Boards
NME Young Bands Thing
Did you see any of them?
How boring are 'the next generation' of bands going to be? They're all exact clones of Arctic Monkeys and the Kooks, looks and soundwise.
"We sound like: Arctic Monkeys, Libertines, Babyshambles etc."
Do you think if 'young people' were starting a band at the moment, the only chance they'd have of getting anywhere, is if they sound like everyone else?
It's the way
it works though. Young people in bands will copy the bands they listen to. Like when Oasis started, everyone was in a band that sounded like Oasis. Or at least, all the 14-15 year olds were.
I got lucky, and was in a band influenced by Cornershop, Pavement and Brian Deane of Leeds United. We ruled.
NME's main target demographic
is 13-18 year olds. Hence, they'll give print space to bands of that age.
"LOOK! KIDS! You too could make a BAND!"
As a music magazine, it should just be disregarded.
i think
young bands should think outside the box, have bands like blood brothers as inspiration or melt banana and be different from everyone else.
The Box were a great band - Stephen Mallinder from Cabaret Voltaire used to sing vocals for them.
I recommend the following
Whenever a few young people get together and start to take an interest in creating music they should be siezed and placed in secure and isolted location. There, they are given two CDs by two artists of widely different styles, say, for example, , Miles Davis's 'A Kind Of Blue' and SPK's 'Leichenshrei. For six months these are the only two CDs they are allowed to listen to. They are required to write enough songs for an LP.
The end result should be a new exciting sound.
I'd give them Bitches Brew instead of Kind Of Blue
And who are SPK again?
Oh dear
Look them up
Oh dear.
There's no reason to suppose that anyone with an interest in music has heard of exactly the same bands as you, John, no matter how important or noteworthy you consider them to be. You should really stop being so superior about having heard some band, especially when dealling with people who have had a decade or two less than you to listen to music. It's deeply ungracious.
In answer to Wrightlylew's question
Whenever'young people' have started a band at any point in history there only chance of gettign somewhere has been soundign like everyone else.
The majority of bands signed and promoted will always be facsimilies of whatever else is going on.
But what makes a difference is that every now and then a band breaks through that isn't the same. And that's how music moves on.
Exactly.
So what do you want to be, a tag-on copy of a better band, or an iconic band that other people copy themselves, and are remembered originators rather than forgotten as copyists?
I guess it's a decision between wanting the chance of a few years of copyist band fun then a dayjob / low level industry job, or a comittment to making music you actually believe in, and a belief that your own ideas and music will get you somewhere.