"Taken a bit further, this bit could become Talking Heads, this bit could become The Beat, this bit The Police, and this bit Prefab Sprout... Perhaps Vampire Weekend will work with a producer who gives them enough experimental edge to make my penny drop."
I never quite understand why you insist on undermining bands based on how much they sound like their influences. I get your point about a general lack of innovation in the "musical grammar", as you called it, and I completely agree that Vampire Weekend would sound a lot better with a Rusty Santos or even a Dave Fridmann to produce them, but I feel like too much is lost in this almost-rockist posture that "they don't make them like they used to".
Perhaps you would be less disappointed with the state of music if you didn't look back so much and compare. A lot of the most interesting music these days is indeed a synthesis of influences from different musical eras, but also most of the innovation comes from the different ways in which these influences/elements are recontextualized and updated, and in that sense I don't think these times are very different from any other period.
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Date: 2010-01-22 06:00 pm (UTC)I never quite understand why you insist on undermining bands based on how much they sound like their influences. I get your point about a general lack of innovation in the "musical grammar", as you called it, and I completely agree that Vampire Weekend would sound a lot better with a Rusty Santos or even a Dave Fridmann to produce them, but I feel like too much is lost in this almost-rockist posture that "they don't make them like they used to".
Perhaps you would be less disappointed with the state of music if you didn't look back so much and compare. A lot of the most interesting music these days is indeed a synthesis of influences from different musical eras, but also most of the innovation comes from the different ways in which these influences/elements are recontextualized and updated, and in that sense I don't think these times are very different from any other period.