|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Intent (what the artist meant) and effect (how it affects the audience) are both valid measures of what a piece of art is about. Someone saying "this is what this song means to me" doesn't overwrite the artist saying "this is what I was trying to convey with this song." They are concurrent.
That's fair - as long as a distinction is recognized.
It gets a little fuzzy when the audience says "this is what I think the artist meant," but if the audience applies that meaning to a piece of art--and especially if that becomes true at a cultural level, then that meaning is added to what the art is about.
This I'm not so sure about - I'd say this is when the "ship-of-Theseus" factor sets in. Once someone else changes the meaning, descent can be claimed from the original, but the new thing is a new thing, a demiurge, if you will, of the original (see also "Riker, Will VS Tom").
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Excitable Boy by Warren Zevon.
Ooh wah ooh ooh ooh
Just don't ask what he did to little Suzy.
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
Excitable Boy by Warren Zevon.
Ooh wah ooh ooh ooh
Just don't ask what he did to little Suzy.Though that is different from at least some of the others in that the message isn't really bad, though the events described are.
I do have a fondness for upbeat peppy songs with really dark lyrics.
It came to mind today because I have a student who has been stealing things from his classmates, taking them home, and telling his mom that the other children gave him the items as gifts.
His mother's excuse is that he does it out of love, "like people breaking off a piece of the pyramids or the Great Wall to take home with them", and it's because society "doesn't teach boys what to do with feelings of love".
All I could think of was, "Gee, in that case, it's a good thing he's too young to start dating."
| 7 people marked this as a favorite. |
Unless he has some developmental disability the kid is a thief and a liar and is being enabled by his parents. There, I said it.
| 8 people marked this as a favorite. |
Well, parent-teacher conferences tomorrow are going to be very interesting.
OH, yeah. I'm sure.
I don't find Ghost to be all that entertaining. I saw them in concert in 2017, opening for Iron Maiden. Just 80s "Satanic metal" put in a new package.
Eh, I stand by my statement. If it's not an issue of nonfiction disagreeing with historical fact, anyway. If it's an artistic statement, the only opinion about its meaning that matters IMO is the creator's.
You're welcome to have your own interpretation, its not like you can really be stopped, but it matters as little as My Immortal matters to the Potterverse canon.
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I still think Blue Oyster Cult songs need more cowbells...
O.o
I've apparently been away from the forums too long. Is this a new policy?
I think it's been around a while.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Well, not counting Postmodern Jukebox takes on truly atrocious pop tunes... an a bunch of good rock tunes that just encourage what I'll generously call short-sighted behavior... and stuff that's already been mentioned... and the fact that most love songs that aren't about how wonderful the person is are about how miserably painful the experience is... and any and all cool villains songs...
"Break it to me Gently" by Brenda Lee. I've been in the "oh crud, you're done with this relationship and I'm not" boat, and lemme tell ya, had the lady broken it to me gently, we both would have been unhappy for a lot longer.
"Be Like the Kettle and Sing." Friggin' wartime propaganda is what that tune is, but I really, really like it...
"Suicide is Painless." Better known to most in its purely-instrumental form, since M.A.S.H. was on the air forever.
"The Wanderer," by Dion. Try a little fidelity, you swine!
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
PMJ makes everything better.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
The only good thing ever to come out of religion was the music.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
The Prodigy- Smack my (censored) up (self explanatory, although I've heard a bunch of people say that phrase is actually slang for doing heroin, which I guess is better?)
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
"Brown Sugar" by The Rolling Stones (1971)
(Misogynist AND racist!)
"I Will Possess Your Heart" by Death Cab For Cutie (2008)
(Protagonist of the song is a super-creepy stalker.)
"Rock and Roll N***er" by The Patti Smith Group (1978)
(The message is well-intentioned but misguided. Smith attempted to redefine the N-word to mean "a creative outsider shunned by society." But as a white woman, it wasn't her word to reclaim, and she had no business making the effort inilaterally.)
"Santeria" by Sublime (1996)
(Catchy song about a gang-banger hunting down the man who 'stole his woman'.)
"Before He Cheats" by Carrie Underwood (2005)
(A woman vandalizes her man's truck because she thinks he's going to dump her for someone else.)
The album L'Histiore de Melody Nelson by Serge Gainsbourg (1971)
(Echoes of the novel Lolita, about an older man who has a year-long love affair with a 15-year-old girl.)
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Depending on what's meant, The Hounds, by the Protomen.
I mean, it's a villain song in the vein of classic Disney (except, you know, more... Protomen), so... it's not exactly condoning his actions. And his actions are a liiiiiiiiiiittle vague, in the sense that it doesn't quite admit to villainy (though it's pretty obvious).
But, essentially, the song is about celebrating how he murdered a woman and blamed his best friend (manipulating public opinion so as to call for death for such a heinous crime), thereby silencing his most valid public opponents, and thus ensuring that people agree to "buy in" to his Orwellian dystopia. And succeeding.
So...
I'm just glad someone else knows who the Protomen are.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I'm just glad someone else knows who the Protomen are.Depending on what's meant, The Hounds, by the Protomen.
I mean, it's a villain song in the vein of classic Disney (except, you know, more... Protomen), so... it's not exactly condoning his actions. And his actions are a liiiiiiiiiiittle vague, in the sense that it doesn't quite admit to villainy (though it's pretty obvious).
But, essentially, the song is about celebrating how he murdered a woman and blamed his best friend (manipulating public opinion so as to call for death for such a heinous crime), thereby silencing his most valid public opponents, and thus ensuring that people agree to "buy in" to his Orwellian dystopia. And succeeding.
So...
They really are great!
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I just had to comment on the idea upthread that REM didn't want to be celebrities.
They say that, but when you sign a record deal, WTF do you think is the desired result? If the record sells, and you make money, do you think obscurity is the result?
Personally I think that's bullcrap they fed the media for the sake of their image. Being a rock star is cool. Caring about being a rock star wasn't cool in the early 90s. And not caring in general sold albums back then. Look at Nirvana.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
As for the thread title, anything from Nine Inch Nails' The Downward Spiral. Especially "Hurt".
That album is beautiful...gorgeous even, but so depressing. It's sad because I relate to all of it, even in many ways "Heresy" (and I'm Christian), because they all remind me of various low points in my life. That's why the message is razor's edge; to me, it's dangerously relevant, and I don't want to go back there.
But holy s#~* is it aesthetic purity.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Downward spiral is like there best album. My favorite anyways, but yeah its a bit depressing.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Benny Mardonez "Into the Night". It's almost a theme song for statutory rape.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Thought of another. Tool's Stinkfist
Seriously, that song is gross. It's about what you think it's about.
...but it's freakin' Tool! They're sooooooo good. Everything else about that song: the instrumentalism, the singing, even the writing about being desensitized to life and dead inside...but I can't get over the fact it ends with "shoulder deep within the borderline, relax, turn around and take my hand" - *shudder* Gross. I get that it's a metaphor, but it's a really nasty one.
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
There's Escape, by Rupert Holmes. (The Pina Coladas song)
It's about a man attempting to cheat on his wife by putting out a want ad, and his wife simultaneously attempting to cheat on him by responding to it.
But damn...
If you like Pina Coladas!
I have no conflict about that song. I straight up can't stand it.
|
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
There's quite a few country songs that have terrible messages. Most of the ones I've heard on the radio (when I've been forced to listen to country) have absolutely awful messages.
Broad strokes, I know.
Always play country music songs backwards. You quit drinking, you get out of jail, your wife comes back, you get a job....
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
"Back in Black" by AC/DC (1980)
(A violent criminal was either released or escaped from prison, and is looking to exact revenge on those who sent him there.)
"Black Mountain Killer" by Blitzen Trapper (2008)
(First-person account of a serial killer's murder spree.)
"Friend of the Devil" by The Grateful Dead (1970)
(A drifter who was married to two different women at the same time is on the run from the law.)
"Cocaine" by Eric Clapton (1976)
(Clapton claims it was an anti-cocaine song, but, c'mon!)
"Cat Scratch Fever" by Ted Nugent (1977)
(A double-entendre metaphor for repeatedly catching STIs from prostitutes. Mainly on this list because while I like this song, I also hate Ted Nugent and everything he stands for.)
"Boulevard of Broken Dreams" by Green Day (2004)
(Nihilistic and depressing.)
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
Yeah, I was a big fan of Ted Nugent before he began spouting *redacted*. I still listen to the old records I have of him, but personally he can go gargle sewage.
Not one I HATE per se but whose lyrics I find kind of disturbing (I couldn't make out any of the lyrics for a long time till I looked it up so I didn't know what it was about at first) The Cure- Icing Sugar (link here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JiTGfhSWQ6c) lyrics are listed in the first post.
Oh, here are some more...
Large chunks of Emilie Autumn's catalogue. By no means a majority, but... enough.
|
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Mine is in honor of the film The Dirt, the film adaptation of Motley Crue's biography, recently being released on Netflix. While I certainly don't approve of the actions in the Girls, Girls, Girls B-side power ballad You're All I Need, I can't deny my appreciation for the art form known as lyrical dissonance.
The title is reminiscent of soap opera star Jack Wagner's soft rock hit All I Need, as Crue bassist and chief songwriter Nixxi Sixx suspected his girlfriend of cheating on him with Wagner. Meanwhile, Sixx was cheating on her with twenty other women, but the hypocrisy failed to register in his drug-addled mind. Vince Neil's soaring upbeat vocals stood in sharp contrast to the tragic tale of the murder of a lover so that the heartbroken narrator could keep her all to himself.
Sixx showcased his dark humor most prominently in the verse-ending line, "But we finally made the news," evoking nostalgia of a time in which securing a headline could be considered relationship goals, long before the era of tweets and hashtags. While this tune would possibly be barred from mainstream airwaves in the modern climate, You're All I Need will remain in the hearts of classic headbangers as one of the all-time great ballads. (OK, maybe not. Home Sweet Home is a far more popular example of a slow pretty song from the leather-and-umlaut clad bad boys.)
Yeah, I was a big fan of Ted Nugent before he began spouting *redacted*. I still listen to the old records I have of him, but personally he can go gargle sewage.
I'm not a big fan of Ted Nugent's music or his politics, but without his public abstinence from drugs and alcohol, we wouldn't have Flex Your Head, DC Hardcore, or Straight Edge in general. I haven't been part of the SXE scene in years, but the music still holds up. Also, apparently, in person, Nugent is less of a cartoon character-- I've heard he's still friends with noted liberal rocker Henry Rollins and noted drug user Joe Rogan, for what it's worth.
I have a couple
1. Jamiroquai- Virtual Insanity: Since it seems to be saying technology is evil
2. Local H - Bound For The Floor: Not so much because I disagree with the lyrics but rather because the kind of person they describe really annoys me.
"Bodies"by the Sex Pistols,Lydon at his reactionary and prudish worst
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I have a couple
1. Jamiroquai- Virtual Insanity: Since it seems to be saying technology is evil
2. Local H - Bound For The Floor: Not so much because I disagree with the lyrics but rather because the kind of person they describe really annoys me.
"Bodies"by the Sex Pistols,Lydon at his reactionary and prudish worst
"Rocking in the Free World' by Neil Young, not so much the actual song,but how right wingers tried to co-opt it,I cant see how anyone could think its a conservative song. It savages American cultural materialism and gun culture and praises Jesse Jackson.
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
"More Than Words," by Extreme, is one that pisses me off, since the message seems to be, 'If you put out, you wouldn't have to say I love you.' Pressuring someone to have sex before they are ready, and conflating that with love, not a good look.
But I guess it only half counts, in that it's a song where I don't like the message, but I also don't like the song anyway. :)
Is that exactly the meaning behind More than Words???
"More Than Words," by Extreme, is one that pisses me off, since the message seems to be, 'If you put out, you wouldn't have to say I love you.' Pressuring someone to have sex before they are ready, and conflating that with love, not a good look.
But I guess it only half counts, in that it's a song where I don't like the message, but I also don't like the song anyway. :)
Yeah, but it's because of crap music like this that we have grunge.
Oh, man. I hate so much that you have to live with that heartache. It sometimes feels like it will never go away, especially when there are so many things to remind us of its presence. And music is one of the staunchest reminders there is.
Music, at least for me, is the only thing that has ever consistently gotten me through the darkest and angriest times in my life. I've been to counselors, taken a battery of medicines, and had the love and support of many of the truest friends anyone could ever ask for. I know that isn't the case for everyone, but had it not been for music I might have killed someone in the late 1980s after my first breakdown. I was certainly in such a shattered frame of mind that I could have. I had certainly worked out a plan to do so. I even broke into her house one night while she and her new boyfriend slept. Only her baby daughter murmuring in her sleep kept me from going ahead with the plan. Huh, I don't think I've ever admitted that to anyone before. Anyway, hearing songs that remind me deeply of the pain I've gone through actually doesn't hurt as much as they once did. They serve to remind me that I fought my way back to sanity and how proud I am of that.
Trauma does suck. Mine has never ever completely healed, even with everything I've thrown at it. I've come to terms with it to some degree, though after the second one hit in 2007 it turned me from an outgoing, mostly extroverted person into one that absolutely can't bear to be around people for very long at a time, even family and friends.
I guess I rambled on about stuff just to say this: the trauma might be something you carry with your whole life. It often takes a long time, but we by and large adapt and overcome it in order to carry on. Don't let the pain keep you from the music or anything else you love. Take strength from them. You have friends out here who understand and will stand by you and carry you when you need it. Never hesitate to reach out.
These are just three lines from a song that kept me going then. They're from "Heart of Steel" by the heavy metal band Manowar. I've lived by them for 33 years now.
"Burn the bridge behind you
Leave no retreat
There's only one way home"