80s decade utopia
I was going to make some similar comments but decided not to after realizing that similar past arguments didn't go anywhere.daniel wrote:Well I have no obsession with 'trueness', I did to some degree at one point but thankfully not anymore, and I don't care one bit whether I can glean information about musicians' motives or personalities etc., if the music has the right feeling everything else is irrelevant. Helm seems to have some big issue about how music should be innovative, which is of zero interest to me, I could live happily the rest of my life never hearing any of the black/death/doom/progressive/technical wankery of the late 80's/90's again. It's quite a bold statement to make, stating that 99% of 80's metal is redundant to a serious appreciator. Now, I find this bordering on insulting, if I find magic in just one track on an LP, obscure or not, THEN IT'S WORTH MY TIME, and I'm a person who actually wants to buy LP:s and cherish them, I recall you saying you don't hunt vinyl, but MP3s Helm, and then you have the nerve to call yourself a 'metal archaeologist'. Am I mistaken or did you also have some sort of limit as to what you would pay for a record...? 20e? How are you going to compile those 100 perfect records if you're not willing to spend more than that? It's easy to go on about how passionate one is, and say it's crazy spending hundreds of euros on records, but to me it's something I'm compelled to do, to me it's idiotic spending so much money on clothes or eating out, that record will be with me forever and it gives me something only that record can give me. I'm not looking forward to some perfect day in the future when I can go through some gay ritual of playing my selected perfect records, that shit happens every day, and it's completely natural I don't have to make a huge deal of it. See when someone atually has to sacrifice more that their wrist muscles to get music the world becomes a very different place. But, I am also very careful not to fall into the trap many collectors do, where rarity comes to define quality.
Just because I, like many, find the 80's to have produced the most perfect metal, doesn't mean I worship every aspect of the 80's, I would think that is a given - it doesn't matter what other crap was going on then because I am obviously focusing on my preferences. Yes other things than simply the end product mean a lot to me when it comes to metal, but if there is an old band I love for their music well more often than not all other aspects of the band become irrelevant on the whole, certainly when drinking beer and playing the records, all you want to do is let the magic wash over you and forget anything negative, so what if a band went from power metal to pop, that doesn't take away from the validity of their 'first' efforts.
Now, I'm not singling out helm individually, but why are Greeks in general so damn arrogant, especially in regards to Metal? Greece really didn’t contribute anything outstanding or even much in gerneral to the Metal scene of the 80's, so where does this "holier than thou" bullshit attitude come from all the time?
bigfootkit wrote:"Your Steel Is Not True"
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nightsblood
- Posts: 2435
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Some thoughts:
Back to the original topic, yes, lots of things sucked about the 80s metal scene. I was involved for the later years of it and there were tons of people into it just for shock value and what-not. It was also a much less tolerant time; wearing a Metallica T-shirt to school in the early-mid 80s was begging for some jock to pick a fight with you, or at the least be called "loser" and "faggot" all day. Metal had a decently-sized audience, but outside that audience there was ZERO tolerance for punks, metalheads, HC kids, etc. In '83 if you went to the mall in a Black flaag shirt you'd get thrown out; today you go to the mall to BUY the shirt!
Now onto Helm's post and the replies:
I'd agree w/ 99% of what Helm said
Regarding his percentage, it may look like a high number but keep some things in mind. First, some listeners are just more picky than others. Some folks consider anything involving a Flying V and a logo with an inverted cross to be awesome, but some folks only like really unique-sounding bands. Helm seems to fall in the latter group, so the percentage of 'useless' bands is gonna be high from his POV.
Second, I think most people overestimate the number of great bands from the 80s. This is easy to do b/c, when looking back on something, you usually focus on the parts you like and not the parts you don't like. It's easy to forget that, for every great album you heard released 20 years ago, you also heard (at least parts of) several albums that didn't interest you enough to take note of them or remember them. There was plenty of crap released back then, but we didn't buy the crap, we don't d/l the crap now, we don't look up the crap on MA, so we forget how much of it there is. Example- someone on another board cracked a joke about IGNORANCE the other day; I hadn't thought about that band in years. Why? THey sucked IMO
Finally- are there really fewer good metal bands around today? My personal response is yes, BUT I think it's hard to say truthfully. Right now it's easy to notice all the crap bands coming out, and thee are more outlets for them (myspace et al) so they're very visible. But also, styles have changed, and I think most people perfer the styles they're familiar with/stick to their old likes. Seriously, every generation says the next generation's music sucks To fans of 80s metal, current bands playing different styles just don't suit our tastes. And while there are plenty of retro bands that might have the right sound, they're not very interesting to us b/c we've "been there, heard that". Stormwarrior is never gonna sound as good as Helloween to an old timer, nor is Portrait gonna replace Mercyful Fate in the heart of someone who grew up playing 'Don't Break the Oath'. Leave the new bands for the kids.
One point in support of a currently weak Metal scene is that the 00s really did not see any new subgenres develop. The closest we came was mall/metalcore (begin your booing); there was no equivalent to the Norwegian black metal scene, or the rise of Gothenburg death metal, or Bay Area thrash metal- no new sound took metal in a new direction this decade. To me, that indicates that most new bands were just following established trends, and when you get to be my age (mid 30s) you get tired of hearing Band X release the same album every 2 years, and you just don't need to hear another band try to reinvent, copycat, ape, honour, salute, or pay tribute to 'Kill em All', 'Powerslave', or 'Melissa'. I heard it the first, second, third and fourth times it was done- I just don't have much interest in a band if they cannot bring something New to the table.
And I think this was what Helm was getting at. Is it too much to ask for a band to put some individuality into their music? I don't expect (or want) every band to try to create their own genre, and there's nothing wrong with incorporating some of your influences into your music. But add something of your own to make it YOUR music, instead of just trying to look, act, and sound exactly like some band from the past.
Back to the original topic, yes, lots of things sucked about the 80s metal scene. I was involved for the later years of it and there were tons of people into it just for shock value and what-not. It was also a much less tolerant time; wearing a Metallica T-shirt to school in the early-mid 80s was begging for some jock to pick a fight with you, or at the least be called "loser" and "faggot" all day. Metal had a decently-sized audience, but outside that audience there was ZERO tolerance for punks, metalheads, HC kids, etc. In '83 if you went to the mall in a Black flaag shirt you'd get thrown out; today you go to the mall to BUY the shirt!
Now onto Helm's post and the replies:
I'd agree w/ 99% of what Helm said
Regarding his percentage, it may look like a high number but keep some things in mind. First, some listeners are just more picky than others. Some folks consider anything involving a Flying V and a logo with an inverted cross to be awesome, but some folks only like really unique-sounding bands. Helm seems to fall in the latter group, so the percentage of 'useless' bands is gonna be high from his POV.Second, I think most people overestimate the number of great bands from the 80s. This is easy to do b/c, when looking back on something, you usually focus on the parts you like and not the parts you don't like. It's easy to forget that, for every great album you heard released 20 years ago, you also heard (at least parts of) several albums that didn't interest you enough to take note of them or remember them. There was plenty of crap released back then, but we didn't buy the crap, we don't d/l the crap now, we don't look up the crap on MA, so we forget how much of it there is. Example- someone on another board cracked a joke about IGNORANCE the other day; I hadn't thought about that band in years. Why? THey sucked IMO
Finally- are there really fewer good metal bands around today? My personal response is yes, BUT I think it's hard to say truthfully. Right now it's easy to notice all the crap bands coming out, and thee are more outlets for them (myspace et al) so they're very visible. But also, styles have changed, and I think most people perfer the styles they're familiar with/stick to their old likes. Seriously, every generation says the next generation's music sucks
To fans of 80s metal, current bands playing different styles just don't suit our tastes. And while there are plenty of retro bands that might have the right sound, they're not very interesting to us b/c we've "been there, heard that". Stormwarrior is never gonna sound as good as Helloween to an old timer, nor is Portrait gonna replace Mercyful Fate in the heart of someone who grew up playing 'Don't Break the Oath'. Leave the new bands for the kids.One point in support of a currently weak Metal scene is that the 00s really did not see any new subgenres develop. The closest we came was mall/metalcore (begin your booing); there was no equivalent to the Norwegian black metal scene, or the rise of Gothenburg death metal, or Bay Area thrash metal- no new sound took metal in a new direction this decade. To me, that indicates that most new bands were just following established trends, and when you get to be my age (mid 30s) you get tired of hearing Band X release the same album every 2 years, and you just don't need to hear another band try to reinvent, copycat, ape, honour, salute, or pay tribute to 'Kill em All', 'Powerslave', or 'Melissa'. I heard it the first, second, third and fourth times it was done- I just don't have much interest in a band if they cannot bring something New to the table.
And I think this was what Helm was getting at. Is it too much to ask for a band to put some individuality into their music? I don't expect (or want) every band to try to create their own genre, and there's nothing wrong with incorporating some of your influences into your music. But add something of your own to make it YOUR music, instead of just trying to look, act, and sound exactly like some band from the past.
"I'm sorry Sam, we had real chemistry. But like a monkey on the sun, our love was too hot to live"
-Becky
-Becky
Everything is supposed to be about heavy metal isn´t it?? if we want to keep the "scene" alive, let´s worry about making metal and supporting it.
I think that is what keeps alive the style, if we are just judging that someone´s music is "bad" or it sucks because a 18 year old kid plays it or they don´t sound "old" enough, etc, we´re lost. I think what is important here is how the musicians EXECUTE their instruments and if they are exploiting good the sound of Heavy Metal.
80´s were the Boom of HM Music, but now is the time of real cool new bands that needs the support of those who lived the 80´s i think.
In the case of my band "Split Heaven" the only thing that we want is to be heard all around the world by metalheads. It´s difficult to be accepted in the circle of heavy metal and that´s not the way is supposed to be, but that´s the nice thing about it. Is all about perseverance.
Fire Down Under!!!!!!
I think that is what keeps alive the style, if we are just judging that someone´s music is "bad" or it sucks because a 18 year old kid plays it or they don´t sound "old" enough, etc, we´re lost. I think what is important here is how the musicians EXECUTE their instruments and if they are exploiting good the sound of Heavy Metal.
80´s were the Boom of HM Music, but now is the time of real cool new bands that needs the support of those who lived the 80´s i think.
In the case of my band "Split Heaven" the only thing that we want is to be heard all around the world by metalheads. It´s difficult to be accepted in the circle of heavy metal and that´s not the way is supposed to be, but that´s the nice thing about it. Is all about perseverance.
Fire Down Under!!!!!!
I'd like to note that I never claimed to be any sort of 'archaeologist'. The equivalent of an archaeologist in our field would be the person that spends a lot of time in strange places amongst vinyl, buying and playing anything that remotely looks like metal and then keeping a clear recollection of what it was like. An archivist. Archivists are collectors. I never had the collector virus, and I've never pretended otherwise here or elsewhere. I know in what company I am and as I respect and try to understand what moves a lot of you who are collectors to collect, I hope you respect my different focus.
I am interested in the history of HM (though I never claimed to be a historian either) but not to the point that I want to know it as an end in itself. My reason for learning about HM is simple: I want to understand the bands I truly love, further. By learning more about HM history and the context in which the little miracles I listen to occurred, I can appreciate their significance more (of course I also run against the risk that I'll find out things that will make me disappointed and disillusioned, but so what!). Other people just like to know a lot of trivia or are interested in transient scenes or pop culture... I just want to understand why I love what I love so much.
The 99% figure I pulled out of my ass but even those of you that collect metal vinyl and thought I was being insulting... how much vinyl do you have? 1,000 records? 2,000 records? 5,000 records? How many of them do you consider top shelf material? Let's say there are even 2,000 indispensable HM records out there in your opinion... yet how many HM records were there all together (even in just the 80's)? I'm sure nobody has a clear figure but 2,000 is I would guess not even 5%.
Avenger: your comment about the Greeks is misguided more than it just is insulting so I will give you a hint: Heavy Metal teaches some things to some people and others to others, according to their idiom. It taught me to respect human beings and treat them with dignity and expect nothing less in return. It has nothing to do with being Greek. I do not mince my words. Faux-humility suits slaves and courtesans and I am neither to you. I try to not use opinions as weapons (and I apologized for saying my '99%' claim was truth whereas I meant it as a personal opinion) and I'm very certain I am wrong in a lot of things I say but so what, that's why we have conversation so you can straighten me out. I am not someone to disrespect, through. You might call this arrogance, I call it basic self-esteem and dignity. It occurs all over the world, not only in the Mediterranean.
Nightsblood: the 00's saw the rise of a new metal subgenre, if you will. As I said before HM began as a modernist sorta thing (though a big part of it was just novelty music, like punk rock as well). It had a very rapid adaptation to different extremes that we classified to death in the 90's and then eventually post-modernism caught up with an otherwise generally romantic and untainted Heavy Metal. The ideas in its core died. Nobody talked -seriously- about pride in life and death, about destruction for rebirth, about transcending mundane limitations (which were initial thematics for HM).
In this disaffected, cynical climate the sub-genre that we've seen grow in the last 5 years was 'post-metal'. Post generally is a term used to describe the appropriation of the techniques and means of a movement to serve wildly different and opposite ends. Just as post-rock bands like godspeed you black emperor or tortoise used traditional rock instruments to play music that really isn't rock n' roll in the least, took out the narrative forms and lyrics and just left abstract soundscapes and whatnot, 'beardy' bands with a vaguely metal background took double-bass drumming, extreme distortion, brutal vocals and other superficial metal traits and used them to write music that was the opposite of Heavy Metal (as we know it) in its core: the sentiments produced were not extreme, they were actually very lazy, almost drowsy comfortable, mumbling teenage angst without direction, no pathos or hope, introverted abstractions of common emotions set to extremely loud crescendos and so on. Regardless of whether this sort of music is successful for you (probably not) that was the new subgenre that we've seen rise in the 00's. And just like philosophers have been brave enough since 1990 or so to talk about 'the death of post-modernism' more for any other reason just because it's not practical to continue an examination of reality through post-modern terms (not to mention how much these terms were subverted by the system itself to sell more shit to disaffected consumer-machines), this will catch up with music and 5 years from now all this post-metal will be considered an odd sidenote in the history of loud music. I'm saying all this to mean that HM hasn't stagnated. It might have evolved in adverse ways for your taste, but metalcore wasn't the last thing that has happened so far. I predict (and I am not the only one) that the next thing will be a non-ironic revival of traditional metal (though it might be called something else, that's what it will be). I do not look forward to that. The really interesting bit will be the 5 years after the next 5 years when this bullshit will quiet down and - probably - metal will become extremely untrendy again. Then we'll see who will still keep making albums.
I am interested in the history of HM (though I never claimed to be a historian either) but not to the point that I want to know it as an end in itself. My reason for learning about HM is simple: I want to understand the bands I truly love, further. By learning more about HM history and the context in which the little miracles I listen to occurred, I can appreciate their significance more (of course I also run against the risk that I'll find out things that will make me disappointed and disillusioned, but so what!). Other people just like to know a lot of trivia or are interested in transient scenes or pop culture... I just want to understand why I love what I love so much.
The 99% figure I pulled out of my ass but even those of you that collect metal vinyl and thought I was being insulting... how much vinyl do you have? 1,000 records? 2,000 records? 5,000 records? How many of them do you consider top shelf material? Let's say there are even 2,000 indispensable HM records out there in your opinion... yet how many HM records were there all together (even in just the 80's)? I'm sure nobody has a clear figure but 2,000 is I would guess not even 5%.
Avenger: your comment about the Greeks is misguided more than it just is insulting so I will give you a hint: Heavy Metal teaches some things to some people and others to others, according to their idiom. It taught me to respect human beings and treat them with dignity and expect nothing less in return. It has nothing to do with being Greek. I do not mince my words. Faux-humility suits slaves and courtesans and I am neither to you. I try to not use opinions as weapons (and I apologized for saying my '99%' claim was truth whereas I meant it as a personal opinion) and I'm very certain I am wrong in a lot of things I say but so what, that's why we have conversation so you can straighten me out. I am not someone to disrespect, through. You might call this arrogance, I call it basic self-esteem and dignity. It occurs all over the world, not only in the Mediterranean.
Nightsblood: the 00's saw the rise of a new metal subgenre, if you will. As I said before HM began as a modernist sorta thing (though a big part of it was just novelty music, like punk rock as well). It had a very rapid adaptation to different extremes that we classified to death in the 90's and then eventually post-modernism caught up with an otherwise generally romantic and untainted Heavy Metal. The ideas in its core died. Nobody talked -seriously- about pride in life and death, about destruction for rebirth, about transcending mundane limitations (which were initial thematics for HM).
In this disaffected, cynical climate the sub-genre that we've seen grow in the last 5 years was 'post-metal'. Post generally is a term used to describe the appropriation of the techniques and means of a movement to serve wildly different and opposite ends. Just as post-rock bands like godspeed you black emperor or tortoise used traditional rock instruments to play music that really isn't rock n' roll in the least, took out the narrative forms and lyrics and just left abstract soundscapes and whatnot, 'beardy' bands with a vaguely metal background took double-bass drumming, extreme distortion, brutal vocals and other superficial metal traits and used them to write music that was the opposite of Heavy Metal (as we know it) in its core: the sentiments produced were not extreme, they were actually very lazy, almost drowsy comfortable, mumbling teenage angst without direction, no pathos or hope, introverted abstractions of common emotions set to extremely loud crescendos and so on. Regardless of whether this sort of music is successful for you (probably not) that was the new subgenre that we've seen rise in the 00's. And just like philosophers have been brave enough since 1990 or so to talk about 'the death of post-modernism' more for any other reason just because it's not practical to continue an examination of reality through post-modern terms (not to mention how much these terms were subverted by the system itself to sell more shit to disaffected consumer-machines), this will catch up with music and 5 years from now all this post-metal will be considered an odd sidenote in the history of loud music. I'm saying all this to mean that HM hasn't stagnated. It might have evolved in adverse ways for your taste, but metalcore wasn't the last thing that has happened so far. I predict (and I am not the only one) that the next thing will be a non-ironic revival of traditional metal (though it might be called something else, that's what it will be). I do not look forward to that. The really interesting bit will be the 5 years after the next 5 years when this bullshit will quiet down and - probably - metal will become extremely untrendy again. Then we'll see who will still keep making albums.
No idea about your abilties in foretelling but somehow I think you are right and I kind of welcome this future (hope there's enough bands/appreciators as to keep the discussion going though...).Helm wrote:The really interesting bit will be the 5 years after the next 5 years when this bullshit will quiet down and - probably - metal will become extremely untrendy again. Then we'll see who will still keep making albums.
Ah you know the Greeks! You can't bang your head with them, you can't bang your head without them...Avenger wrote:Now, I'm not singling out helm individually, but why are Greeks in general so damn arrogant, especially in regards to Metal? Greece really didn’t contribute anything outstanding or even much in gerneral to the Metal scene of the 80's, so where does this "holier than thou" bullshit attitude come from all the time?
No offense to either part (of the Atlantic) - just grabbing the oppotunity being the silly peace making child that I am.
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metalmaster
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It is lovely to know that none in this forum is a "true Metaller", that's nice! Also it is lovely to see that none of us are blind followers of the 80s and actually can point some negative aspects of that era.
It is funny to see how we are like a nowadays PMRC in a crusade to find those "posers" who desecrate our holy Heavy Metal.
Hilarious! we are filled with contraditions!
But as I have always say: never mind of what others do, better mind of what you do. We all are "metal lovers" in our own eyes, but are we actually?
It is funny to see how we are like a nowadays PMRC in a crusade to find those "posers" who desecrate our holy Heavy Metal.
Hilarious! we are filled with contraditions! But as I have always say: never mind of what others do, better mind of what you do. We all are "metal lovers" in our own eyes, but are we actually?
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ION BRITTON
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This comment reminded me of how subjective discussions like this are. I know a guy who's worshipping Stormwarrior and can't listen to Portrait at all, what's considered great and what mediocre obviously changes from person to person.Black Axe wrote:Don't compare the greatness of Portrait with mediocre stuff like Stormwarrior.
I don't know if we are trying to find some kind of universal truth with such a discussion, but if we do, then it's probably in vain. It all depends on each one's own taste and his musical preferences.
I also don't know if the shitty albums of the 80's were 55% or 17% or 99.66% of the total vinyl released, i haven't done any calculation yet and honestly i don't intend to. All i know is that most of the time it's "old" metal that i put on the turntable at my home, most of time i find myself headbanging to old stuff and most of the time i'd rather discuss about 80's metal than discuss about the new album of the x band. For me 80's was the golden age for heavy metal period. In 90's many great albums were released, few of which can stand the comparison with the monuments of the 80's, however 00's were bloody awful. That's my opinion and i don't hold it to be the law or anything. I don't give a goddamn shit if someone thinks that 80's metal stunk, or if that 90's and 00's were equally great, i really don't, and i won't try to change his opinion. I listen to music for my own pleasure, not because i want to please the others. If someone thinks that 80's metal is not as great as some people believe it to be, fine by me, although i doubt we can have a common (musical) ground and much to say about it despite of being both the so-called ''metalheads''.
Good against Evil, Evil sure to win
"It really didn't matter if they liked it or not, i was going to give it to them straight down their throats" -John Stewart
"It really didn't matter if they liked it or not, i was going to give it to them straight down their throats" -John Stewart
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nightsblood
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Helm- what bands do you consider post-metal? Just curious; it's not a term I've heard before, and being unfamiliar with a lot of newer bands I'm not sure what acts it refers to.
No way to know exactly how many Metal albums there are, especially since it's hard to decide what is and is not HM sometimes. For what it's worth, Metal Archives has 10,767 full-length titles listed from the USA alone. Using Helm's example, if there are 2,000 truly great heavy metal records and they're all from US bands, that only accounts for 18.57% of US metal albums. Yes, there are plenty of assumptions built into this little calculation (e.g., looking at all US releases not just 80s releases, only considering full length US releases, what is/is not listed on MA, only counting 'truly great' albums, etc) but it's a starting point and quantitatively demonstrates how it's not so hard to wind up with a very high percentage of non-essential metal albums out there.
Ion has a very good point too. Everyone's tastes are different, even in a "small" genre like HM. Thus, you'll never reach consensus on topics like this. Enjoy what you enjoy however you choose to enjoy it, and let others do the same, rather than worrying about who's more true or why someone hates a band you love.
No way to know exactly how many Metal albums there are, especially since it's hard to decide what is and is not HM sometimes. For what it's worth, Metal Archives has 10,767 full-length titles listed from the USA alone. Using Helm's example, if there are 2,000 truly great heavy metal records and they're all from US bands, that only accounts for 18.57% of US metal albums. Yes, there are plenty of assumptions built into this little calculation (e.g., looking at all US releases not just 80s releases, only considering full length US releases, what is/is not listed on MA, only counting 'truly great' albums, etc) but it's a starting point and quantitatively demonstrates how it's not so hard to wind up with a very high percentage of non-essential metal albums out there.
Ion has a very good point too. Everyone's tastes are different, even in a "small" genre like HM. Thus, you'll never reach consensus on topics like this. Enjoy what you enjoy however you choose to enjoy it, and let others do the same, rather than worrying about who's more true or why someone hates a band you love.
"I'm sorry Sam, we had real chemistry. But like a monkey on the sun, our love was too hot to live"
-Becky
-Becky
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nightsblood
- Posts: 2435
- Joined: Sun Mar 18, 2007 6:11 pm
I don't care for Portrait either. THey reportedly have a new vocalist. Stormwarrior sound like 'Walls of Jericho' if all the songs were about vikings.GJ wrote:Haven't heard Stormwarrior - Portrait on the other hand does not at all impress on the KIT dvd I have (in the vocal department to be specific).
OK, b/c I'm a nerd and had some time to kill this morning, here's an expanded calculation regarding Helm's 99% statement (helm- I realize you didn't mean this figure literally, I'm just crunching some numbers for fun, not to beat your statement to death).
Using the MA database (biased by what is/is not listed on MA):
-Including all recorded formats, there are 12,156 recordings listed from the 1980s worldwide.
-If only 1% of these are really essential, that equals 121.56. So yes, 1% seems way too low even for very discerning metal fans.
-However, even allowing 2,000 of these to be essential (~the size of my entire collection, including titles on mp3s), that's only 16.5% of the total, meaning that 83.5% of metal releases from the 1980s are not essential. That means almost exactly 5 out of 6 recordings are non-essential.
If you exclude demos from the search:
-Then there are 7,055 metal releases in the 1980s worldwide
-1% of that equals 70.55 essential releases (obviously too low).
-2,000 essential releases equals only 28.3%, so 71.7% of 80's metal releases are not essential. That's almost 3 out of every 4.
Final note: 'Essential' is highly subjective of course, and 'non-essential' does NOT = 'bad'. I own lots of albums that I think are very good, but i'd stop short of calling them 'essential'.
"I'm sorry Sam, we had real chemistry. But like a monkey on the sun, our love was too hot to live"
-Becky
-Becky
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ION BRITTON
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- Joined: Tue Jul 25, 2006 3:07 pm
That's right. Essential are the albums i personally can't live without, the 15-20 deserted island records. The ones i can't imagine how myself would be without having listened to them.nightsblood wrote: Final note: 'Essential' is highly subjective of course, and 'non-essential' does NOT = 'bad'. I own lots of albums that I think are very good, but i'd stop short of calling them 'essential'.
However, i do not spend all my free time listening to essential albums. I am also having fun listening to not-so-essential albums which are highly enjoyable though. I think it would be rather boring having to listen to only ''essential'' albums all the time, having in mind also that my essential albums list has been made many years ago and is not bound to change any time soon.
The essential SONG list is something different though. That one is constantly changing. Now that i'm thinking of it, i'd be much happier if i was allowed to make 20 self-made compilations which would include ONLY killers and NO fillers at all as an answer to the well known island question.
Good against Evil, Evil sure to win
"It really didn't matter if they liked it or not, i was going to give it to them straight down their throats" -John Stewart
"It really didn't matter if they liked it or not, i was going to give it to them straight down their throats" -John Stewart