Disagreement with the masses

Name some:

Songs or bands (or for classical folks, pieces or composers) that everyone and his kid brother seem to love, but that you, personally, cannot stand. Alternatively, the opposite: songs or bands that you adore but that critics and/or public just never warmed to.

Give at least three or four words of explanation, so that this can turn into an actual discussion rather than just a list of various opinions.

I'll start: I really HATE John Lennon's "Imagine." The message* is not only mush-headed but muddled. The instrumentation and structure is simplistic and repetitive. In short, it's an awful song. You can't escape from the damn thing either, since it still gets played far too much. And yet, when you tell people you don't like the song, they stare at you like you just said you eat puppies.

--M.

*Y'know, I don't really mind the message itself -- or I wouldn't if it actually had a single clear message. It's just that it's incoherent. Peace and love and all that are nice--but communism, anarchy, and atheism thrown in for good measure, and all together in one single midden heap?

Edited by: mrpenney to add footnote

I've talked about this here and on other forums over the years - that Imagine is one of the sappiest pieces of bubblegum I've ever heard - although I do like the way A Perfect Circle covered it - dark and broody, made a world of difference in the song - not a big solo Lennon, Lennon/Ono fan to begin with

have to think about the rest of the question

I don't like Elvis or Jimi Hendrix.

I'll be shot for saying this but as much as Hendrix is revered for technique, and rightly so, I don't find the music itself all that relevant today - although back then I'd have to say I was among the masses on Hendrix

Elvis is another story - I don't see him as "The King" but I still like a good Elvis tune

I'm still thinking - I know there are some but right now I'm drawing a blank until people mention them

If JR were here I'd have to give honorable mention to Mr. Monotone and Mr. Whine and Cheese just to do it

Bob Dylan. I don't understand where all the love comes from. "But...but...he's the GREATEST POET OF OUR GENERA TION...yadda yadda..." I can hardly understand him, and his nasally whine is more than I can handle for more than 1 or 2 songs.

Celine Dion: She doesn't really sing, so much as yell out lyrics with far more passion and volume than the lyrics require. Her voice isn't bad at all, it's what she does with it.

Jonas Brothers: Why are they even mildly famous?

Amy Winehouse: Why is she even mildly famous, other than for being a walking trainwreck?

Sweet Home Alabama. God that song is just about the crappiest most repetitive piece of crap ever written. Its my veto song for my covers band.

Unluckily, that means I have to place eagles songs. Who are just about the most boring band I've ever heard. I just don't get it.

The worst thing about not liking these bands is that people then try and convince you that you are indeed wrong. For like 30 minutes.

I don't have guilty pleasures I like some will young, daniel bedingfield and make no excuses.

but I hate it when people underrmine a band I love because they went on to release shoddy material. Such as the offspring, the shamen, manic street preachers, ocean colour scene.

In the words of scrubious pip...' thou shall not put bands and recording artists on a rediculous pedistool, no matter how good they are or were....the beatles, just a band, the beach boys, just a band, the pistols, just a band.....the next big thing, just a band'

Sweet Home Alabama. God that song is just about the crappiest most repetitive piece of crap ever written. Its my veto song for my covers band.

The worst thing, from my point of view, is that everything of any value in that song was ripped off of Neil Young. Intentionally, of course, to make a point. But that makes it worse, if anything.

Neil Young may have been unfair to the state of Alabama, but his is much the better song.

--M.

REM. Whining, jangly, middle of the road, self-indulgent twaddle. And I hate the guy's voice.

Hehe... I like this thread. Right, then: Phil Collins. I love A Trick of the Tail (Genesis, 1976), however once he went solo he became sappy, cheesy and a serious candidate for the world's #1 über schmaltzmeister. Then again, commercial pop in the 80s were generally a bloody nuisance anyway. Jon English, Chris de Burgh, Elton John, Bryan Adams, Duran Duran, Modern Talking... the list goes on. Patrick Bateman's views in B E Ellis' American Psycho on Genesis, Whitney Houston and Huey Lewis and The News make for some good laughs.

Pearl Jam. I can only understand about 10% of the lyrics, and those that I can, are just pointless.

John Mayer. Why is he the spokesman of my generation? Why?

I'm a huge Monster Magnet fan.

don't beat around the bush or anything, why don't you just.....say what you mean to say

I like REM and Pearl Jam but can't stand Led Zeppelin. I find the singer's voice whiny. I HATE stairway to heaven.

Stairway to Heaven encapsulates every dance I went to for years before Disco, Glam, and Punk hit - that and Knights in White Satin and a couple of others - again, I don't find it relevant today but back then...well - I can't hate it for that reason alone - too many memories

I said Knights in white satin - someone usually catches that and let's me know about it :-)

sorry, carry on

sympathy for the dyslectics, 's why.

obviously you know my pain ;-)

Of curse....

I hear you regarding "Imagine." It's one song that other singers don't seem to mind bowdlerizing because it's so logically tortured. I heard Joan Baez add an "except your own" onto the end of that "and no religion too" line at a concert, and some gospel singer add a "just one God" in the same spot on a TV show. Imagine that!

I'll just stick to a couple of acts and a song people (and critics) think of as actually "good" other than in a cash-register sense. Otherwise the list would be way too long.

U2. I had "Boy" and "October" (and some bootleg LP too) long ago and liked them, but never bought anything from "War" onward. Don't like them, don't hate them. They do nothing for me.

Lenny Kravitz. If you want to talk about derivative music you may as well begin here. Everyone goes on about his talent, but to me he's most talented as a ripoff artist peddling instant nostalgia to people who have no actual memories of the good music he's pillaging.

GnR. I just don't get it. I have no idea why they are somehow considered better than the rest of the crap on MTV at the same time. I have friends (whose taste I respect) who are fans, but I don't see it.

Red Hot Chili Peppers. I can't stand this kind of strutting dumbth generally, and these guys may as well be the poster boys.

The Santana song "Everything is Coming Our Way." Those first three Santana albums have some great stuff on them, but that song... It didn't help that we had a houseguest in college who, over the course of a weekend, had us play that song (and nothing else off the album) about thirty times, sometimes five or six times in a row.

Edited by: chriskean1

I cannot stand Queen and not a fan of Guns & Roses.

Bob Dylan. I don't understand where all the love comes from. "But...but...he's the GREATEST POET OF OUR GENERA TION...yadda yadda..." I can hardly understand him, and his nasally whine is more than I can handle for more than 1 or 2 songs.

I'm a Dylan fan but disagree with people who say he's a great poet or lyricist. He does write some great lyrics but even in songs which I enjoy I sometimes find the lyrics to be poor or feel as if they don't really fit that well with the music. It's hard to describe but overall I do think he's good.

Bruce Springsteen - he's okay to listen to, but his music is too common. Some lyrics are good though.

Metallica - I find James Hetfield's voice annoying, it's got a very limited scale. The sound of the band isn't sophisticated enough

Whitney Houston - too cheesy, and not my kind of repertoire anyway. In the same class with Micheal Bolton.

Elvis Presley - never been a fan of him, too sweet and sentimental. The beginning of his career was interesting though (I appreciated it afterwards), but at that time I was still in diapers.

Oasis - a very average band that gained popularity mainly due to bad behaviour on and off stage

Fieldgate, Oasis got where they got to through ripping off the sound of better bands(roses, charltans, ride, soup dragons, carpets, even early blur and marketing it well.

But still overated and a really boring live band.

That said, noel has a talent for getting loadsa songs outa the same chord progresions. And His B-sides such as half the world away are really good.

I used to love Oasis. Owned everything they ever released, had copies of all rare tracks and live recordings. Now I can barely stand to listen to them. It's the lyrics more than anything, they are absolutely nonsense.

I own the one Oasis album (What's the Story Morning Glory) and never really saw a need to acquire a second one. I put it into the category of whiny mid-90's pop-rock* that I think twenty years from now everyone will agree was a bad idea all around.

*not a unified movement or sound--just that from here it seemed like there was a lot of music in the mid-90's with annoyingly whiny vocals and a profound lack of imagination. It's like between 1993 and 1998, everyone in music just took a holiday from good sense.

Oddly, though, I do like the Smashing Pumpkins. Can't explain it really, since I do NOT like Billy Corgan's voice.

--M.

Funny--I was reading your post #25 mrpenney, and the term "whiny mid-90s pop-rock" immediately made me flash on Smashing Pumpkins. I was going to ask whether you included them in the category but then you answered that yourself. I take it your answer is "yes and no," or "yes, but..." which is basically mine. I don't listen to them too much anymore, other than a few songs.

Never liked Oasis. Not a Springsteen fan.

John Mayer. Why is he the spokesman of my generation? Why?
HA! Yeah but there’s something quite funny about the line in one of his latest songs “I don’t remember you looking any better but then again I don’t remember you”. That appeals to my sense of humour which has a nice dollop of bitterness.

immediately made me flash on Smashing Pumpkins. I was going to ask whether you included them in the category but then you answered that yourself. I take it your answer is "yes and no," or "yes, but..." which is basically mine.

Yep. Specifically, "yes, but... there's something that they get right that sort of makes up for it for me." And if I had to put a finger on it, that "something" would be some quality songwriting much of the time, and better-than-average musicianship, such that between the two, more often than not there's something there.

Another way of putting it--they were trying to be popped-up Nirvana rather than grunged-up Counting Crows, which makes all the difference in the world.

--M.

Edited by: mrpenney

Smashing Pumpkins are excellent. :)

Queen got mentioned here somewhere. I think their early stuff up until and including A Night at the Opera is brilliant. Then they went completely ga-ga, Flash Gordon takes the biscuit. As for Supertramp, I've always enjoyed Crisis, Breakfast, Crime and Quitet Moments - stellar keyboard sound. In moderation, of course. That goes for Genesis and Queen as well, needless to say.

In high school all my friends loved Led Zeppelin - I really tried but just couldn't listen to them.
I used to love the Red Hot Chili Peppers circa 1992, but dear god those guys should stop releasing new albums.
I hate Billy Corgan as much as the next guy, but I listened to Siamese Dream on spotify the other day and have to concede it's a great album.

As for newer stuff... Foo Fighters are awful, Florence and the f***ing Machine: her voice is like a hammer to my temple, the Hold Steady seem like nice guys but I don't know why their dull dull music has so much hipster cred.

OK euro you're right, zepplin hyped a lot, but before my time so for me it was maybe you have to be there.

Chillies, spot on

Corgon, spot on siamese dream is brilliant

rest, spot on

but the hold steady for me is a band that should get boring after 2 songs but for some reason doesn't, so kind of know what you mean. Songs like chill out tent (reminds me of personal experiences of chill out tents and girlfriend in a coma by doug copeland) and chips ahoy (which reminds me of mispent youth and a particular girl) just stand out and come across honest.
Hipster cred comes from the fact they write songs about all of lives vices and may have actually have them and make no apoligies.

Led Zep, Hendrix - if you were 16 or 18 at that time (end 60s/beg 70s) you'd love them.

At that time, nobody thought of music that it'd survive, it was only for today, and it was great.

Much as I admire 'Imagine', there was an incident involving John and Yoko here in Toronto that has caused me some pause. Seems just prior to his writing that iconic hit, John and Yoko spent an extended winter vacation of sorts on the outskirts of Toronto. They were guests at the ranch-home of rockabilly singer Ronnie Hawkins. They enjoyed some skidooing and other winter activities. But they also spent an inordinate amount of time on the phone, John apparently staying right on top of his financial investments ('Imagine no possessions...'). Point is, that they left Hawkins with the phone bill and never paid despite promises. I forget the outstanding figure involved with this bill, but it ran into thousands of dollars----and that was a sizable chunk back in those days. Imagine........

U2 is over-rated. Too many people I have met over the years couldn't understand that it is possible to dislike the band.

To be fair I haven't listened to that much hold steady, they just don't seem to be my thing. And it's not like they've become global superstars or anything. But I really do hate the Foo Fighters.

The horror of horrors is, to me, Michael Jackson. First, this guy could not sing at all. Second, his change of appearance to look like a white woman was simply sick and required a therapist, not a cheering audience.

The horror of horrors is, to me, Michael Jackson. First, this guy could not sing at all.

YES.

I"ll reserve comment on the psychological oddities, which were severe, but even when he was massively popular I didn't get what was so special.

--M.