Alright, let's leave it at that. I go and put a flower into my hair now and dance along to Circulus' latest album.
Guess you know that article
- Thread starter Occam's Razor
- Start date
Allright!! 
The Lick On The Tip Of An Envelope Yet To Be Sent had some great songs. Guess I'll fetch my sandals and do a little hop around the maypole too :Smokin:
The Lick On The Tip Of An Envelope Yet To Be Sent had some great songs. Guess I'll fetch my sandals and do a little hop around the maypole too :Smokin:
BenMech
student of the d'eh
Jim LotFP
The Keeper of Metal
Occam's Razor said:
I think you may be portraying me a bit more openminded than I actually am. hehe.
I did really like Of One Blood, mainly because of the creative vocals and overlapping lines. That's what made it stand out, and I was happy to talk with Bachand and Fair at that time. When The Art of Balance came out, it was lacking this feature and I fell out of fascination with the band.
Appreciate electronics? Unless you're talking about older Fear Factory or some Samael stuff, I'm forgetting what electronics I'm supposed to be appreciating. Do you mean the Scald review in the current issue?
70s prog... yes yes yes! Genesis, ELP, Yes, Rush, Comus of course, Mellow Candle, Goblin, Bo Hansson... even on up to not-so-prog bands like the Scorpions, Deep Purple, Rainbow, Blue Öyster Cult of course... early Queen, even stuff like Boston and Skynyrd. 70s rock just seems very open.
And Scum was not merely a provocation. It was a result of not being a writer for some months, having "quit" LotFP in that time period, and taking a step back. What is metal, what is not metal, it doesn't mean a thing as far as being "good." Do not discount Part 3 in Scum at all:
"This investigation is not intended to show heavy metal as superior to other forms of music. It does not imply any connection between heavy metal and quality. It will be necessary to make generalizations in each category discussed. We are discussing an entire genre of music; it would be impossible to avoid generalizations. I know that there are exceptions to every statement I am going to make. This is heavy metal. Each case is to be individually evaluated."
I realize there is a difference between "I like heavy metal more than any type of music" and "Heavy metal is better than any other type of music", but there's no reason to hammer it home continuously in LotFP, where the entire point is to create discussion specifically about heavy metal.
But there is a tendency for people to say things aren't metal if they don't like the style (say movements including Korn, Machine Head, and this metalcore thing happening now) and include things as metal if they do like it. (I found out about bands like Anekdoten, Änglagård, and Landberk through metal magazines covering them!) I was trying to create a standard to judge these things against. I've spent a lot of time and money on LotFP, a "heavy metal" publication. I spend lots of time discussing the music with others. I spend a lot of time listening to it, and even when it's not on, the music is constantly, constantly, swimming in my head. Wanting to concretely answer "What is it then?" doesn't seem pointless or silly to me at all. The entire project was serious and not merely trying to piss people off.
The style it was written in (and the standard for LotFP writing in general) was indeed confrontational in tone. This is intentional. I wish that reading LotFP should be an active exercise and not a passive reading experience. You shouldn't just say "Oh, I agree," or "I disagree" in passing. It should be something that jars you into action. "Yeah. HELL YEAH!" or "wwhhhhaattttt? He's fucking crazy..."
That is the part where I succeeded and Some Bastard "fell like a sucker for it."
Some Bastard said:
You are absolutely correct except where you say we are putting heavy metal in a cage. A lot of the writing around here has been talking about metal as a movement and a genre, yes. But you have even noted that the music itself doesn't seem to be specifically talked about. This too is intentional, simply because the music does constantly grow and people think of new things to do with it. It still is a living, breathing organism, and therefore speaking of it in "absolute generalities" is a losing proposition. So we struggle with that: We believe heavy metal is a definable thing while realizing it's not a dead language so to speak, so the definition has to also allow growth.
Some Bastard said:
Of course. If heavy metal is so stagnant that half a decade does not create new truths about it, and if my views and writing are so stagnant that I do not have new perspectives in half a decade's time, then I'm pretty fucked.
Shit, I'm reading through the issue just released Monday and already second guessing the odd line or two. .)
But I still like to approach my writing with the idea that it's the most serious thing in the world. Even if I don't succeed in creating something I think is 100% fuckin' rad, I can at least avoid writing the absolute garbage that characterized some of my earlier work.
BenMech
student of the d'eh
Jim LotFP said:
The point is, preferences may change like bands do. At the time you did that interview, the band had better music to offer than today - even though I've never been a friend of theirs. Their approach was not yet hackneyed back then though. Coincidentally, they lost appeal while gaining commercial success.
Yep, but appreciation is not love, is it. I mean, it is not that you totally refuse it because it is artificial - you can see that it is there for a reason. That's not narrow-mindedness.
I have grown fond of South American and South European stuff from that era. Esperanto, Jumbo, PFM, Museo Rosenbach,...and I have a sampler here with Japanese psych from the 60s and 70s...far, far out!
Therefore my reproach to people that they do not read stuff they are talking about properly.
those people that push it forward have always been a minority though - which counts for every genre.
Oh, I can relate to that!
Jim LotFP
The Keeper of Metal
Guess that's it then
"Rest in Peace, my beloved Heavy Metal. We've had some wonderful times" *sob*
"Rest in Peace, my beloved Heavy Metal. We've had some wonderful times" *sob*
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