pioneer98 wrote:There was a lot of music back then that I thought was silly even then. Huey Lewis. Herbie Hancock. The Bangles. The Cars. Peter Gabriel. Etc. There were exceptions that were actually pretty good. Genesis. U2. Prince. Michael Jackson. Maybe Springsteen? Etc.
Whoa, whoa, WHOA!!! You lump Peter Gabriel in with the "bads", yet Genesis in with the "goods"??? That is wrong on multiple levels!!!
I'm glad someone else mentioned this. Tsk, tsk on the Peter Gabriel dis.
The synth schlock started in the 70's of course. I mean there is some synth on Abbey Road after all.
There were some that used it well: Dark Side of the Moon for instance.
But then you had things like Heart's Dreamboat Annie and Boston's debut. At the time it sounds great, new, fresh, modern! But boy it hasn't aged well. So much of it sounds like cheap video game effects.
MrSaigon wrote:EDM, Dubstep, even modern Radiohead aren't my thing but I wouldn't say they bother me all that much. But that soulless, hollow synthesized sound of the 80s is (almost always) unbearable.
Exhibit B (listen to Beams' interview before the performance as well, I think I lifted that subconciously in paraphrase before):
I like Iron and Wine, but I disagree with the point being made. "Oh, let's improve this song with "real instruments" because it sounds better to me." Music is subjective. If the synths, and those flat, non-reverberating notes that go with it don't bother you, then it's fine. I think it would be lame if all music was arranged and instrumented according to one particular era or school of thought. I like that you can listen to a song and know right away when it came out.
Go back to the earliest days of music and play three chords on an acoustic guitar and three notes on a 80s synth for 10 notable artists every ten years and ask what they prefer. What you get may not be objective, but it will be overwhelming. It's a horrible sound. It's the Yellow-5, artificial preservative carcinogen of music.
But for a time, people chose it. And there are some people still making music on those old synths, or at least making it sound that way.
I get what you're saying. If you go back and offer those same people a modern synth, they'd probably take it over what they had. For me it still works.
And yeah, Peter Gabriel =/= silly and Genesis had maybe a couple good songs.
It's not a worthless sound. That Buffalo Bill song is a cool tune, well arranged--and what's great about it is I have no idea what instruments you might replace the synth with.
But it's almost always terrible. And there was no reason for that sound to get as much run as it got. And it's inexcusable for it to resurface. It's like they were part of the revolt against disco and said, 'No! Terrible! You need to double down on that soulless, hollow (I'm running out of adjectives) drum machine sound!'
Let me be super pretentious (or at least skirt the line) for a minute. When I was a boy, my grandmother took me to the Oregon Symphony every few months. I was usually so bored. But sometimes I wonder if my loving music with dense arrangements like Van Morrison's Astral Weeks, or Kanye's beats was informed by those experiences, or similarly, my distaste for the Pet Shop Boys.
Now let me be super offensive. When are the 80s going to come out as gay--not lame gay, but homosexual gay?
REM
The Pogues
Clash's London Calling;
The Jam's last two albums
Prince
The Waterboy's Fisherman's Blues
Springsteen's The River and Nebraska
The Smiths
Public Enemy
The Beastie Boys
Talking Heads
Fishbone
lukethedrifter wrote:REM
The Pogues
Clash's London Calling;
The Jam's last two albums
Prince
The Waterboy's Fisherman's Blues
Springsteen's The River and Nebraska
The Smiths
Public Enemy
The Beastie Boys
Talking Heads
Fishbone
The Cocteau Twins, particularly Elizabeth Fraser, were a spectacular band. "Bluebeard" is up there as one of my favorite songs ever. I love jangly, ethereal pop sound though. They had to heavily influence The Sundays who came out in the '89/90 time frame. The Smiths are one of my all time faves as well.
