Should we hate Hear'say..?

[WaldoMcFroog]

Andy Hughes said, re another question: 'As for bands like Hear'Say, the argument seems to be that their output or perceived lack of talent is 'depressing' but why? They appeal to a certain market, I, and the previous correspondents do not belong to it, so why not let it pass you by?' Okay, well this is clearly going to part subjective opinion but I don't agree with you here Andy, although I understand what you mean. The reason I personally find Hearsay, Attomic Bagladies, Blue, etc etc ad infinitum ad nauseum quite so offensive has little to do with the actual music per se. It has everything to do with the fact that because of the music industry's obsession with marketing to pre-teens means other great bands are missing out. I think it's fair enough that Here'sy etc are allowed to make records - I wouldn't expect them to close the children's section of the library just because I don't want to read kids books (*I know that's an outrageous thing to say btw - but it's so deliciously offensive, I can't help it). I don't just mean 'Oh, *MY* music isn't getting airplay (althoguh it isn't), but a whole range of stuff, from dance to indie to folk to rock to lo fi etc etc... And if kids can't hear it, how will their musical palates ever develop? There are channels developing - Six Music on the BBC for instance, but the overwhelming majority of pop programming is aimed at children, and is as cynical as standing outside the school gates offering them heroin. Am I just a musical facist? I don't think so - I like rock, metal, folk, dance, classical, goth, prog and even some pure 'pop', and buy at least 5 albums a month, but I'm not getting those leads from mainstream TV or Radio, because they play nursery rhyme music for nursery children. In fact, increasingly, they're not coming from magazines either... They're coming from online communities of netizens.Someone somewhere is failing to provide for a lot of passionate music fans...

[Waterwolf]

I agree with you Waldo, pop music is in a terrible state (it's a crying shame that 'pop' has become a dirty word), and I think Radio 1 has to take a large share of the blame. It's the nation's youth station, yet it feeds its listeners an endless diet of boy/girl bands and dance music. This, and record companies' aggressive marketing, means most young people are being exposed to a narrow range of music and being told that it is what they must listen to. You can't possibly develop your own musical tastes unless you hear a wide enough range. Groups like Hear'say have a right to exist, but if yung people hear only that type of music, it must be a bad thing for the future of popular music.

[WaldoMcFroog]

Yes, it was a little on the er... 'snappy' side, wasn't it? :-) But I wasn't having a go at Andy, but taking him at apparent face value (I think he was being reasonably light hearted himself) merely suggesting that there *are* plenty of good reasons to be depressed by such bands. And, as you point out Einstein, there have always been rubbish pop bands even in the 60s, the difference now is that if you look at the charts, all you see are the rubbish ones..! There is good music out there, but you don't find it in the charts (Where even the pop is pants - there's no 'intelligent' pop bands these days (Which I appreciate makes me sound like a right old coffin dodger)? It's a sad state of affairs when you look back and say 'Bananarama were a million times better than todays girl bands, and *they* were palapably rubbish!). Increasingly, music is ending up split between record company controlled blandola, and musicians who are working outside of the mainstream because the mainstream isn't even interested in them any more! At least Coldplay have a modicom of talent about them for an MTV darling...

[andy hughes]

The point I was raising is that the 'depression' discussed ( and I suffer as well by the way!) is less to do with the bands, or their output, than the larger context of the music industry itself. It certainly wasn't my intetion to 'reprimand' anyone, andyes, I was being light-hearted - this is one of the problems with debating in print, but we all manage to convey our responses eventually, which is the idea of the AB. So - I entirely agree that the 'dumbing down' of pop at the expense of new and innocative music is a cause for 'depression', but the output from, andpurveyors of the current trend for disposible pap are not the cause for concern. What we are seeing is a sea-change in attitudes to music - young people today (don't worry I'm not preaching!) have an entirely different attitude to pop - based on access to the Net, music on television, other competition for leisure spending, and so on. But hey - let's not get depressed shall we? I'm off to play my valued vinyl album copy of The Bat City Rollers' Greatest Hit, which always brings a smile to my wizened features!