If Music Could Talk

WestwayKid wrote: ↑

10 Jul 2019, 8:48am

Gimme Shelter. I missed the 60's - but seen through my Gen X eyes I've always been dismissive of the Summer of Love slant given to the decade and this song - which came out at the very end of the decade - seems to speak far more about the 60's than many other "classics" 60's songs. The song makes you feel like the world is closing in on you and to that point - it still speaks to us today. I think one has to be care to not "vilify" the 60's too much. Yes, it was a decade of strife and war and murder, but it isn't much different right now. I think (and again - I didn't live through the decade) that what feels jarring about the 60's is the fact that it was an awakening to the horrors of the world - or maybe a remembering of the horrors of the world. A pulling back from the gauzy post war years where everyone (if you were white) had a nice house in the suburbs, a large car in your driveway, and a membership to the local country club. Gimme Shelter speaks to the realities of the world - the bad stuff is all just a shot away - and the Stones do a great job of crafting the song into a great vehicle for that message. Keith truly shines on this track: great opening (guitar and vocal), pounding rhythm guitar and stinging lead. Jagger's vocal is excellent (as is his harmonica playing) and Merry Clayton's vocal is once-in-a-lifetime perfect.

WestwayKid wrote: ↑

10 Jul 2019, 8:48am

Gimme Shelter. I missed the 60's - but seen through my Gen X eyes I've always been dismissive of the Summer of Love slant given to the decade and this song - which came out at the very end of the decade - seems to speak far more about the 60's than many other "classics" 60's songs. The song makes you feel like the world is closing in on you and to that point - it still speaks to us today. I think one has to be care to not "vilify" the 60's too much. Yes, it was a decade of strife and war and murder, but it isn't much different right now. I think (and again - I didn't live through the decade) that what feels jarring about the 60's is the fact that it was an awakening to the horrors of the world - or maybe a remembering of the horrors of the world. A pulling back from the gauzy post war years where everyone (if you were white) had a nice house in the suburbs, a large car in your driveway, and a membership to the local country club. Gimme Shelter speaks to the realities of the world - the bad stuff is all just a shot away - and the Stones do a great job of crafting the song into a great vehicle for that message. Keith truly shines on this track: great opening (guitar and vocal), pounding rhythm guitar and stinging lead. Jagger's vocal is excellent (as is his harmonica playing) and Merry Clayton's vocal is once-in-a-lifetime perfect.

101Walterton wrote: ↑

10 Jul 2019, 5:47am

Marky Dread wrote: ↑

10 Jul 2019, 4:18am

muppet hi fi wrote: ↑

09 Jul 2019, 9:57pm

Heston wrote: ↑

09 Jul 2019, 9:43pm

Are we talking subversive tracks here?

If we are, it's '71 again: "Brown Sugar". Think about it ya'll...

"White Sugar" sounded too racist.

Icing sugar

Marky Dread wrote: ↑

10 Jul 2019, 1:25pm

If its the Stones then it's Street Fighting Man for me.

Dr. Medulla wrote: ↑

11 Jul 2019, 10:44am

Gonna abuse Westway's good will again in this thread to mine the collective wisdom of the board. I mentioned in the Reading thread that I'm listening to Our Band Could Be Your Life in part for lecture ideas. I've already decided to do one on indie labels, but listening to the chapter on Black Flag, I've come up with another idea. One of the themes in McKinney's brilliant Beatles book is that the band freed their audience, to help them see that there could be more to life than suburbs and mortgages and the like. Yet, as the band continued to explore and really pursue freedom, more and more of the early fans rejected and resented that. The Beatles got too weird, too controversial. We want the Fab Four! The same kind of thing happened with Black Flag, with the band aware of conformity within hardcore and so they regularly altered their sound and look, and a lot of the audience reacted negatively. We want the old stuff! So I'm interested in examining this idea of "the old stuff was better," where the artist wants to grow and the audience resents it. My question(s) then, can you think of other interesting examples of bands and fans developing a somewhat antagonistic relationship because the band wants to change and the fans don't, and do you have any thoughts about this dynamic?

Dr. Medulla wrote: ↑

11 Jul 2019, 10:44am

Gonna abuse Westway's good will again in this thread to mine the collective wisdom of the board. I mentioned in the Reading thread that I'm listening to Our Band Could Be Your Life in part for lecture ideas. I've already decided to do one on indie labels, but listening to the chapter on Black Flag, I've come up with another idea. One of the themes in McKinney's brilliant Beatles book is that the band freed their audience, to help them see that there could be more to life than suburbs and mortgages and the like. Yet, as the band continued to explore and really pursue freedom, more and more of the early fans rejected and resented that. The Beatles got too weird, too controversial. We want the Fab Four! The same kind of thing happened with Black Flag, with the band aware of conformity within hardcore and so they regularly altered their sound and look, and a lot of the audience reacted negatively. We want the old stuff! So I'm interested in examining this idea of "the old stuff was better," where the artist wants to grow and the audience resents it. My question(s) then, can you think of other interesting examples of bands and fans developing a somewhat antagonistic relationship because the band wants to change and the fans don't, and do you have any thoughts about this dynamic?

WestwayKid wrote: ↑

11 Jul 2019, 11:05am

First time I saw The Cure was on their Wild Mood Swings tour and there was a definite goth presence in the audience and it was pretty clear they did not care for the direction the band had gone in. Lots of scowling and dirty looks directed towards anyone who dared dance to Friday I'm In Love and so on. Neil Young seems like a guy who constantly has confounded his fans - shifting sounds and even genres.

Marky Dread wrote: ↑

11 Jul 2019, 11:55am

The Clash. The band took lots of stick from moving away from the punk sound of earlier records.

Wolter wrote: ↑

11 Jul 2019, 12:09pm

Bad Religion tried it early and were shot down when they put out a prog album that they later swept under the rug.

Dr. Medulla wrote: ↑

11 Jul 2019, 12:35pm

Wolter wrote: ↑

11 Jul 2019, 12:09pm

Bad Religion tried it early and were shot down when they put out a prog album that they later swept under the rug.

Was their backtracking (if you know) due to fan response or artistic disappointment?


While thinking of other examples, I was struck by the case of the Fall, a band whose sound evolved a fair bit (or, as Peel said, always different, always the same), yet as far as I know, MES never really lost his audience. Fall fans may have drifted in or out, but there was never that kind of "the old stuff was better" outrage.