On Sun, 30 Nov 1997, Jamie Huxley wrote:
"The closest thing to heaven is rock 'n' roll"
Discuss
Rock 'n' roll is surely by definition happy, upbeat music. It is designed to cheer people up. That's why it was named after sex; it's a joyful occasion, a brief moment of euphoria, something that makes your life a more enjoyable thing to inhabit. That's why I have problems with refering to pop music generally as rock 'n' roll. Good music needn't be cheerful - indeed it can cheer you up without being cheerful in itself - but then it comes under another category. So rock 'n' roll is what the writer of the song thinks heaven should be like, eternal happiness and all that; but it won't transport you to heaven in the first place. The problem I think is that there are so many different (and usually contradictory) labels for the same music. Maybe this is just a British thing, the desire to find a name for every conceivable type of music, but when the different genres inevitably merge, what do you call it then? So I don't think it is possible to differentiate between rock and pop (ie popular) music. However I do think you can differentiate between rock and POP! (ie deliberately populist) music. That's why B&S would say they had rock influences, because they have never written music purely because they think it will be popular (as people like the Spice Girls or Wet Wet Wet do); they write it because they like it, it does something for them. There seems to be a great confusion over what pop means, because someone like Radiohead are popular without being populist. Similarly Bon Jovi produce populist rock, whereas Iron Maiden simply produce popular rock. There are no clearcut definitions, no exact opposites; which is why whenever you hear somebody slagging off a band for being pop or whatever, you have to be very careful what they mean. Forgive my ramblings, forgive me if I appear to have contradicted myself, but I think things like this are very hard to put into words; music is all about feelings, which by their very nature are hard to describe. I just think it's worth trying. Stuart G ----------------------------------------------------------------------- . This message was brought to you by the Sinister mailing list. . To send to the list please mail "sinister@majordomo.net". . For subscribing, unsubscribing and other list information please see . http://www.majordomo.net/sinister . For questions about how the list works mail owner-sinister@majordomo.net . We're all happy bunnies humming happy bunny tunes. Aren't we? -----------------------------------------------------------------------