An Open Letter To RWHN

[AFK]

The latter being focusing on peoe who directly oppose your POV.

The latter wasn't happening, thank you very much.  I mean, it's kind of impossible to not discuss my opposing point of view without discussing it with the people wth the opposite view.  I was being quite civil as well.  It was others who decided to get personal and call me a snob, retard, etc.


But I supposewe just HAVE to continue to make me the bad guy anytime I have a differing opinion right? 


This is fucking ridiculous.

[Pæs]

You either flounce a hero or post long enough to see yourself become a bitter troll.

[Junkenstein]

The latter being focusing on peoe who directly oppose your POV.

I am fucking ridiculous.

             /


You didn't even make it a week. Nice going.

[AFK]

I used to hate Mindless Self Indulgence, Morbid Angel, Rammstein, Marilyn Manson, Cradle of Filth, Johnny Cash, and hell, even Ke$ha.

Not really familiar with MSI.  Morbid Angel were good in the golden era of death metal. Their last album was a complete embarrassment.  Rammstein, MM, and Cradle of Filth are all kinda boring but I don't "hate" them.  I've always liked Johnny Cash. 

You gotta catch them at the right moment. Once you get that right moment, it all makes sense and you get to enjoy the stuff that you stubbornly rejected for some reason. The first MSI song I heard was Shut Me Up when I was going through my Black Metal is awesome thing. It grated on me for stupid reasons. He likes his coffee black, just like his metal, but it was not a Metal song, let alone a Black Metal one. Then one of Villager's housemates played Never Wanted to Dance in the Car a month ago and now because of one riff in that song, I can't get enough of them. Morbid Angel was an impulse buy. Then I got stoned, and now I listen to it stone sober at work. I didn't like Du Hast, but Engel sold me on Rammstein, and they put on one fuck of a show. Manson I didn't get at all until I saw him at Ozzfest. Cradle of Filth required an assist from Emperor (let's face it, Dani's vocal style is not terribly approachable, and combine that with the fact the first I heard was the poor sound quality Cruelty and the Beast, I was like, fuck these guys. Johnny Cash? Country. Didn't want to hear it. Folsom Prison Blues. Done. And Ke$ha? Still hate listening to her shit but she writes really solid, serious songs for other people. She just knows what pays well. So good on her. She's smarter than you or I. She's getting paid to troll the masses. Miley Cyrus? Don't know. Not particularly interested. So I say nothing about it and only skimmed the first page to confirm that she's also trolling the masses. Good on her too. Still not going to listen to her music or tune into TMZ ever. So why mention it? I'm sure she is actually talented. Just because you don't like it doesn't  mean she doesn't know what she's doing.

Sure, she's doing stuff to piss off parents.  Which has been done by many musical acts that have a youthful demographic.  She's rebelling against her Disney image, which has been done by many former Disney princesses before her.  It's nothing new.  What's different is that we're now in this era of going viral on the internet.  To do that, you gotta throw out "shocking" crazy shit to get people talking and viewing.  I acknowledged that she's done that very well.  Where I part ways with everyone else is this idea that it is this deeper commentary or troll of current pop culture.  She IS current pop culture.  I see it as the complete opposite.  I see her hitting all of the right notes in the current era to maximize eyeballs.  Not as commentary, but as a pure commercial enterprise. 


So I suppose in that regard she is talented.  But I stand by everything else.  She's a horrible actress and I don't think she is a particularly talented singer either.  But, that's like my opinion man.  Your results may vary.

Do you like Anarchangel? Do you think we're talented? Remember Holist?

I like what I've heard yes.  But you guys also write your music.  Call me a snob, but I hold that in much higher regard than a manufactured pop product. 

[LMNO]

Using the same standard, the entire Motown catalog is worthless crap.

[AFK]

Well sure, if you are going to be very black/white and overly simplistic about it.


I would hope you can appreciate how you can't make a one-to-one ratio between the Motown era and the current Pop music era.  They are oceans apart. 

[LMNO]

Photogenic performers singing songs written by a team of composers?

[LMNO]

Also, Glen Gould was a hack.  He only played other people's songs.

[AFK]

The big difference, IMO, is the whole visual/spectacle that is necessary in today's pop music to move units.  It isn't AS necessary to have a good singer.  You need someone who can be packaged in a way that gets views.


Motown was much more reliant on people who could sing the songs.  I mean, take Marvin Gaye for example.  The guy was a fucking phenomenal singer.  He didn't need to twerk on stage and strip down to make you feel "Let's Get It On".   He nailed that just by standing in front of a microphone and singing it. 


Having a good voice doesn't cut it anymore.  I mean, take a woman like Anneke van Giersbergen who has an absolutely divine voice.  She should be huge.  But she isn't.  She's still kind of languishing in the metal/post-rock world. 


But let us also consider, Miley Cyrus is Miley Cyrus.  Daughter of a former (if short-lived) pop-country icon.  That opens quite a few doors that are not open to people who are more talented but don't come from celebrity. 

[LMNO]

Nope, no spectacle, no glitz, no glamour, no melodramatic movements, no flirting with the audience, no backup dancers... oh wait.

[AFK]

This will come off as musical snobbery, but whatever it is what I think:


The music in pop music today is a lot more secondary than it was in the Motown era.  Sure, groups were photogenic, but if a song sucked, if the group couldn't convincingly interpret it for the audience, the song was going to be a flop.


Today, you can have a shitty song but still move units of you have a properly titilating visual or image to go with it, whether it is a music video, or a viral video of a performance of that song. 

[AFK]

Nope, no spectacle, no glitz, no glamour, no melodramatic movements, no flirting with the audience, no backup dancers... oh wait.

Nobody would've been talking about Miley Cyrus the next day if she had limited her performance and  interpretation of the songs to the level of what Gaye did in his performances. 

[Cainad (dec.)]

Whether or not Miley Cyrus is talented, or even if her content is less musically relevant than the dried crust on a trumpet's spit valve, is immaterial to the conversation in the other thread.

I don't think anyone would contest that pop music of that sort is a formulaic, canned product. The music is secondary to the spectacle.

The quality, or musical or historical value of Miley's songs, are not the subject of interest in the other thread.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

RWHN, I asked you before, but what was the title of the other thread, again? Just wondering if you caught that. You asked why it was OK for other people to express their opinions in that thread repeatedly, but not you. I was wondering if you might have made the connection regarding why what you were doing pretty much looks like trolling.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I kind of feel like you've spent so long being the adversary here that you've forgotten how to be anything but adversarial, even in threads where it's really not appropriate. Maybe take a long look, a deep breath, and try to start over without the contrarian "I'll show them" attitude.