The Bad Songs

[j$]

May I be so bold as to reccommend moving the whole thread out of 'FIGHT discussions and reviews' and into Monkey Business, where it clearly belongs?



Or to take a less confrontational stance, I just heard the accompanying CD to 'Songs in the Key of Z'. It sounded, mainly, like Phunt Your Collective. Take from that what you will.

[erik]

I heard Hotel California on the radio this morning, which is one of those ubiquitous songs that usually just goes in one ear and out the other for me. But after paying attention to it for perhaps the first time in my life, I was struck by how much more detailed and finely crafted it is than, say, anything that's been popular since 1990. On one hand, I'm glad that pop music has become a more "common" pusuit thanks to technology and the power chord. On the other hand, man, they sure don't make it like they used to!

Gah, the Eagles are like everything that's wrong with music. It's technically above average, yet emotionally and innovatively bankrupt. Not to mention cheezy. There's just nothing there. Were the Eagles a good band? Well, they weren't a <i>bad</i> band. But if I were trying to explain why music rules to martians or some shit, I wouldn't pick that band to hold up as a benchmark for awesomeness.

[wages]

Everyone seems to want a cookie just for pretending to try their best, but few people are actually willing to endure the time, pain and suffering that's typically required to become truly good at something.

I just want to take this on a different tangent (sp?)...

I was told that part of the problem within The Beatles (other than Yoko) was that Paul was a perfectionist whereas John was more of "let's do the song and move on" kinda guy (like me). Of course, when you're as good as John Lennon, you can afford such luxuries. I've listened (to the best of my knowledge) to John's entire catalog including demo recordings and "messin' around recordings" (defined as a recording made just as a record of an idea but not even demo quality; like 1/2 of my submissions). So i've listened to his lowest quality recordings which still seem like strong tunes, and that proves that Lennon was talented enough that he didn't need great production. Bob Dylan was the same on early albums and still to a large degree on his latest albums. While I think to have a decent tune I will probably have to work REALLY hard to achieve this. I think this is why Dave Grohl says his song structures are complicated because he can't make it simple.

The guys of Coldplay spent 18 months producing their latest (albeit, over AND under rated album). I think there is a line when it comes to "endure[ing] the time, pain and suffering", and I think spending more than a week's effort on a single song is that line. And when I say "a week's effort", I mean spending all your available time on the project. I personally spend however much time I feel like on a song (usually 1hr or 2hr if I'm lazy and up to 5hrs if I'm really working hard; I get to a point where I feel I need a band to get better at some things; partly because I have riffs or progressions that go together but I need someone's input on connecting it...like a drummer or bassist). "If" (the dreaded word) I were in a band, I might be inclined to think differently, but alas I've never been in a band (small town life is cheap, but it's the pits for non-country musicians too!).

The mediocre songs are just good enough to keep my finger off the button, but not good enough to engage me.

Guilty as charged! Seriously though, I know exactly what you mean. I feel the same. I listen to between 5 and 30 new albums on a typical day on my search for hidden gems and my new favorite bands. I hate it when I need to listen to a song for more than 1:00 to decide if I like it because I still have 500+ albums to listen to and I'm getting new ones all the time, so I try not to waste my time. ...but those damned mediocre songs (and bands)!

In regards to #3, I can still respect this person because they tried. I think that counts for something... at least in rehtoric. I will still delete the song from my hard drive, but thanks for tryin'!

#4, really! Don't submit a song if you truly don't care! I would rather spend my time giving better reviews to fewer songs.

[erik]

The attitude can be summed up as "you, my audience, are not sophisticated enough to comprehend the subtleties at work in my piece."

Perhaps these students are right... but more and more... (as I get older and more stubborn) I'm thinking they're just being pissy/lazy.

--Em

Yeah, that's a gigantic cop-out. If I say something to you and only use words you don't know, and you say to me "I don't get it", it is MY failure at communicating, not your failure for not getting it. It's a two-way street.

That's not a cop-out at all. The only way it's a cop-out is if you use "Suceeds at conveying intended message to everyone" as the only valid metric by which to judge a speech, or a painting, or any form of artistic expression. But there are other reasons for making art, most notably, because it's fun and you enjoy making it. If NO-body gets your art, then yeah, time you re-evaluate what you are doing with your art. But if some people don't get it? Hell, that's life.

If I tell a joke to someone in Spanish, and they only speak German and don't laugh, that doesn't mean the joke wasn't funny. It doesn't mean I told it wrong, and it doesn't mean that I'm bad at telling jokes. It means that it was impossible for that dude to get that joke told in Spanish. And that's nobody's fault.

There's all kinds of art that I just don't get. Graffitti memorials. Livejournal poetry. Death metal. I really can't tell if it's being done well, or not well, or what. But other people can. You can't judge the effectiveness of a work by whether one person (out of millions) was able to appreciate it.

I think I was that 1% of the art class that didn't care to change my art when the teacher offered suggestions. It wasn't that I thought other people were dumb who didn't get what I was trying to do, it was that ultimately it really didn't bother me that some people didn't get what I was doing.

[melvin]

But if I were trying to explain why music rules to martians or some shit, I wouldn't pick [The Eagles] to hold up as a benchmark for awesomeness.

Agreed. I guess what I noticed most is that they could REALLY sing and REALLY play their instruments in a way that is, by and large, not required (or even attempted) by commercial bands these days. On the upside, this has opened the doors of broad acceptance for musicians like me, who play guitar like they're wearing mittens.

[fodroy]

Livejournal poetry.

ok. that stuff is just bad. there's a reason publisher's aren't scouring livejournals for the next great writer. i think it's more difficult for people to become good writers or poets, because you need at least some idea of where literature has been, but most people don't know a thing about that. they've never any in-depth literature classes. they've only read a couple classic books in high school. it's a lot easier to get into making music, because it's easier to be exposed to previous music. it's easier to know where you're coming from and where you're going.

I think I was that 1% of the art class that didn't care to change my art when the teacher offered suggestions. It wasn't that I thought other people were dumb who didn't get what I was trying to do, it was that ultimately it really didn't bother me that some people didn't get what I was doing.

i was in the same boat. my art teacher was cool, but whenever i brought a piece up to him for his opinion he'd just give me a look like "what the hell is this?" and i'd just say, "well, they thought it was cool." and that was all i needed. i probably did suck. it goes back to my above argument. i didn't have much knowledge of art history or theory or anything.

i'm just glad that there people out there making music and making art. i say bring on the suck, as long as it shows an effort to do something cool and interesting.

[Lunkhead]

I think in a classroom environment the teachers may be assuming that students are there to learn their craft, hence the possibility of communication issues with students who feel like they don't need to hone their skills at their craft in order to express themselves.

[melvin]

What Lunkhead said. I don't think we'd know Hotel California if The Eagles hadn't mastered their instruments first. To me, worthwhile art combines indefinable passion and inspiration, with cold, calculated, technical skill. The first is often in-born; the second very rarely is.

[erik]

We all know Andy Warhol, and he wasn't a master painter. We all know the Pixies, and they weren't masters of their instruments. Russ Meyer, John Waters, Don Rickles, Christopher Walken, William Shatner, the list of people who've made interesting art without being technically proficient in their chosen media goes on and on. Technical skill is very often not a requirement for making worthwhile art.

[Adam!]

Hotel California

This is the song I hate the most. I don't think it's bad. It's in the very middle of my Mediocre list, which is worse IMO. Blech.

I'd listen to Is It Cold by the Jim Varney All Stars, which easily fulfils all 4 of JoS's criteria, over Hotel California any day.

[Lunkhead]

I didn't say technical skill was required to make worthwhile art. I was trying to only respond to the comments about students in art/music classes. If you decide you don't need to improve technically to express yourself through your art/music, which is fine, and you also can't express yourself through verbal/written communication, which is fine too, it seems to me like classes are not the right place for you. SongFight! is.

Classes to me are for giving you more tools to use when expressing yourself. Some people need simple tools, some people need more complicated tools.

Anyway, sorry to get things further off topic. Back to Bad Songs. I wish the Bad Songs were quieter and shorter. That would make them a lot less bad.

Twice I've sent in songs of my own that I thought sucked, sorry! Otherwise I spent a ludicrous amount of time on my Lunkhead entries. Now I feel like SF! is a good motivator to get things done, but after a while you get burned out and start saying "Well, it's good enough for SongFight!" and start cutting corners. Really it isn't worth spending 20+ hours on a song if your expectations are to get good reviews and lots of votes. I see more the side of people who crank something bad to mediocre out in a couple hours, and I wish I had enough inspiration frequently enough to do that...

[Lunkhead]

On the topic of Hotel California, my opinion is that I'd rather listen to something corny and cheesy that was well performed and produced than something similarly uninspiring (from a songwriting perspective) that was performed badly and produced awfully (eg a lot of SF! entries). It's all part of the equation, for me, and technical proficiency can go a long way to making something that I'm not that into less awful to endure.

[erik]

I didn't say technical skill was required to make worthwhile art.

Oooookay, but someone did. I was replying to that person. He had the post right before mine.

[rone rivendale]

*wipes the sweatbeads off of his head*

I thought for sure a thread about bad songs that was 2 full pages long would have my name in it at least once but it doesn't. I'm so relieved.



But seriously, bad songs are one of the things that makes SF what it is. Without people who sucked, the people who didn't suck wouldn't look so good. The Melvins of the world love the Rone's because they give the D- songs that make their B+ songs look like A's. If that makes any sense. That's my 2 cents, feel free to give me back my change.

[anti-m]

I didn't say technical skill was required to make worthwhile art.

Oooookay, but someone did. I was replying to that person. He had the post right before mine.

Whee! We've gone way off track in interesting ways! I'm still trying to finish these reviews... but I keep getting sucked into this philosophical rumination! This is cool!

I don't think ART is necessarily a question of technical proficiency. As you point out, Ericb, plenty of excellent art has come of less-than-sterling technical proficiency. And as JOS pointed out in another thread, technical proficiency alone can often be booooooring.

What I DO think separates ART from CRAFT (or hobby or interest or diversion) is the idea of audience. That is to say, art is made with at least a passing thought as to who will ultimately be looking at it / listening to it / otherwise consuming it. To make art without an audience in mind is at some point a contradiction. That isn’t to say there isn’t value in doing something for the sheer love of it… but is it art? Yes, if you made it with the idea of potentially showing it / sharing it with someone else.

…And I have to question the motivation of an artist who makes something with an audience in mind…but doesn’t care about what that audience thinks. It begs the age-old question: “Why make art in the first place?â€

[jack]

which fight is this thread about again?

[erik]

[quote="anti-m"]…And I have to question the motivation of an artist who makes something with an audience in mind…but doesn’t care about what that audience thinks. It begs the age-old question: “Why make art in the first place?â€

[Adam!]

[quote="erikb"][quote="anti-m"]…And I have to question the motivation of an artist who makes something with an audience in mind…but doesn’t care about what that audience thinks. It begs the age-old question: “Why make art in the first place?â€

[furrypedro]

A subset of #2 is "good band, bad singer" songs. Those're even worse than the mediocre songs that you want to like, because they actually sound great until the American Idol reject starts whining. I'd do more reviews if we had a "learn to sing .. NEXT" smiley.

this is a bit close to the bone for me, but i don't know if the fact that I write a lot of songs that I don't consider to be "bad" makes me feel better because at least I can play guitar, or worse because I'm trashing a perfectly good track with amelodic vocals. I think those that have yet to perfect their technique are obviously capable of creating great songs/art and each new piece, be it good or bad, is always just part of the learning curve. and I think it's a good thing that SF! can provide a forum for those in the middle of the process.

Also, I'm sure I'm not the only person here who has changed their mind about a song after a period of time/number of listens. In fact, stuff that grabs me 1st listen I tend to get tired of after a while, but a lot of music that made me go "eh? ugh" on 1st listen, I ended up really loving; caP'n Jazz for example, dodgy recordings, and Tim Kinsella can't sing for beans, but how he tries.

sometimes I find myself liking stuff with potential that is imperfectly formed because it lets you imagine what it could have done, and that's almost sweeter than hearing a song reach a perfect conclusion, because the mercurial nature of the piece may be lost in the writing/recording process. I'm not totally sure if that's relevant to the thread, but i can't make it any clearer.

[Jim of Seattle]

which fight is this thread about again?

Fight Discussions and Reviews
Discuss upcoming, current, and previous song fights.

[Jim of Seattle]

If I tell a joke to someone in Spanish, and they only speak German and don't laugh, that doesn't mean the joke wasn't funny. It doesn't mean I told it wrong, and it doesn't mean that I'm bad at telling jokes. It means that it was impossible for that dude to get that joke told in Spanish. And that's nobody's fault.

No, but you just wasted his time. I think it's important to remember, particularly for an artform like music, that the audience is doing me a favor by listening to my music. I am asking for a few minutes of their time and attention and in return I promise to try to make it worth their while. If I put something I'm pretty sure they won't get, then I'm asking for something for nothing. "You pay attention to me for three minutes, but I'm not giving you anything back."

[roymond]

Twice I've sent in songs of my own that I thought sucked, sorry! Otherwise I spent a ludicrous amount of time on my Lunkhead entries. Now I feel like SF! is a good motivator to get things done, but after a while you get burned out and start saying "Well, it's good enough for SongFight!" and start cutting corners. Really it isn't worth spending 20+ hours on a song if your expectations are to get good reviews and lots of votes. I see more the side of people who crank something bad to mediocre out in a couple hours, and I wish I had enough inspiration frequently enough to do that...

I'd never send in something to SF that I thought sucked, but I accept your apology. But I have sent in things that weren't fully developed, yet good renditions of what I had in mind. This typically is due to time constraints, and sadly drum programming and bass lines are the first to suffer. But I am confident in the song, its structure and the production of what I do get finished. If I didn't like the song, I would never subject anyone to it. I don't see what one gains by having one more song in your archive if it sucks.