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What Are You Listening To?

Haywood said:
I've seen footage of these guys from back before they were signed. Their sound has not particularly changed, though they have gotten better. Nobody has done old-school blues-based rock for years, so I'm not sure how this is a sell-out. Every time I hear Highway Tune, it puts a smile on my face.
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There are many fans on this forum, so I will refrain from writing any more critical reviews of GvF.

Haywood said:
Any thoughts on the other two bands? I'm also listening to a lot of The Pretty Reckless.
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Halestorm is just boring to me. But, they have skills and a sense of what makes a song interesting. It is simply not a style of music I can get into.

The Struts are a great band, but rehashing the same shit all the pop rock bands are all producing over the last 10 years.

The Pretty Reckless sound like someone took Taylor Swift songwriting sensibilities and arranged with a shit load of 40-something studio musicians trying to sound like the 1980s. It isn't good, but it also doesn't suck.


There are good new bands out there, and we hear them all the time, but trying to revive the classic sounds of genre defining artists like Queen, Led Zepplin, and others by merely copying their songs, clothes, and make-up isn't "new" to me. For me, it is the same as going down to any of the thousands of live-music bars in Austin and watching any of the hundreds of old-rock cover bands play. Sometimes they play a song I haven't heard before, either because they wrote it or I just happened to have never heard the original album it was on, but when they do that, at least they know how to play, arrange, and feel authentic.

I don't see the point of buying a record that sounds like Pink Floyd's outtakes or Van Halen's toss away demos. Hell, I don't see the point of buying music from the original artists they felt wasn't worthy of putting out when it was recorded. If you want to listen to Led Zepplin, they have a 8 original studio albums and 4 great live albums available. That's hours of their artistry readily available to you.

Trigger Warning: An opinion on GvF
Forcing nostalgia acts, as I feel GvF does, just leaves me wanting to turn it off and making every effort to forget it. Also, GvF needs a fucking new drummer. That ass-hat is terrible - especially after two years of touring, he should be better by now.
 
Flint said:
Halestorm is just boring to me. But, they have skills and a sense of what makes a song interesting. It is simply not a style of music I can get into.

The Struts are a great band, but rehashing the same shit all the pop rock bands are all producing over the last 10 years.

The Pretty Reckless sound like someone took Taylor Swift songwriting sensibilities and arranged with a shit load of 40-something studio musicians trying to sound like the 1980s. It isn't good, but it also doesn't suck.
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My wife doesn't like Halestorm either. I think you either like the genre or you don't. Like 'em or not though, there are not very many rock bands these days with enough of a following and enough staying power to produce four major studio albums over a ten year period. This is largely because they've been playing over 200 gigs a year for more than a decade and use the rest of their time going to radio stations, doing interviews, recording and making videos. Their work ethic is pretty impressive.

I hear elements of what you are talking about with The Struts, but I think there is more to them than that. There is an element of their sound that makes me thing of Muse, The Killers, and Coldplay, but there is also an element that traces its roots back to the Stones and Queen. The newness is the marriage of the two. Apart from musicality, their lead singer is very charismatic and super fun to watch. I love their cheeky schtick.

On the topic of The Pretty Reckless, I am curious about the Taylor Swift comment. What do you mean when you say, "sensibilities?" If you are going to go with Taylor Swift, I would almost suggest that it is the bastard step-child of her and Black Sabbath. They don't smash you over the head with it like Ghost, but there is an element of the horror theatricality of bands like Sabbath, Maiden and Alice Cooper.

On a side note, watching the video for You Make Me Wanna Die makes me feel like a bit of a pedophile, because she was only 17 when they shot it.

I don't think that the new hard rock / alt-metal sound is identical to what came before. It is more of an evolution from what came before. There is an identifiable "sound" to it, much like their were identifiable sounds to the 70s and 80s.
 
Ok fine, so GvF isn't LZ. Are they really trying to be? Sure if you take the stance that they're basically an LZ cover band and judge them on that... well, it's 40 years later, they're not gonna be the same. Just like complaining that Mumford & Sons isn't a great Irish band; they're not Irish they're from London. And GvF are YOUNG dudes. Can't fault them too terribly much for not having developed their own completely unique sound yet. But I think their writing is good, sure vocally and instrumentally they sound like LZ on the surface, but their writing is not all that similar. (Whether you consider it better/worse/equivalent is another subjective matter.)

Can't comment on the drummer, I thought he sounded ok. But all rock drummers are boring hacks compared to jazz drummers, so what can you do...
 
Haywood said:
On the topic of The Pretty Reckless, I am curious about the Taylor Swift comment. What do you mean when you say, "sensibilities?" If you are going to go with Taylor Swift, I would almost suggest that it is the bastard step-child of her and Black Sabbath. They don't smash you over the head with it like Ghost, but there is an element of the horror theatricality of bands like Sabbath, Maiden and Alice Cooper.
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To me, The Pretty Reckless songwriting is identical to Taylor Swift's in damn near every way. The only real difference is the backing tracks are distorted guitars and hard rock produced drums while Taylor Swift uses synths and samples with more of an overproduced drum-machine vibe. In fact, it wreaks of everything coming out in the Country-Rock or Alt-Country genre and I would never in a billion years call it hard rock at all. It lacks everything that makes hard rock hard rock.

But, it is what it is. You should enjoy it if you want to. Hell, I think I'm the only Kate Bush fanatic on this forum, and I will continue proclaiming she is the most brilliant musical and artistic genius of her generation.

PaulyT said:
Ok fine, so GvF isn't LZ. Are they really trying to be? Sure if you take the stance that they're basically an LZ cover band and judge them on that... well, it's 40 years later, they're not gonna be the same. Just like complaining that Mumford & Sons isn't a great Irish band; they're not Irish they're from London. And GvF are YOUNG dudes. Can't fault them too terribly much for not having developed their own completely unique sound yet. But I think their writing is good, sure vocally and instrumentally they sound like LZ on the surface, but their writing is not all that similar. (Whether you consider it better/worse/equivalent is another subjective matter.)
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I get it, but why "forgive" a shitty band because they are young? Why compare them to another vastly overrated shitty band?

I know you like them, which is great. In fact, you are filling me with envy as I haven't felt the need to defend many new artists in a long time. The last time I thought I discovered a great new artist, specifically Bleu (McCauley), it turned out he had been writing, recording, and producing music for decades. Kinda sucks.
 
PaulyT said:
Ok fine, so GvF isn't LZ. Are they really trying to be? Sure if you take the stance that they're basically an LZ cover band and judge them on that... well, it's 40 years later, they're not gonna be the same. Just like complaining that Mumford & Sons isn't a great Irish band; they're not Irish they're from London. And GvF are YOUNG dudes. Can't fault them too terribly much for not having developed their own completely unique sound yet. But I think their writing is good, sure vocally and instrumentally they sound like LZ on the surface, but their writing is not all that similar. (Whether you consider it better/worse/equivalent is another subjective matter.)

Can't comment on the drummer, I thought he sounded ok. But all rock drummers are boring hacks compared to jazz drummers, so what can you do...
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Oh..................................here we go!!!!

I will start a new thread on this one...........................
 
Flint said:
To me, The Pretty Reckless songwriting is identical to Taylor Swift's in damn near every way. The only real difference is the backing tracks are distorted guitars and hard rock produced drums while Taylor Swift uses synths and samples with more of an overproduced drum-machine vibe. In fact, it wreaks of everything coming out in the Country-Rock or Alt-Country genre and I would never in a billion years call it hard rock at all. It lacks everything that makes hard rock hard rock.
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I was thinking more of the lyrical content in terms of songwriting. They are classified as hard rock, but I will concede the point on that and just call them rock. I do not see the alt-country connection though. This does not sound a thing like country to me.

 
I'm not getting offended. I'm genuinely interested in the conversation. Part of the problem might be that I've always disliked country music and therefore do not follow it and probably have no idea what it sounds like these days.
 
Haywood said:
I'm not getting offended. I'm genuinely interested in the conversation. Part of the problem might be that I've always disliked country music and therefore do not follow it and probably have no idea what it sounds like these days.
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I am not trying to put down this music, but since I personally don't like I feel like I am, so take this with a grain of salt.

I listened to about 5 songs watching videos on YouTube. If you break down the structures of those songs, they perfectly match the exact models used by damn near all of the big commercial alt-country and country-rock bands. The energy level roller coaster matches nearly all modern country. The breaks, timings, and even energetic swells, are stereotypes of the genre. The melodies and rhythms of singing and even the lyrical content is exactly the same as the modern popular country genres. Even her look in the videos mimics the current styles of the alt-country lead chick singers. Where it isn't Alt-Country is where is going further in suggesting sexuality or brutality lyrically and visually. But every aspect, aside from that (and the production of the guitars and drums), it is Alt-Country in every way.

The difference with the band isn't what they are playing - at all. It is note for note what a good alt-country backup band would play. The difference is how much aggressive distortion, compression and subsequent "crunch" on the guitars and the early 2000's hard rock sound on the drums. Add some sampling and the tone would be identical to 1990s Linken Park being applied to Alt-Country songwriting.

That's why I say what I say.
 
Listened to this last night...............first time ever in the HT.

I recommended that Flint listened to the last track on the original album, Fireball, released in 1971: No One Came

The reason that I recommended that Flint listen to the original recorded is that Martin Birch did great things during their recording sessions. Listen to the each instrument on this track!!

220px-Deep_purple_%E2%80%93_fireball.jpg
 
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Zing said:
I don't know who Cindy Lou is but her sister Betty Lou's gettin' out tonight.
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Well at least somebody played along. What I was talking about, is that the lead singer of Pretty Reckless is Taylor Momsen, the girl who played Cindy Lou Who in the Grinch. I hadn't ever heard her sing before, but she sounds pretty good.
 
Huey said:
Well at least somebody played along. What I was talking about, is that the lead singer of Pretty Reckless is Taylor Momsen, the girl who played Cindy Lou Who in the Grinch. I hadn't ever heard her sing before, but she sounds pretty good.
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I knew the character name, connect the dots. NFW.
 
Huey said:
Well at least somebody played along. What I was talking about, is that the lead singer of Pretty Reckless is Taylor Momsen, the girl who played Cindy Lou Who in the Grinch. I hadn't ever heard her sing before, but she sounds pretty good.
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Check out their videos for Heaven Knows, You Make Me Wanna Die, and Take Me Down. Cindy Lou grew up to be a hottie.
 
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