[mod.music.gaffa] IED and underground music

Love-Hounds-request@EDDIE.MIT.EDU (03/17/87)

Really-From: hsu%uicsrd.CSRD.UIUC.EDU@a.cs.uiuc.edu (William Tsun-Yuk Hsu)


At the risk of reviving the old American music does/does not suck debate
(let's keep it short this time, ok?):

IED (you know what machine he's on by now) writes:
>The problem IED has with most of the "underground" music so
>ardently discussed by a few of the Love-Hounds in this forum
>is that precious little of it is done with real care -- so little of
					    ^^^^^^^^^
>it shows the kind of attention to every detail that Kate's music
		      ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>shows. Of course, he realizes that most such recordings are done
>on a shoestring budget, and he is quite willing to admit that this is
>just a matter of personal taste, anyway. He can only answer that
>he simply has insufficient patience for messy body work,
>however powerful the engine under the hood may be.

IED should qualify that statement: most of the underground music *IED* 
has heard is done with little attention to detail. So how much 
underground music is IED familiar with?

A lot of my favorite underground bands show obvious attention to detail.
Listen to Sonic Youth for an obvious example. Or Controlled Bleeding.
Or John Zorn's the Big Gundown. There is so much going on in the complex 
textures that Lemos (of Controlled Bleeding) weaves, and certainly the
vocal control and range of color of Diamanda Galas show attention to
detail that few people can miss. And when No Trend thrashes in 5/4 time,
Fear rolls into a tight jam in 7/4 time, or D. Boon of the Minutemen
sings his compressed, Burroughsian lyrics over twisted guitar lines,
it's obvious that this music has been carefully thought out and worked
over. Maybe the underground music IED is familiar with is mostly slipshod,
but many of my favorites sure aren't. We must listen to different
undergrounds or something.

The most elaborate packaging also comes from underground bands. You
thought Sigue Sigue Sputnik had sophisticated packaging? Big deal. 
Many underground cassette releases come with booklets of collages
and graphics. I've seen cassette holders made of handprinted canvas sacks
(Boy Dirt Car), bags of woven human hair (Jarboe), multi-cassette
sets with really slick printed cardboard cases (Gargoyle Mechanique
and Nurse with Wound) etc. Soviet France has elaborate packages of
carved wood, tin foil or crepe paper. (Oops, Soviet France and Nurse
with Wound are not American, but NwW's cassette box is distributed
by Cause and Effect in Indianapolis, who also designed the box.)
Granted, packaging is only a small (non-essential) part of the product.
But these people don't sound like they don't pay attention to detail,
right?

>The other side of the coin -- the mainstream American popular
>music of our time -- tends to be horribly conventional, emotionally
>empty or (worse) false, and enslaved by rigid conventions of genre.

Agreed, but that's not where the most interesting American music is
these days.

Somehow this is strangely reminiscent of the Mike Krantz affair last
year, which introduced the infamous argument "I've only heard a small
amount of non-mainstream music but I think it sucks so it does". Maybe
IED has a better basis for his sweeping generalizations of American
music (other than "Kate Bush defines attention to detail so no American
music shows similar attention to detail because it's not by Kate Bush"
type arguments). I (we?) wait with baited breath.

Bill

Love-Hounds-request@EDDIE.MIT.EDU (03/19/87)

Really-From: Rich <RMRichardson.PA@Xerox.COM>

From: hsu%uicsrd.CSRD.UIUC.EDU@a.cs.uiuc.edu (William Tsun-Yuk Hsu)
> ... underground bands ... John Zorn ... Diamanda Galas ... 

I was in the San Francisco Tower Records store when I heard some 
interesting things being played, so I went up to the counter to find 
out what it was.  There was already someone asking about it.  The 
counterman showed us the cassette box of John Zorn's the Big Gundown.  
When I asked if it was only available on cassette, the man said no, 
they had LPs available and, in fact, CDs, and they were in the Jazz 
section.  I grabbed the CD version.  The point is, I find it difficult 
to think of someone with cassette, LP and CD versions of a work 
available, that's getting play at Tower, as an "underground band."  
Unless, perhaps, you're thinking most jazz artists are "underground."  

Diamanda Galas I don't know too much about, other than having two 
albums by her.  I would not find it difficult to believe that she is 
about as "underground" as, say, Kate Bush 3 to 4 years ago, i.e., just 
not well known in this country.  Is this what you mean by underground?  

If, by underground, you mean all that which is not getting on "top 40" 
or something similar, then I would suggest Frank Zappa as meeting IED's 
criteria. 

I think it would help to define what you mean by "underground," and then 
we can find out if IED is using the (roughly) same definition.

From: IED...
> ... He can only answer that
>he simply has insufficient patience for messy body work,
>however powerful the engine under the hood may be.

If you're looking at show car, the finish is quite important and 
you're quite right;  if you're looking at a race car, the finish 
must be good enough to not lose the race.  This comment would lead 
me to believe IED doesn't care for the early work of Bob Dylan; is 
that true?  (No big deal, but I would conclude IED has more limited 
taste than other people posting on Love-Hounds.  Is this conclusion 
correct?)

Rich