Controversial Music Opinions On BEA! - Music

Kool Keith Sweat

I might just not know many trumpeters, but I would only think of Leo Smith and Don Cherry as better composers and players, and Nate Wooley and maybe Rob Mazurek as better players.

Also, "Black Angel's Death Song" is the best track on VU+N.

RoundTheBend
I miss the comfort in being sad

Location: Ground Control

AfterHours wrote:

sethmadsen wrote:

The masterpiece apparently is my least favorite. I still really like it (only one I have on wax). But thought it a bit funny... I guess the singing and distortion in Femme Fatale and the nonsense of The Black Angel's Death Song brought the score down. The rest of course is absolutely fantastic.

The Velvet Underground 90
White Light/White Heat 90
Loaded 86.5
The Velvet Underground And Nico 85

You should upgrade Loaded to #1 just to further illustrate how differently we must be hearing their songs/albums Wink

Btw, the distortion and singing of Femme Fatale, and the claustrophobic noise of Black Angel's Death Song are not really "songs" so much as they are Expressionist theatre. Their accompaniments are illustrations of distorted reality, devastated psyches and mental collapse in an increasingly oppressive darkness and harrowing waking nightmare.

Are you meaning Venus in Furs? To me that has the context of expressionist theatre, from what I know about it. And I think that song is fantastic.

Black Angel's Death Song... you may be giving it more credit than it deserves. Lou Reed himself wrote:"The idea here was to string words together for the sheer fun of their sound, not any particular meaning."

Idk... that's my take on it. I feel like the performances on those songs are not an aesthetically pleasing listen (I find grating music pleasurable...not sure how to describe what I mean)... and I don't think the distortion is on purpose... I feel it was the method in which the album was recorded... most of the album is not recorded very well.

But I do think your interpretation is interesting and intriguing on how you reached it - tell us more!

This is where I strongly believe in what literary critics call Reader Response Theory. The concepts/words don't exist until they are interpreted in the reader or in this case the listener.

Also please note I'm giving these albums an A- and B+ roughly... not really that much of a difference.

Sounds like you don't like Loaded? If it were Squeeze, say no more, but Loaded is pretty damn good. Sure you could argue it isn't their masterpiece, but I get this feeling you are more saying it is terrible? Tell us more!

RoundTheBend
I miss the comfort in being sad

Location: Ground Control

Kool Keith Sweat wrote:

Also, "Black Angel's Death Song" is the best track on VU+N.

Is it you just love the chaos or?

AfterHours

Gender: Male
Location: originally from scaruffi.com ;-)

Quote:

Are you meaning Venus in Furs? To me that has the context of expressionist theatre, from what I know about it. And I think that song is fantastic.

Black Angel's Death Song... you may be giving it more credit than it deserves. Lou Reed himself wrote:"The idea here was to string words together for the sheer fun of their sound, not any particular meaning."

Idk... that's my take on it. I feel like the performances on those songs are not an aesthetically pleasing listen (I find grating music pleasurable...not sure how to describe what I mean)... and I don't think the distortion is on purpose... I feel it was the method in which the album was recorded... most of the album is not recorded very well.

But I do think your interpretation is interesting and intriguing on how you reached it - tell us more!

I think Lou Reed, though an amazing artist, has done one too many drugs and can be lazy in his explanations. He often has an I-don't-give-a-bleep attitude with interviews. It's also probable that Cale was more the brains behind their sound at that point. So maybe Lou didn't require an explanation and just did his thing, while Cale provided the sound and concept? The expressionist, theatrical intentions behind their music are very clear in how they're produced and what they evoke, as well as in their "Exploding Plastic Inevitable" presentations and performances while realizing their sound: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HsR4ghMfq0U

Venus in Furs is certainly the most intense example. That the whole album creates an entirely new sound that had never been heard before, follows the same oppressive, deaf-toned, nightmarish atmosphere (in different varieties of) throughout its songs, and then is dropped in later albums, is not an accident or happenstance. The "singing" on Black Angel's Death Song is clearly in the form of a theatrical "recitative". On Femme Fatale, of a chanteuse, in soliloquy, lamenting from the stage.
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RoundTheBend
I miss the comfort in being sad

Location: Ground Control

AfterHours wrote:

Quote:

Are you meaning Venus in Furs? To me that has the context of expressionist theatre, from what I know about it. And I think that song is fantastic.

Black Angel's Death Song... you may be giving it more credit than it deserves. Lou Reed himself wrote:"The idea here was to string words together for the sheer fun of their sound, not any particular meaning."

Idk... that's my take on it. I feel like the performances on those songs are not an aesthetically pleasing listen (I find grating music pleasurable...not sure how to describe what I mean)... and I don't think the distortion is on purpose... I feel it was the method in which the album was recorded... most of the album is not recorded very well.

But I do think your interpretation is interesting and intriguing on how you reached it - tell us more!

I think Lou Reed, though an amazing artist, has done one too many drugs and can be lazy in his explanations. He often has an I-don't-give-a-bleep attitude with interviews. It's also probable that Cale was more the brains behind their sound at that point. So maybe Lou didn't require an explanation and just did his thing, while Cale provided the sound and concept? The expressionist, theatrical intentions behind their music are very clear in how they're produced and what they evoke, as well as in their "Exploding Plastic Inevitable" presentations and performances while realizing their sound: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HsR4ghMfq0U

Venus in Furs is certainly the most intense example. That the whole album creates an entirely new sound that had never been heard before, follows the same oppressive, deaf-toned, nightmarish atmosphere (in different varieties of) throughout its songs, and then is dropped in later albums, is not an accident or happenstance. The "singing" on Black Angel's Death Song is clearly in the form of a theatrical "recitative". On Femme Fatale, of a chanteuse, in soliloquy, lamenting from the stage.

Do you know if they wrote music to the images or were the images applied to the music? Is there anything written about them purposely making bass and vocals distorted? I guess what I'm asking is that the songwriting being purposely out of key a bit (the violin?) and then the grating guitar sounds, etc. is expected, and I get that aesthetic... but the overall recording being lo-fi, is there "proof" anywhere it was artistically on purpose or cause of budget/lack of understanding of recording (the video said anybody can do it... right?). I realize that's splitting hairs and who cares, and likely if you are dealing with Andy Warhol, he'd tell you anything you'd want to hear about how artistic he was.

Interesting concepts, but also nothing amazing either. I mean it's perfectly good, but I didn't have this out of body experience or cathartic experience, but an interesting artistic concept for sure. Perhaps seeing it live would be different (I feel that way about classical/jazz music... recordings some how make those experiences pretty flat).

I grew up with someone who knew Andy Warhol's lawyer... apparently he was of the belief that Andy's death was originally supposed to be staged so that the worth of his art would increase, but he actually died from the staged death.

AfterHours

Gender: Male
Location: originally from scaruffi.com ;-)

It seems like with Warhol involved (who was quite famous) they could've easily got enough financing to record the album in (much) higher sound quality. Maybe not like Pet Sounds or the 750 (or whatever) studio hours applied to Sgt Pepper, but certainly higher quality than they did if they wanted such a sound.

I think it's a certainty the sound was completely intentional, as it is so outside what was happening at the time, as it was shockingly revolutionary in its ideas and particular execution, and so thoroughly matches the conceptual and emotional intentions of the music itself -- from the overall sound to each nuance and facet. Both Reed and Cale were rebellious but quite well-educated in English literature, in poetry, in music history. Reed was very into free jazz, while Cale was an expert on the avant-garde, both of them much more knowledgeable than probably any Rock acts of the time.

You can't accidentally de-tune your instruments, inject massive doses of distortion, screeching feedback, oriental droning, Middle Eastern scales, mantras, raga, free-jazz improv, tribal rhythms and African folk. It's no accident that no artist/band since has been able to replicate their "sound", despite a near infinity of influence across the whole of Rock music. Many have various elements. Dadamah probably comes the closest, but without the expressionist theatre.

Their sound is an overwhelming ritual of urban alienation and decadence, simultaneously oppressive, unnervingly claustrophobic (trapped in pummeling deaf-noise and/or painful drones and/or piercing and recklessly violent violas, guitars, tribal drums, etc) and majestic to the point of orgasmic chaos (expressing the mental and spiritual death from lives consumed by drugs and deviant sex but also the terrifying lure and high they provide for the addict, and the God-like power they haunt over one), stricken inside a hallucinatory, harrowing waking nightmare of German Expressionist theater. The album plays like a Dante's Inferno for the metropolis. Its apocalypse, book-ended with the luring cyclic fairy tale of Sunday Morning and the staggeringly oppressive, chaotic violence of European Son, is not just a spectacle of destruction, but a pummeling torture and deadening of humanity and purpose, an overwhelmingly complete mental collapse of its characters and its society into collective catatonia. It is, honestly, one of the most unbearably powerful artistic documents of the 20th century.
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AfterHours

Gender: Male
Location: originally from scaruffi.com ;-)

Quote:

Sounds like you don't like Loaded? If it were Squeeze, say no more, but Loaded is pretty damn good. Sure you could argue it isn't their masterpiece, but I get this feeling you are more saying it is terrible? Tell us more!

I mean, it's a solid album but it's not an overwhelming masterpiece of staggering creativity, conceptual and emotional resonance, like their debut. It's just a collection of solid songs, like thousands of other albums.
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LordMark

Gender: Male
Age: 36
Location: Ontario

I haven't made my verdict quite yet, but I think I might like Music for the Masses better than Violator. The latter album has 4 excellent singles and the underrated "Clean", but I think the former is a lot more consistent. Music for the Masses also doesn't have a dull song like "Sweetest Perfection".

craola
crayon master

Location: pdx

LordMark wrote:

I haven't made my verdict quite yet, but I think I might like Music for the Masses better than Violator. The latter album has 4 excellent singles and the underrated "Clean", but I think the former is a lot more consistent. Music for the Masses also doesn't have a dull song like "Sweetest Perfection".

i agree. music for the masses is far superior to violator. i think black celebration is better as well.
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RoundTheBend
I miss the comfort in being sad

Location: Ground Control

AfterHours wrote:

Quote:

Sounds like you don't like Loaded? If it were Squeeze, say no more, but Loaded is pretty damn good. Sure you could argue it isn't their masterpiece, but I get this feeling you are more saying it is terrible? Tell us more!

I mean, it's a solid album but it's not an overwhelming masterpiece of staggering creativity, conceptual and emotional resonance, like their debut. It's just a collection of solid songs, like thousands of other albums.

That's a fair assessment.

I mean it is clear we have different taste.

I like the pop aesthetic that is bitter sweet... it's pop yet artistic and not baseless bubble gum. And I mean that in the broad sense - You know like Rolling Stones (blues rock), Nirvana (grunge...I hate this term, so really punk), and even VU (art pop?) as pop music... short simple songs that reach the masses yet can be complex and are intriguing ideas - stuff that touches the heart and makes the mind think... yet isn't a struggle to get there.

For you, I think you really are seeking the deepest and grandest masterpieces, which is fantastic.

And both are perfectly fine, imo.