Return of Confessions

Rush2112 · Post by **Rush2112** » Mon May 11, 2015 3:32 pm

The Sybian wrote:
I was joking about the Cornell show comment. I know many Dead snobs call it their best show, so I was playing off TB's comment about the DJ. [I did have a bootleg tape of that show back in college, probably still do.]

Not sure if it was there best show. I know the reason it's considered the best is because it was the first one that EVERYONE had and it was friggin' pristine, even on a 3rd generation boot.

(and I'd take Space off to go roll a joint or hit the head, when I listen on a recording it's skipped.)

Rush2112 · Post by **Rush2112** » Mon May 11, 2015 3:38 pm

tennbengal wrote:Rush, I didn't say they played one song aimlessly for two hours, I said they played aimlessly for two hours. Now, I grant you, all their songs pretty much do sound the same, so, I can see the confusion.

This can be said about Phish, but no way in hell can it be said about the Dead. Maybe the three songs you've listened to, but it's incrediably far from the truth.

As Syb mentions above, they drew from a myriad of styles and each member brought their own influences to the band.

Bobby's cowboy songs

don't sound like a cover of Not Fade Away

or the early psych..

C'mon. I can understand someone not liking their music but don't talk in uninformed generalities.

Jerloma · Post by **Jerloma** » Mon May 11, 2015 3:40 pm

Now you've done it, TB. Here come the fucking youtubes.

Why is that even a confession? No shame in hating The Dead.

tennbengal · Post by **tennbengal** » Mon May 11, 2015 3:44 pm

Jerloma wrote:Now you've done it, TB. Here come the fucking youtubes.

Why is that even a confession? No shame in hating The Dead.

Because, holy hell, when you say it out loud, the wrath of the fanbase falleth upon you.

"You can not like them, but you have to not like them for approved reasons."

mister d · Post by **mister d** » Mon May 11, 2015 3:46 pm

Its like when you say Tom Brady might be guilty, huh? LOL.

Rush2112 · Post by **Rush2112** » Mon May 11, 2015 3:58 pm

mister d wrote:Its like when you say Tom Brady might be guilty, huh? LOL.

Christ, do you do anything but troll?

Rush2112 · Post by **Rush2112** » Mon May 11, 2015 3:59 pm

tennbengal wrote: Because, holy hell, when you say it out loud, the wrath of the fanbase falleth upon you.

"You can not like them, but you have to not like them for approved reasons."

Nothing wrong with you not liking them, but saying "they all sound the same" means you've never listened to them.

tennbengal · Post by **tennbengal** » Mon May 11, 2015 4:19 pm

It's true, growing up in 70s and 80s and going to college with hippie wannabes afforded me no chances to listen to the dead.

P.D.X. · Post by **P.D.X.** » Mon May 11, 2015 4:25 pm

I don't like them because their vocalists can't sing and their guitar tones sound like nails on chalkboard to me. Sure, they cover a wide range of Americana, but even at their best they're third-rate to the true masters of whatever style they're appropriating at the moment.

Post by **brian** » Mon May 11, 2015 5:07 pm

The Grateful Dead suck. Period. End stop. I'd rather listen to a crap band like Phish because if you're going to listen to 30 minutes of jam masturbation at least there's some musicianship there.

MaxWebster · Post by **MaxWebster** » Mon May 11, 2015 5:14 pm

ok i don't like either of them at all either but if you're going to rip the Dead for not being good musicians you've lost some cred

Pruitt · Post by **Pruitt** » Mon May 11, 2015 6:10 pm

MaxWebster wrote:ok i don't like either of them at all either but if you're going to rip the Dead for not being good musicians you've lost some cred

Agree. This Dead hatred is going a bit too far.

Especially when there are Huey Lewis fans lurking around here.

DC47 · Post by **DC47** » Wed May 13, 2015 12:07 am

MaxWebster wrote:ok i don't like either of them at all either but if you're going to rip the Dead for not being good musicians you've lost some cred

Do you think they're all good musicians? I've got a very mixed view. For example, to my ear, Bob Weir is no more than a bar band singer and guitarist.

bfj · Post by **bfj** » Wed May 13, 2015 5:44 am

DC47 wrote:
MaxWebster wrote:ok i don't like either of them at all either but if you're going to rip the Dead for not being good musicians you've lost some cred
Do you think they're all good musicians? I've got a very mixed view. For example, to my ear, Bob Weir is no more than a bar band singer and guitarist.

Good rhythm guitarist, ok singer, wrote some good songs. Phill and Jerry stood out as musicians. The rhythm section was very good. It's hard to take some people's opinions in this thread seriously when they think that Elton John and Kiss are great artists.

tennbengal · Post by **tennbengal** » Wed May 13, 2015 7:15 am

Kiss is terrible. Elton John wrote some nice songs - or knew enough to shelter with Taupin.

ETA: Beth is supremely terrible. Easily top 5 worst song, worse than Truckin'.

Pruitt · Post by **Pruitt** » Wed May 13, 2015 7:22 am

Kiss is beyond terrible. And they have been around so long that any ironic pleasure they once gave is also long gone.

mister d · Post by **mister d** » Wed May 13, 2015 8:02 am

These Kiss takes are refreshing to read.

sancarlos · Post by **sancarlos** » Wed May 13, 2015 8:04 am

Well, Kiss isn't selling musicianship. Nobody who wears kabuki makeup is focused on technical musical excellence. They are selling entertainment and pyrotechnics, mainly to 15-year old boys. They are great at it, and super businessmen, to boot. To criticize them for not being good musicians is to miss the point.

tennbengal · Post by **tennbengal** » Wed May 13, 2015 8:12 am

sancarlos wrote:Well, Kiss isn't selling musicianship. Nobody who wears kabuki makeup is focused on technical musical excellence. They are selling entertainment and pyrotechnics, mainly to 15-year old boys. They are great at it, and super businessmen, to boot. To criticize them for not being good musicians is to miss the point.

I hate everything about them, never found them entertaining, and, they generally suck.

mister d · Post by **mister d** » Wed May 13, 2015 8:12 am

That shouldn't get you in the Rock & Roll HoF, no matter how dumb HoFs are.

sancarlos · Post by **sancarlos** » Wed May 13, 2015 8:29 am

TB and D, I get your points, and don't really disagree. But maybe because I feel like a debate, I'll continue. Personally, I still love the Sex Pistols. But they, like lots of rock and rollers, were barely competent musicians. God knows I think Madonna is crap, but she has a huge following. A huge segment of rock and roll and pop is more about attitude and style than about musicianship. Kiss isn't your style and it isn't my style (or at least, not since I was in my early teens), but I think you can make an argument that rock and pop music are for the young, not us. Not for the mature folks of more discerning taste. So, do they not deserve accolades such as the R&R Hall of Fame less than say, Iggy Pop and the Stooges, because on a relative basis we don't respect their musicianship or like the attitude and style they represent? I'm just saying that it's a slippery slope.

A_B · Post by **A_B** » Wed May 13, 2015 8:58 am

Who doesn't like to rock and roll all night and part of every day?

Kiss is fine in small doses. I know this because I ended up in a bar that had a Kiss tribute band - the kind that dresses up and all that jazz - and you don't realize how many Kiss songs suck until you have to wait for the 2-3 you kinda know.

I've also watched an AC/DC tribute band..and that show was killer.

Jerloma · Post by **Jerloma** » Wed May 13, 2015 9:06 am

Kiss is fun if you don't take yourself too seriously. I've seen them 10 times and never left disappointed.

P.D.X. · Post by **P.D.X.** » Wed May 13, 2015 10:08 am

Fans of punk never try to sell you on their bands' musicianship. That's the difference.

The Sybian · Post by **The Sybian** » Wed May 13, 2015 10:27 am

bfj wrote:

Good rhythm guitarist, ok singer, wrote some good songs. Phill and Jerry stood out as musicians. The rhythm section was very good. It's hard to take some people's opinions in this thread seriously when they think that Elton John and Kiss are great artists.

Other than JLo, I don't think you'll get any argument on Kiss. I'm not an expert, but Bob Weir never struck me as being talented. I love the Dead, but there are a lot of concerts where they sound like shit. Not sure if it was bad equipment, bad recordings or bad drugs, but they had a lot of off nights. Donna, OTOH, had very few nights in which she was on. She is great on studio albums, but always off key and off beat.

I was way into Phish 20 years ago. Much more than the Dead, I totally get why people would hate their music, but believe their talent has to be respected.

Rush2112 · Post by **Rush2112** » Wed May 13, 2015 12:18 pm

The Sybian wrote:
Other than JLo, I don't think you'll get any argument on Kiss. I'm not an expert, but Bob Weir never struck me as being talented. I love the Dead, but there are a lot of concerts where they sound like shit. Not sure if it was bad equipment, bad recordings or bad drugs, but they had a lot of off nights. Donna, OTOH, had very few nights in which she was on. She is great on studio albums, but always off key and off beat.

I was way into Phish 20 years ago. Much more than the Dead, I totally get why people would hate their music, but believe their talent has to be respected.

Donna gets a bad rap in my mind. Yes she sounds way off, but they didn't really set her up to succeed. Hardly had her own monitor so couldn't hear herself, the shows she did you can hear the difference.

Weir was actually fired because he was a bad guitarist. He just showed up at the next show and kept on playing.

A lot of their concerts are crap, and I think its a combination of all the things you listed, plus the amount of shows they played. A lot of bands play the exact same thing at every show and do 30 shows a tour. The Dead had a different setlist every night and did 3 or 4 30 show tours a year. The rarified air that Cornell '77 resides in (as well as that entire Spring Tour) was that everything was right and they sounded fucking incredible.

I was the same with Phish 20 years ago. I saw my first show in '89 and was hooked. Stopped about '98 or so and have been to a few show since I'm no longer enamored. I don't like the new songs, don't like the new fans, etc., etc.

With Phish I think the guitarist is the weak link. Machine gun solos, and a bad choice to be "Jerry" in the farewell shows.

Johnnie · Post by **Johnnie** » Wed May 13, 2015 4:01 pm

Up until maybe 8th grade I thought KISS was some sort of parody of a rock band that did covers of other bands. This was around the time, probably, when Jerry Garcia died. (I was 12 in 1995, my 8th grade year.) I never heard of the Grateful Dead. I had to ask my parents about them. The following year I heard of Phish only because my English teacher would talk about how they could play a city three nights straight and each show would be different each night. Each instance for all these groups yielded an indifferent response from me. I know they exist, but I have no opinion either way.

Brontoburglar · Post by **Brontoburglar** » Wed May 13, 2015 4:21 pm

You were 12 in 8th grade?

howard · Post by **howard** » Wed May 13, 2015 4:33 pm

I turned 13 in december of my 8th grade year, graduated hs at 17. Not that out of the ordinary.

Post by **brian** » Wed May 13, 2015 4:51 pm

It may have been in the 70s, but bands playing without setlists isn't really that rare, at least with good bands, so it's hard for me to get too excited about that.

Rush2112 · Post by **Rush2112** » Wed May 13, 2015 5:44 pm

How many other bands play 80+ shows a year and have a catalog of 500+ songs though?

A_B · Post by **A_B** » Wed May 13, 2015 5:48 pm

None. For a good reason.

Post by **brian** » Wed May 13, 2015 6:16 pm

Rush2112 wrote:How many other bands play 80+ shows a year and have a catalog of 500+ songs though?

Bands don't write three albums a year any more so that's kind of a straw man but there's lots of bands I can think of with like 100+songs who play 100+ shows a year without a set list.

Post by **brian** » Wed May 13, 2015 7:36 pm

I really didn't find Mary Steenbergen attractive until her mid-50s.

Rush2112 · Post by **Rush2112** » Wed May 13, 2015 10:07 pm

brian wrote:
Rush2112 wrote:How many other bands play 80+ shows a year and have a catalog of 500+ songs though?
Bands don't write three albums a year any more so that's kind of a straw man but there's lots of bands I can think of with like 100+songs who play 100+ shows a year without a set list.

Lots of bands? Like?

(BTW, the Dead had all of 17 studio albums over a 30 year career.)

Post by **brian** » Wed May 13, 2015 10:15 pm

Rush2112 wrote:
brian wrote:
Rush2112 wrote:How many other bands play 80+ shows a year and have a catalog of 500+ songs though?
Bands don't write three albums a year any more so that's kind of a straw man but there's lots of bands I can think of with like 100+songs who play 100+ shows a year without a set list.
Lots of bands? Like?

(BTW, the Dead had all of 17 studio albums over a 30 year career.)

So they did like 350 cover songs? (That's not really unrealistic for a band with a career that long but I wouldn't exactly call that a catalog of 500 songs then.)

And to answer your question just off the top of my head without any research...Drive-By Truckers, Lucero, American Aquarium. Jason Isbell tours pretty much non-stop and if you include his DBT songs is probably over 100. Others don't play with a set list and probably get damn close to 80-100 shows a year like Ryan Adams.

mister d · Post by **mister d** » Wed May 13, 2015 10:19 pm

Dave Matthews Band, which seems like a good comp in terms of "I was really into them in college then slowly got over it".

Post by **brian** » Wed May 13, 2015 10:24 pm

mister d wrote:Dave Matthews Band, which seems like a good comp in terms of "I was really into them in college then slowly got over it".

I didn't know if they toured that much (I know they do a lot), but yeah...same idea. Also, Pearl Jam. They probably average something like 80 dates a year most years and never play the same show twice.

Post by **brian** » Wed May 13, 2015 10:36 pm

If setlist.fm is to be believed I was at one of the only two shows where Drive-By Truckers played a cover of "Holland, 1945". That's pretty cool.

Pruitt · Post by **Pruitt** » Wed May 13, 2015 10:38 pm

Rush2112 wrote:How many other bands play 80+ shows a year and have a catalog of 500+ songs though?

The Fall just released their 31st studio album and tour constantly in the UK (mainly in small halls and large pubs.)

And it's not bad...