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Established artists desperately trying to take on new genres

Started by 23 Daves, May 12, 2005, 05:50:48 PM

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23 Daves

There are few things more tragic in life than to see an artist desperately clinging on to a trend in music in the hope that adopting its "ways" will in some way enhance their career.  

One very well-known example of this, of course, would be Phil Collins "Sussudio", described by Smash Hits (if memory serves) as "Phil playing with his younger son's transistor radio, hearing Prince's "1999", and thinking it sounded rather good and he could copy it".  However, plenty of other more interesting examples do slip through the net.

Cliff Richard and Hank Marvin's stab at psychedelic pop in "The Joy of Living" is but one tragedy.  One of the first lines on this track is Cliff singing in a dreamy, lilting voice "A multi-coloured croco-diiile!".  It goes downhill from there.  Ostensibly a weary psych-gospel number about how the "motor car" is taking over the world, the faux-sincerity of the piece ultimately ruins any fun the listener might have with it.  Cliff sounds as if he wants to be a new age prophet like one of those West Coast American fellas, and the net result is a rather twee man singing a rather badly written protest song with a passion that sounds distinctly contrived.  "Movin' On Up" it is not.  Still, Hank does make some marvellous way-out wailing noises with some effects pedals on his guitar throughout, and it's hard not to think that Cliff's psychedelic career could have taken the genre into previously unexplored (and downright bizarre) areas if he had actually carried on smoking the banana skins.

The Dave Clarke Five did something similar with "Lost In His Dreams", except (to be cunning) what sounds like a typical psych-by-numbers track – slowed down fairground organ riffing, lazy guitars, fragile vocals – is actually a nasty, stabbing parody.  "He thinks he's better off than you and me", they drone in the chorus, "the man who spends his life lost in his dreams".  A nation duly noted Dave Clarke's points, then chose to ignore them and go out and buy another much more interesting "hippy" disc instead.  

Any more?  Any other genres out there that have been taken up by unlikely people?

Jemble Fred

I can think of plenty of examples, but none of them 'desperate', so they don't really belong here.

Peking O

Quote from: "Smash Hits""Phil playing with his younger son's transistor radio, hearing Prince's "1999", and thinking it sounded rather good and he could copy it".

That's such a great piece of writing that any other examples in this thread will simply wither and die in the enormous shadow it's casting. I discovered recently that my mum found hundreds of issues from my '80s Smash Hits collection in her loft. I thought they'd been binned years ago. I've given her very specific instructions not to throw them away and, if possible, to preserve them in some kind of anti-chamber under the watchful eye of an armed guard. If all goes to plan, I will see her in July and figure out if I can ship the entire collection over here. With a bit of luck I'll have grasped this internet thing a bit more by then and be able to get some scans online. Unless someone has already done this?

Leila

David Bowie during his drum and bass phase springs to mind.

Clinton Morgan


DJ One Record

Cor, I remember what a dark day it was when Peter Andre gave up being a legendary reggae pioneer and decided to try his hand at pop music.

On a more serious note, I remember feeling there was a sense of desperation in Daniel Beddingfield and, perhaps more evidently, Craig David and Ms. Dynami-tee-hee of not wanting to be tied down to UK garage/two-step music after their first singles, resulting in a hasty transition to watered-down r&b or, in Beddingfield's case, heavily watered-down ballads and quarter-arsed attempts at rock.

I realise that doesn't necessarily fit in with the thread's original subject, but it's an interesting opposite to consider: artists who desperately want to be disassociated with a genre.

Quote from: "Jemble Fred"I can think of plenty of examples, but none of them 'desperate', so they don't really belong here.

Gary Numan did fantastically well to "reinvent" himself from electro-nu-wave to Goth Industrial.  Although in some ways (tracing the history of music through the 80s and 90s) you can kinda see a connection.  The styles fit if you think about the evolution.

Ciarán2

Quote from: "Peking O"
Quote from: "Smash Hits""Phil playing with his younger son's transistor radio, hearing Prince's "1999", and thinking it sounded rather good and he could copy it".

That's such a great piece of writing that any other examples in this thread will simply wither and die in the enormous shadow it's casting. I discovered recently that my mum found hundreds of issues from my '80s Smash Hits collection in her loft. I thought they'd been binned years ago. I've given her very specific instructions not to throw them away and, if possible, to preserve them in some kind of anti-chamber under the watchful eye of an armed guard. If all goes to plan, I will see her in July and figure out if I can ship the entire collection over here. With a bit of luck I'll have grasped this internet thing a bit more by then and be able to get some scans online. Unless someone has already done this?

I've been brewing up something similar, maybe we can collaborate on that - Smash Hits deserves a decent on-line archive/tribute site.

Peking O

Sounds good. It will be several months before I can do anything about it, but I'll let you know.

NoSleep

Mark Owen going all 'Indie/Brit Pop'... Just look how sincere he looks on his homepage http://www.markowenofficial.com/markOwen.php

Saturday Boy

Quote from: "Leila"David Bowie during his drum and bass phase springs to mind.

Add to that:

David Bowie in his glam rock phase (Ziggy, Aladdin Sane)
David Bowie in his Krautrock phase (Station To Station, Low)
David Bowie doing popdance like Le Chic phase (Let's Dance)
David Bowie's Phil Collins phase (Never Let Me Down)
David Bowie's grunge phase (Tin Machine)
David Bowie's stately man of pop phase (...Hours, Heathen, Reality)

LadyDay

Neil Young, changed genres so often, he got sued by his record company for not making a "Neil Young" album. Blues, country, rockabilly, grunge and the the industrial album Trans among others.

Not always good but always interesting.

The sound of Madonna rapping on "American Life" ...simply awful.

Just awful.

*gags*

Hypnotoad.

Axl Rose rapping during live renditions of Rocket Queen, my fave ever Guns track

Just......toe-curlingly awful. Fuck knows what ever made him steer GnR away from the formula that made Appetite. Hearing subsequent interviews with the band (now masquerading as Velvet Revolver), they were all pretty disillusioned with his 10 minute piano solos, backing singers, brass instruments etc etc

Not that I give two hoots nowadays, my taste has moved on somewhat, but I was pretty disgusted as a teenager when GnR were life !!

Hypnotoad.

Quote from: "DJ One Record"....

Or in Beddingfields case, an untalented cunt trying anything to extend his 15 mins

(for Beddingfield, also read Halliwell, Beckham, blah blah)

another Mr. Lizard

Virtually all attempts at reggae by white artists have been disastrous or laughable. The magnificent exception that proves the rule being 'Jah War' by The Ruts.


The Wedding Present have re-invented themselves in a number of surprising ways - their Ukrainian folk phase was most entertaining, their 'Seamonsters'/Albini-era attempts to imitate Gedge's favourite U.S. hardcore/slacker artists was in my view their finest hour (the crushing RCA version of 'Brassneck', the cover version of 'Box Elder' before anyone over here had even heard of Pavement), and the new album opens with some intriguing ambient sounds before lapsing into business as usual.

Robot Devil

Quote from: "DJ One Record"in Beddingfield's case, heavily watered-down ballads and quarter-arsed attempts at rock.

On Capital Radio once Dr. Fox intro'd a live Bedingfield song with something along the lines of "He's so talented, reinventing Gotta Get Thru his as reggae, what a great musical treat blah blah".

Then it came on.

"AHHHH GATT TA GET TRUUUUU DIS" in the most teetering-on-racist "voice" I every did hear.

Jemble Fred

Billy Bragg going all Motown again on 'Tears of my Tracks' is a triumph – despite practically creating his own genre (with a voice like that, where the hell could you place him?) Bill's always been happy to bounce around from Punk to Folk to Motown and back to full-on Rock & Roll.

But then all the best performers transcend genres anyway – there's almost no area of music in which Macca hasn't dabbled, and generally excelled.

Labian Quest

Quote from: "another Mr. Lizard"Virtually all attempts at reggae by white artists have been disastrous or laughable. The magnificent exception that proves the rule being 'Jah War' by The Ruts.

What about 'Johnny was' by SLF or 'Police and Thee-ee-eeves' by The Clash, surely they're rather good examples of 'Regatta de blanc'

The Mumbler

Surely those who are cited as versatile, though, often have their collaborators underrated, and they are often the people who are just as important to the record's sound as the "famous" artist.  As brilliant as Costello or Bowie or whoever have been on their musical travels, for instance, aren't (respectively) T-Bone Burnett, Nieve/Thomas/Thomas and The Brodsky Quartet, or Visconti, Eno and Ronson etc. just as important to what makes those records impressive?

Rather love Costello's forays into "classical", incidentally.  Can I be the only one?

Jemble Fred

Quote from: "Clinton Morgan"Paul McCartney and his 'Liverpool Oratorio'.

My only problem with that is the Liverpudlian nature of it, though. No offence to Teej and any other Mersey types, but the idea of 'Coming from Liverpool brings with it certain responsibilities' set to music doesn't excite me. EVen if Jean Boht's husband was working overtime on it.

But having said that, I really like 'Standing Stone'.

sam and janet evening

Slightly obscure one, Eric Clapton made an odd electronica/Drum and Bass type album under the name TDF (or something similar), for some peculiar reason I own this. It's rotten. I suppose it's not quite desperate (given it came out under a pseudonym) but still...
Elvis Costello has spent about ten years playing dress-up ("ooh look, I'm Stephen Sondhiem, ooh look -classical music, weee! look at me!) with varying degrees of success.
Dolly Parton once released a truly atrocious 'dance' version of 'Jolene'
And all older country singers are now obliged by law to make 'stripped down, backtotheirroots, Bluegrass, Oh Brother johnny Cash where art thou'' albums, even when this bears no relation to their earlier, successful work and sounds about as authentic as pot noodle.

Derek Trucks

Quote from: "LadyDay"Neil Young, changed genres so often, he got sued by his record company for not making a "Neil Young" album. Blues, country, rockabilly, grunge and the the industrial album Trans among others.

Not always good but always interesting.

Speaking of which, I was thinking of getting Trans, is it worth it?

Most interest for me is Talk Talk's transistion from reasonable synth-poppers to moody, magnificent minimalists - the band Doves & Coldplay could be if they had any guts and quit the Ford Mondeo music.

another Mr. Lizard

Quote from: "Labian Quest"
Quote from: "another Mr. Lizard"Virtually all attempts at reggae by white artists have been disastrous or laughable. The magnificent exception that proves the rule being 'Jah War' by The Ruts.

What about 'Johnny was' by SLF or 'Police and Thee-ee-eeves' by The Clash, surely they're rather good examples of 'Regatta de blanc'


I like both of these, but they are probably the weakest tracks on the albums on which they appear. I have a documentary about Lee Perry on tape somewhere, during which Paul Simonon tells how The Clash played their version of 'Police & Thieves' to Scratch and his entourage soon after recording it, seeking and expecting some kind of fatherly or teacher-like encouragement - instead, Perry and his mates collapsed with laughter about thirty seconds in...

Labian Quest

Quote from: "another Mr. Lizard"
Quote from: "Labian Quest"
What about 'Johnny was' by SLF or 'Police and Thee-ee-eeves' by The Clash, surely they're rather good examples of 'Regatta de blanc'


I like both of these, but they are probably the weakest tracks on the albums on which they appear. I have a documentary about Lee Perry on tape somewhere, during which Paul Simonon tells how The Clash played their version of 'Police & Thieves' to Scratch and his entourage soon after recording it, seeking and expecting some kind of fatherly or teacher-like encouragement - instead, Perry and his mates collapsed with laughter about thirty seconds in...

Heh, you'd have thought that would have put them off the idea, but they still went on to cover 'I fought the law', though they did de-reggify it somewhat.

The Culture Bunker

Quote from: "Labian Quest"Heh, you'd have thought that would have put them off the idea, but they still went on to cover 'I fought the law', though they did de-reggify it somewhat.

Given it was written by a member of Buddy Holly's backing band and the version they knew, by the Bobby Fuller Four, was pretty much classic rock and roll, it wasn't hard to de-reggify it.

Derek Trucks

Quote from: "another Mr. Lizard"Virtually all attempts at reggae by white artists have been disastrous or laughable. The magnificent exception that proves the rule being 'Jah War' by The Ruts.

If you haven't already, give UB40's debut, Signing Off a listen (Don't be scared!). Got it the other day - some good quality dub on there.

LadyDay

QuoteSpeaking of which, I was thinking of getting Trans, is it worth it?


It's a good album really, he plays with some of the best musicians he's played with over the years. I just don't play it often just because he and Nils went barmy with the Vocoder, which irritates me.

Neville Chamberlain

Quote from: "Derek Trucks"Most interest for me is Talk Talk's transistion from reasonable synth-poppers to moody, magnificent minimalists....

Ah yes, Laughing Stock and Spirit of Eden being two of the most magnificent creations on this planet. Mind you, as 'synth-poppers', they were always a cut above the rest I reckon.

Jemble Fred

There was nothing desperate about 'Release' – the Pet Shop Boys' second real push towards guitar-based rock. It's a bit of a masterpiece, in fact.