3 thoughts on “Warren Ellis and the sad sad state of the (pop) music scene…”

  1. Err, barang, slamp.

    “If you’re dumb enough to be able to sit through those shows without the front of your head filling with tumours, you get to vote for the performer who is retarded enough to be a comfort to you.”

    So then, well now. Perhaps my head has filled with tumors that I don’t know about; that’s probably the case, as anyone as dumb as me, who’s dumb enough to have sat through those shows, is too dumb to recognize the formation of brain tumours.

    I don’t like writing like this. I’m not arguing with his point, which is that there’s a lot of crap on the radio, but I’m certainly arguing with his specifics, which don’t make any sense to me. There’s that thing that Zappa guy said, or so I’m told, that “writing about music is like dancing about architecture,” and that’s the problem with a lot of music writers. But couple that with someone who not only writes about music but (at least seems to) take his own opinion as fact and I just get a big spikey red pain through my forehead.

    Here’s what he says is bad: “Formless, sensitive strumming, riff-free and invisible to memory, and a belief that their vaunted “songwriting” requires nought but muttering lots and lots of words without actually saying anything at all.”

    Then here’s what he says is “the verse of the year”:
    “Hey! Beat Takeshi
    I’m sitting in an English garden
    The flowers are black
    And the sun has been attacked
    And that baby’s never gonna sing…”

    I sure as hell am not going to argue against the merits of that latter thing, but is it saying anything?

    Baerumpo. Bing bing. Slink.

    One of these days I’ll get myself back to actually writing, too. Too. Too.

  2. ah….
    this has mostly to do with my liking writing that doesn’t hang limp like a wet flag, regardless of the specifics…
    ah, frankzappa and his incredible good sense…
    i also like this quote:

    “Rock journalism is people who can’t write interviewing people who can’t talk for people who can’t read.”

    or this one:

    “If you wind up with a boring, miserable life because you listened to your mom, your dad, your teacher, your priest, or some guy on TV telling you how to do your shit, then YOU DESERVE IT.”

    I’ve been meaning to write more, too, but I’ve been too busy having a lazy four-day weekend… more on that later, maybe.

  3. Limp, wet-flag writing doesn’t do much for me, either. But I also don’t go much for overbearing.

    It’s probably the triptophan talking. If it talks. And if it’s spelled that way.

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