04.18.2013 03:35 PM

Indie rant: my God, I so agree with this statement

Quote:

“I’m so exhausted by this generation of watered-down, vaguely 60’s or vaguely folk, mid-tempo, non-offensive, cutesy indie music.  When I was 16 or 22 I wanted to break shit.  I was pissed off at an unjust world, at the indignities of high school, at my parents, at that ever-present dude who grabbed my ass at rock shows (I’m still pissed off at that dude, by the way).  I don’t get it, these kids grew up in a post 911, Patriot Act world where they will likely never make as much money as their parents or pay off their student debt and yet all they want to do is grow a beard, play the banjo, and hold hands.  What the fuck?”

My kids, and Lala, have been hearing me ranting on this subject for months, particularly after I stumble across the somnambulistic dreck that dominates at places like Alt Nation on Sirius XM:

“DON’T THESE KIDS HAVE PASSION ABOUT ANYTHING? DON’T THEY GET MAD ABOUT ANYTHING? DO THEY ALWAYS HAVE TO SOUND SO FUCKING BLASE AND BLAND AND BORING? P.S., WHILE WE’RE ON THE SUBJECT, HAVEN’T THEY EVER CONSIDERED IT WORTHWHILE TO HAVE DRUMS ON THEIR SONGS? MY GOD MY GOD THEY ARE DESTROYING MY SOUL!”

Seriously, I actually go on like that.

Anyway, when the likes of XX or Death Cab or (the aptly-monikered) Tame Impala are among the biggest bands in the world, it tells me that popular music has become BORING AND SHITTY again, and that we are in need of a great big cultural enema.

It tells me, in fact, we need something like this again:

26 Comments

  1. Derek Pearce says:

    Not giving a fuck is, for the “Millenials” or whatever they’re called, rebellion. The fact it pisses you off so much gives them a smirk (which makes you angrier I imagine.) Sad but true.

    *Also, just because they’re listening to Bon Iver doesn’t mean they’re not also listening to punk. The DayGlo Abortions are always on tour and are still playing sold-out shows, and the audience is not the same one it was 20+ years ago.

    • smelter rat says:

      As is Propaghandi

      • hello says:

        Hi stumbled upon this site. that quote is the problem in itself. it’s like people watched the Nirvana documentaries and acouple punk documentaries and take lines from em and try to pass it off as originality. “indignities of high school” come on! kinda like those pussies that now use words like “esoteric” or “aesthetic” or phrases like “trim the fat” or “that’s punk!”. indie music’s there, you just got to make the actual effort to find it.

  2. deb s says:

    Id be curious to know what happened to the crew stage diving …I wonder if they are still angry and protesting. I wonder if they are still counterculture or if they became boring, assimilated and old…sighhh.
    Heres one of my oldtime fav bands expressing it better
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZoZ68pOoY3E&list=PL2124C80332173DB4&index=9

  3. Kaplan says:

    Been listening to Lamb of God since 2003. You want angry, intelligent, aggressive, break-stuff music with a politically-astute message?
    It’s all out there.

    • Kaplan says:

      One other band worth checking out, Warren, though I suspect they’re too heavy for your taste: Misery Index.

  4. Roger Beigemstum says:

    What the kids are actually listening to:

    Aubrey Drake Graham aka Drake was a teen actor who played the character of Jimmy Brooks on Degrassi High and Degrassi: The Next Generation. Overall, he appeared in a total of 138 episodes. Millions of Canadian children and teenagers followed the life of Jimmy Brooks.

    This was the perfect foundation to create an entertainment products aimed at younger demographics; thus drake was born and rose quickly in the world of Rap. With ten number-one singles, he also has more than any other rapper on Billboard’s Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart, passing Jay-Z in August 2012.

    The Kluger Agency, who specialize in product placement in top 40 musical acts, has a “relationship” with Drake and other performers including Lady Gaga, Jennifer Lopez, Flo Rida, Britney Spears, and Eminem. A wage range of products including alcoholic drinks, “hook-up” sites, Mercedes cars, and credit cards, are inserted into rap videos and other media. Eventually, an octopus-like juggernaut is created of music downloads, videos, concerts, merchandise, and advertising/propaganda.

    The popular Drake song, “Forever” features Kanye West, Lil Wayne, and Eminem:

    Kanye West raps at one point:

    I stuck my dick inside this life until that bitch came
    And went hard, all fall like the ball teams
    Just so I can make it rain all spring
    Y’all seen my story, my glory
    I had raped the game young, you can call it statutory
    When a nigga blow up they gonna build statues for me

    Eminem raps:

    He ain’t had him a buzz like this since the last time that he overdosed
    They been waiting patiently for Pinocchio to poke his nose
    Back into the game and they know, rap will never be same as before
    Bashing in the brains of these hoes and establishing the name as he goes
    The passion in the flame is ignited, you can’t put it out once we light it
    This shit is exactly what the fuck that I’m talking about when we riot

    The core goal of all this is to make propaganda of maximum potency – hence the harnessing of the most primal drives – raping, plundering, rioting – to maximize sales of the above products. A sort of vicious cycle ensues where increasingly more deranged concepts are needed to drive sales. The social costs, “externalities,” collateral damage of indoctrinating a generation of young men into the supposed glamour of the “gangsta” lifestyle is not taken into account.

    The “Punk” movement looks positively Amish by comparison.

    • Ty says:

      The 60s, 70s, 80s, and 90s have all blended together for my generation. We’re not really rebelling against anything, we’re synthesizing.

      When I listen to older punk, I listen to a bunch of idiot soon-to-be-sell-outs who could barely play guitar. Sorry. Every song sounds the same. I know older folks who say the first few chords of “Love Will Tear Us Apart” changed their lives. It means nothing to me.

      Look at Against Me!. Singer comes out as a woman. Nobody really cares. How can you get angry at a society like that?

  5. Vic Green says:

    As long as cold beer, hot food, rock ‘n’ roll, and all the other amenities remain expected norm, our conduct of the war will only gain impotence. We need fewer men, and better. If they were committed, this war could be won with a fourth of our present force. – our present command structure.

    Yeah, my eyes are red, my dad ain’t rich, my mom, well she’s a first class bitch, I got a shitty job, I live in fear, just wanna play my guitar and drink some beer, I just wanna drink some beer, I just wanna drink some beer, well booze is cool but pot’s a crime whos bright idea was that and I just wanna write songs that’s weird, snap the bong, drink some beer, I just wanna drink some beer, I just wanna drink some beer, come to the Chase Club, to the point now blow me while I roll a joint, front to back, in your ear, you can kiss my ass while I drink some beer, I just wanna drink some beer, I just wanna drink some beer, I just wanna drink some beer, I just wanna drink some beer, I just wanna drink some beer! – FEAR – DRINK SOME BEER LYRICS.

    You do the math.

  6. Pamela says:

    Hey, everyone needs some easy listening from time to time …

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&feature=endscreen&v=xtgWKTBxwv8

  7. smelter rat says:

    The kids all have computers, cellphones, web access and videogames. They live in their parent’s basements, get free food and Mom does the laundry. What’s to be upset about?

    • Ty says:

      Maybe that’s because the previous generation ran up massive amounts of debt and inflated the housing market to ridiculous levels so that its’ impossbile to find a decent place to live that isn’t in *shudder* Brampton.

  8. Chubsy Ubsy says:

    The world needs another band like YES! 🙂

  9. Pipes says:

    What! I don’t know anyone post 911 who wants to play the banjo. I can play the banjo as well as guitar and bagpipes ( being the worst musician since the days of Egypt, being the home of the original Pipes) and I still don’t know one person who ever thinks about the banjo.

    On the other hand, a banjo is a happy sound. Is there something wrong with that? ( With the exception of the banjo in Deliverance ).

  10. james Smith says:

    90% of recorded popular music is made for, and consumed by young women 11-19 years old. 90% of what is written about popular music is written by men who could not bring themselves to speak to a young woman until they were well into their 20’s & 90% of what they write is how that music that’s marketed to young women is trite.

    AND

    90% of all statistics are made up. Just ask these guys: http://www.thestar.com/business/2013/04/18/student_finds_glaring_spreadsheet_errors_in_study_used_to_justify_budget_slashing.html

  11. George says:

    Porcupine Tree…Fear of A Blank Planet.

    That album should be the soundtrack to a lost generation…

    Xbox is a god to me
    My finger on the switch
    My mother was a bitch
    My father gave up trying to talk to me

    The entire album is a dystopian work of genius…released in 2005 if I recall correctly…if you check it out you will not be disappointed.

  12. bigcitylib says:

    Titus Andronicus: Four Score and Seven, Theme From Cheers. These guys’ll clear your flaps. 3, count em 3, electric guitairs.

  13. Andrew says:

    Just stop listening to the radio. You wouldn’t have heard angry music on the radio in 1979, why do you think you would now?

  14. CaligulaJones says:

    Well, Pete Seeger was a “bearded guy with banjo”, and Dylan was every bit of a “punk” as you could name, but I’ll agree: wimps have taken over. Its a generational think, like photocopying a photocopy.

    Although not a punk by any stretch of the imagination, John Hiatt is a pretty raw song writer, and he lived the life. I saw him on stage with Lyle Lovett once: two guys, two guitars, two hours explaining the music. Lovett would ask where he got a song about tragic alienation, and Hiatt would answer that he got word of the birth of his son just after he was barfing into a toilet somewhere on the road. And I wondered if someone ever asked Justin Bieber what he, and the six other people, were thinking when they wrote “Baby, baby, baby, baby, baby…”.

    Or, this:

    http://cheezburger.com/7255991552

  15. Andrew says:

    On further review, that article is actually awful. If you can’t find raw, visceral rock music these days, you’re not looking hard enough. Paul Lawton sums it up real well:

    http://slaggingoff.tumblr.com/post/48361558115/on-hey-kids-grow-a-pair-how-indie-blogs-neutered

    – Music was the best when I was 12

    – Some year end lists I read featured bands that had nothing in common with the bands I liked when I was 12

    – Music being made popular post-9/11 doesn’t reflect the times we are living in.

    – Smaller indie blogs parrot P4K

    – Nirvana and L7 were cool in the 1990’s.

  16. ray says:

    I disagree. There are artists like James McMurtry who dared to stand in the glare of the Bush and Cheney years circa 2004 and write the following masterpiece. The sad truth is that we prefer the illusion to any reality. It take a lot of guts to stand on a stage and sing these songs which is why James is one of my inspirations and he can sure rock out. Yes, he is the son of Larry McMurtry of Lonesome Dove fame and many others.
    ray in Kingston
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lOWrqR_QFfg

  17. ray says:

    Warren. I meant to post the acoustic version of “we can’t make it here anymore by James Mcmurtry so your readers could see who he is. If I may.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v8h5VdIe33o

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