Artists that are never getting a positive criticial reappraisal

[MiddleRabbit]

I think part of the problem with the lack of fond nostalgia towards Britpop is because it was about optimism, which dates really badly because whatever you end up with is always worse than it could have been.

And it was, of itself, about reverence for the fashionable arts from 1966-72, with perspective, you might as well just go to those relevant dates as listen to an homage to them.

There's some great stuff, Back In Denim, if that counts as a Britpop album, which it wasn't really, or poor Lawrence might have found himself on TFI Friday, if only Chris Evans'd heard of him.  Anyway, that's a love letter to the 70s, and it's perfect. 

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=iO9ekL9lohk

The Osmonds. Get a load of that.

There was a lot of crap, but there always is on the back of an exploitable scene.  But it seemed exciting because it wasn't just music, there was a resurgence of all of the arts after the 80s polished itself to death and the reaction was what came before it.  Albeit in a more polished way, the more melodic shambling indie bands that filled up the gap between The Smiths and The Stone Roses, who were also dreadfully optimistic and inevitable became the model for pop groups, instead of blow dried men from deodorant adverts with their Italian jacket sleeves rolled up, on mountaintops, doing double pull downs with a grimace while singing about Mah Beh-beh.

Britpop had its po-faced music, but it was mainly seen as cheeky chappy, now a bit dubious.  Skool Daze discos with its 'dressing up as tarty schoolgirls and dancing ironically to Duran Duran' schtick widely seen as a mainstream activity for adults of all ages.

But there was a period where British cinema put out a few good films after a run of less kitchen-sinky glossy 80s films.  And ordinary people heard of Tracey Emin and Damien Horst, who you might not like, but it was the first time modern artists were famous in terms of the mainstream. 

But that's what it was. To use it as analogy of itself,, Britpop was what was left after the majors bought up all the indies because of The Stone Roses and broke indie.  Which lead to Oasis and Blur.  But not just in terms of music, in terms of everything.

It was all over everything, the limited four telly channels,  and the radio were the last thing that happened before the internet was in every home and, if people had heard of it, they were nerds.  Who were also cool because everything was Britpop and everything was cool.  There were music programmes with live bands on. Being in a pop band stopped meaning you had to look and sound like Deacon Blue, and now you had to look like you were from the 60s, but only the colour bit of it.  The tv magazine shows were Britpoppy, there was a Britpoppy breakfast telly, and it was made so everyone could understand it because it was about Red, white and blue and beer and shouting.

And it looked like things were going to change for the better after years of Thatcherism and the football, and everything.

You've seen the early 90 TOTPs - they're only going to get worse.  And Britpop'll seem exciting because it's about being a toddler and everything that entails.  It was a reaction against the overblown tail end of the 80s, and it had to appeal to everyone.  So enough of it had to be lowest common denominator garbage.  And it was,

A load of things happened at once and then it killed itself with big, sad choruses after Oasis lied about sounding like The Beatles, apart from 'Whatever' and appealed to millions of maudlin drunks who took cocaine so they could be mawkish for longer.  And that meant that Embrace, a former metal band, whose main selling point was being ordinary, could finally happen and then we'd all be sorry.

And then the internet happened to normal people and nothing could dominate anything else any more, culturally.  Or make its mark on the mainstream like Britpop did, because it's a more an era than a genre.

So, to be philosophical about it, we can't love Britpop because it's Britpop's fault we are where we are.

When things turn up again, if they ever do, that's when Britpop's Greatest Hits'll come back.  Staying Out For The Summer by Dodgy blaring out of the ghetto along with the general relief about being able to get maudlin just  for entertainment again.

Yeah.  Sorry about that.

[Jockice]

I think part of the problem with the lack of fond nostalgia towards Britpop is because it was about optimism, which dates really badly because whatever you end up with is always worse than it could have been.

And it was, of itself, about reverence for the fashionable arts from 1966-72, with perspective, you might as well just go to those relevant dates as listen to an homage to them.

There's some great stuff, Back In Denim, if that counts as a Britpop album, which it wasn't really, or poor Lawrence might have found himself on TFI Friday, if only Chris Evans'd heard of him.  Anyway, that's a love letter to the 70s, and it's perfect. 

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=iO9ekL9lohk

The Osmonds. Get a load of that.

Back In Denim is the greatest album ever made. In world history. By anyone.

"In the seventies I was just a kid, still knew what it was all about. I soaked it in now it's all dripping out." A line that makes me well up without even hearing it.

[purlieu]

In 2014 there was a fair bit of stuff online, on the radio and, to a lesser extent, on TV about the '20th anniversary of Britpop' that was full of errors and such, but was absolutely all about fond nostalgia and praise for the era.

[Brundle-Fly]

I really only embraced Britpop because refreshingly the bands weren't trying to sound like the usual list of influences you'd see pinned on a board in guitar shops (Singer wanted) or the back of the NME during the 1980s.  ie:- The Doors, The Velvet Underground, The Stooges, The Ramones, MC 5, NY Dolls etc.  That was the only emancipation I got from Britpop. At last, artistes inspired by the bands I used to like for a change.

I was already pushing thirty at its zenith and knew it was only going to last roughly four years tops because I'd experienced myself that these sort of scenes/ styles always fizzled out.

[Brundle-Fly]

It might as well have been, they were all exactly the same. The Feeling, The Kooks, The Thrills, Noah and The Whale, The Futureheads, The Wombats, The View, The Zutons, The Fratellis...

The Futureheads sound nothing like The Thrills or The Feeling.

[dr beat]

In 2014 there was a fair bit of stuff online, on the radio and, to a lesser extent, on TV about the '20th anniversary of Britpop' that was full of errors and such, but was absolutely all about fond nostalgia and praise for the era.

This is a very good riposte: https://thequietus.com/articles/15092-blur-parklife-anniversary-review

[jobotic]

I was 17 in 1990 and just getting well into indie music - plus a lot of US Blast First type stuff - and had a fabulous indie girlfriend too!

Four years later not only had been dumped but fucking Britpop corporate wank music was all over the place and what was "indie" had been ruined. Thank fuck I was happy to listen to music made on machines, unlike the Britpop lads.

Snobbish and wrong maybe but I was 21 and that's how I felt. And Britpop for me brings back horrible memories. Luckily it's all shit (I was right) so I never have to listen to it.

https://youtu.be/WFcu7gSt640

[Brundle-Fly]

I was 17 in 1990 and just getting well into indie music - plus a lot of US Blast First type stuff - and had a fabulous indie girlfriend too!

Four years later not only had been dumped but fucking Britpop corporate wank music was all over the place and what was "indie" had been ruined. Thank fuck I was happy to listen to music made on machines, unlike the Britpop lads.

Snobbish and wrong maybe but I was 21 and that's how I felt. And Britpop for me brings back horrible memories. Luckily it's all shit (I was right) so I never have to listen to it.

A lot of late eighties/ early nineties 'indie' was so drab though. I'd take Pulp and Blur over The Frank And Walters or The Brilliant Corners any day of the week.

[checkoutgirl]

The New Grave genre. I know that sounds like a CaB injoke but it was real, lasted about a week in the late 90s and involved indie bands with a vaguely gothy look and at least one member with a heroin problem. Placebo were patient zero (and possibly the only band still widely remembered) but Mansun, Marion and These Animal Men were others. I very much liked all of them, particularly Mansun who I still love, but I can see history isn't going to be kind to them.

That doesn't sound like a genre to me, more like a Select Magazine columnist desperate to come up with a couple of paragraphs so lumps together a handful of indie bands and whacks a label on them. Which as you say is forgotten in a week.

Amazed Scooter are still going. Exactly 50% late 90s happy hardcore and 50% Eurovision song contestant. They should have gone out with the Macarena.

[Sebastian Cobb]

Another reason britpop won't get a resurgence is because lots of Radio X listening QASHQAI dads never left it to begin with.

[Pink Gregory]

Another reason britpop won't get a resurgence is because lots of Radio X listening QASHQAI dads never left it to begin with.

There's a Global Radio billboard on my commute, just listing some of the artists that they play and stuff.  Led with the Libertines.  They know their market I suppose, but I didn't think mid-oughts nostalgia would crop up so quickly.

[purlieu]

I've seen Facebook friends attend noughties indie nostalgia nights before now. The past is very quickly catching up with us.


Blur, Suede, Pulp, Definitely Maybe-era Oasis, plus several non-Britpop acts who gained more exposure because of the movement - Dubstar, The Divine Comedy, the Manics, Lightning Seeds - justify Britpop for me, even if it eventually became associated with Ocean Colour Scene, Shed Seven, Menswe@r and the like.

[Goldentony]

Oasis are genuinely deserving of Stalin photo treatment, just out of history forever. Gone. Nothing in Britpop is as fucking bad as them. It's like a massive heaving carrion mass above all these good to decent bands with only a time period in common just spewing shit onto everything every time you try and re-evaluate. I never used to get why every single person I spoke to hated Guns N Roses, but it's the same thing in retrospect - big omnipresent arseholes that have a gravitational pull to grab anything Suede, Pulp and Speedy ever achieved and just chew on it. 5 total twats. Take Oasis out of it and Britpop talk probably gets so much easier.

[Custard]

The Feeling had at least one good pop single, Fill My Little World. I don't think anyone considered them a "band" band.

Didn't one of them get to marry Sophie Ellis Bextor?

If so, he's won at life. The absolute winner

[Jockice]

Oasis are genuinely deserving of Stalin photo treatment, just out of history forever. Gone. Nothing in Britpop is as fucking bad as them. It's like a massive heaving carrion mass above all these good to decent bands with only a time period in common just spewing shit onto everything every time you try and re-evaluate. I never used to get why every single person I spoke to hated Guns N Roses, but it's the same thing in retrospect - big omnipresent arseholes that have a gravitational pull to grab anything Suede, Pulp and Speedy ever achieved and just chew on it. 5 total twats. Take Oasis out of it and Britpop talk probably gets so much easier.

Speedy. Bloody hell, does anyone remember Speedy? Except me and that's cos I actually knew them.

[Absorb the anus burn]

I knew them as Blammo.

[The Mollusk]

Oasis are genuinely deserving of Stalin photo treatment, just out of history forever. Gone. Nothing in Britpop is as fucking bad as them. It's like a massive heaving carrion mass above all these good to decent bands with only a time period in common just spewing shit onto everything every time you try and re-evaluate. I never used to get why every single person I spoke to hated Guns N Roses, but it's the same thing in retrospect - big omnipresent arseholes that have a gravitational pull to grab anything Suede, Pulp and Speedy ever achieved and just chew on it. 5 total twats. Take Oasis out of it and Britpop talk probably gets so much easier.

Fair comparison with GnR. I can't fucking stand them. Where Sabbath stands out as one of those bands where you can definitively say "Yeah, there's other bands, sure, but then there's fucking Sabbath mate", GnR just do not hold that ground at all, and the sensible benefit of coming of age after all the hype surrounding them is it's easier to just look at them and be like "What the fuck was everyone so excited about? They are shit".

I quite like a handful of stuff off the first two Oasis albums but it's really only because of nostalgia. My mum and her then-partner listened to them a lot, so it was my first big exposure to rock 'n' roll, although obviously in retrospect I can see how fucking wank they are and how awful their lyrics are and how massively derivative their sound is. I do still get a shameless sense of abandon when (the song) "What's The Story" plays but if they suddenly completely ceased to exist I wouldn't notice or give a toss.

[Dusty Substance]

//

It might as well have been, they were all exactly the same. The Feeling, The Kooks, The Thrills, Noah and The Whale, The Futureheads, The Wombats, The View, The Zutons, The Fratellis...

No one has mentioned The Music yet.

Ha! I was just about to chime in with "The Music" when reading Captain Z's post.

I've said it before and I'll say it again - "The Music" is the worst band name of all time.

[Shit Good Nose]

I've said it before and I'll say it again - "The Music" is the worst band name of all time.

Genuinely sure I've read somewhere that they called themselves The Music because their other choice - The Band - was already taken.

[JaDanketies]

I've said it before and I'll say it again - "The Music" is the worst band name of all time.

I feel like A came out just at around the time that everyone got on the internet, and they might have called themselves something else otherwise.

Black metal does hipster band names well, because part of the BM schtick is that some bands don't want to be famous or even noticed and want to be as deliberately obscure as possible. The best example of this imo is the band ██████

[kngen]

I feel like A came out just at around the time that everyone got on the internet, and they might have called themselves something else otherwise.

Yep, had a chat with their singer, and he said they did it (semi-jokingly) so that they'd be at the front of CD racks in shops. 'But then the internet happened.'

[Jockice]

I knew them as Blammo.

I preferred them as Blammo. Even though in person they could try the patience of a saint. And the singer still owes me a tenner.

[Brundle-Fly]

I preferred them as Blammo. Even though in person they could try the patience of a saint. And the singer still owes me a tenner.

I once saw Blammo play live at the Camden Falcon. I chatted with the band afterward and found them quite pleasant. I'm relieved I didn't lend the singer any money that night.

[Jockice]

A lot of late eighties/ early nineties 'indie' was so drab though. I'd take Pulp and Blur over The Frank And Walters or The Brilliant Corners any day of the week.

I love the Frank And Walters though. I seriously think they're one of the most underrated bands ever.

[Absorb the anus burn]

I love the Frank And Walters though. I seriously think they're one of the most underrated bands ever.

Three brilliant eps followed by a debut album made of dogshit.

[Jockice]

Three brilliant eps followed by a debut album made of dogshit.

Nah! I disagree totally. Trainspotters from that album makes me cry. A song about being jealous of them because they've found something that makes their lives fulfilling and worthwhile. Brilliant!

[Brundle-Fly]

I've nothing against TF&Ws( I had some of the singles) but like a lot of those jingly-jangly indieschmindie bands of that era, I found them a bit meat and two veg. No oomph.

[purlieu]

I feel like A came out just at around the time that everyone got on the internet, and they might have called themselves something else otherwise.

Doesn't help that their biggest hit was called 'Nothing', which never made them particularly more Googleable.

Black metal does hipster band names well, because part of the BM schtick is that some bands don't want to be famous or even noticed and want to be as deliberately obscure as possible. The best example of this imo is the band ██████

Ha, I'd never seen that in black metal, but there are so many ridiculous ones in vaporwave, such as ~▲†▲~, ▬▬▬▬ ★☆★☆ C L I N T O N - I N D I C T M E N T ☆★☆★ ▬▬▬▬ and the utterly ludicrous ▂▅▇█▓░✌✌✌░▓█▇▅▂. Not to mentioned Four Tet's ⣎⡇ꉺლ༽இ•̛)ྀ◞ ༎ຶ ༽ৣৢ؞ৢ؞ؖ ꉺლ alias.

[Jockice]

I once saw Blammo play live at the Camden Falcon. I chatted with the band afterward and found them quite pleasant. I'm relieved I didn't lend the singer any money that night.

Let's just say we had an up and down relationship. Mind you Blammo once had a very complimentary live review in the NME. Written by the aforementioned singer. I admire him for having the sheer nerve to do that. I've just remembered that they also supported the Beautiful South on a tour playing some pretty big venues. Which was weird.

Speedy's album was never released at the time - like a lot of Britpop bands they were dropped when they didn't have a hit - but a few years ago someone did release it and they played two shows to promote it. I went to the Sheffield one and found it very enjoyable, although that may have been due to seeing so many old faces from the scene rather than the music.

[DrGreggles]

Add me to the list of F&W fans.

Rather bizarrely I saw them in Boston in about 1996. Turns out they'd moved there.