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| From | Sam Smith <sam@lullabypit.com> |
| Subject | What IS influence, anyway? |
| Date | Wed, 28 Feb 2007 11:11:20 -0700 |
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All of this talk about Elvis and the Beatles brings me back around to
the question of what exactly influence IS. I always thought I knew, being
a writer with a boatload of influences myself. But maybe I was wrong.
We always loved hearing Mitch Easter talk about what a big influence Led
Zeppelin was, because you listen to Let's Active and you really don't
hear it. At least nobody I know does. I have another buddy - Mike Smith
of Fiction 8 - and he talks about The Church like Sister Mary Margaret
talks about Jesus, but hit their MySpace page and tell me how much Marty
Willson-Piper YOU hear. Skinny Puppy? Sure. Joy Division? Yup - in
spades. But Church?
The truth is that all musicians seem to have all these other musicians
whose work they love, but whose influence you'd never be able to detect
from listening, no matter how good your ears are.
So I guess I wonder - there being a good number of musicians here, and
plenty more informed listeners - is there a standard that says if I can't
hear it, it's not really an influence? Or can influences be more or less
invisible to the listener of the finished product?
And let's try to keep Conway Twitty out of this one, mmkay? :)
_______________________
Sam Smith
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