Automatic Preference

This Must Be the Place / Talking Heads, 1983

Thirty years ago now.

That’s Bernie Worrell of Parliament on the couch & playing keyboards.

I’m suddenly thinking maybe David Byrne wasn’t just acting strange, or just imagining strange characters in his songs. I think maybe he really is kind of different.

Blue World / Eiffel 65

Days Go By / Dirty Vegas

They must be out there but I sure don’t know how to find them.

Wait Here / Al Green

See rant in previous post. Awesome 1990s music is out there, dude just apparently doesn’t know about it & can’t be bothered to learn.

Here’s Sonic Youth on fucking Letterman! Hey, dude, you have one thing straight, there was good stuff going on in pop in the 1990s, and it was out in the mainstream. People should listen to it. Starting with you.

Bull in the Heather / Sonic Youth, 1994

Stupid Girl / Garbage, 1996

Out There / Dinosaur Jr, 1993

Teh unrestrained joy of ahistoricality!–were the 1990s a golden age of US popular music? Via Subrealism.

It’s not only something we do for personal gain. People love to make shit up and then nuke the evidence until it fits the bullshit. It’s the Creative Drive!

So if you do read the link, I have no freaking clue how to answer his question: Was there was more high-quality music selling at huge volumes during the period he calls “good music” than during the periods he calls “bad music.” (Don’t buy top 40 stuff, is my solution to that & has been since around 1977. Never mind what’s been selling. It’s what you’re buying. But he wants to talk financial vengeance, so fine, whatever.)

The problem is his supporting data is completely out to lunch. He seems to have no idea what time period his musical examples actually come from. He says the 1990s were more awesome than the 1980s because in the 1990s they had REM, INXS and Guns ‘n’ Roses. Uh? Is he trolling on purpose? Those are quintessential 1980s bands! He says the 1990s were much more awesome than the 1980s, because in the 1990s they had a Dead Kennedys tribute band. Tribute band? RUFKM? People who don’t already know that the DKs THEMSELVES were PLAYING throughout the early 1980s would have to look it up or else assume (wrongly) that the guy isn’t blowing the entire article out of his ass.

It’s time to harvest the crust from your eyes, dude.

Bulldog Front / Fugazi

Blueprint / Fugazi