Boorishly listens to your young people's music

Posted: Sun Mar 30, 2008 11:32 pm

BOORISHLY LISTENS TO YOUR YOUNG PEOPLE'S MUSIC

Okay guys for real this is the year when I get it together and listen to some of your young people's music. It is okay to make fun of it without knowing much of anything about it, but it is probably even better to educatedly make fun of it. And I guess some of it might be good.

Artist: Vampire Weekend
Album: Vampire Weekend

Boorishly sez: So this is the indie band that everybody in the straight media is talking about. Or at least it kind of seems that way. So I guess they are the new Artic Monkeys or Bright Eyes or Belle and Sebastian. (Not that I know anything about those guys, but I hear people talking about them.) Except they have a much much much much more horrible name. An awful name. A name that made me want to not buy their album, but I bought it anyway.

Why: Well they are the band that everybody is talking about. And I heard a couple songs on college radio that sounded pretty okay.

But: Even though it is a pretty short album, I guess I kind of wish it was even shorter. I mean, it's only eleven songs and most of the songs are about three minutes long... But even so I guess I get kind of bored. Though the second half is a lot better than the first half, which really is a nice change. And the guy who sings enunciates really well, which is good because I don't like that mumbly music. He isn't whiny either, which is also good.

I think what I don't like is that the songs are pretty simple and most of them are repetitive. Like you hear it once, and then they go through it a second time and that's their three minutes. I think I'd like it better if they wrote fewer songs, but gave them second verses instead of repeating the first one twice. They could even take two of their existing songs and stick them together, since it's not like they make any sense as it is.

Also, one of the songs is about punctuation and it is a horrible song. But there's another song that namechecks English Breakfast AND Darjeeling. I would say it is the best use of tea in a song since Clutch's "Open Up the Border". Oh and this album helped me realize how much I am starting to hate songs about school. Just a couple years ago, I liked songs about school. Now, not so much.

Best song: I like the two longest songs best -- so that would be "M79" and "The Kids Don't Stand a Chance". Most of them are at least pleasant though.

Would I buy more albums by these people: Maybe if they wrote some longer songs and added in the string section fulltime. Otherwise probably not, but they are okay and I won't make fun of you if you like them.

Final grade: B-

true falcons will attack children · Posted: Sun Mar 30, 2008 11:40 pm

I came into this thread hoping you would comment on how our music is too loud and, on a side note, our hair is too long.

Posted: Sun Mar 30, 2008 11:47 pm

If anything, your music is usually too timid and wussy. I do hate your hair a lot though, and also your pants.

Joined: 19 Jul 2005 Posts: 16347 Location: TaBB Graveyard

but they make my ass look so nice :(

Posted: Mon Mar 31, 2008 12:20 am

New favourite thread.

Thank you Boorishly! I have not listened to them before, and you review is very educational!

Joined: 10 Jan 2008 Posts: 1065

boorishly next can you review this band called animal collective
they are all the rage

Christmas came early Joined: 16 Feb 2005 Posts: 9225

boorishly's opinion of 'strawberry jam' by animal collective is of great interest to me.

also boorishly, i would give vampire weekend a B- as well. I actually like 'oxford comma' as a song. but i don't like how basically vampire weekend only sings about the problems that arise when you live in martha's vineyard. i also don't like the idea that this sort o thing could become a trend, as i hate boat shoes and madras.

Posted: Mon Mar 31, 2008 9:12 am

Oh yeah, great point baber. They are seriously a whole band made up entirely of Billy Joels. Twenty years from now aging hipsters are going to be telling each other, "Really the only Vampire Weekend album you need is the greatest hits and also the pretentious one where they do jazz." Then they will pay $70 for a concert ticket and drive their SUVs to the basketball stadium to see them play. And everybody will leave during the first encore to try and beat the rush.

Also, Animal Collective is on my big list of bands to listen to. For some reason I put down that I should buy Here Comes the Indian but I have no idea why I picked that one. Maybe All Music Guide told me to? Should I switch to Strawberry Jam? Anyway, I will do them eventually but not next because I already have a bunch of other albums I've been listening to.

Joined: 10 Jan 2008 Posts: 1065

Actually I think Feels would be the best place to start
and Here Comes The Indian is maybe one of the worse places to start
Feels just has a little bit of everything and also has Banshee Beat which is like

Laurie Anderson
in love and singing underwater

Posted: Mon Mar 31, 2008 2:28 pm

Animal Collective is kind of like the construction workers who die building a ballpark so that Derek Jeter can hit home runs and get his picture in the newspaper.

Posted: Mon Mar 31, 2008 2:39 pm

That is a beautiful simile that I just

don't

get

Posted: Mon Mar 31, 2008 3:09 pm

Boorishly, I know this album is kind of dated (by about 5 years or more), but can you review Blueberry Boat by the Fierey Furnaces?

Posted: Mon Mar 31, 2008 4:33 pm

Eidam wrote:

Boorishly, I know this album is kind of dated (by about 5 years or more), but can you review Blueberry Boat by the Fierey Furnaces?

Yes, please do! I still don't know what I think of it, myself.

I think I love it, but I'm not sure.

Christmas came early Joined: 16 Feb 2005 Posts: 9225

billy joel analogy is right on.

boorishly can we see your list so we can give you better ideas of what young people listen to? because not very many of us listen to 'here comes the indian' so i have my doubts about what is in store for us.

Posted: Mon Mar 31, 2008 6:39 pm

Love, Your Third Daughter wrote:

Laurie Anderson
in love and singing underwater

so disappointed when I realized this didn't say "Louie Anderson"

Posted: Mon Mar 31, 2008 6:54 pm

Wouldn't you rather be surprised? I think you would really rather be surprised! I have no doubt that I will be listening to a lot of stuff that no young people would touch with a ten foot stick, but after all I am the one plunking down the cash. Basically my only criteria is that it should be something released within the past ten years -- but preferrably the last five years. And that it is somehow interesting to me.

If you want to suggest something then I guess go crazy! I have already dropped Here Comes the Indian from the plan and replaced it with Feels based on feedback from actual young peoples. And I have added whatever the heck Eidam was talking about. So I am not ignoring you like all the other authority figures in your lives! I am listening to your hep jive! Though I guess I should say that I am trying to keep it no more than 30% indie rock because I think I would get bored pretty quick if I stuck to only one genre. (Even a genre so indefinable as "indie rock".) But young people listen to a lot more than just indie rock, I know.

Anyway my list is totally fluid up to the point where I actually buy the albums. I'm working through a batch of ten right now, but beyond that it is wide open country! I was only going to do one post per week (since albums cost dollars and I am not made of dollars) but maybe I will do two instead. I will try to get another one up this week at least!

Joined: 29 Jun 2005 Posts: 3795 Location: Gotham City

hey boorishly if you need an antidote to that gay "indie" shit you should get Dopesmoker by Sleep (I know how much you enjoy hitting bongs, and whatnot)
I'm listening to it forever until I get bored which will be never
dan told me to listen to it and that guy knows his shit

Joined: 29 Jun 2005 Posts: 3795 Location: Gotham City

just look at this goddamn album cover

Joined: 20 Feb 2005 Posts: 5464 Location: dino zone

the horse has four faces cause one face isnt enough to hit four dank-ass bongs at once

Joined: 29 Jun 2005 Posts: 3795 Location: Gotham City

odin only has one eye because of the time he held in smoke for so long that he turned blue and his eyeball popped right out

Posted: Mon Mar 31, 2008 8:00 pm

Mr. Foundry, please consider for review one or another Lupe Fiasco album. The kids like him, he's not indie rock, and he's pretty acclaimed I think, so your that less likely to regret the purchase.

Posted: Mon Mar 31, 2008 8:02 pm

The Cool

Joined: 29 Jun 2005 Posts: 3795 Location: Gotham City

lupe fiasco? more like poopy peeassblow

Christmas came early Joined: 16 Feb 2005 Posts: 9225

boorishly if you need albums and just want to "listen to them" but not "own them" i know some people you can talk to
also that might make these happen faster

Posted: Tue Apr 01, 2008 10:18 am

Guys, the analogy is Paul Simon, not Billy Joel. And I like them, but I also like boat shoes and Martha's Vineyard so there I go.

Posted: Tue Apr 01, 2008 10:22 am

Also, I was going to mention that I saw them play at SXSW, and they were always hanging around everywhere at rock shows and hotel bars and lobbies and seemed like nice guys, but then I figured that, combined with the Martha's Vineyard thing, you guys would be all, Oh Steve and his jet-setting ways/Oh Steve and his seeing people, and I thought better of it.

And then I went ahead and told you anyway, but in a different way.

Posted: Tue Apr 01, 2008 10:24 am

Also also, I've noticed an annoying trend where people who I know love Paul Simon's Graceland complain about Vampire Weekend, and I mean seriously it is so the same thing that I think they have got to be kidding me. I mean seriously.

Posted: Tue Apr 01, 2008 11:51 am

I've never heard that Paul Simon album but I am going to assume it is about divorce and father/son relationships and growing old and Vampire Weekend doesn't talk about any of those things.

Posted: Tue Apr 01, 2008 11:57 am

This is Paul Simon.

He's all like:

"RECONCILING YOUTHFUL IDEALISM WITH REALITIES OF MIDDLE AGE LIFE"

Posted: Tue Apr 01, 2008 1:37 pm

I meant sonically, not textually, Boorishly. GAWD.

Textually, Vampire Weekend are closest to a J.Crew catalog, not Billy Joel. Billy Joel only thinks you should wear your New English clothes when you are standing on a corner, picking your nose.