As for MirrorMask, and I mean this nicely, but doesn't it interest you to hear where things come from and how things evolve? I remember listening to Used Bin Radio, and they were talking about "Tommy", and I realized that I had never heard it before. I went to AKA Records in Philly, bought it used for a $1.00 and checked it out, not because I'm the hugest Who fan, but because I feel like I have to know "Tommy" to know and appreciate (or not) what came after. Same with Hendrix; not the hugest Hendrix fan, but after listening to the three studio albums that he made while alive, it really explained a LOT about the music that I listened to growing up. Kiss, Priest, Scorpions (at least Roth), Vai, ALL influenced HEAVILY by Hendrix, but interestingly, Maiden, not. It puts things in context.
Well, sometime down the road I want to explore stuff I've been missing out so far... the point is that there's so much music out there and only so much free time...
I concur. I have no interest whatsoever visiting these classic bands that help shape the foundation of rock music, due to the fact that there are so much good music out there nowadays and so little time. Everyone states how great guys like Sabbath, Ozzy, Pink Floyd, Deep Purple, Def Leppard, etc. are and I'm not downplaying their achievements and what they've done, which they've done are really massive and help influence bands that I love. I just have no personal interest to listen to them and I have honestly no personal reason to do so.
There are times where I question why I love Rush and Iron Maiden above those bands and I just think it's because of their (Rush and Iron Maiden) "modern" releases and how much care and effort they put into those albums and those albums act as a gateway for me, as a younger fan, to explore their past stuff and see how it progresses from there.
I get it, this is a personal, subjective thing, but just as part of the discussion... it's important to me to hear that - as much as I love, say, ELO, they're a REALLY derivative band when you know what came before, and you know where they were influenced. The grunge movement is another great example. For me, Soundgarden is the paradigm of the grunge movement, even if Alice In Chains, Pearl Jam and Nirvana are the more well-known. Why? Because there's a whole lot more obvious "influence corner" with the other three bands; knowing that the solo in Alive is an homage to Kiss makes a difference (to me). Soundgarden was a more pure distillation, in my opinion.
It's one thing I did with my kid (and she has explicitly thanked me for this). She wanted a CD with some covers by Taylor Swift, and I told her: I'll buy you whatever music you want, but you HAVE to listen to the original too. She now "gets" Fleetwood Mac and understands the influence that Stevie Nicks had on her. Some band named Panic At The Disco (I think) did a cover of "Bohemian Rhapsody". I said "listen to this". She's a huge Queen fan now, and understands where a lot of PATD is coming from. In a weird way, she likes it MORE knowing what the singer/writer/leader has taken from Queen and what he brought to the table himself. I forget the link now, but somehow "Rush" came up, and I played "Tom Sawyer", same thing. Granted, some things get ruined; once I figured out Hendrix, a LOT of guitar players became lame to me (do something new, dude) but for the most part, the listening experience is richer for knowing where things came from. FOR ME. I get it, FOR ME. Just sharing.
As for this list? I picked only Jump and Africa. Welcome to the Jungle is a great opener to a very great debut album, but like all the bands I listed in the first paragraph, I just cannot care too much about GNR on a personal level.
I only heard about them more thoroughly because Slash picked my favorite vocalist and one of my favorite musicians ever, Myles Kennedy, to be the lead singer for his solo band. Then I started hating Slash because, to me, he was getting in the way of the things that I personally wanted Myles do more of (which is get more active with Alter Bridge and get his solo album out) and surprise, surprise.
The moment Slash rejoined GNR and his solo band is on hiatus, the less I cared about him and then Alter Bridge went on to have one of their best years ever in 2017 and that Myles finally is going to have his solo album out in 2018. Funny how that worked out and I think this is for the best that Slash's solo band is on the hiatus it is now.
Sorry about that tangent, but I had to get it out there.
In conclusion relating to the thread, Africa is just a great song to me, even I can't grasp the lyrics. Everything else about it is great and I like the intro to Jump.
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