Post by SheriffFatman on Feb 6, 2018 2:02:05 GMT 1
Thanks to the wonders of social media, I have been challenged by an actual genuine member of Frankie Goes To Hollywood to justify my refusal to completely hate Kanye West. He said he's not a "proper musician" and referred to his headline set at Glastonbury as "The day the music died". I didn't realise who he was at first, but when it was explained to me the following was my reply. I just wondered if Haven thought I did myself (and Kanye!) justice?
"Now that Peter has explained who you are (sorry!) I’m inclined to completely change direction and just mention my genuine awe and admiration for what you’ve achieved, but for the sake of integrity I suppose I’d better keep digging my hole...
I have no idea whether or not Kanye is a proper musician, as in whether he personally plays instruments in the studio when his music is recorded, I haven’t got a clue. I’m just judging the end product and can see clearly that he has put his name to some excellent singles. Homecoming is a wistful tribute to a long forgotten childhood akin to Summer Of ‘69; Runaway is a haunting, epic, self-loathing anthem which The Sunday Times declared the 93rd best song of all time; FourFiveSeconds with Rihanna and Paul McCartney of all people actually got intelligent acoustic guitar music into the top ten for the first time in years. I could go I but I doubt you’d want me to.
It is fascinating, ironic and slightly depressing that the post-punk generation of musicians and fans, who were brought up on bands like The Sex Pistols, The Clash and The Ramones, with their stated intention of radically changing popular music and blowing away all that came before, have now become just as curmudgeonly and stuck in their ways as the people they were rebelling against. I am 40 and I was led to believe the whole point of bands like that was that they were, in an establishment sense, not proper musicians. Now the exact same words are used to belittle more recent artists, just because they sound different. Happily, people 20 or more years younger than me are taking absolutely no notice and recording, buying and streaming whatever they want. Long may it last."
"Now that Peter has explained who you are (sorry!) I’m inclined to completely change direction and just mention my genuine awe and admiration for what you’ve achieved, but for the sake of integrity I suppose I’d better keep digging my hole...
I have no idea whether or not Kanye is a proper musician, as in whether he personally plays instruments in the studio when his music is recorded, I haven’t got a clue. I’m just judging the end product and can see clearly that he has put his name to some excellent singles. Homecoming is a wistful tribute to a long forgotten childhood akin to Summer Of ‘69; Runaway is a haunting, epic, self-loathing anthem which The Sunday Times declared the 93rd best song of all time; FourFiveSeconds with Rihanna and Paul McCartney of all people actually got intelligent acoustic guitar music into the top ten for the first time in years. I could go I but I doubt you’d want me to.
It is fascinating, ironic and slightly depressing that the post-punk generation of musicians and fans, who were brought up on bands like The Sex Pistols, The Clash and The Ramones, with their stated intention of radically changing popular music and blowing away all that came before, have now become just as curmudgeonly and stuck in their ways as the people they were rebelling against. I am 40 and I was led to believe the whole point of bands like that was that they were, in an establishment sense, not proper musicians. Now the exact same words are used to belittle more recent artists, just because they sound different. Happily, people 20 or more years younger than me are taking absolutely no notice and recording, buying and streaming whatever they want. Long may it last."