"It's impossible to be Actual* Pop and Actual Rock simultaneously!"

[dubdobdee.livejournal.com]

the lex just claimed this: is he korrekt?

my response = it is NOT COMMON CERTAINLY but it has happened, like a kind of harmonic convergence within recorded music after -- with things after never the same as before

for example:
i. stones
ii. sabbaf
iii. slade/pistols (=essentially the same thing anyway)
iv. pulp fiction inspired resurgence of SURF sound

obv plenty of bands have been one then the other but not simultaneously, and some have even switched back again

*note use of ACTUAL here must not be employed in any kind of essentialist slipperiness, bcz that kind of behaviour is INDIE

Comments

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

I have to say System of a Down are the only simultaneously METAL/POP band that are ANY GOOD AT ALL. And that's cos they are 23% Turbo Folk.

[piratemoggy.livejournal.com]

Definitely. Katatonia (misspelling deliberate) are alright, too but nothing I'd deliberately listen to.

Actually, thinking about it (and I may get lynched for saying this) but Linkin Park had an interesting style on their first album, it was semi-groundbreaking and sometimes I think you can hear a bit of that sort of noise in Girls Aloud's first album. Probably just me.

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Linkin Park's "Numb" and "Faint" are loads better than anything I've ever heard by worthy-but-dull SOAD.

[carsmilesteve.livejournal.com]

only decent SOAD song = THE ONE ABOUT CIDER

[chezghost.livejournal.com]

i like the one about the pogo stick

[juror8.livejournal.com]

Well, "Grafitti My Soul" always struck me as a deliberate Nine Inch Nails tribute, so...

[carsmilesteve.livejournal.com]

dude, it's EARL BRUTUS! wake me up is the NIN one ;)

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

That was 'Wake Me Up' surely? 'Graffiti My Soul' was Prodge tribute innit.

[juror8.livejournal.com]

(In my defence, I did only wake up at half noon. Alex is CORRECT)

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

When WWTNS? was released I thought 'Wake Me Up' was a major stand-out non-single (at the time). A year on I tend to skip it. 'Thank Me Daddy' is the WWTNS? long-term gem which no one picked up on at the time.

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

Only SOAD-related song I like = live cover of one of them by Miss Avril Lavigne. She is totally taking the piss, going uber-fast on the verses and eventually collapsing in giggles

[cis.livejournal.com]

but a lot of the time SOAD were kind of taking the piss! that was what made them so good, that they were overblown political operatic-metal but with a sense of humour, three minute songs, big pop choruses, etc. eg 'Sugar' is probably supposed to be about the alienation of modern life or something but mostly it's a guy with a beard rattling through impossibly wordy verses in a silly voice and then screaming 'sugar!', ie amazing.

[chezghost.livejournal.com]

agreed, but they did so much awful toss like 'Aerials' to undermine the funny bits.

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

Ah yes, it's the old bpm problem. SOAD only good when fast.

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

they seemed really really very serious to me :(

[cis.livejournal.com]

I think the level of humour in metal is always really hard to gauge, a lot of the time the immediate reaction is to go 'well this looks frankly absurd but surely they don't realise this, they must be really really serious to take with a straight face something so silly-looking', also maybe because it sounds so doomy one would assume there are no lulz? Actually it's the level of humour in all this angsty/miserable/emotional stuff that evades you unless you're into it - some my chemical romance and panic! and the disco stuff is really, really funny, intentionally so I think (the songs about VAMPIRES!), and even some manics lyrics were v arguably pisstakes (i think 'everything must go' is the first manics album that really takes itself seriously) (and I think even the most hardcore manics fan has had a day where they sat down and re-wrote 'revol' starting with the line "mr bradfield: awaken the pie"), reading Kerrang at the time it was all much more light-hearted than you'd have expected.

[chezghost.livejournal.com]

her career high!

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

my favourite Lavigne work is 'I'm With You' closely followed by 'My Happy Ending'.

I realised that in virtually every possible case, my favourite song by a pop act is generally the existential/metaphysical/abject/sappy ballad: Backstreet Boys, Britney, Spice Girls, All Saints, Avril...