smoe.org mailing lists
ivan@stellysee.de
| From | "Sager, Greg" <greg.sager@bankofamerica.com> |
| Subject | immediacy |
| Date | Mon, 25 Jun 2007 03:41:12 -0500 |
[Part 1 text/plain us-ascii (4.6 kilobytes)]
(View Text in a separate window)
<<Date: Sun, 24 Jun 2007 03:03:37 +0000
From: Gene Good <javagene@hotmail.com>
To: <audities@smoe.org>
Subject: Re: Well, this should keep the McCartney Thread alive for
another
Message-ID: <BAY105-W1939146815E36A36F03C53DA150@phx.gbl>
I am not familiar at all with this Lefsetz guy at all.The thing that
really got to me was the part where he said he only sampled the
McCartney cd and that was not only enough for him but for anyone.He
hated it so much he completely negates the idea that this album could
reveal itself to him in time.That is so insane.All music improves with
familiarity.I know,he said it has to be good in the first place.But we
all know how good music just grows on you. Way back in the early posts
on this album,several people have mentioned how this album hit after
several plays.The more they listened the more they liked what they
heard.I just find that to be the case with all music.Some of it hits you
immediately but then new layers are revealed after further
listening.Heck, that was the case with Beatle albums. I know this guy is
nothing to get hung about.>>
I gotta disagree with you pretty strongly on a couple of points here,
Gene. First of all, not all music improves with familiarity. I've heard
Morris Albert's "Feelings" and Starland Vocal Band's "Afternoon Delight"
a zillion times since they were released in the '70s, and I don't like
either song one bit more now than I did back in the days of flared
corduroys and shag carpeting. I think it's safe to say that neither
recording will ever improve with more familiarity -- and I could name an
endless parade of Top 40 dreck released over my lifetime that burbles
within that same "no improvement with more familiarity" cesspool.
Second, I don't think that your second generalization, "all good music
just grows on you", is necessarily true, either. There are some songs
that I love right from the get-go, and they stay that way. For me, that
describes *most* of the music that I love. I value immediacy. I think
it's the greatest virtue of popular music -- how a song can grab your
attention and make you like it the very first time that you hear it.
It's essentially the bedrock of what's made the popular music industry
work over the past half-century plus, and it's often cited by people who
hate popular music as the very reason why they hate it. If a musical
work's essential appeal is something that an untrained ear can hear the
first time out, their reasoning goes, then it's too shallow to have any
intrinsic value. What I, and a whole lot of other popular music lovers,
say in response is that being grabbed by something the very first time
that you hear it is what's *right* about the music. Say what you will
about the disposability of modern consumer society and the short
attention span of the consumers it has produced; the fact of the matter
is that music touches areas of the human psyche that are innate and not
socially formed. Any music that moves people has an intrinsic value to
it, and many of us are moved the most by music that triggers our
endorphins the very first time that we hear it.
Sure, some great popular music has layers that you don't catch (and
therefore don't appreciate) the first time out of the gate. But an awful
lot of it does -- most of it, in my estimation and in the estimation of
many other people. I have yet to hear any new layers to "As Long As I
Have You" by Garnet Mimms, "I Want You Around" by the Ramones, "Bad
Luck" by Social Distortion, "She's a Girl and I'm a Man" by Lloyd Cole,
or "Emily Mazurinsky" by the Adventures of Jet that I didn't hear the
first time I heard those songs. And you know what? I don't miss the
absent hear-them-somewhere-down-the-road layers at all. The songs didn't
need them ... and neither did I as the listener. Eddie Cochran's
"Something Else", Johnny Cash's "Folsom Prison Blues", the Beach Boys'
"Girl, Don't Tell Me", and the Who's "I Can See For Miles" sound exactly
the same to me as they did upon my first listen however many years ago
that was ... and I love those songs not one bit less for it.
I've said it before on Audities, and I'll say it again: What I love
about great popular music is its immediacy. If a song doesn't wow me the
first time through with a great hook, compelling performance, or a
fantastic melody, chances are it that never will. So don't expect me to
play McCartney's new album, or anyone else's, five or six times waiting
for it to reveal itself. All that'd almost certainly do is frustrate me,
because there's too much other stuff I want to hear that stands a much
better chance of satisfying my musical sweet tooth the first time that I
hear it.
Greg Sager
For assistance, please contact
the smoe.org administrators.