Nadir

OK, Slate has officially taken pointless contrarianism to its absolute nadir with this article: "It's time to give Creed another listen. Seriously."

And it's not that the band didn't deliver. To the contrary, Creed seemed to irritate people precisely because its music was so unabashedly calibrated towards pleasure: Every surging riff, skyscraping chorus, and cathartic chord progression telegraphed the band's intention to rock us, wow us, move us. Tremonti was a brutally effective guitarist, and by 2001's "Weathered" he'd even added subtlety—or the hard-rock version of it, anyway—to his arsenal. Creed was formulaic, but that's only an insult if the formula doesn't work. One of the surprises involved in returning to Creed with a fresh pair of ears is how rocking, exciting, and, yes, moving, the songs can be. "Higher" might turn out to be the nu-grunge "Don't Stop Believing": dismissed by cognoscenti on arrival as bludgeoning and gauche but destined for rehabilitation down the road as a triumphant slab of ersatz inspirationalism.

How will they ever top this bullshit? They can't. They're talking about Creed.

Comments

[lemmy caution]

"He's harnessing his unrivaled cred to remind us that Christmas ditties are as deeply American—and often, as just plain deep—as anything Alan Lomax ever recorded in an Appalachian holler. Singing (or rasping) "Silver Bells" and "Do You Hear What I Hear?" and "Here Comes Santa Claus," Dylan is the haggard, haunting voice of the musical collective unconscious—our Ghost of Christmas Past."

http://www.slate.com/blogs/blogs/browbeat/archive/2009/10/15/i-dreamed-i-saw-st-nicholas-why-bob-dylan-s-christmas-album-isn-t-a-joke.aspx

They sure do love their contrarianism at slate.

[dsquared]

"effective" is like "unshowy" or any of the million and one synonyms for "workmanlike" that used to be applied to Johnny Ramone and similar guitarists - it's a polite way of saying the guy sucks.

[lemmy caution]

Being an effective guitarist starts with the basics:

“In ‘69, Barney started a series of seminars in Northern England called “The Effective Guitarist.” He gave them all over the world for a number of years. These were four-day seminars - very intensive, but one of the things he talked about a great deal, and that people remembered who had taken the seminar, were how to be a good human being. How to lead your life and that it was a lot more than just playing the guitar well. That’s one of the things that was very important to him.”

[lemmy caution]

This is pretty funny:

http://twitter.com/search?q=%23slatepitches

[Website Designing]

It have a fun

[Salient]

It have a fun, indeed.

[jholbo]

Truer words.

[albrt]

And yet this post remains at the top of your blog for nearly a month? Hope you are all OK.