Ask a music scene micro celebrity

[glittercop666]

jesus chirst steve give it a rest. word on the street is u recorded kurt and his band for free. [censored] i gotta tell ya, my brain is a little fuzzy but i remember the poster children recording up there at smart studio after gish and after we mixed the 1st catherine record there, and hum, that song about outter space and the wacky gurl... i liked it a lot. [censored] we used open for them, and the pumpkins and the flaming lips, and lush. Steve i was at everyone of those metro shows u talking about and i remember it different.... so, you were on one side of the tracks and then there was the wax trax i liked playing on the tracks. fun, just don't piss on the third rail. hey man, music is music and we all gotta pay rent. p.s. i'm working on a side project. u gotta hear it. i send u a copy. bye 4 now
kerry

[sponge]

Steve,

How do you reconcile the differing opinions of someone from within the "scene" and someone far removed from it. For example, as a teenager in a tiny, tiny farm town I loved the Pumpkins. Their management situation and their professionalism would've meant absolutely nothing to me. I've heard something about Paul McCartney dictating the Abbey Road sessions but I didn't know or care anything about that when I was spinning You Never Give Me Your Money over and over.

At some point, won't the music be so far removed from its origins that it can be judged on its own merits?

[felix240]

Yeah, I mean there's no guarantee of quality on either side of the major/indie divide, but I think someone following their own muse rather than aping the current top o the charts has a better shot at producing something of lasting value and depth. Similarly, just cause a lot of people bought the Smashing Pumpkins records in their prime doesn't mean those records are necessarily "better music" or that they even speak to the masses as music - people buy [censored] for a lot of reasons besides the actual use value or quality of the thing they bought. This is especially true with cultural stuff, cause we have been trained to think we are what we choose to own. "Taste" is I think more complicated and less personal then it might seem. Marketing and image for the Smashing Pumpkins is a huge part of how they sold what they sold.

That said, I like a lot of Gish.

[electrical]

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Hi, I was more just making an argument to understand why bands like SP are reviled as 'sellouts'...

[/ QUOTE ]
And I tried to explain (in a couple hundred words you chose to ignore) that selling out has nothing to do with success, and is not why people disliked the Smashing Pumpkins in the first place.

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just because they were good enough and good at the game, and didn't mind making a nice living.

[/ QUOTE ]
It is a ridiculous straw man (and a common one among apologists for mainstream culture) that independent-minded people are against success, and that we see something inherently wrong with making money, being well-liked, etc. I will say it again here (and for the 10,000th time in my life in identical discussions with people who are misrepresenting this position):

Nobody thinks success is a bad thing, nobody thinks less of a band just because they are successful, and nobody faults a band for wanting to make money. All of those things are embraced by the independent/underground culture. My band is reasonably popular. My bands have all turned a healthy profit. My bands' tours are all profitable. My bands have all sold a lot of records. I am glad it is so, and I have never wished that it was otherwise.

What is rejected is the bulldozer of corporate intrusion, the enforced group-think of the mass culture and the herd-of-sheep mentality that makes it possible. When someone embraces all those things, we are within our rights to notice and form an opinion of that embrace, and the person performing it.

I cannot say it any more clearly: Nobody has a problem with success. We have a problem with an oppressive, monolithic culture being thrust on us at every juncture, and those who would help it along using the excuse that they "just want to be successful."

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I am totally fine and understand just doin it for fun and enjoyment, I don't think those are the people that take it seriously enough to produce something fantastic that reaches a ton of people.

[/ QUOTE ]

You are apparently ignorant of the careers of the many independent bands who have made "fantastic" records that have changed lives. How many people is a "ton?" Is a million enough? I can name you a dozen independent bands who have reached that many people and more.

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Is it wrong to seek commercial success if you think you're good enough and palatable enough for broad consumption?

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The way you pose the question makes the answer obvious: No, of course not. That's also not what anybody is complaining about. "Seeking success" can be done without joining forces with the most destructive elements of the business and culture, and that's what you're excusing by reducing the discussion to a simpleton's level; "they just want to be successful." This is in keeping with the way the outfit excuses torching a restaurant and threatening the family of the proprietor, "it's just business."

[episkeptis]

Which are your favourite non strategy poker books?


Which would get more tiresome if you had to do it every day for a year playing poker or playing gigs with Shellac?

[electrical]

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At some point, won't the music be so far removed from its origins that it can be judged on its own merits?

[/ QUOTE ]
Music is more than sound. The sound is just the part that you can hear that gets you thinking, and what you think about is the music.

Everything I think about when triggered by the sound is music to me, and when I hear certain music, I love everything about it. The sound is the window into what I love, but why I love it is probably unique to each piece of music.

Also, for "love," read "hate" and "don't give half a damn about."

It is impossible for music to be evaluated on "its own merits," because on its own, it's just sound stripped of its intent. If, when you listen to music, you just hear sound, I pity you.

[woozer]

Hi Steve,

is it true that you hate touring Germany?
If so, why? If not, how come you´re here so rarely? And: Would you consider coming anyway (please!)?

[sponge]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
At some point, won't the music be so far removed from its origins that it can be judged on its own merits?

[/ QUOTE ]
Everything I think about when triggered by the sound is music to me, and when I hear certain music, I love everything about it. The sound is the window into what I love, but why I love it is probably unique to each piece of music.

Also, for "love," read "hate" and "don't give half a damn about."

It is impossible for music to be evaluated on "its own merits," because on its own, it's just sound stripped of its intent. If, when you listen to music, you just hear sound, I pity you.

[/ QUOTE ]

Oh no, please don't pity me, I didn't say or imply that all I heard was sound. I said that at some point music will exist far apart from the scene it originated from. Managers and contracts and even recording techniques won't matter when the sound triggers the personal feelings and ignites, as you said: "everything I think about." Considering all those other things is just a form of politics isn't it?

[Hanys]

I read through all the 40 pages of questions, answers and samples of the whoever-registered-for-the-sole-purpose-of-wanting-to-ask-themicrocelebrity-a-question-is-a-dork forumserver.twoplustwo.com sort-of-like elitist underground ethics. Whoever initially exposed this forum to the outter internet world, they sure were not a "stranger", right? Some sickly ambitious PR, maybe.

So, while some of the questions asked by 'the strangers' might've been a bit dull, and many of the questioners could've found their way here not exactly by the map painted on five cards, the music dorks still help give some of the true members that shortly oblivious feeling of importance and.. The witty one will know. Hey, Stevie, congrats on, how many years of dryness? 26? Well then.. I'm only into yer shtik.

[longfellow]

do you recall a band you recorded from fort collins, CO called tanger? your thoughts on them?