In many ways, Scott Walker was the inspiration for this entire blog. I had the pleasure of watching a documentary, 20th Century Man, centered around Walker and his impact on the music world. Watching David Bowie and members of Radiohead discussing the impact this man's music had on them, I was struck with the revelation that bands and artists most people have never heard of helped shape pop music without ever being included within it. The Velvet Underground and The Stooges may be the classic examples, but Scott Walker was the example that really drove the point home.
After all, the true tragedy of the punk genre (and, as previously mentioned, the alternative and grunge movements of the 90s) was that it was a deliberate reaction against what was already popular. Once the genre itself became mainstream, the artists suddenly lost their purpose. The simplest illustration of this is The Clash, who went from who went from their 35 minute, self-titled debut to the three-disc, 144 minute album Sandinista! in three years.
The point is, the proto-punk all-stars were never meant to be mainstream. They deliberately pushed boundaries by reducing their music to a skeletal version of what the public considered rock music. It's considerably different from how David Bowie chose to push boundaries, and how he chose to revive the careers of the two kings of proto-punk, Lou Reed and Iggy Pop. Bowie, after all, made new music by combining elements of already popular groups into an unfailingly interesting (at least until the early-80s) whole.
Scott Walker falls under the Bowie-camp described above. Formerly a part of the reasonably successful Walker Brothers, Scott broke off on his own after it became clear that his ambition and artistic influences far outstripped those of his 'brothers' (none of the group were actually named Walker; Scott's real name is Noel Scott Engel). While the other Walkers operated in basic, MOR pop, Scott found himself attracted more to the baroque and embellished, symbolized by the work of Jacques Brel.
Already one of the more popular Walker brothers due to his distinctive baritone, Scott was allowed to pursue a solo career by his parent label, releasing the critically and commercially successful album Scott. It's impossible to tell how much of the album's baroque-styled violin and horn embellishments were actually Scott's idea instead of his producer, but the lyrics and melodies were certainly his. Many of the songs were translated versions of Brel's songs (including the classic "My Death" which Bowie himself often performed on tour though never, oddly enough, on record) but Scott's own songs displayed his touch for the dramatic and memorable.
His next two albums, creatively titled Scott 2 and Scott 3, followed a similar pattern, though 3 provided early hints of Walker's later musical style. The records continued to be successful as well, helped along by Scott's own television show.
None of this exactly sounds like an obscure, cult-following musician, does it? Though he has never been successful in the US (which is ironically his home country) Scott's albums consistently hit the top-ten in England, no doubt helped by the fact that his baroque style had at least vague similarities with Sgt. Pepper.
That all ended with Scott 4, the first album to be released under Walker's birth name instead of his alias. The change was prompted by Walker's belief that this album represented his first 'true' artistic statement, growing from the avant-garde subtext of 3 into full blown experimental music. To give an idea of just how experimental it was, the first track is "The Seventh Seal", a five-minute summary of the Ingmar Bergman classic. That's about as far from pop as you can get without going into Metal Machine Music territory. The album was also bereft of most of the baroque-style of his first three albums, further suggesting that those orchestra overdubs were the responsibility of the producer.
Predictability, the album flopped. Whether it was too off-the-wall or simply lacked Walker's name recognition is impossible to answer; it was likely a combination of the two, but the album isn't really that beyond the pale for late-60s pop music.
Though Walker faded into a period of obscurity following Scott 4, he made a psuedo-comeback with '84's Climate Of The Hunter. I say psuedo because it merely marked an artistic comeback; Walker has never captured his early success and, judging from his current style, he doesn't want to.
Hunter kicked off Walker's avant-garde, heavily experimental period. That album, along with everything that followed, fall into the No Wave territory that Sonic Youth briefly strode out of during the late-80s. Those albums, especially The Drift, released in 2006, are the aural equivalent of a slasher movie. I don't like them, but I also hate Sonic Youth so it shouldn't really be much of a surprise.
4.23.2010
Classic Rock Apocrypha - ABBA
You think I'm fucking with you don't you? "Ha ha ha," you say, "ABBA is a classic cornerstone of music history. Very funny, now go do a post on the Eagles or something." Well fuck your shit; I'm going to take the time to carefully explain how ABBA is the single most important dance/club group of all time.
Laughing again? Like it or not, dance music has been one of the most important parts of pop music since the classical era. Most of the pieces we regard today as 'art' was deliberately designed to be background music for a shindig. This is why virtually every symphony (including the much venerated "Fifth Symphony") includes a movement based on a common dance rhythm.
Shit, why do you think people liked jazz music? Up until Coltrane got all uppity with his artsy mumbo-jumbo jazz was made for a bunch of people to dance to. Remember when swing came back for ten minutes back in the late-90s and that one guy you knew started going to swing dance classes? Dancing, not the rockin' horn section, gave swing its popularity.
You can nail down rhythm as key through pop music history, from jazz all the way down to contemporary R&B. People don't like Ke$ha, the Black Eyed Peas, or Lady Gaga for their talent (I hope), but because their music's got a good beat and they can dance to it. This is why no one gives a shit about shoegaze, drone, speed/black/scream/anything-after-second-wave metal, or art rock; you can't dance to it.
And of course, when you talk about dance/club music, you absolutely must discuss disco. Why? Because disco was the original contemporary R&B. Both genres require minimal effort (drum machines and synth, later to be joined by the hated Autotune) and often have empty lyrics about sex/drugs. Same shit, different name. So why do I love ABBA?
Let me first address something; certain bands have the special distinction of being household names. They are bands that have transcended mere popularity and have entered into the public consciousness on a very basic level. In many cases, the names of these bands have become adjectives.
ABBA is, quite obviously, part of this list. Everyone knows about ABBA. There's an entire musical devoted to them; not even Sinatra got that kind of attention. It's proof of what I'm talking about with dance music, because ABBA is very definitely a pop group. They weren't particularly experimental or interesting. What they had going for them were hooks. Tons of hooks. Shit-tons of hooks. They were a goddamn tackle box.
First, they are a singles group among singles groups. This is one distinction ABBA shares with pre-Beatles pop music; no one can name a single one of their albums. The only album ABBA put out that the modern music-lover cares about is Gold, one of the unquestionably perfect greatest hits compilations of all time (along with the one for Al Green).
Second, they are absolutely fundamental to modern day pop music. Their work helped make synthesizes ubiquitous to the modern sound, and firmly established the soaring female tenor that gripped contemporary pop since the classic era. More admirably, they helped expand the range of emotions available to pop musicians, from simple ("Dancing Queen") to the historical/political ("Fernando") to the depressed/bitter ("The Winner Takes It All") and finally to the self-assured ("One Of Us", "Thank You For The Music").
So why are they in the Apocrypha, the category I use for the obscure and underrated? It's because popularity is a continuum, and if Scott Walker defines one end of the spectrum, ABBA defines the other. They are so well known, so ingrained in our lives, that we no longer care about the actual music they produced. Not in a historical sense anyway. Maybe it's because so many music critics are incurable snobs, but the more popular a band becomes, the more likely people are to dismiss them. Look at what happened to Elvis; one of the most popular and innovative (remember, John Lennon attributed all of rock music to him) performers of all time became a grotesque joke in the public consciousness. His music faded into the background, and by 1977 we no longer cared about his contributions, only his failures. The same was true about Michael Jackson; it took his unexpected death to cure people of their associations, to remove his music from purgatory and put it back on the towering pedestal where it rightly belongs.
So what about ABBA? Are we supposed to dismiss them just because they have a museum, Broadway musical, and film dedicated to them? Or should we accept that no band could get this popular without having some measure of talent? Just because disco was popular doesn't mean it was all a wash. I'm not saying there wasn't a lot of pointless drivel produced in that genre; there was, just like every other popular genre. From the right angle, every genre known to man is shit. A pointless waste of time. Looking at things that way, music doesn't seem to have much of a point at all. The important thing is to look at what is good, and has persisted among us because of some inherent quality. I may not like Journey, but I don't deny their significance in music history.
Laughing again? Like it or not, dance music has been one of the most important parts of pop music since the classical era. Most of the pieces we regard today as 'art' was deliberately designed to be background music for a shindig. This is why virtually every symphony (including the much venerated "Fifth Symphony") includes a movement based on a common dance rhythm.
Shit, why do you think people liked jazz music? Up until Coltrane got all uppity with his artsy mumbo-jumbo jazz was made for a bunch of people to dance to. Remember when swing came back for ten minutes back in the late-90s and that one guy you knew started going to swing dance classes? Dancing, not the rockin' horn section, gave swing its popularity.
You can nail down rhythm as key through pop music history, from jazz all the way down to contemporary R&B. People don't like Ke$ha, the Black Eyed Peas, or Lady Gaga for their talent (I hope), but because their music's got a good beat and they can dance to it. This is why no one gives a shit about shoegaze, drone, speed/black/scream/anything-after-second-wave metal, or art rock; you can't dance to it.
And of course, when you talk about dance/club music, you absolutely must discuss disco. Why? Because disco was the original contemporary R&B. Both genres require minimal effort (drum machines and synth, later to be joined by the hated Autotune) and often have empty lyrics about sex/drugs. Same shit, different name. So why do I love ABBA?
Let me first address something; certain bands have the special distinction of being household names. They are bands that have transcended mere popularity and have entered into the public consciousness on a very basic level. In many cases, the names of these bands have become adjectives.
ABBA is, quite obviously, part of this list. Everyone knows about ABBA. There's an entire musical devoted to them; not even Sinatra got that kind of attention. It's proof of what I'm talking about with dance music, because ABBA is very definitely a pop group. They weren't particularly experimental or interesting. What they had going for them were hooks. Tons of hooks. Shit-tons of hooks. They were a goddamn tackle box.
First, they are a singles group among singles groups. This is one distinction ABBA shares with pre-Beatles pop music; no one can name a single one of their albums. The only album ABBA put out that the modern music-lover cares about is Gold, one of the unquestionably perfect greatest hits compilations of all time (along with the one for Al Green).
Second, they are absolutely fundamental to modern day pop music. Their work helped make synthesizes ubiquitous to the modern sound, and firmly established the soaring female tenor that gripped contemporary pop since the classic era. More admirably, they helped expand the range of emotions available to pop musicians, from simple ("Dancing Queen") to the historical/political ("Fernando") to the depressed/bitter ("The Winner Takes It All") and finally to the self-assured ("One Of Us", "Thank You For The Music").
So why are they in the Apocrypha, the category I use for the obscure and underrated? It's because popularity is a continuum, and if Scott Walker defines one end of the spectrum, ABBA defines the other. They are so well known, so ingrained in our lives, that we no longer care about the actual music they produced. Not in a historical sense anyway. Maybe it's because so many music critics are incurable snobs, but the more popular a band becomes, the more likely people are to dismiss them. Look at what happened to Elvis; one of the most popular and innovative (remember, John Lennon attributed all of rock music to him) performers of all time became a grotesque joke in the public consciousness. His music faded into the background, and by 1977 we no longer cared about his contributions, only his failures. The same was true about Michael Jackson; it took his unexpected death to cure people of their associations, to remove his music from purgatory and put it back on the towering pedestal where it rightly belongs.
So what about ABBA? Are we supposed to dismiss them just because they have a museum, Broadway musical, and film dedicated to them? Or should we accept that no band could get this popular without having some measure of talent? Just because disco was popular doesn't mean it was all a wash. I'm not saying there wasn't a lot of pointless drivel produced in that genre; there was, just like every other popular genre. From the right angle, every genre known to man is shit. A pointless waste of time. Looking at things that way, music doesn't seem to have much of a point at all. The important thing is to look at what is good, and has persisted among us because of some inherent quality. I may not like Journey, but I don't deny their significance in music history.
Genre Dictionary - AOR
I've referenced this before, and the term is obscure enough that it deserves a decent explanation instead of my usual sarcasm-laden posts from this category.
AOR stands for album-oriented rock, and was, essentially, the first major type of alternative radio. The format got its start when FM stations were prohibited from echoing the playlists of their AM counterparts, who predominately played major singles, in the late-60s. Fortunately, the mid-60s had ushered in an era of album-based experimentation, marking the beginning of the LP as the main form of artist expression. This, in turn, had its origins in the late-50s concept albums put out by Frank Sinatra (which included major critical successes like No One Cares, Come Fly With Me, and Sinatra's personal favorite of his discography, Only The Lonely).
The LP-as-artistic-statement got a further boost from the Beatles' post-Rubber Soul output, especially the landmark Sgt. Pepper album. Suddenly flush with songs, FM DJs began playing songs that hadn't been selected as singles, giving them a much wider range of material to work with.
The end result was that a certain branch of music was suddenly given a great deal of widely played material, especially during the 70s. One key example is the Eagles; many of their best known songs (such as "Desperado") were never issued as singles, meaning the distribution of such tracks was due to the AOR format.
The format is extraordinarily wide-reaching (its influence can be seen in college radio and most alternative stations, who play bands that probably never had singles in the first place) but the stations that fell directly into the form disappeared in the late-80s and early-90s... to be replaced by classic rock stations. Which is why the term AOR tends to crop up so much.
AOR stands for album-oriented rock, and was, essentially, the first major type of alternative radio. The format got its start when FM stations were prohibited from echoing the playlists of their AM counterparts, who predominately played major singles, in the late-60s. Fortunately, the mid-60s had ushered in an era of album-based experimentation, marking the beginning of the LP as the main form of artist expression. This, in turn, had its origins in the late-50s concept albums put out by Frank Sinatra (which included major critical successes like No One Cares, Come Fly With Me, and Sinatra's personal favorite of his discography, Only The Lonely).
The LP-as-artistic-statement got a further boost from the Beatles' post-Rubber Soul output, especially the landmark Sgt. Pepper album. Suddenly flush with songs, FM DJs began playing songs that hadn't been selected as singles, giving them a much wider range of material to work with.
The end result was that a certain branch of music was suddenly given a great deal of widely played material, especially during the 70s. One key example is the Eagles; many of their best known songs (such as "Desperado") were never issued as singles, meaning the distribution of such tracks was due to the AOR format.
The format is extraordinarily wide-reaching (its influence can be seen in college radio and most alternative stations, who play bands that probably never had singles in the first place) but the stations that fell directly into the form disappeared in the late-80s and early-90s... to be replaced by classic rock stations. Which is why the term AOR tends to crop up so much.
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