One thing I can’t stand—and it’s something that I used to do, so I can’t be too judgmental—is when someone sweepingly dismisses a band as simply being a rip-off of some other band.
I once played a few tracks from My Bloody Valentine’s “Loveless” for a co-worker, and he actually claimed that they were just clones of The Velvet Underground.
...Huh??!!!
This idea of originality is an interesting criterion of musical preference; People can get downright righteous about it, and yet no one’s all that steadfast in applying it to their own tastes. Think about it, if you have ever written off a band that you claim defiles some ideal of artistic innovation (and who hasn’t?), and you have one album in your collection that’s derivative of another sound, guess what? You’re a hypocrite.
If I’m gonna rag on the Yeah Yeah Yeahs for copping the Kill Rock Stars sound, it should be assumed that I also hate Clinic, who openly borrow from Suicide and the Silver Apples. And Modest Mouse for mashing Pavement and the Pixies. And Stereolab for sounding like Sergio Mendes and Neu!.
Ad infinitum.
I know, I know, everyone takes from some other artist. Music doesn’t exist in a vacuum, and everyone acknowledges that every artist has inspirations. And notions of innovation and imitation sometimes do seem really clearly distinct, at least for certain exemplar bands. For instance, take Led Zeppelin and the Raveonettes. Led Zeppelin outright stole old blues songs, yes, but they altered them almost beyond recognition, and made a signature sound that was both complex and visceral. So even if they were dicks for slighting the original artists in their songwriting credits, they still can be seen as innovators. In contrast, the Raveonettes just sound like the Jesus & Mary Chain. Melodies, beats, riffs, distortion effects, vocal style, even lyrical content. Pretty much a carbon copy, with no discernible idiosyncrasies. It’s easy to see that they’re imitators.
But it’s not always so clear a distinction. When is it an homage, and when is it just a lazy copy? The Cramps are considered the pioneers of “psychobilly,” which is just rockabilly with a ghoulish image and a slightly more aggressive sound. But the rhythms, the chords, and the vocal affectations are all knowingly taken from pre-established sounds. The Gun Club is another highly respected psychobilly band, but they just repeat the Cramps’ stylistic homages, with a little more speed. The White Stripes are a band clearly influenced by these groups, and interestingly they’ve gotten flack as being imitators. But what’s the real difference from the Gun Club and the White Stripes, aside from about twenty years? Not much, in that both wear their influences on their sleeves, and are content to belt out a fast and dirty hybrid of their favorite rock sounds. There is a bit of the arbitrary, here, yes?
People who are fans of a certain genre or genres (i.e., most music fans) have many artists who aren’t that different from each other stylistically, especially to an outsider’s ear. Are the Dead Boys that different from Johnny Thunders and the Heartbreakers? Is State of Alert radically different from Minor Threat? Dissection from Darkthrone? Frontline Assembly from Skinny Puppy? King Tubby from the Upsetters? Alan Jackson from Kenny Chesney?
No, but the fans can’t get enough bands within these narrow stylistic ranges. They appreciate the subtle differences between the bands, and balk at people who say it all sounds the same. Excuse me? The Birthday Party and the Pop Group are the same? Preposterous! The Pop Group obviously have a funkier, spacier sound, while the Birthday Party etc etc etc. This is something that almost everyone does. When you are really receptive to a sound, you care enough to specialize in all of its details. Which is another way to say that you listen to a bunch of bands that sound really similar, and you don’t mind it.
I think when most people do the tossed off “They Just Sound Like X” dismissal, they are simply not receptive to new sounds at the moment. Sometimes you’re in the mood to absorb new bands, and sometimes you’re not.
Not to rag on my brother in law, but he does this all the time to me. He told me once that Nirvana's "In Utero" album was ripping off Sonic Youth, and that the Feelies just sound like the Velvet Underground.
First off, come on: would you ever confuse these bands? To me, the most valid evidence for brazen imitation is if I can actually mistake a song or general sound as belonging to an older group. If so, I can confidently dismiss the newer group as a mere copy. The aforementioned Raveonettes sound so much like the Jesus & Mary Chain that I actually have confused them before. If someone told me that Interpol’s “Obstacle 1” was a long-lost Joy Division track, I could probably be persuaded.
But no one would ever confuse any song off "In Utero" with a Sonic Youth song. Period (Unless you only listen to Jazz vocalists from the 40s and refer to all rock music as “that racket”). The influence is certainly there, but Nirvana has its own sound, and it’s unmistakable. Glenn Mercer of the Feelies does have a voice that recalls Lou Reed, but you could never, ever mistake a Feelies song for a VU song. There’s more to their sound than a vocal tic (not to mention that Reed’s own vocal affectation was an open nod to Bob Dylan).
Second, when said Dismisser also likes the Strokes, who have Lou Reed vocals as well as guitars that sound like the Feelies, can’t we just admit that there’s something other than originality that’s keeping you from connecting with “Crazy Rhythms?”
In the past, when I criticized a band as being derivative, I was often oversimplifying what I really felt. For instance, I don’t actually mind when bands conjure up the spirit of Ian Curtis (Xiu Xiu’s Jamie Stewart does it to great effect in “I Love the Valley Oh!”), but when Interpol does it, it usually comes off as a forced affectation. More generally, bands who merely borrow the aesthetics of an influence rather than an expressive component risk being obscured by the large, looming shadow of their references. It’s not that Interpol sounds too much like Joy Division for me, it’s that they don’t get it quite right. They remind me of Joy Division, but they also remind me that I should be listening to Joy Division instead of Interpol.
But this instance of the Feelies vs. The Velvet Underground vs. the Strokes is a different matter. This just screams: “Sorry dude, Nothin doin. I will end this encounter with an attack on your band’s credibility, and you will bring it up no more.”
I try not to make these sweeping dismissals anymore. Nowadays, I’ll simply say, “I’m not really into it” and leave it at that. I also try to be less stringent in my criteria for originality. I don’t think I’ll ever get a Raveonettes album, but hey, if people like the Jesus & Mary Chain sound, and want more of it, who am I to judge?
I’m hoping for a day when people are a little more honest about their personal, subjective biases rather than turn the matter into some argument for objective good taste. And admit that originality is in the eye of the beholder.
Otherwise Nirvana's just a Sonic Youth ripoff, Sonic Youth (and My Bloody Valentine) just aped the Velvet Underground, the Velvets listened to too much Dylan, Dylan was just a Woody Guthrie wannabe, Woody was a John Jacob Niles clone, and John Jacob Niles is really derivative of that 8 year old girl in the Appalachians who sang for him one day in the '20s, that girl stole lyrics from Irish Immigrants, who learned them on an English trade ship, ad infinitum.
pattern recognition is a pleasurable part of listening to any kind of music. when we approve, we call patterns knowing references and soak up the intentional nods to sophisticated art.
ReplyDeleteperhaps, if nothing in a song/band at first grabs a listener as being of particular interest, simple pattern recognition becomes the most basic way to process new music. however, recognition and categorization probably also have the effect of closing down a listener's sensitivity to a song's particular variations or novelties that others might enjoy. at that point, the capacity for recognition can lead us away from actually listening to the music and into dismissive games of one-upmanship, in which any given pleasure can be exploited as a weakness (being taken in by the merely derivative) and personal taste requires robust theories of origination or irony.
that said, it can be really fun to debate whether a particular musical reference sufficiently avoids being merely derivative, as long as everyone realizes they are talking out of their asses to some degree.
ReplyDeletealso, the reality of industry cynics churning out known quantities for easy profits makes it seem almost necessary to value musical innovation as ethically important, if only to feel like human agency is somehow greater than corporate profit margins.
Good point about the corporate angle. Even though they usually do just churn out more and more of the same, at least the facade of caring about artistic integrity or whatever that may mean sometimes results in some good stuff.
ReplyDeleteI think that, at least for those of us who have this originality criterion, it's not simply a sonic novelty that's required, it's also an ability to mentally generate some artistic persona from the music we're exposed to. For a long time, I had no taste for most 80's hardcore outside of Minor Threat, because it all sounded the same to me. Not only was it all stylistically very similar, the artists seemed like angry robot zombies rather than people. But once I started thinking about the whole scene as more of a collective folk movement, I was able to learn to appreciate the similarity of sound, and even start to distinguish between the sounds and personalities of different bands. The sonic novelty is definitely a big component for early analyses, but other factors can affect evaluation as well, and even mitigate the need for novelty.