Greatest Rock Band Of All Time

Redeye · Post by **Redeye** » Mon Dec 25, 2006 2:23 am

Eruption wrote:Van Halen. But only the Van Halen with David Lee Roth. Sammy Hagar is a poofy haired retard, and Gary Cherone can get AIDs.

From what I read Roth was great to work with but impossible to live with.

Hyper, and not just from all the coke.

Subhuman · Post by **Subhuman** » Mon Dec 25, 2006 2:37 am

He's still like that, with a side of self-righteous.

vx trauma · Post by **vx trauma** » Mon Dec 25, 2006 5:01 pm

monster magnet. and live. with drugs.

Eruption · Post by **Eruption** » Mon Dec 25, 2006 5:42 pm

Redeye wrote:
Eruption wrote:Van Halen. But only the Van Halen with David Lee Roth. Sammy Hagar is a poofy haired retard, and Gary Cherone can get AIDs.
From what I read Roth was great to work with but impossible to live with.

Hyper, and not just from all the coke.

I can see that. David Lee Roth just seems like a cool guy, even if he does act like a fairy all the time.

PiP · Post by **PiP** » Mon Dec 25, 2006 10:25 pm

Pink Floyd, Doors, Led Zep, U2

also Beatles and Black Sabbath but they're perhaps pushing the boundaries a bit to the 'pop' and 'metal' sides (or rather from the beatles' times the 'rock' notion evolved to something a wee bit different in the times of the other bands i mentioned)

close but not there: Yes, RAtM, Nirvana.

I don't really know King Crimson or Deep Purple so I won't discuss them

Oh and mentioning Korn here is obviously either trolling or mindless arse-talk.

atoga · Post by **atoga** » Mon Dec 25, 2006 10:39 pm

this guy really hates the beatles, and most of what he says is pretty right.

still listen to them for a larf now and then though.

edit:

Subhuman wrote:I said career, not album. And a perpetually shaky one at that.

didn't catch this until now, but it's not like you defined the criteria for the topic at hand. don't be such a cocksucker

Frater Perdurabo · Post by **Frater Perdurabo** » Tue Dec 26, 2006 12:15 am

PiP wrote:Oh and mentioning Korn here is obviously either trolling or mindless arse-talk.

As is RatM

POOPERSCOOPER · Post by **POOPERSCOOPER** » Tue Dec 26, 2006 7:40 am

Genesis is good, I don't know if thats "rock." Correct me.

baby arm · Post by **baby arm** » Tue Dec 26, 2006 8:08 am

I can see that. David Lee Roth just seems like a cool guy, even if he does act like a fairy all the time.

My dad moved Van Halen back in the day and said Roth was a total asshole. He also said "And they're users. Trust me."

Cthulhugoat · Post by **Cthulhugoat** » Tue Dec 26, 2006 3:29 pm

POOPERSCOOPER wrote:Genesis is good, I don't know if thats "rock." Correct me.

Prog rock. Rock anyway.

johnnygothisgun · Post by **johnnygothisgun** » Tue Dec 26, 2006 6:43 pm

POOPERSCOOPER wrote:Genesis is good, I don't know if thats "rock." Correct me.

which genesis? peter gabriel or phil collins?

Eruption · Post by **Eruption** » Tue Dec 26, 2006 9:30 pm

baby arm wrote:
I can see that. David Lee Roth just seems like a cool guy, even if he does act like a fairy all the time.
My dad moved Van Halen back in the day and said Roth was a total asshole. He also said "And they're users. Trust me."

Wow, I always pictured Roth as being a nice guy. Then again, I didn't ever move the band, so I wouldn't know.

As far as them being users, I think we all knew that.

4too · Post by **4too** » Tue Dec 26, 2006 9:45 pm

The Long And The Short

Topic embraces the absolute, ''greatest'' and '''all time''.

Tricky.

Short answer?
Based on what is in the CD player right now, and that NBC piece about top 10 bands?

----------------------- Rolling Stones ----------------------------

Long answer involves the unlikely fact that the CD in the player is NOT a Rolling Stones disc.

..................................................................................

But let me thank atoga first.

atoga:

this guy really hates the beatles, and most of what he says is pretty right. ...

Excellent referral.

He does try too hard and over reaches.

He drives a stake into each heart. Meticulously if not always accurately he retells pop history to suit his personal aesthetic.
Nail by nail he hammers on.
Seems to never lose a chance to put down 'the Fab Four".
Intentional or not the comic part .... this avenging essayist
will even prop them up with a schizophrenic jump to faint praise , and then bitch slap them back into the coffin that he seems to, if not ready to bury, to burn.

Worth reading at least a page length, or two, or more, to grasp at the concepts he is spinning.

Here's the diamond in the rough.

Pierro Scaruffi:

... This is the sad status of rock criticism: rock critics are basically publicists working for free for major labels, distributors and record stores. They simply publicize what the music business wants to make money with. ...

... Hopefully, one not-too-distant day, ... rock critics will study more of rock history and realize who invented what and who simply exploited it commercially. ...

This gem might apply to all entertainment reviews:
this band versus that band, this movie versus that movie, ... and this game versus that game.

.................................................

The long answer continued.

The Stones have successfully spanned the decades with Rock rooted in the Blues and R and B. You don't have to be directly exposed to their discs to be able to sing along with a lot of their songs. Depending on your life style, and life when, there can be a lot of secondary exposure.
Song and lyric exposure candidates , via primary and secondary sources , can include the Beatles, perhaps The Dead, annnnd the Beach Boys. Had Stones albums, had Beatles albums, Dead was always lurking around, NO Beach Boys records, but went to a Beach Boys concert on a whim and could sing along with the crowd.
Just from the AM radio exposure of that pop band.
A lot of the Motown sound could qualify too for that distinction if you were alive and riding in that AM radio equipped V-8 or slant 6 between 1965 to 1975.
Why maybe an important qualifier to the pretense of throwing around absolutes like 'greatest' and 'all time'
is the popular culture penetration of a body of work AND like sounding musical style that never seems to fade away.
A whole fricking genre that resonates a similar sound , and transcends re-treading tired old tunes, get a reinvigorating ping and from time to time a miraculous reincarnation.

And whose CD is in the player?

""Who Do You Love""?

It's not the classic Bo Diddley, although ''Smokestack Lightning''; still stands very RAW 'N' TALL.

Not the hippy dippy first album for Quicksilver Messenger Service with the timely peacenik cover of "Pride Of Man'.

CD in the player: George Thourghgood Live.

Styles come and go, and a traditional sound never goes away.
When artfully and powerfully played the old is always new.
Holy , Stones, and Ramones!
Some where in that 'new wave' [your 'new' may vary] rediscovered the roots that never went limp and hung on in the purgatory of elevator muzak. 1977, Blues based rock was still being played LIVE in the small taverns of the Pacific Northwest .... developed a taste for a minimalist, guitar based, raw voiced ""Who Do You Love"", and ""One Bourbon, One Scotch, 'n' One Beer"".

Of the ten I'll pick the Stones as representing an 'all time' great that never faded away.

4too

atoga · Post by **atoga** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 2:04 am

granted, scaruffi does try too hard - he's academic to a fault, & he pounces too quickly on artists for 'selling out', as if that was the worst thing in the world they could do. still agree with him about the beatles though: hailing them as revolutionary when they were, in fact, just really (commercially) influential is a mistake.

4too · Post by **4too** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 6:03 am

Two Concepts On Hype And History

In the right place at the right time.

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Woody_Allen

Attributed to Woody Allen:

Eighty percent of success is showing up.

And .....

James Loewen in "Lies My Teacher Told Me", talks about the methods of dunning down and spoon feeding history. One is the use of the ''Great Man" myth. Allows for a sanitized, a politically correct, and an easily propagandized (''-pasteur-ized'') pabulum.

The emphasis on ""The Great Man"" in telling, and selling popular history, (selling newspaper, magazine, TV commercial time slots), might be extended to the pumping up of the Beatles legend, ""The Great(est) Group"", ev-ahhh.

Scaruffi seems to imply that the - great men - in Beatles Inc. were the manger, Brian Epstein, and the music producer,George Martin.

So maybe....

"Zelig": Aiming to please, so changing to please.
Perhaps the Beatles story could be told in the mockumentry style of Woody Allen's "Zelig" , including a cameo commentary appearance of Scaruffi parodying his academic attack style (the 'fearless vampire killer'). Working in "Hard Days Night" or "Help" like chase sequences featuring Scaruffi with large wooden mallet and stake.

A send up like "This Is Spinal Tap" , featuring Led Zepplin style over indulgence might be too extreme, too 'eleven'. A ''Ruttles'' style might be too kind for the tough love disciplinarian academicians that venture into reforging popular history to fit the, or maybe, their facts.

4too

.................................

And ah, ....

About one Beatle myth, the search of satanic or mind control content in pop and rock music.

If one were to play ABBA tracks backwards, would they sound the same?

Imagine the cosmic impact IF that were so .....

Just asking ...

4too -2

baby arm · Post by **baby arm** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 6:04 am

still agree with him about the beatles though: hailing them as revolutionary when they were, in fact, just really (commercially) influential is a mistake.

Um, how about hailing them as just the Best Shit Ever? Seriously, people who are intent on 'debunking the Beatles myth' are generally lame and not worth anyone's time. Just use your motherfucking ears.

And 4too's right about one thing: George Thoroughgood does kick ass live. At least he did when I saw him open for the Allman Brothers back in 1990. Yes.

Subhuman · Post by **Subhuman** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 7:02 am

What baby arm said: Use your ears. People love to get on board the Beatles-bashing train because we're all sick of hearing "She Loves You" and "Hey Jude", but the fact is the Beatles composed some of the best pop music of the 20th century, melodically if not lyrically (although their lyrics certainly moved a lot of people).

And if I read another rant from another journalist bitching about how Indie Band X is doing just what Overexposed Rock Star Y is doing now only infinitely better, I'm going to shoot someone.

atoga · Post by **atoga** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 7:07 am

Subhuman wrote:And if I read another rant from another journalist bitching about how Indie Band X is doing just what Overexposed Rock Star Y is doing now only infinitely better, I'm going to shoot someone.

i thought you [were] among the pitchfork-reading set?

Subhuman · Post by **Subhuman** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 7:08 am

I read it ironically.

PiP · Post by **PiP** » Wed Dec 27, 2006 4:08 pm

Frater Perdurabo wrote:
PiP wrote:Oh and mentioning Korn here is obviously either trolling or mindless arse-talk.
As is RatM

You're probably too young to remember the impression and influence their first album made when it came out and how it was refined in the second one. I agree the later records are less... exceptional.