Proved that you can be a worldwide money-making success by being stoned to the bageezus

 

Don Johnson - Set a precedent that actors and actresses can, at will, bypass the trenches and sign major label record deals on the spot

[HeartfeltDawn]

Lou Reed - oh please Lou, tell us more stories of getting {censored}ed up on drugs! tell us more tales of your {censored}ed-up childhood! Yawn. The hipster's self-obsessive bore. Lester Bangs was so right about you, you {censored}.

 

Stevie Ray Vaughan - {censored} hats, {censored} guitar straps and got pissy when Bowie pissed about during Let's Dance. Thank you for inspiring countless dreadful blues bands everywhere. Listen to a MIDI version of Rude Mood and you'll hear how hideously twee it is.

 

Eric Clapton - dull Brit takes drugs. Possibly the only man alive in music to deserve a damn good kicking more than Paul McCartney.

 

Ian Curtis - no, disabilities do not make you a genius. Neither does suicide. neither do teenage 'woe betide me, isn't the world nasty' lyrics.

 

Jim Morrison - hurrah, another drug-addled {censored} poet!

[boosh]

:freak: :freak: :freak: :freak: But " Love is All Around " has more then three chords

 

Yeah but they covered that from WET WET WET

[Edmond Zedo]

 

The Troggs-sounding like they had barely learned the three chords in Wild Thing, they made thousands of teenagers start their own garage bands playing three chords in a sloppy manner.

 

 

I heard 6654321 on the radio ONCE and it's still a fav of mine. Where can I hear it online?

[blue2blue]

 

I'm going to slay some sacred cows in this post, so please bring your sense of humor and perspective. I'm going to harshly, but sincerely, criticize the weaknesses of some musicians that I actually enjoy overall. Let's consider those rock/pop musicians who lowered the bar by becoming popular despite, or perhaps, because of, their lack of talent, skills and self discipline. Many of these artists made other musicians think "I can do that" and start playing music despite their limited abilities. I'll list a few in roughly chronological order: Bo Diddley-Built a career based on one rhythm and one chord which he used in virtually every song. He didn't even invent the so-called Bo Diddley beat. Among others, Johny Otis used it in Willie and the Hand Jive well before Bo Diddley became popular. (Johny says he heard the beat used in the late 1930s) Bob Dylan-He showed that a winey, nasal and often tuneless voice is no barrier to a musicial career. Later he demonstrated that a song with lyrics consisting of nothing but bad puns, lazy rhymes, non-sequitors and insider references can be accepted as genius. The Troggs-sounding like they had barely learned the three chords in Wild Thing, they made thousands of teenagers start their own garage bands playing three chords in a sloppy manner. Velvet Underground-They never let their very limited musical abilities stop them from churning out overly long, repetitive, noisy, out of tune songs. They were also among the first to glorify the use of heroin and have never been held responsible for the thousands of dupes who they inspired to live the glamorous life of a junkie. They also inspired countless bands with singers, especially female singers, who sound like they are about to nod off into a drug stupor before the song ends. They also inspired all those who continue to think that uncontrolled feedback over a drone is new and interesting ART. I'm running out of time and I don't want to make this too long, so I won't discuss the Ramones, Jonathan Richman and others until later.

 

 

So... who do you like?

 

Let's make this... interesting.

[Zipperhead]

Neil Young - specifically his electric guitar solo work.

 

Once you get into it, what Neil does on any instrument is genius. But on first listen, would you really describe his electric solos as great guitar playing?

 

David Lee Roth - I love him, but is that singing?

 

Zip

[Lee Knight]

Jefferson Starship lowered the bar so low I kept tripping on it...

 

38 Special. They took something that was actually kind of cool, that southern outlaw rock from the Skynyrd and the Allmans and made an absolute joke out of the genre. Or Black Oak Arkansas are somebody like that...

 

Styx. Same as Black Oak Special. I can't listen to Yes without hearing echos of Mr Roboto. Icky.

 

Lords of the New Church. They took what Iggy did and made it silly. Ok... Iggy was silly too but, he was COOL silly. Big difference.

 

Blink 182, Rancid, etc.

 

Punk?

[Lee Knight]

Zamfir! I can't listen to my old pan pipe albums with thinking of his version of Let It Be!!! Damn you Zamfir!!!

 

And Slim Whitman ruined it for the whole Boxcar Willie thing...

 

 

 

Sorry.

[Phil O'Keefe]

Don Johnson - Set a precedent that actors and actresses can, at will, bypass the trenches and sign major label record deals on the spot

 

One of the shortest, and most brutal reviews I've ever read (wish I could remember who wrote it and where I saw it - maybe in Musician magazine) went something like this:

 

"Don Johnson sings about as well as Glenn Frey acts."

[strathound]

Two words: Buddy Guy.

[Ed A.]

One word: Bono

[Ed A.]

Several more come to mind:

 

Kenny G

 

David Arkenstone

 

Yanni

 

Kanye West

 

P. Diddy (or whatever he changed his name to)

[Dean Roddey]

I have to say that, when you think someone sucks, but they are almost universally considered giants of their chosen industry, then the odds are good that the problem is you, not them.

[strathound]

 

I have to say that, when you think someone sucks, but they are almost universally considered giants of their chosen industry, then the odds are good that the problem is you, not them.

 

 

Have you seen Buddy Guy play lately? :poke:

[boosh]

Angelo I get the feeling you're the man behind Gunther,...........

[regular guy]

Yawn! another hater thread....

[UstadKhanAli]

Lowered the bar:

 

Celine Dion - for feeling, subtlety, and lack of singing chops

Kenny G - making generations of people think that he was playing jazz

Raffi - yick!

Lenny Kravitz - pretending to be a one-man band when he actually didn't play most of the instruments, stealing riffs from "Crossroads", pretending to be retro, and just being generally pedaling mediocrity as something sensational.

[HeartfeltDawn]

Don Johnson - Set a precedent that actors and actresses can, at will, bypass the trenches and sign major label record deals on the spot One of the shortest, and most brutal reviews I've ever read (wish I could remember who wrote it and where I saw it - maybe in Musician magazine) went something like this: "Don Johnson sings about as well as Glenn Frey acts."

 

 

 

The classic harsh review as Charles Shaar Murray in New Musical Express. His review of Lee Hazelwood's LP entitled 'Poet, Fool or Bum' was short and succint:

 

"Bum".

 

That was it. One whole word. Marvellous.

[kurdy]

I have to say that, when you think someone sucks, but they are almost universally considered giants of their chosen industry, then the odds are good that the problem is you, not them.

 

I think the original poster made it clear that it was meant all in fun, and they actually enjoy some of the artists in question.

 

That said, in some ways these artists did lower the bar, because they made a bunch of wannabes think they could do what they did as effectively. What these artists may have lacked in concrete musical skill, they made up for with their ability to express something musically in a way that no one else did at the time. However, for the scores of other bands who try to sound like them, without that originality, they just...kinda suck, basically (pardon my bluntness).

 

Another great example is the Rolling Stones. Inspired a million bar bands to greater heights of suckiness.

[Tedster]

Here's the deal...

 

Rock and roll started with kids in a garage bashing out 3 chord tunes, or kids on a streetcorner singing doo-wop harmony.

 

Early sixties, kids in a garage bashing out "Gloria", "Louie Louie", or "96 Tears" for example. They can't play that well, but they're having fun bashing and watching their girlfriends shake their derrieres.

 

All of a sudden, guys like Clapton and Hendrix (and a lot of others, but you get my drift) come along and raise the bar. Which is good. Next thing you've got Buddy Miles, Carlos Santana, raising the bar again...but wait...we've got prog bands like King Crimson, Yes, fusion stuff like Mahavishnu...raising the bar even more.

 

And the girls aren't shaking their tailfeathers to that stuff. The kids in the garage can't play it. No one can sing it either. Oh, sure, it's great to smoke a doob and veg to, but that's about it.

 

Enter the Ramones, Clash, Jam, Sex Pistols...punk. All of a sudden rock is ACCESSIBLE again! It's fun! Kids can play that stuff in a garage.

 

And the bar starts to get raised again, this time by the Van Halens of the world. Now it's guys who sing soprano fronting bands with guitar virtuosos who can play 64th note solos at 120 beats per second.

 

Enter Kurt Cobain, and kids can bash in their garages again. It's cyclic. It's supposed to be.

 

There's room for everything in rock and roll, but, it's really about kids bashing 3 chords in a garage while their girlfriends shake their asses.

[elsongs]

 

Kenny G

 

 

Actually the problem with Kenny G was that the labels and media ignorantly pegged him as a "jazz" artist. As a "jazz" artist he's atrocious when in actuality he plays "instrumental pop." When looked at that perspective, Kenny G. does just fine.

[elsongs]

 

Here's the deal... Rock and roll started with kids in a garage bashing out 3 chord tunes, or kids on a streetcorner singing doo-wop harmony. Early sixties, kids in a garage bashing out "Gloria", "Louie Louie", or "96 Tears" for example. They can't play that well, but they're having fun bashing and watching their girlfriends shake their derrieres. All of a sudden, guys like Clapton and Hendrix (and a lot of others, but you get my drift) come along and raise the bar. Which is good. Next thing you've got Buddy Miles, Carlos Santana, raising the bar again...but wait...we've got prog bands like King Crimson, Yes, fusion stuff like Mahavishnu...raising the bar even more. And the girls aren't shaking their tailfeathers to that stuff. The kids in the garage can't play it. No one can sing it either. Oh, sure, it's great to smoke a doob and veg to, but that's about it. Enter the Ramones, Clash, Jam, Sex Pistols...punk. All of a sudden rock is ACCESSIBLE again! It's fun! Kids can play that stuff in a garage. And the bar starts to get raised again, this time by the Van Halens of the world. Now it's guys who sing soprano fronting bands with guitar virtuosos who can play 64th note solos at 120 beats per second. Enter Kurt Cobain, and kids can bash in their garages again. It's cyclic. It's supposed to be. There's room for everything in rock and roll, but, it's really about kids bashing 3 chords in a garage while their girlfriends shake their asses.

 

 

 

Interesting theory, but for at least 10 years the bar has conistently been lowered. Who's been raising the bar lately?

[Ed A.]

I have to say that, when you think someone sucks, but they are almost universally considered giants of their chosen industry, then the odds are good that the problem is you, not them.

 

Yeah that's it. Kanye West is actually a brilliant musician that I just can't appreciate because of my limited understanding of music.