Foals

[Worm]

I like that song, just posted above. It reminds me of.... see? Inevitable. It reminds me of "old-school" U2. But the singing. Is it always like that?

If only your memory could be wiped clean so your mind could properly receive the sounds you are hearing. If only a clean, well-scrubbed, air-conditioned, immaculately ordered space could open up in your brain to give the song the atmosphere it seeks, the music falling into your narcotized distraction like a coin sliding into a slot. Motion without motion, excitement without excitement, pleasant rather than pleasurable-- and how tired you get by the end, no? Doesn't that mean you've been somewhere?

 

[PregnantForTheLastTime]

Do not want to go to there.

No, I'm pretty happy the way things are, musically. My favorite albums mean so much more now that they are encrusted with layers of personal meaning and memories. I just don't want to miss out on good stuff. I just have to have faith that the truly good new stuff will break through, somehow.

 

[fuckfrankie]

If only your memory could be wiped clean so your mind could properly receive the sounds you are hearing. If only a clean, well-scrubbed, air-conditioned, immaculately ordered space could open up in your brain to give the song the atmosphere it seeks, the music falling into your narcotized distraction like a coin sliding into a slot. Motion without motion, excitement without excitement, pleasant rather than pleasurable-- and how tired you get by the end, no? Doesn't that mean you've been somewhere?

dude! that is sooooo weird! i was thinking the exact same thing!



but seriously, can we stop comparing my favorite bands to coldplay and u f***ing 2?

 

[PregnantForTheLastTime]

dude! that is sooooo weird! i was thinking the exact same thing!



but seriously, can we stop comparing my favorite bands to coldplay and u f***ing 2?

Okay, as soon as you find favorite bands that don't sound like Coldplay and u f***ing 2. The latter song, "Alabaster," sounded like it should have been on War.

 

[Qvist]

Does this though?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTPdpySFCL4

cheers

 

[Anaesthesine]

Does this though?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v

cheers

Here is the curse of the musically obsessive mind at work:

This



sounds like a nicely updated version of this



When I hear this Foals track, I think of King Crimson (one of the first bands I ever saw live). Those Foals guitars are very reminiscent of Robert Fripp. I like the Foals track, but it sounds awfully familiar.

 

[Qvist]

Nice one, I didn't know that KC number. For my part, it strongly reminds me of Underworld despite the guitar/electronica divide - the same kind of relentless frantic energy on display on UWs first album. I don't neccessarily think that's a bad thing, as long as it doesn't only or primarily remind you of something else.

cheers

 

[Worm]

Do not want to go to there.

That's okay. You don't have to. I admit it was a cheap shot. I did sneak in an eye-rolling emoticon, you know.

By the way, from Foals' Wiki page*, did you know there's something called "math rock"? There's also "mathcore". Apparently math rock has its roots in Chicago!

Read the Wiki entry. It's one of the funnier poker-faced entries I've read.

Math Rock

(King Crimson is mentioned, by the way.)

The key sentence is: "The term math rock has often been passed off as a joke that has developed into what some believe is a musical style".

_________________________
*Bonus fun fact: According to Wiki two members of Foals quit Oxford, where they were studying English literature.

 

[PregnantForTheLastTime]

That's okay. You don't have to. I admit it was a cheap shot. I did sneak in an eye-rolling emoticon, you know.

By the way, from Foals' Wiki page, did you know there's something called "math rock"? There's also "mathcore". Apparently math rock has its roots in Chicago!

Read the Wiki entry. It's one of the funnier poker-faced entries I've read.

Math Rock

(King Crimson is mentioned, by the way.)

The key sentence is: "The term math rock has often been passed off as a joke that has developed into what some believe is a musical style".

I didn't read your post as a shot at me, at all. Maybe I misread it.

I read the math rock wiki page and immediately thought of one particular local band I've heard. They don't self-identify as math rock, but I thought they sounded like Jethro Tull minus the flutes. There were long, interweaving, complex guitar lines, and even lyrics about wood nymphs. It was remarkable.

So, Foals. Yes, fine, but not new in any way. Those of us with long memories find it hard not to draw associations between new bands and old. I do that with books, too. It's just what happens once you have years of listening/reading under your headband.

 

[Worm]

I didn't read your post as a shot at me, at all. Maybe I misread it.

Not at you. At Foals.

I read the math rock wiki page and immediately thought of one particular local band I've heard. They don't self-identify as math rock, but I thought they sounded like Jethro Tull minus the flutes.

Jethro Tull without flutes? My God, Jethro Tull without flutes is nothing. That's like AC/DC 'unplugged' or Ratt without spandex.

There were long, interweaving, complex guitar lines, and even lyrics about wood nymphs. It was remarkable.

In the criminally underrated film "I Love You, Man", the eccentric L.A. slacker playboy Sidney Fife is apparently a reader of Nabokov. There's a scene in his "man-cave" in which a copy of Ada, or Ardor is visible over Paul Rudd's shoulder. The author's name is in a bold, white font face on the black spine of the distinctive McGraw-Hill dust jacket, and though it is not immediately striking to the eye and has no function in the story it was clearly placed in a position to be seen over Rudd's right shoulder.

So, Foals. Yes, fine, but not new in any way. Those of us with long memories find it hard not to draw associations between new bands and old. I do that with books, too. It's just what happens once you have years of listening/reading under your headband.

Have you considered the idea of choosing to erase your memory as a positive act of self-discovery and individualism? Even if one could not undergo an operation, as in the film Eternal Sunshine of The Spotless Mind, it is perhaps conceivable that you could make a conscious effort to de-link-- or rather expand your network, which is the same thing-- your present experiences from the memories of your past. Your mind would not be a blank slate. In fact, traces of your memories would exist. In the case of music, you would have the distinct impression that you've heard a song before without even the mildest twinge of anxiety; the vague sense of deja vu would actually constitute a pleasure akin to blissful floating. You would be more yourself, because you would be everyone else. Is this not Oscar Wilde's dream as articulated in "The Decay of Lying" and "The Critic As Artist"?

 

[PregnantForTheLastTime]

In the criminally underrated film "I Love You, Man", the eccentric L.A. slacker playboy Sidney Fife is apparently a reader of Nabokov. There's a scene in his "man-cave" in which a copy of Ada, or Ardor is visible over Paul Rudd's shoulder. The author's name is in white on the black spine, and though it is not immediately striking to the eye and has no function in the story it was clearly placed in a position to be seen over Rudd's right shoulder.

So was it one of the first American hardback editions? Because the current paperback edition has tiny black letters on pale green.

Who's the bigger showoff/geek? The set designer or writer, for placing the book there, or you and I for noticing?

Have you considered the idea of choosing to erase your memory as a positive act of self-discovery and individualism?

"That would be an extraordinarily bad idea, Ray."

 

[matt]

I didn't like their first album too much

This coming from someone with their first album bang in the middle of his avatar?

Sorry, just found that funny.

I loved their first album, but this new track does f*** All for me if I'm honest.

Matt

 

[Worm]

So was it one of the first American hardback editions?

Yes. I amended my post to mention McGraw-Hill.

Who's the bigger showoff/geek? The set designer or writer, for placing the book there, or you and I for noticing?

Does it matter? Where do you end, where does the film begin?

"That would be an extraordinarily bad idea, Ray."

Would it? Isn't the greatest luxury the 21st Century promises us the ability to jettison as much or as little of our personal history as we want? Isn't history "a nightmare from which we are trying to awake"? Isn't the point of "baggage" that you can lose it? Isn't it the new American dream?

 

[PregnantForTheLastTime]

Yes. I amended my post to mention McGraw-Hill.

I wanted to post a picture, but instead only managed to learn that there is a LiveJournal community for people with "literary" tattoos.

Does it matter? Where do you end, where does the film begin?

I've never seen the film, so there must be a gap. As a potential, the gap is tiny. How few mouseclicks separate me from consumption of the film? How many calories of energy would I consume, between my hands and the computer's use, in calling it up on my screen?

Somebody should calculate the "carbon footprint" of sitting on the internet all f***ing day. Servers use a lot of electricity.

Would it? Isn't the greatest luxury the 21st Century promises us the ability to jettison as much or as little of our personal history as we want? Isn't history "a nightmare from which we are trying to awake"? Isn't the point of "baggage" that you can lose it? Isn't it the new American dream?

Is that a luxury? Reinvention is marketed as such. But not only is it not possible, it's not advisable. I count on my ability to learn from my mistakes.

 

[Anaesthesine]

Have you considered the idea of choosing to erase your memory as a positive act of self-discovery and individualism? Even if one could not undergo an operation, as in the film Eternal Sunshine of The Spotless Mind, it is perhaps conceivable that you could make a conscious effort to de-link-- or rather expand your network, which is the same thing-- your present experiences from the memories of your past. Your mind would not be a blank slate. In fact, traces of your memories would exist. In the case of music, you would have the distinct impression that you've heard a song before without even the mildest twinge of anxiety; the vague sense of deja vu would actually constitute a pleasure akin to blissful floating. You would be more yourself, because you would be everyone else. Is this not Oscar Wilde's dream as articulated in "The Decay of Lying" and "The Critic As Artist"?

You just have to drag OW into it - and why not, all roads do lead to him eventually.

If one craves the shock of the new - that thrilling sensation that you and the rest of the world are hearing something entirely original, then the older one gets, the more disappointed one will become. That was a point, I suppose, made in THAT thread.

However, it's those cultural connections, that echo of past greatness that is often an essential part of the pleasure for me. As is evident in another thread, I'm a Rammstein fanatic, in part because they're the closest thing to a musical Goethe that I'm going to get (in spirit and in form). I hear their influences so clearly, and it transports me to a timeless place that is deeply pleasurable, fraught with cultural meaning and pleasingly familiar.

I don't want a watered-down imitation or pastiche, but a band/writer/artist that EXPANDS upon and reinterprets earlier ideas is an essential link in our cultural memory, and an important part of our cultural coherence.

The great pleasure of The Smiths was that they were instantly so familiar (like the inside of one's own mind), and yet so entirely new.

 

[Worm]

I wanted to post a picture, but instead only managed to learn that there is a LiveJournal community for people with "literary" tattoos.

Maybe the rising popularity of tattoos suggests an attempt to resist our collective memory-loss. Used to be we didn't want to forget "Mom" or "U.S.M.C.". Now we don't want to forget a verse in Galatians or a line from Eliot.

Is that a luxury? Reinvention is marketed as such. But not only is it not possible, it's not advisable. I count on my ability to learn from my mistakes.

"Marketed as such": yes. Therein lies a tale. Tell me something, can you see any difference between contemporary advertising and the foundational ideas behind individualism as rooted in thinkers like, say, Thoreau and Emerson?

 

[Worm]

You just have to drag OW into it - and why not, all roads do lead to him eventually.

Of course they do.

If one craves the shock of the new - that thrilling sensation that you and the rest of the world are hearing something entirely original, then the older one gets, the more disappointed one will become. That was a point, I suppose, made in THAT thread.

THAT thread? Oh, but we're not reprising THAT thread. We're advertising for Foals, keeping a thread on top of the "Other Music" section for going on one day now. It's all Foals, all the time 'round here. Foals, Foals, Foals.

Let's frame it a little differently. As we age we must accept that we can no longer experience the shock of the new. But as I understand your point you're really talking about the shock of the new as a positive experience. What you mean is, to experience something new and original as a "shock" of quality. There is still the realm of unfamiliarity, indeterminate quality, the "shock of the new" which leaves one disoriented, highlights how out of step one is-- underscores how old one is.

You can imagine how rock and roll would have jolted a fortysomething in 1960. You can imagine how Jim Morrison or Nico would have sounded to a fortysomething in 1971, or how Johnny Rotten would've sounded, or Chuck D. or Kurt Cobain to the same person nearing middle age. When was the last time you experienced the shock of the new negatively? When was the last time you listened to something and felt your age?

I don't want a watered-down imitation or pastiche, but a band/writer/artist that EXPANDS upon and reinterprets earlier ideas is an essential link in our cultural memory, and an important part of our cultural coherence.

But pastiche can be a consciously positive ideological expression. Don't Foals seem utterly free to you? Freer than you, freer than me? Doesn't their stylistic freedom represent a peak of Western civilization, at least to this point in time? Doesn't any discussion about Foals' influences immediately strike one as not only irrelevant but-- unjust? Isn't that really why Preggers didn't finish her sentence? "It reminds me of..."

 

[PregnantForTheLastTime]

But pastiche can be a consciously positive ideological expression. Don't Foals seem utterly free to you? Freer than you, freer than me? Doesn't their stylistic freedom represent a peak of Western civilization, at least to this point in time? Doesn't any discussion about Foals' influences immediately strike one as not only irrelevant but-- unjust? Isn't that really why Preggers didn't finish her sentence? "It reminds me of..."

No. This is the "too many Legos" syndrome. It used to be there were bricks. You were lucky if you had a few doors, or axles, or one or two of those clear, slanted bricks you could use as a windscreen. Now you can't build without having actual little antennas and Lego booster rockets and a head with the right expression on it to put on the pilot figure in the cockpit. And building something when you have every possible dedicated piece is no accomplishment at all. Putting together airplane models is an exercise in patience and precision, nothing more. You're free to make a perfect replica of the picture on the box. There is no freedom in that.

 

[PregnantForTheLastTime]

Maybe the rising popularity of tattoos suggests an attempt to resist our collective memory-loss. Used to be we didn't want to forget "Mom" or "U.S.M.C.". Now we don't want to forget a verse in Galatians or a line from Eliot.



"Marketed as such": yes. Therein lies a tale. Tell me something, can you see any difference between contemporary advertising and the foundational ideas behind individualism as rooted in thinkers like, say, Thoreau and Emerson?

Between the message the advertising is supposed to be conjuring, or the actual function of the advertising? No, advertising is simply now selling individuality and distinction instead of conformity--which is the new conformity. It's just catering to more specific tastes. It's like those tattoos. If you love Eliot, you can copy out passages from memory. You don't need the tattoo. You need the tattoo to show everyone that you are the kind of person who could quote Eliot. It's just commodification of a different set of aesthetic values.

There is a huge advertising campaign now for a new wireless service in which all the commercials begin with, "This isn't a commercial." The bus ads: "This isn't a bus. It's a place to stream live sports on your way to work." What is a commercial that tells you it isn't a commercial?

 

[Anaesthesine]

What you mean is, to experience something new and original as a "shock" of quality. There is still the realm of unfamiliarity, indeterminate quality, the "shock of the new" which leaves one disoriented, highlights how out of step one is-- underscores how old one is.

You can imagine how rock and roll would have jolted a fortysomething in 1960. You can imagine how Jim Morrison or Nico would have sounded to a fortysomething in 1971, or how Johnny Rotten would've sounded, or Chuck D. or Kurt Cobain to the same person nearing middle age. When was the last time you experienced the shock of the new negatively? When was the last time you listened to something and felt your age?

Interesting point. I have never heard anything new that shocked me, that made me feel old or out of touch. The more educated the listener, the less likely that s/he can be shocked. It's the familiarity of the music, the way that I can now identify the musical cycles, that makes me feel my age.

Shock is for the young, or those lucky enough to live in extraordinary times.

But pastiche can be a consciously positive ideological expression. Don't Foals seem utterly free to you? Freer than you, freer than me? Doesn't their stylistic freedom represent a peak of Western civilization, at least to this point in time? Doesn't any discussion about Foals' influences immediately strike one as not only irrelevant but-- unjust? Isn't that really why Preggers didn't finish her sentence? "It reminds me of..."