May God Damn You, Phil, For There's Work I Should Be Doing. Part I
The Earle of Mackenzie asked me today, "What music should I download?" How does someone who loves his 70gig of mp3s equally answer this question? My kommunist musik loyalties tell me to answer, "Download all of it or none of it." That's improbable but not impossible--I'm lookin' at you, Pat. It feels unfair to me to recommend only some music to people; just as unfair, however, is to assume Phil gives a shit about my equal loyalties to both Blackalicious and Kodo (Japanese Taiko drumming). My main man from Mankato asked me for help. I owe it to him to, just this once, discriminate in order to make a list he, and anyone else, might be able to work with.
In general, categories/genres/stereotypes are thought of as negative, right? I guess I believe this too. We are better than labels. We don't need them. This is what we think at our most blind, human moments. My conflict is that I hate labels, but I love labeling. Furthermore, I love identifying cross-label mingling, especially in music.
Take The Allman Brothers: If I were to keep it as real as possible, and be as specific to their style with a label, I'd be happy with "Bluesy Jamband Dirty-Southern Revival Rock." That label doesn't do any a shit lot of good but me. It certainly is unwieldy for the functions of an iPod. There aren't too many other bands that fall into the "Bluesy Jamband Dirty-Southern Revival Rock" genre. So, I guess if I'm the mood for that sort of thing, I'll just listen to Allmans.
It feels too easy and unfair to categorizes music into blanket genres, but it's necessary for a project like Phil. I had to do this anyway, however, when organizing my mp3s into iTunes. Somehow, I narrowed everything down to twelve genres--just twelve! Apologetic Declaration: To my music collection, I'm sorry; I'm so ashamed. You deserve better. The blanket-genres I settled on are: Atmospheric, Classical, Comedy, DJ, Folk, Funk, Hip-Hop, Jazz, Metal, Rock, Soundtrack, and Themes.
I feel dirty.
Can you imagine my horror in resorting to labeling The Allman Brothers as "Rock?" Greg, Duane, Dickey, et. al.: I'm sorry. How about the sloppy inclusion of Al Green into Funk when Soul or Music-to-Make-Love-to-Your-Old-Lady-by would be more accurate. What about bands with concept albums, which shift from one sub-genre to another throughout their library? Mastodon should be Caveman Metal for their album Remission, and Whaler Metal for Leviathan. Mastodon into plain-ol' Metal? I mean, Fucking Ozzy Osborne is considered Metal.
I feel that I've made my point, that I don't like to use blanket categories and discriminate any recommendation... but here goes:
[These are more or less alphabetical within genres, but I front loaded stronger recommendations.]
Atmospheric - I hate the phrase "background music" but what can you do?
Bjork
Godspeed You, Black Emperor! Amazing, creepy writing music.
Classical
Gorecki - Symphony #3
Wagner
Holst
Comedy - Great online poker listening.
Bruce McCulluch (from The Kids in the Hall)
Lewis Black
Bill Cosby
Brak
Dave Attell
DJ
The Avalanches - [strong recommendation]
DJ Shadow - A Gretsky among DJs.
Dan the Automator - album: Nathaniel Merriweather Presents... Loveage: Music to Make Love to Your Old Lady By
Cut Chemist
Danger Mouse - album: The Grey Album
Handsome Boy Modeling School - album: So... How's Your Girl
Kid Koala
Folk - I use this label for musicks native to cultures and geographies, not the Dylan-type Folk--I'm lookin' at you, Seth. You'll understand what I mean...
Silly Wizard - featuring the one Scotsman I love more than Phil, Andy Stewart and his silky-as-Scotish-gets voice. Strength: Andy's voice, accordion
Planxty - strength: pipes
Johnny Cash
Kodo
The Pogues
Funk
James Brown - Duh.
Ohio Players
Beck - Where do you put Beck?!
Parliment
Funkadelic
Return to Forever
Weather Report
Al Green
Curtis Mayfield
Earth, Wild & Fire
Fishbone
Stevie Wonder
G. Love & Special Sauce
Hip Replacement - OK, that's one of my bands. Ya gotta plug.
Jamiroquai
KC & The Sunshine Band
Kool & The Gang
Hip-Hop
RZA - album: The World According to RZA
GZA - album: Liquid Swords
Blackalicious - album: Broken Arrow
Beastie Boys - album: Paul's Boutique
A Tribe Called Quest
Mos Def
De la Soul
Del Tha Funkee Homosapien
Atmosphere - Minneapolis BOYEEEEE!
Common
Dialated Peoples
Jurassic 5
Wu Tang
...to be continued
In general, categories/genres/stereotypes are thought of as negative, right? I guess I believe this too. We are better than labels. We don't need them. This is what we think at our most blind, human moments. My conflict is that I hate labels, but I love labeling. Furthermore, I love identifying cross-label mingling, especially in music.
Take The Allman Brothers: If I were to keep it as real as possible, and be as specific to their style with a label, I'd be happy with "Bluesy Jamband Dirty-Southern Revival Rock." That label doesn't do any a shit lot of good but me. It certainly is unwieldy for the functions of an iPod. There aren't too many other bands that fall into the "Bluesy Jamband Dirty-Southern Revival Rock" genre. So, I guess if I'm the mood for that sort of thing, I'll just listen to Allmans.
It feels too easy and unfair to categorizes music into blanket genres, but it's necessary for a project like Phil. I had to do this anyway, however, when organizing my mp3s into iTunes. Somehow, I narrowed everything down to twelve genres--just twelve! Apologetic Declaration: To my music collection, I'm sorry; I'm so ashamed. You deserve better. The blanket-genres I settled on are: Atmospheric, Classical, Comedy, DJ, Folk, Funk, Hip-Hop, Jazz, Metal, Rock, Soundtrack, and Themes.
I feel dirty.
Can you imagine my horror in resorting to labeling The Allman Brothers as "Rock?" Greg, Duane, Dickey, et. al.: I'm sorry. How about the sloppy inclusion of Al Green into Funk when Soul or Music-to-Make-Love-to-Your-Old-Lady-by would be more accurate. What about bands with concept albums, which shift from one sub-genre to another throughout their library? Mastodon should be Caveman Metal for their album Remission, and Whaler Metal for Leviathan. Mastodon into plain-ol' Metal? I mean, Fucking Ozzy Osborne is considered Metal.
I feel that I've made my point, that I don't like to use blanket categories and discriminate any recommendation... but here goes:
[These are more or less alphabetical within genres, but I front loaded stronger recommendations.]
Atmospheric - I hate the phrase "background music" but what can you do?
Bjork
Godspeed You, Black Emperor! Amazing, creepy writing music.
Classical
Gorecki - Symphony #3
Wagner
Holst
Comedy - Great online poker listening.
Bruce McCulluch (from The Kids in the Hall)
Lewis Black
Bill Cosby
Brak
Dave Attell
DJ
The Avalanches - [strong recommendation]
DJ Shadow - A Gretsky among DJs.
Dan the Automator - album: Nathaniel Merriweather Presents... Loveage: Music to Make Love to Your Old Lady By
Cut Chemist
Danger Mouse - album: The Grey Album
Handsome Boy Modeling School - album: So... How's Your Girl
Kid Koala
Folk - I use this label for musicks native to cultures and geographies, not the Dylan-type Folk--I'm lookin' at you, Seth. You'll understand what I mean...
Silly Wizard - featuring the one Scotsman I love more than Phil, Andy Stewart and his silky-as-Scotish-gets voice. Strength: Andy's voice, accordion
Planxty - strength: pipes
Johnny Cash
Kodo
The Pogues
Funk
James Brown - Duh.
Ohio Players
Beck - Where do you put Beck?!
Parliment
Funkadelic
Return to Forever
Weather Report
Al Green
Curtis Mayfield
Earth, Wild & Fire
Fishbone
Stevie Wonder
G. Love & Special Sauce
Hip Replacement - OK, that's one of my bands. Ya gotta plug.
Jamiroquai
KC & The Sunshine Band
Kool & The Gang
Hip-Hop
RZA - album: The World According to RZA
GZA - album: Liquid Swords
Blackalicious - album: Broken Arrow
Beastie Boys - album: Paul's Boutique
A Tribe Called Quest
Mos Def
De la Soul
Del Tha Funkee Homosapien
Atmosphere - Minneapolis BOYEEEEE!
Common
Dialated Peoples
Jurassic 5
Wu Tang
...to be continued
posted by Mason @ 7:16 PM
5 Comments:
At 5:05 PM,
Anonymous said…
Mace,
I had to make similar decisions on my pod. I went with Genres of: Black Metal, Classical, Comedy, Folk, Metal, Pop, R&B, Rock, and Soundtrack. I pretty much melted down all ‘white’ music into Rock and all ‘black’ music into R&B. When in doubt, pull out the race card. I pulled black metal out of metal because it scares (and scars) most people. I pulled some ultra-cheesy pop out of rock because I have to be in a certain mood to tolerate it.
Suggestions: You gotta include the 3 B’s in classical, dawg – Bach, Beethoven, and Brahms. Comedy – Tenacious D, hello? Folk – Stille Volk! Cross the genres, Jared. Move Ulver’s Kveldssanger to folk. Funk – would you put MJ, Prince, and Withers here or in rock?
Hey, please no more ripping Ozzy. War Pigs, Mr. Crowley, and Diary of a Madman opened some dark doors to greatness, dude. I gladly include him in metal!
At 5:14 PM,
Anonymous said…
Some iPod tips: Besides categorizing by Genre, the best way I have found to subdivide is using Comments in iTunes. You can add multiple comments to each track and then make a Smart Playlist that selects all tracks containing a certain word. For instance, I have Smart Playlists called Autumn, Night, and Sad. The song Bridget O’Malley by Silly Wizard contains those 3 words in Comments, so it is on all 3 lists. This way you can have all kinds of mood, time, or situation playlists that can overlap songs. I’m lovin’ it. God, I need a girlfriend.
At 2:25 PM,
Mason said…
Remember, Z, this was a list for the general public and Phil, who wouldn't give a damn about Ulver--regardless of the different concept albums and genres they've dabbled with. So, when I get to Metal in part. II, it'll probably have to be short. I'll put in the power five, but even then I'll have to discriminate.
There are obvious artists left out of the list so far because I haven't been able to load all 70-ish gig into my iTunes library. I'm more or less up to N, plus 'must haves' afterward in the alphabet. I'll get there, someday. Someday.
At 10:26 AM,
Michael David MacBride said…
Good list... to yours, I would add the following:
Classical:
Walter/Wendy Carlos (though, this also bridges the gap into electronic music)
Comedy:
Eddie Izzard (by far my favorite ever, get Dressed to Kill)
DJ:
DJ Spooky (mixes all kinds of whacky samples)
Plastikman (my favorite from my rave days)
Folk:
Beck (I know you have him in Funk, and he definitely belongs there too, but One Foot in the Grave, Sea Change, and Mutations earn him some chops here as well)
Ani DiFranco (girl indie folk, rocks out)
Of Montreal
Neil Young (any of the Harvest records)
Hip-Hop:
Definitely need some Run DMC
Kanye West
Eminem
And then I'd add a category or two:
Drum and Bass:
Plug
Roni Size
Krust
Classic Rock:
Led Zepplin
The Who
The Doors
The Beatles
Black Sabbath
Crosby Stills Nash & Young
James Gang
Lots of others
Industrial/Goth:
Bauhaus
Ministry
Einsturzende Neubauten
Clutch
80's/90's alternative:
The Smiths
The Cure
Hmm... I'm sure I could ramble on for days.
At 11:35 PM,
Anonymous said…
Blues (traditional-1950's):
Little Walter
Muddy Waters
Elmore James
Jimmy Reed
Sonny Boy Williamson
Buddy Guy
Tbone Walker
Blues (contemporary):
Kim Wilson
Rod Piazza
James Harman
Fabulous Thunderbirds (1st 4 lps)
Duke Robillard
Jazz/Swing:
Count Basie
Duke Ellington
Can't Go Wrong:
BB King
Ray Charles
Jeff
Post a Comment
<< Home