Uncool

I started this idea on the Peyroux thread - Peter Stockwell replied, so I've transplanted his suggestions here to keep things together

quote:

Jason,

I like John Mellencamp, and he never comes up as being cool, or so it seems.

I also like Robin Trower, in preference to Jimi Hendrix, although it's not hard to see who's the innovator and who's the imitator. But to say Robin is only a Hendrix imitator I think is missing the mark. BTW, In my view hendrix was largely inspired by John Coltrane, so the point is probably moot.

Although I think he's definitely dodgy now, I love the Carlos Santana recordings of between let's say 1970 and 1975ish, that's to say from Abraxas to Borboletta, especially including the colaboration with John mclaughin - "a love supreme" (now, who's that going to remind one of , I wonder...)

that'll do for a start.

Hendrix inspired by Coltrane,Trower over Hendrix
Might i suggest a different title for the thread.

People who are Tone deaf,and trying to be cool by being provocative and listening to Miles Davies/ Coltrane when really they would rather watch the Villa or the films of Ted Gorly

too late, title's fixed - guess you'll have to start your own

quote:

trying to be cool by being provocative

thread. Got anything to say about this one?

Jason

Are Half Man Half Biscuit cool then?

I like the Incredible String Band's albums but I think that is considered uncool. I really find Dire Straits tedious beyond belief, but I know others think they are really cool; so I guess that makes me uncool. I like Martha and the Muffins, but is that cool? What is cool?

Guess you like it or you don't. It's getting hot in here.

Don't think it's just about what you like, but whether you think what you like is perceived as cool.

I actually like Dire Straits, but don't think they're generally regarded as cool. I also like Nick Cave, who I guess has more credibility.

OTOH, I never really got into Mingus, who I figured at the time must be cool (tried, but he's never really clicked for me) but I like Madonna - I'm guessing she wouldn't make it into most people's definition of cool, but maybe I'm wrong?

Hmm. May have to take back that remark about Mingus - just playing "Goodbye Pork Pie Hat" to remind me what he's like as I posted that last answer, & actually like it (damn ), but, er... most of his stuff doesn't do it for me - will try & think of a better example later.

ROTF

HMHB - personally I'd say yes, if only for the intro "let it happen, bass player..."

Incredible String Band - no idea, never heard any - can you recommend a good album to try?

Martha & the Muffins - not sure. I love Echo Beach, but that's all I've heard, & it gets overplayed on local commercial radio, so maybe not??

J

PS - am emphatically NOT trying to set myself up as the arbirter of cool - just interested in opinions

Jason

ISB recommendations

• 5000 Spirits or the Layers of an Onion
  
• Hangman's Beautiful Daughter
  

I think some folks might consider them weird folkies from the sixties - mystical lyrics rather than hard in your face type of stuff. Which I guess is uncool.

Martha & the Muffins

• Metro Music
  
• This is the Ice Age
  

I guess This is the Ice Age has to be cool.

He made an album "Birth of Cool",which he certainly was not,he hated whites was a junkie and dressed like a twat.
Although he did have good taste in white guitarists,John Scofield being the best as far as i could tell,who unlike Mclaughlin did not look, ironicaly like a Nazi Dentist,i find him very attractive with his hair (whats left) tied in a pony tail in rapture with his 335 copy.


Most hifi bores seem to like him though "Kind of Blue" thats the one they own about five copies of,very boring it is to.

My personal favourite cool music guy is Ben Britten,his "Nocturnal" for guitar and some of the English Folk songs he recorded with Peter Pears are about as cool as i can tolerate,oh i almost forgot "Serenade For Tenor Horn and Strings" which always reminds me of Autumn.


"The days grown old,the fainting sun,has but a little way to run.
And yet his steeds with all skill,scarse lug the charriot up the hill"

How is "cool" judged seems to have several factors that come with whole notion:

Does the artist write thier own material ?

Are the "band" equal contributers in the act ?

Does the artist or band member being dead always help ?

Did the producers association with the band/artist add to the sum of the parts ?

Who do you see the artist/band move with socially, thier off stage life style ?


U2 are a case study in thier own right moving between "cool" and "uncool" with each passing year and album. At the moment they are on an up swing. During the whole Rattle and Hum period I'd say they hit thier lowest "uncool" patch, the Zooropa craziness started the climb back up. Interestingly when no U2 album is out and Bono can be seen hugging up to Bush and Blair U2's "cool" is generally thought to wane

Oh and...

Cool for me

Johnny Cash
Ramones
Talking Heads
Muse

Uncool for me

Coldplay
Simon and Garfunkel
Simple Minds
New Order

I own albums by all these artist it's just some I see as cool others not so

SJH

Bands who have members in their 20's, who are pouty and stare at their shoes. A few tattoos and piercings optional. If said member dates a model it also helps. A Fabulous Life Of... episode doesn't hurt either.

I think this new wave of British pop is BANAL SHITE! Radiohead & Coldplay are regarded as "cool", but B-Diddy thinks not.

The Bee Gees were also once considered cool. As were ABBA... See? Not much has changed. It all depends on what you percieve as "cool" I guess.

Cool has a real Heisenberg's Uncertainty thing going on... something can't really be cool once it is hailed as cool; the act of pronouncing it cool makes it most decidedly not.

Bit like surfer lingo; by the time wannabes have figured out what they're saying and started to emulate it, surfers aren't saying it anymore.

As Jayd says "cool" is a continuously moving target following time's arrow forward.
Long long ago in a town not so far away in my err...teens I played in a schoolboy trad Jazz band when friday evening jive session in local Jazz clubs were cool. In fact for a brief moment in time there was this guy called Acker who became cool with a Stranger on the shore. Not now Daddy-O!
In fact our attitude to what was cool changed pretty rapidly as we morphed into a mainstream tending to modern jazz group within 6 months of forming because that was becoming cool again.
Earlier than that Bill Haley had rocked around the clock Elvis had lauded miss claudy and Gene Vincent had be-bopped with lula and all been cool on 78rpm black stuff.
As time moved on we all formed up behind the Stones and the Beatles and just occasionally for briefer periods accepted the likes of Gerry and the Pacemakers and Lonnie Donnegan into the cool room.
Somewhere along the road after that I lost my "cool" and became old and distanced from the new cool in the eyes of my (claimed by them to be) misunderstood teenage sons.
I gave up being cool and just got relaxed about it. I reverted to what was cool for me way back when. Now I listen to Jazz on vinyl and CD and it often occurs to me that the likes of Cannonball, Dizzy, the Duke, The Count, Hodges, Webster, Hawkins and Gordon are forever cool BUT ALSO a lot of so called sidemen who never quite made it to "gaint" status are all goodam "cool", and then it occurs to me that it's the sidemen like Carlton and co who made groups like Steely Dan cool.
So god bless the sidemen who keep it forever cool.

Dig;

Cool is an unstable isotope; something may be very cool to a teen, but if their parents say "Hey, I like that music;" it's immediately damaged. Cool is a way in-groups (or out-groups) use to define themselves as apart from the herd; for me, it's a useless concept (I could never get the Velvet Underground). For me, what you like is cool - to you. Too much ink has been uselessly spilled onto paper by clueless critics trying to promote talentless bands as - cool.

Baby.

quote:

Originally posted by bhazen:
Dig;

Cool is an unstable isotope; something and be very cool to a teen, but if their parents say "Hey, I like that music;" it's immediately damaged. Cool is a way in-groups (or out-groups) use to define themselves as apart from the herd; for me, it's a useless concept (I could never get the Velvet Underground). For me, what you like is cool - to you. Too much ink has been uselessly spilled onto paper by clueless critics trying to promote talentless bands as - cool.

Baby.

stax, daddio.

quote:

Originally posted by KRO:
Hendrix inspired by Coltrane,Trower over Hendrix
Might i suggest a different title for the thread.

People who are Tone deaf,and trying to be cool by being provocative and listening to Miles Davies/ Coltrane when really they would rather watch the Villa or the films of Ted Gorly

Tone deaf , he might be. I'll be honest, how can I deny that Hendrix is inflential to guitarist even to this day, and surely will be for ever after, I don't. I just said, or meant to say, that I enjoyed listening to Robin Trower (Bridge of Sighs and Twice Removed from Yeserday) more, mainly because it's more orderly, easier if you prefer. I listened to Hendrix before I could even spell Coltrane, I just was surpised how there are moments on Hendrix's first album, in particular, that remind me of the music of John Coltrane.

I do like Miles Davis and I do have "Kind of Blue", I argue that it's a fine album by any standards. For me Miles was the most important figure in jazz in the 2nd half of the 20th century.

I'd like to think I've given up trying to be cool, although I dislike wearing socks when I'm wearing sandals. Watching Villa , what's that ? and I've never heard of Ted Gorly.

quote:

Originally posted by Jason Milner:
Hmm. May have to take back that remark about Mingus - just playing "Goodbye Pork Pie Hat" to remind me what he's like as I posted that last answer, & actually like it (damn ), but, er... most of his stuff doesn't do it for me - will try & think of a better example later.

Ah um is a great album, a good system makes music easier to understand.

Interesting thread. More often than not, I find that "cool" bands are ones that people discover before they hit it really big, at which time they suddenly become "uncool" because they are played all over the place and "less hip" people have jumped on the bandwagon. I think someone earlier in the thread mentioned Dire Straits, which is a good example of the point I am attempting to make. My sense is that most people thought Dire Straits was very cool following their early albums, probably up until Brothers in Arms, in which case they gained mass popularity and, consequently, were deemed uncool. While Brothers in Arms may be a little more "pop" than some earlier albums, it still is a strong album, in my opinion, but it can never be considered cool because it is so popular.

Hopefully, most on the Forum listen to music they like irrespective of whether performers are deemed cool or uncool.

Just my two cents.

Mike

quote:

Originally posted by Naimed-In-NY:
I think someone earlier in the thread mentioned Dire Straits, which is a good example of the point I am attempting to make. My sense is that most people thought Dire Straits was very cool following their early albums, probably up until Brothers in Arms, in which case they gained mass popularity and, consequently, were deemed uncool. Hopefully, most on the Forum listen to music they like irrespective of whether performers are deemed cool or uncool.

Just my two cents.

Mike

Good point. I still like Brother's in Arms, as I like Love over Gold and the prior albums. I generally like what Mark KNopfler does.

See I must be uncool - I generally avoid everything Mark Knopfler does - which is quite difficult in a lift or supermarket. Sorry, but is Phil Collins cool - 'cos I'm no fan of his either. Though I did like early Genesis - when PG was in command.

I guess I'm the Henry Cow of cool.

quote:

"All great art and culture is created by nerds… that is, The Uncool. Because the cool people are too busy having sex and drugs with other cool people and buying cool things. Which is not as cool as it looks. Which is why they all end up in rehab or co-starring with pigs in adverts for banks that made most of their fortune out of apartheid. Which is about as not cool as it gets." - Gary Mullholland

This comes from Gary Mulholland's round-up of the 500 best singles from 1976 to 1999. The book takes its name from The Rezillos' 1977 single, "I Can't Stand My Baby," in which lead singer Fay Fife declares, "I… AM… UNCOOL."

Uncoolness, Mulholland tells us, is the willingness to resist what we've been told is cool and to create something cool instead. This is the benchmark Mulholland uses in deciding whether a single is truly great. Uncool, he's decided, is anything cool before being co-opted as such by the corporate mainstream, after which it is sold back to us as cool, which is a sure sign that whatever was uncool is now not cool. In other words, cool things move chronologically from uncool (good) to not cool (bad), where uncool + capitalism = not cool. That Mullholland co-opted the Rezillo's uncool jargon for his money-motivated book would seem to render the book itself not cool.

Go to Amazon.com and check out "The Rock Snob's Dictionary" by David Kamp. Will end this thread, wherein I had the hippest entry

Don't give tinkers cuss whats friggin' cool. I'll continue playing what I like. Which is the only arbiter as far as I am concerned.

Howard

Howard, that is the essence of cool.

I'm listening to The Essential ELO right now; to some, uncool. To me...so cool it's mentholated.