Im sure we all been part of this conversation:
“What are you into to?”
Me: “Errr, I like music”
“What kind of music”
Me:”Errr, all sorts”
… and thats the end of the conversation thankfully, because I dont want to explain that when I say “all orts” I dont mean everything. Far from it. I mean things like 60’s psych, early 70’s soul, pre-war jazz yada yada. If I tried to go into more details I would be considered an insufferable bore and rightly so.
Recently however I have been thinking that if my feet were held to the fire, and I had to name my absolute favourite genre what would I pick … and I’ve decided that, at least today it would be anything that ticks the following boxes:
1. Generally cheerful (at least superficially), sunshiny pop.
2. Chamber/Baroque, often orchestral, with obvious roots in Pet Sounds
3. Particularly with a Herb Alpert-y trumpet solo.
The 60’s give rise to this kind of thing. After Pet Sounds came Love, and lots of Burt Bacharach. In the 90’s and 2000’s there was a bit of a resurgence. The High Llamas have obviously built a whole career on just this kind of stuff, and Im a fan. However I recently discovered this Pearlfisher’s track which I hadn’t heard before which fits the bill nicely and I’d be grateful if you guys could point me in the direction of any others I may not have heard that you think I’d like.
That’s a lovely track, @noisecandy
I just found a June and the Exit Wounds Fanpage on Facebook!
https://www.facebook.com/JuneAndTheExitWounds/
Thanks @Kaisfatdad,
I’ve just checked it out, looks good.
“So what sort of music do you like?” Aaaaargh, I sooooooo hate that question, right from my mother asking it of me, once I started my precocious journey. She was both a snob and musically ignorant, to whom rock meant “and roll”, so it was always going to be a challenge. Now when I say folk, country, blues, electronica, bit a jazz and world, and some heritage rock, still the room for confusion remains, as they press their tales of Joan Baez, Jim Reeves, Acker Bilk and Queen on me. They usually are unfamiliar with blues and electronica.
I like the sort of music I like.
That’s convenient – occasionally I don’t like the music I like and, indeed, vice versa…
Oddly enough I was thinking of your vice versa only yesterday. I’ve recently been co-opted to play bass in a splinter group of the old time fiddle band I’m in that’s been formed to play for the inmates of care homes (I’m treating it as a useful reconnaissance mission). As you might imagine, the music is not cutting edge – That’s Amore, Que Sera Sera, ‘Enery the 8th, She’ll Be Coming Round the Mountain, and what seems like half the Seekers’ greatest hits. All stuff I would once rather have gnawed my leg off than admit to listening to, but I’m loving it. I can often be heard going about my business whistling Georgie Girl. We’re all adequate-to-good musicians, there are a couple of really good singers, and I add a croak from time to time, including the obbligato bits of Bobby Darin’s Things. What larks!
It’s a curious thing – but these tunes are often more fun to play in a band than to sit and listen to…as a direct consequence of your post, I now want to dig my acoustic 12 out and play Georgie Girl!
Having said that, my “tatty old pop” playlist includes stuff that my sister liked at the time and I sneered at in my teenage progressive pomp – not only am I listening to them, but I find that I know all the words!
Georgie Girl is actually quite tricky – you need to keep your wits about you. Latest Seekers banger to surface is Red Rubber Ball, which I’d never heard before. (Obviously…) It’s really quite good. Co-written by Paul Simon and a Seeker, oddly enough.
My oldest friend is a bass player. He’s been playing bass for over 50 years.
He cut his teeth playing in his cousin’s C&W/pop covers band on the North London Irish pub circuit in the early ’70s.
He reckons it was a really valuable experience, learning not to be a musical snob and to play for the song and not for himself.
Also learning to quickly suss out songs he didn’t know, that had been forcefully requested by very large drunken men.
Exactly this, although very large drunken men will be thin on the ground in local care homes I dare say.
Hepworth covered this is one of his ‘orange’ books. If I remember correctly, he just says ‘Beat Music’.
Feet to the fire, one genre?
Foundation reggae
If two choices I’d add Chicago Electric Blues
I’m very musically tolerant. Apart from the most violent Gangsta Rap and the vast majority of Death Metal I’m cool with anything, really. Though I may choose not to listen to much other than Jazz (from ancient to ultra-modern, including free skronk), Classical Chamber & Orchestral, some Opera and Choral, Electronica, Acoustic folk in a live setting, melodic intelligent pop/rock in a live setting.
Two fairly relevant quotes: (not verbatim but paraphrased)
Duke Ellington “There are only two kinds of music. Good and bad.”
Louis Armstrong “All music is folk music. I ain’t never heard a horse making music.”
Incidentally, my favourite Ellington quote is “To keep a band together, you’ve got to have a gimmick. My gimmick is that I pay them money.”
I think I first heard that quote that you attribute to Louis as from Big Bill Broonzy. Whoever said it it’s great
And yeah those two Ellington quotes – yes and yes!
I think for me there has to be humour.
Not overt – “ha ha listen to this isn’t it funny” – but just subtle humour.
It’s everywhere in the best music.
Erik Satie
Thelonious Monk
The Beatles
Frank Zappa (often overt, and also sometimes not exactly funny these days)
probably unpopular music AND pop music, with maybe a little dub on the side
You’ve probably heard these, but just in case:
Prefab Sprout
XTC
The Divine Comedy
Sagittarius
The Millennium
Jon Brion
Til Tuesday (specifically the third album)
Aimee Mann
Here are a couple of Beach Boys/Chamber pop gems you may have missed:
Eric Matthews, complete with flugelhorn solo:
Something from the Wondermints’ underrated last album:
My tastes have evolved/regressed (you choose) as I have aged. I can appreciate most genres apart from hoary old rock and metal (never have been into that kind of testosterone-fuelled gubbins), liked the energy of punk at the time, have rediscovered a latent pleasure in country fostered by my parents, and have always adored the ring-a-ding cool of Sinatra and the other crooners and torch singers
At heart, though, I’ve always been in Neil Tennant’s parlance, a “pop kid”. I just love pop music, the shinier the better, and increasingly ‘mainly girlie’ pop. It annoys me so much when it’s generally dismissed as “only pop” and not worthy of further attention, when creating a great pop song can be as difficult and complex as in any other genre.
I have an ace T-shirt, originally modelled by Dua Lipa, which has the fabulous smackdown slogan “Hating pop music doesn’t make you deep”. I’ll stand by that.
(I rather like that slogan.)
Agreeissimo. But is pop music one genre?
If not, then funk/soul (cheating slightly but you’ll admit, I’m sure, that there is a large crossover)
Americana in its broadest sense, although that’s a bit like admitting you like Nickelback these days. Whenever anyone asks me who my favourite artists are I usually descend into a pressure induced brain fog and am unable to name a single one of them.
Nobody asks me as they know they’ll get a long answer. But the short answer is:
If you were 15 in 1980 then your first loves are all the post-punk explosion that was happening then.
Then 9 years later you went to the Hacienda on a trip back to Manchester.
Those are the centres of the spider-map that extend backwards in time, cross genres and take in influences, future mutations and legacies. But you can trace most of my music back to one of these centres.
Bass is better than treble, rhythm is more important than melody, and the vibe trumps all.
Anything with a bit of swing, intelligence, and humour. Not a lot that is earnest, too 4:4 in beat, or to obviously manufactured. As I write, I’ve been listening to Bill Doggett’s r n’b floor fillers, and this was preceded by The Tangent’s mighty latest (full of humour, wit and pleasing Canterbury-oriented prog), Talking Heads, Graham Central Station, Iggy Pop, and Louis Jordan ).
I say Jazz.
Most people accept that without further comment.
..as they back away.
“Oh yes? I always preferred A Night at The Opera, myself…”
Another vote for all sorts, although if pushed I would have to say Syd Bassett
Arf!
Telling someone you like folk music is either the start of a very long or a very short conversation, likewise if I mention that I dance as well.
All it usually reveals is that people have a fixed idea of one style or artist or even song and think that is entirely representative of a whole genre. That artist could be Bob Dylan or Joni Mitchell, or it could be Fairport or Steeleye, or it could be the Waterson/Carthy dynasty, or maybe they’ve come across Bellowhead. Some are bemused at the idea that I might sing unaccompanied – they’ve just never come across the idea. Some don’t distinguish between folk and country, whereas I run a mile from one of those genres while wallowing in the other. Even some who think they are in the know show a remarkably narrow outlook; when my phone feeds me with some magazine’s article along the lines of ‘Best 20 folk songs ever’, I will check to see whether there is a .com suffix. If there is, then the chances are all 20 songs have been written by American artists between 1960 and 1980; Mr & Mrs Trad don’t get a look in.
What goes on at folk festivals represents a broad church and leaves me plenty of space to roam within. I make no special claim for my favoured genre; I’m sure others feel the same way about their own tastes.
You make a good point there, Cheshire. If someone asks you what kind of music you like, naming any specific genre is a big gamble. You might get a long conversation or the bum’s rush. Best to keep it as broad and vague as possible.
I like the Almann Brothers, Sister Sledge, Father John Misty and the Mamas and the Pappas.
Or …. Prince, King Creosote, Queen Latifa and the Thin White Duke.
Good advice, KFD! Next time, I shall alter my reply to ‘oh, you know, Rheingans Sisters, Juana Molina, Blowzabella, Inge Thomson and Patterson Dipper’? This answer would be absolutely genuine; they have brought out some of my very favourite albums.
That’s a great answer, @the cheshirecat. Hopefully it will lead to a lively conversation because very few people will have heard of them.
I don’t know Patterson but the others are all great favourites.
That doesn’t make them niche or obscure. Juana is a big name in Latin America. I am very lucky to have seen her live at Roskilde.
Also, I was so chuffed when the Rheingans played here in Stockholm at Stallet, a small cost folk venue, A quite magic evening full of music and wonderful stories.
The Dipper half of Patterson Dipper is John Dipper who, I believe, got some coverage on these pages a little while back (probably just from us two, but that’s still coverage, right?). He plays the viola d’amore, and plays it beautifully. He has a very English sensibility to his playing; it feels part folk, part chamber and, as far as I’m concerned, that’s where it’s at, baby.
Thanks Cheshire! James Patterson and John Dipper sound very promising.
https://pattersondipper.bandcamp.com/album/unearthing
http://www.pattersondipper.co.uk/
Both kinds – Country AND Western …
(I like some Country style music, but yee-ha type C&W leaves me cold)
Feet to the fire? Punk, New Wave, Post Punk, Rock, Heavy Rock, Heavy Metal, Thrash Metal (some of it), Heavy Rock, a bit of Soul, R&B (RnB?), Motown, Indie, Dad Rock – pick a genre and I have an appreciation somewhere
Don’t actively dislike anything, but can’t be doing with Dancefloor Bangers (or whatever falls into R&B (RnB) now?), or Scandanavian Death Metal.
The CD collection is a fairly all encompassing Venn Diagram
I don’t go by genre so much. Often the best acts transcend genre labels. Pink Floyd, Dylan etc. Genres are misleading. The Byrds, folk rock? Not helpful. It really is all just pop. The question is, is it to my taste? If it’s not pop I think I am drawn to what tends towards jazz. Longer pieces, more instrumental, solos. Progressive I suppose but once again that would give the wrong idea. Not actually jazz either, or jazz rock, but some of that’s good. Girlie dance pop I like but that’s more a description than a genre, and only some of it of course. If we are to have Genres then reggae, soul, disco, art rock (a bit of an unclear term, I think Roxy, Bowie, post punk, Lou Reed, Television, Talking Heads – a favourite category really, classic rock (well clearly some of it’s fantastic), more jazz inclined prog, psychedelia. Punk doesn’t offer much, a few Damned singles. New wave is better, it’s broad, it’s a certain period of time. Beat music? That’s a typical Hepworthian, limiting reduction. I’m pro-Abba, anti-Joni.
I’ll go for…
From: Not simply what The Beatles et al were listening to when they were teenagers, but what they would have ‘wanted’ to listen to when they were teenagers. Broadens the amount of Rock ‘n’ Roll significantly. Paul would have had no more Jin Records in his record collection in 1959, than Tottenham have cups in their trophy cabinet in 2024.
To: When did The Beatles spilt up again? That’ll do me. Saves SOOOOO much time and money.
Sunshiny pop? Here you go @chilli ray virus. A few of my favourites.
Camera Obscura from Scotland
Laurent Voulzy from France
The Cardigans from Sweden (their first single, many years ago)
Manu Chao from Barcelona
The late, great Pino Daniele from Naples
From the Dominican Republic, a wonderfully danceable tune.
Finally. some Brazilian reggae from Natiruts. No. I have little idea what they are singing about either. It hits the spot very nicely anyway.
It’s May 17th: Norway’s National Day.
Cue for a song!
Or Dora Saint as she was know to her parents.
The spring has arrived here in Stockholm with a vengeance. So now I want to hear lots of the kind of music you described in the OP, @chilli ray virus.
So I made a playlist of the songs and artists that have been mentioned so far.
Then I began to think of more.
The Cardigans – Rise and Shine
Rumer – P.F. Sloan
Loving Spoonful – What a day for a daydream
Highasakite – Indian Summer
Where I’m from – Digable Planets
Harry Belafonte – Jump in the line
Sigrid- Don’t kill my vibe
Poco – Rose of Cimmaron
Zara Larsson – Lush Life
Josh Rouse – Love Vibration
Donovan – Sunshine Superman
As we all know, Donovan invented Baroque/Chamber, Herb Alberty, Cheerful, Sunshiny Pop!
What you want is the Sound of Sunshine
Wonderful choice, @Gary. Great video too. You reminded me of this wonderful Franti favourite from 1996.
And another very sunny tune from Taj Mahal.
And can you get sunnier than the Jolly Boys?
Just about anything by The Pearlfishers is a winner – one of my favourite bands over the last 25 yrs or so. If you like the track you posted Chilly then try any of their albums. Another band in a similar retro 60/early 70s vibe is the Heavy Blinkers particularly this album
I am delighted to see(the now disbnded) Canadian Chamber pop band , The Heavy Blinkers getting a mention, @Feedback_File. Lush , witty pop music.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heavy_Blinkers
https://www.allmusic.com/artist/the-heavy-blinkers-mn0000083949#biography
They won me over with this witty retort to the Little Drummer Boy.
The singer is Jenn Grant who has a lovely set of pipes.
Reading Dave Ross’s review of the new Blow Monkeys’ album, it struck me that they fitted in very nicely with the artists on this thread.