Reputation and taste changes in Music

[23 Daves]

All you need is 'Mykonos' anyway. The rest is tune-dodging shit for studes.

The "Fleet Foxes" LP is great, I think - nothing original, but superbly executed and in places deeply eerie and chilling. Whether you need more than that is open to question. "Helplessness Blues" is largely psuedo-profound, meandering piffle.

If anything caused people to look away it might have been the flood of diluted folk acts (such as Mumfords) who rushed through in their wake.

[CaledonianGonzo]

I think ver Foxes have announced that they're about to stir back into action.

I saw Joanna Newsom last month with Robin Pecknold in support, and he debuted a whole heap of new songs.

[holyzombiejesus]

Maybe due to the tv shows not being repeated any more, The Monkees seem to be less lauded than a couple of decades ago.

[non capisco]

All you need is 'Mykonos' anyway. The rest is tune-dodging shit for studes.

I still love 'White Winter Hymnal' and 'He Doesn't Know Why'. The rest of their stuff gets a big old shrug from this guy, especially that second album that seemed to go on for a million years. There's also a song on their first album where it unfortunately sounds like they're all singing 'darky man' which I put on at work once and was accused of being a racist. Fuck you, Fleet Foxes!

[CaledonianGonzo]

I really like some of the second album. Blue Spotted Tail is like vintage Simon & Garfunkel or something

[the science eel]

Maybe due to the tv shows not being repeated any more, The Monkees seem to be less lauded than a couple of decades ago.

Yeah, I think that's true. Shame.

I've noticed young people go on about Led Zep a lot more than they did a couple of decades ago, too. Now they're maybe the number two old band (after the Beatles) for students and those sorts.

[holyzombiejesus]

It's hard to tell with bands when I was young because I wasn't aware of them until I'd heard them (if that makes sense) but when did Nick Drake start getting acclaim? I heard (of) Love and Nick Drake for the first time as a teenager at a girlfriend's house as her dad played them whilst we ate tea.

Not sure if many people rated Big Star until after Teenage Fanclub released Bandwagonesque.

On the flipside, Portishead and Air.

[NoSleep]

Nick Drake was fairly obscure until the Guardian did this Alternative top 100 albums where they made rules to eliminate the usual suspects from dominating it and Bryter Layter was number 1. After that, Nick Drake CDs began to appear in record shops and Drake became a "classic" artist. That was in 1999.

[23 Daves]

I still love 'White Winter Hymnal' and 'He Doesn't Know Why'. The rest of their stuff gets a big old shrug from this guy, especially that second album that seemed to go on for a million years. There's also a song on their first album where it unfortunately sounds like they're all singing 'darky man' which I put on at work once and was accused of being a racist. Fuck you, Fleet Foxes!

https://youtu.be/-uSGtRoEQYA

As for Led Zeppelin, I seem to remember the big turning point for them was the "Past Masters" box set being issued in the early nineties. While not exactly overlooked - Led Zep have never been completely disregarded - they didn't really have much of a youth audience, and the arrival of PM close to the onset of a rock revival via grunge did them wonders. They seem to have gone from strength to strength since.

A lot of seventies hard rock behemoths had a lowered reputation during punk and for awhile afterwards in the eighties, though, so Zep were by no means alone in that respect. I still find them a bit dull, to be honest with you. Never got the fuss.

Green Day and Blink 182 are odd cases in point as well. If I'm talking to anyone under the age of 30, I'm expected to take them seriously as Classic Rock bands, when in my youth almost everyone (apart from the skaters in the local square) just saw them as making catchy punk-pop records and little else. I've really surprised younger family members by saying that actually, you could go out on the town in the mid-nineties and never hear Green Day in the local alternative club all evening.

[Brundle-Fly]

Nick Drake was fairly obscure until the Guardian did this Alternative top 100 albums where they made rules to eliminate the usual suspects from dominating it and Bryter Layter was number 1. After that, Nick Drake CDs began to appear in record shops and Drake became a "classic" artist. That was in 1999.

I thought it was about six years earlier after a revitalised Paul Weller released Wild Wood to massive UK acclaim. He said at the time Drake had been an influence and it piqued peoples' interest. That's when I discovered him after a mate did me a compilation tape of his stuff around 1994.  Shuggie Otis, of course was waiting in the wings.

[holyzombiejesus]

No, it was well before then surely. It was 1985's Heaven in a Wild Flower compilation that I first heard.

I guess it's all by degrees and I'm gauging reputation by things like articles in fanzines, which is where I used to get most of my musical tips from.

[Brundle-Fly]

No, it was well before then surely. It was 1985's Heaven in a Wild Flower compilation that I first heard.

Not heard that Was it a popular compilation with NME readers et al back then?

[holyzombiejesus]

Not heard that Was it a popular compilation with NME readers et al back then?

Not sure if you're taking the piss or not but...



It was on Island and I'm pretty sure it was mid-price too. Think I got mine from Boots or John Menzies.

[NoSleep]

It was after the 1999 Guardian chart that Nick Drake CDs became regularly stocked items in the stores. There was a flood of interest following that chart and it has not declined subsequently.

[Brundle-Fly]

Not sure if you're taking the piss or not but...



It was on Island and I'm pretty sure it was mid-price too. Think I got mine from Boots or John Menzies.

No, I wasn't taking the piss. I thought Heaven In A Wild Flower might have been a compilation of different sixties artistes that was hip at the time. i.e.: A bit like some of those lounge/ easy listening compilations were in the mid-nineties.  I didn't even know that Drake compilation existed.

[holyzombiejesus]

Ah, ok.

[Hanslow]

Green Day and Blink 182

err

[holyzombiejesus]

err

Can't say anything about the latter but I do remember when, pre-Dookie, Green Day were quite credible and well regarded, albeit with people who liked stuff like The Descendents and NOFX.

[Brundle-Fly]

When did folk start namedropping Scott Walker?

I was already well acquainted with The Walker Brothers oeuvre but discovered his solo career around 1993/4  (the same time as Nick Drake, funnily enough).  A friend was playing Scott 3 in his car and it knocked me sideways. I almost made him drive me to the nearest Virgin Megastore so I could buy his entire back catalogue immediately. I devoured those solo albums back then; bathing in those luscious Angela Morley (formerly Wally Stott) orchestral arrangements, Walker's phenomenal voice and those wonderfully florid lyrics.

I was huge fan of Momus so I could see how much Currie and also Marc Almond had been influenced by him (along with Jacques Brel).  1995 seemed to be the year of his pop cultural reevaluation. Of course, the other biggest champion of the man at that time was the newly crowned king of indie chic, Jarvis Cocker who clearly worshipped at the alter of Engels. When Bowie heralded Walker's album Tilt as 'a work of genius' and his latest inspiration, his legacy was sealed forever . 

Well...for at least a few more years, if what I've learnt from this thread is anything to go by.

He also was so enigmatic. Please tell me he's not on Twitter now.

[Crabwalk]

When did folk start namedropping Scott Walker?

I was already well acquainted with The Walker Brothers oeuvre but discovered his solo career around 1993/4  (the same time as Nick Drake, funnily enough).  A friend was playing Scott 3 in his car and it knocked me sideways. I almost made him drive me to the nearest Virgin Megastore so I could buy his entire back catalogue immediately. I devoured those solo albums back then; bathing in those luscious Angela Morley (formerly Wally Stott) orchestral arrangements, Walker's phenomenal voice and those wonderfully florid lyrics.

I was huge fan of Momus so I could see how much Currie and also Marc Almond had been influenced by him (along with Jacques Brel).  1995 seemed to be the year of his pop cultural reevaluation. Of course, the other biggest champion of the man at that time was the newly crowned king of indie chic, Jarvis Cocker who clearly worshipped at the alter of Engels. When Bowie heralded Walker's album Tilt as 'a work of genius' and his latest inspiration, his legacy was sealed forever . 

Well...for at least a few more years, if what I've learnt from this thread is anything to go by.

He also was so enigmatic. Please tell me he's not on Twitter now.

Yes, it was the early 90s when Boy Child was issued on CD and you had the likes of Tindersticks emerging as critical darlings that his stock started to climb high again.

As for Nick Drake, I remember hearing 'Northern Sky' played on Radio 1 around '96/'97 (by someone improbable like Simon Mayo as I recall) which prompted me to buy the Way To Blue compilation which was always widely available and cheap. There were definitely other fans around when I was at university at that time, and of course Belle and Sebastian were emerging then so he was being referenced constantly in association with them.

[Bingo Fury]

When did folk start namedropping Scott Walker?

It must be 1980. I remember Julian Cope doing an interview for the NME when he was all "WAAAH SCOTT WALKER" and paused the interview so he could play the journalist "Big Louise" (possibly the same interview in which he popularised the term "Corrie"), and his compilation "Fire Escape In The Sky: The Godlike Genius Of Scott Walker" came out in 1981. Even though I wasn't to appreciate him until much later in life, as far as I'm concerned, the name "Scott Walker" has been shorthand for top-notch, well-crafted quality work since that date.

[Phil_A]

Nick Drake was fairly obscure until the Guardian did this Alternative top 100 albums where they made rules to eliminate the usual suspects from dominating it and Bryter Layter was number 1. After that, Nick Drake CDs began to appear in record shops and Drake became a "classic" artist. That was in 1999.

In the mid-nineties, I remember him getting name-dropped a lot before I heard any of his music, usually in relation to Belle & Sebastian. Then there was Patrick Humphries biography that came out in 1998, which was probably the first time he'd been extensively written about, and there was a documentary about him on BBC2 the same year - I think I must've got a copy of Five Leaves Left not long after.

And then Pink Moon got used on a car ad in America.

[Brundle-Fly]

It must be 1980. I remember Julian Cope doing an interview for the NME when he was all "WAAAH SCOTT WALKER" and paused the interview so he could play the journalist "Big Louise" (possibly the same interview in which he popularised the term "Corrie"), and his compilation "Fire Escape In The Sky: The Godlike Genius Of Scott Walker" came out in 1981. Even though I wasn't to appreciate him until much later in life, as far as I'm concerned, the name "Scott Walker" has been shorthand for top-notch, well-crafted quality work since that date.

Isn't Copey largely responsible for Krautrock entering the rock snob's vernacular after his sampler book? Again 1995!

[phantom_power]

It was after the 1999 Guardian chart that Nick Drake CDs became regularly stocked items in the stores. There was a flood of interest following that chart and it has not declined subsequently.

I know he was talked about a lot when the Way To Blue compilation came out in 1994 because that is when I became aware of him and fell in love with his music after buying it.

[Phil_A]

I think the first time I remember hearing Scott Walker's name was via a review of now completely forgotten electro-country-Krautrock act Scott 4 circa 1995. At that point it was fairly hard to find any of his stuff around other than the Boy Child compilation. I don't remember seeing the "classic" Walker albums in the shops until they all got reissued in 2000.

[23 Daves]

I think the first time I remember hearing Scott Walker's name was via a review of now completely forgotten electro-country-Krautrock act Scott 4 circa 1995. At that point it was fairly hard to find any of his stuff around other than the Boy Child compilation. I don't remember seeing the "classic" Walker albums in the shops until they all got reissued in 2000.

No, you could get them quite easily in the mid-nineties - that's when I bought them. The local HMV had all of them at mid-price. Of course, when they did all get remastered circa 2000 I did feel quite frustrated, but there you go.

I would say Scott Walker's stock probably rose around the point of the "Nite Flights" LP, and was improved further still by Cope's pushing of him in the early eighties. Then, as stated above, Divine Comedy and Tindersticks and Pulp (and to an extent Suede) helped him further along in the next decade. He's always had champions, though things have been quieter for him on that front recently.

[TJ]

Nick Drake was never really 'obscure', at least not in the modern sense; in the eighties, a bit like Big Star he was one of those names that the more knowledgeable broadsheet critics would drop whenever they could. He also had an entry in a Rolling Stone Ultimate Guide To Rock from the early eighties.

I picked up the three albums on CD in a small HMV in around... 1991? After hearing Mike Read play The Thoughts Of Mary Jane towards the end of his Radio 1 days at any rate. Also, isn't it true that the albums were never deleted due to a clause in Joe Boyd's contract? There's a story that they sold steadily every year apart from when the Fruit Tree box set first came out (which I think was 1979).

[TJ]

I think with a lot of the artists mentioned here - including Scott Walker and Love - their reputation had been maintained by the now virtually non-existent 'Friend's Mate Network'; you know, the way you'd always meet someone through one of your friends whose opening gambit was how good #1 Record or the Deram Bowie Album or whatever was, usually offering to 'tape' it for you in the process. That's long since been seen off by the Internet really. Certainly that's how I first got to hear about Dave Pike, David Ackles, Tim Buckley, Sandy Denny, White Noise and loads of others besides.

Interestingly, there was apparently a rash of interest in a lot of these cult acts in the early-mid seventies, just after Nuggets and while the reissue market was just beginning to properly kick off. I first heard Love when an older relative gave me a compilation called Love Masters from 1972 on hearing that I liked that there 'sixties' music, which looked to be a fairly high-profile effort and still had a Boots price label on it!

[the science eel]

Dave Pike? You've made that up!

[TJ]

The Dave Pike Set? No I sodding have not! Finest Prog-Jazz outfit outside of The Mike Westbrook Concert Band.