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General => General Music Discussion => Topic started by: npiazza91 on July 11, 2014, 02:42:14 PM
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I like thinking about the people's personality traits when it comes to different genres of music. I'm a very introverted person, love meeting people, but don't really like to be around groups of people for a long period of time. I'm not shy at all, I just have a harder time getting to know people in groups, as opposed to just having a conversation. I'm not judgmental at all and I'm actually fascinated by how people are so different from each other, yet so alike at the same time.
Anyway enough about me. It seems like (from who I've spoken to) people think that prog lovers are much smarter people because the music is much more complex and a simple minded person just "doesn't get it". However, I think it's a little bit different than that. I think most of the people that listen to prog are generally more open minded about other people and their personal tastes, and they have more of an understanding of interpersonal relationships than other people. They know what to say, when to say it and how to say it, and are generally perceptive of other people's feelings. I'm not speaking for everyone that likes prog, but it seems like a lot of them do. Think about it. Prog in general sounds different than any other genre of music. Those who can appreciate the differences and accept them for what they are, actually learn to love these differences and look past the things that the average person would like in the average commercial song, are more likely to do that when it comes to other things in life.
Then again, I could be wrong, and music taste actually has nothing to do with someone's personality, or way that they view the world. What do you think?
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I think Prog is so segmented, I cannot see how someone who was just into prog could have an open mind. I find the people with the most open mindedness are the ones that can listen to anything, especially pop.
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No. Some prog fans are extremely close minded.
Not that that's necessarily a bad thing, it's just a thing.
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I find the people with the most open mindedness are the ones that can listen to anything, especially pop.
This. I often see the "complex is automatically better than simple music" mentality (i used to think this way in the past too), which is stupid.
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I think Prog is so segmented, I cannot see how someone who was just into prog could have an open mind. I find the people with the most open mindedness are the ones that can listen to anything, especially pop.
I agree with the first part, but the "especially pop" part I disagree with. Pop isn't hard to like for the average person to just pick up and listen to. I would think it's the opposite, with pop. However, yes I do agree that the people that listen to more genres than others are generally the more open minded ones, good point. It's hard to narrow down specific genres without stereotyping people.
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Pop isn't hard to like for the average person to just pick up and listen to. I would think it's the opposite, with pop.
What? that doesn't make sense. The fact that the average person will like pop means that the average person is generally more open minded about music.
I guess you could make the point that the average person may have some stereotypical notions about certain genres, but I consider pop the most wide ranged type of music.
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Are "prog" fans generally more open minded people?
You must be new to the forum.
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Are "prog" fans generally more open minded people?
You must be new to the forum.
:lol
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I would say the opposite happens. Prog fans "open up" to prog, think they've found the best music ever, and proceed to never check out anything new that isn't "prog" again, because how could it be good?
Though I guess neither caricature is really helpful.
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Pop isn't hard to like for the average person to just pick up and listen to. I would think it's the opposite, with pop.
What? that doesn't make sense. The fact that the average person will like pop means that the average person is generally more open minded about music.
I guess you could make the point that the average person may have some stereotypical notions about certain genres, but I consider pop the most wide ranged type of music.
My bad, I definitely worded that wrong. Both of those sentences were basically the same thing, just worded differently. If you take either of those two sentences out, it makes more sense, haha. I don't know why I did that.
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I would say the opposite happens. Prog fans "open up" to prog, think they've found the best music ever, and proceed to never check out anything new that isn't "prog" again, because how could it be good?
Exactly :tup
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Pop isn't hard to like for the average person to just pick up and listen to. I would think it's the opposite, with pop.
What? that doesn't make sense. The fact that the average person will like pop means that the average person is generally more open minded about music.
I guess you could make the point that the average person may have some stereotypical notions about certain genres, but I consider pop the most wide ranged type of music.
My bad, I definitely worded that wrong. Both of those sentences were basically the same thing, just worded differently. If you take either of those two sentences out, it makes more sense, haha. I don't know why I did that.
You must be new to the forum.
:biggrin:
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I would say the opposite happens. Prog fans "open up" to prog, think they've found the best music ever, and proceed to never check out anything new that isn't "prog" again, because how could it be good?
Though I guess neither caricature is really helpful.
Yeah I used to think that as well. The only thing is, while yes, music is subjective, the same could be said of paintings, movies, and the beauty of another person (among other things). I can say all day that a painting by DaVinci is not as good as a painting I made myself. However, quality is quality. While taste is subjective, the actual quality of something is not subjective. My personal opinion is that whatever music anyone likes, I don't think less of them in any way. People like what they like. What I do think is that they could potentially be missing out on something they have not tried yet. That is why pop music is, in my opinion, sort of like a music trap. The people that like it don't seem to feel the need to like anything that isn't catchy or 3 minutes. I feel like the people that listen to prog have already opened their mind to get there, since it is not easily accessible. If it was easily accessible, prog would be all over the mainstream radio hits.
I started listening to pop when I was 7, then glam rock, then old school metal, then industrial metal, then thrash metal, and finally prog. That's just me.
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I would say the opposite happens. Prog fans "open up" to prog, think they've found the best music ever, and proceed to never check out anything new that isn't "prog" again, because how could it be good?
Though I guess neither caricature is really helpful.
Yeah I used to think that as well. The only thing is, while yes, music is subjective, the same could be said of paintings, movies, and the beauty of another person (among other things). I can say all day that a painting by DaVinci is not as good as a painting I made myself. However, quality is quality. While taste is subjective, the actual quality of something is not subjective. My personal opinion is that whatever music anyone likes, I don't think less of them in any way. People like what they like. What I do think is that they could potentially be missing out on something they have not tried yet. That is why pop music is, in my opinion, sort of like a music trap. The people that like it don't seem to feel the need to like anything that isn't catchy or 3 minutes. I feel like the people that listen to prog have already opened their mind to get there, since it is not easily accessible. If it was easily accessible, prog would be all over the mainstream radio hits.
I started listening to pop when I was 7, then glam rock, then old school metal, then industrial metal, then thrash metal, and finally prog. That's just me.
Enlighten me as to how you can definitively define quality.
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I would say the opposite happens. Prog fans "open up" to prog, think they've found the best music ever, and proceed to never check out anything new that isn't "prog" again, because how could it be good?
Though I guess neither caricature is really helpful.
Yeah I used to think that as well. The only thing is, while yes, music is subjective, the same could be said of paintings, movies, and the beauty of another person (among other things). I can say all day that a painting by DaVinci is not as good as a painting I made myself. However, quality is quality. While taste is subjective, the actual quality of something is not subjective. My personal opinion is that whatever music anyone likes, I don't think less of them in any way. People like what they like. What I do think is that they could potentially be missing out on something they have not tried yet. That is why pop music is, in my opinion, sort of like a music trap. The people that like it don't seem to feel the need to like anything that isn't catchy or 3 minutes. I feel like the people that listen to prog have already opened their mind to get there, since it is not easily accessible. If it was easily accessible, prog would be all over the mainstream radio hits.
I started listening to pop when I was 7, then glam rock, then old school metal, then industrial metal, then thrash metal, and finally prog. That's just me.
Enlighten me as to how you can definitively define quality.
Well, if I draw a picture, but you can't even make out what I drew, then you drew a picture which had clearly defined details and shades, your picture would be the better picture. Sure, someone could LIKE my picture better, but yours IS the better picture. The person that liked mine is liking something of lesser quality. It doesn't make that person wrong, because TASTE ITSELF is subjective. People can like what they like.
Take the movie THE ROOM, this is actually a great example. I'm sure Tommy Wiseau still thinks this movie is a masterpiece. However, the acting is terrible, the plot makes almost no sense and the characters are all over the place. Tommy is able to love this movie, but this movie that he loves so much is a terrible film, quality wise.
Now I don't know a whole lot about song writing or music theory, so I can't speak for what songs are actual quality over others, but all I have to say is Beethoven vs Justin Bieber. Who has more talent? Even though more people do listen to Bieber, there is no comparison here who's music is of better quality. For the record, I don't listen to classical at all, so my opinions are in no way, shape, or form, seeping through.
Like I said, simply LIKING something doesn't make you wrong, as taste is subjective. But, some things we enjoy are of lesser quality than others. I really like Batman and Robin for example, it's fun to watch. However, it is also a terribly made film.
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That is why pop music is, in my opinion, sort of like a music trap. The people that like it don't seem to feel the need to like anything that isn't catchy or 3 minutes.
I think you're confusing pop with mainstream radio music because catchy/3 minutes hardly represent all of the genre.
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I would say the opposite happens. Prog fans "open up" to prog, think they've found the best music ever, and proceed to never check out anything new that isn't "prog" again, because how could it be good?
Though I guess neither caricature is really helpful.
Yeah I used to think that as well. The only thing is, while yes, music is subjective, the same could be said of paintings, movies, and the beauty of another person (among other things). I can say all day that a painting by DaVinci is not as good as a painting I made myself. However, quality is quality. While taste is subjective, the actual quality of something is not subjective. My personal opinion is that whatever music anyone likes, I don't think less of them in any way. People like what they like. What I do think is that they could potentially be missing out on something they have not tried yet. That is why pop music is, in my opinion, sort of like a music trap. The people that like it don't seem to feel the need to like anything that isn't catchy or 3 minutes. I feel like the people that listen to prog have already opened their mind to get there, since it is not easily accessible. If it was easily accessible, prog would be all over the mainstream radio hits.
I started listening to pop when I was 7, then glam rock, then old school metal, then industrial metal, then thrash metal, and finally prog. That's just me.
Likewise, I started with rock and pop, moved on to prog, experimental, discovered old school metal (through DT), classic metal, classic prog, indie, electronic, etc., roughly in that order. And I discover new music in non-prog genres that is WAY more interesting than what most prog bands are doing.
Trust me, dude. Prog is just where you are at on your particular path. As someone who discovered prog and now still finds plenty of non-prog stuff that's just as good if not better than prog, where you *think* you are musically and how open minded you *think* are to new things is completely relative to where you started. If you already think you've found the best music your mind is already closed to all the great music (prog and non prog) still yet to be made.
There is nothing wrong for spending some time obsessing over a particular genre, my feeling is that you are just obsessed with prog right now, but if you continue to prioritize listening to music later in life the same way you do when you're in high school and college, you will discover that there is still plenty to discover.
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Now I don't know a whole lot about song writing or music theory, so I can't speak for what songs are actual quality over others, but all I have to say is Beethoven vs Justin Bieber. Who has more talent?
See, you pick a defining representant of classical music and put it up against Justin Bieber, who hardly represents anything, making it pretty unfair for Pop.
In that regards, (the best of) Classical x (the best of) Pop would be something like Beethoven (or many others) x Lennon/McCartney or Brian Wilson.
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Well, if I draw a picture, but you can't even make out what I drew, then you drew a picture which had clearly defined details and shades, your picture would be the better picture. Sure, someone could LIKE my picture better, but yours IS the better picture. The person that liked mine is liking something of lesser quality. It doesn't make that person wrong, because TASTE ITSELF is subjective. People can like what they like.
Take the movie THE ROOM, this is actually a great example. I'm sure Tommy Wiseau still thinks this movie is a masterpiece. However, the acting is terrible, the plot makes almost no sense and the characters are all over the place. Tommy is able to love this movie, but this movie that he loves so much is a terrible film, quality wise.
Now I don't know a whole lot about song writing or music theory, so I can't speak for what songs are actual quality over others, but all I have to say is Beethoven vs Justin Bieber. Who has more talent? Even though more people do listen to Bieber, there is no comparison here who's music is of better quality. For the record, I don't listen to classical at all, so my opinions are in no way, shape, or form, seeping through.
Like I said, simply LIKING something doesn't make you wrong, as taste is subjective. But, some things we enjoy are of lesser quality than others. I really like Batman and Robin for example, it's fun to watch. However, it is also a terribly made film.
You haven't defined what makes something good, though. You're just saying something makes some things better than others, but you can't quantify it.
And greater talent doesn't necessarily correlate to greater quality. Some of the best musicians in the world can make completely boring music.
I don't think there's anything inherently "better" about a piece of art in contrast to another, beyond taste and convention.
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Are "prog" fans generally more open minded people?
You must be new to the forum.
/thread
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I would say the opposite happens. Prog fans "open up" to prog, think they've found the best music ever, and proceed to never check out anything new that isn't "prog" again, because how could it be good?
Though I guess neither caricature is really helpful.
[/quote]
Yeah I used to think that as well. The only thing is, while yes, music is subjective, the same could be said of paintings, movies, and the beauty of another person (among other things). I can say all day that a painting by DaVinci is not as good as a painting I made myself. However, quality is quality. While taste is subjective, the actual quality of something is not subjective. My personal opinion is that whatever music anyone likes, I don't think less of them in any way. People like what they like. What I do think is that they could potentially be missing out on something they have not tried yet. That is why pop music is, in my opinion, sort of like a music trap. The people that like it don't seem to feel the need to like anything that isn't catchy or 3 minutes. I feel like the people that listen to prog have already opened their mind to get there, since it is not easily accessible. If it was easily accessible, prog would be all over the mainstream radio hits.
I started listening to pop when I was 7, then glam rock, then old school metal, then industrial metal, then thrash metal, and finally prog. That's just me.
[/quote]
Likewise, I started with rock and pop, moved on to prog, experimental, discovered old school metal (through DT), classic metal, classic prog, indie, electronic, etc., roughly in that order. And I discover new music in non-prog genres that is WAY more interesting than what most prog bands are doing.
Trust me, dude. Prog is just where you are at on your particular path. As someone who discovered prog and now still finds plenty of non-prog stuff that's just as good if not better than prog, where you *think* you are musically and how open minded you *think* are to new things is completely relative to where you started. If you already think you've found the best music your mind is already closed to all the great music (prog and non prog) still yet to be made.
There is nothing wrong for spending some time obsessing over a particular genre, my feeling is that you are just obsessed with prog right now, but if you continue to prioritize listening to music later in life the same way you do when you're in high school and college, you will discover that there is still plenty to discover.
Thank you for this insightful response. I am on a "prog binge" right now, and it is really hard to open your mind to other things when you're on a particular binge. We all have a music path to follow, and let me tell you, I love every second of mine.
[/quote]
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Another thing about being new to the forum: quote mishaps. :P
Although that happens to regular members too. :lol
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Now I don't know a whole lot about song writing or music theory, so I can't speak for what songs are actual quality over others, but all I have to say is Beethoven vs Justin Bieber. Who has more talent?
See, you pick a defining representant of classical music and put it up against Justin Bieber, who hardly represents anything, making it pretty unfair for Pop.
In that regards, (the best of) Classical x (the best of) Pop would be something like Beethoven (or many others) x Lennon/McCartney or Brian Wilson.
Well my post above somehow got screwed up, let's see if this one will be ok. Yu make a good point, it was unfair.
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lolno
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Well, if I draw a picture, but you can't even make out what I drew, then you drew a picture which had clearly defined details and shades, your picture would be the better picture. Sure, someone could LIKE my picture better, but yours IS the better picture. The person that liked mine is liking something of lesser quality. It doesn't make that person wrong, because TASTE ITSELF is subjective. People can like what they like.
Take the movie THE ROOM, this is actually a great example. I'm sure Tommy Wiseau still thinks this movie is a masterpiece. However, the acting is terrible, the plot makes almost no sense and the characters are all over the place. Tommy is able to love this movie, but this movie that he loves so much is a terrible film, quality wise.
Now I don't know a whole lot about song writing or music theory, so I can't speak for what songs are actual quality over others, but all I have to say is Beethoven vs Justin Bieber. Who has more talent? Even though more people do listen to Bieber, there is no comparison here who's music is of better quality. For the record, I don't listen to classical at all, so my opinions are in no way, shape, or form, seeping through.
Like I said, simply LIKING something doesn't make you wrong, as taste is subjective. But, some things we enjoy are of lesser quality than others. I really like Batman and Robin for example, it's fun to watch. However, it is also a terribly made film.
You haven't defined what makes something good, though. You're just saying something makes some things better than others, but you can't quantify it.
And greater talent doesn't necessarily correlate to greater quality. Some of the best musicians in the world can make completely boring music.
I don't think there's anything inherently "better" about a piece of art in contrast to another, beyond taste and convention.
For the first point, I gave a few examples of what makes a film better than another.
For the second point, I agree with this.
For the third point, I disagree. I think there is a difference between perceived quality and actual quality.
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OK, well for the film comparison, let's take that further. How do you define "good" acting? If there is some objective standard, why do people not agree on what constitutes good acting? And some film makers (David Lynch, I think) are revered for films where the plot makes no sense.
The thing it always comes down to is subjectivity.
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OK, well for the film comparison, let's take that further. How do you define "good" acting? If there is some objective standard, why do people not agree on what constitutes good acting? And some film makers (David Lynch, I think) are revered for films where the plot makes no sense.
The thing it always comes down to is subjectivity.
Good acting is where the actor can clearly be convincing in becoming the person he is portrayed as. I do know some people who cannot tell good acting from bad acting. That is ok, but it is up to them to decide if they want to educate themselves on how to act or what good acting entails.
David Lynch is a weird example haha. I happen to love his movies, however his films are so strange, over the top, and dream like that I would actually put him in the category of completely subjective, since trying to analyze his films so much to the point of figuring out how good of films they actually are...would make one's head explode. I'm still debating about "Lost Highway" to this day. Someone may hate David Lynch films (actually many people do) but you can't argue that the psychological themes of most of his films are of better quality than that of a typical R rated comedy. To go way in depth into Lynch's films would make someone go crazy...I'm kidding of course. It's funny you bring up David Lynch, because I think of Lynch the same way I do Prog...hard to understand and appreciate at first, but if you put in the effort, it pays off.
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Well, if I draw a picture, but you can't even make out what I drew, then you drew a picture which had clearly defined details and shades, your picture would be the better picture. Sure, someone could LIKE my picture better, but yours IS the better picture. The person that liked mine is liking something of lesser quality. It doesn't make that person wrong, because TASTE ITSELF is subjective. People can like what they like.
Take the movie THE ROOM, this is actually a great example. I'm sure Tommy Wiseau still thinks this movie is a masterpiece. However, the acting is terrible, the plot makes almost no sense and the characters are all over the place. Tommy is able to love this movie, but this movie that he loves so much is a terrible film, quality wise.
Now I don't know a whole lot about song writing or music theory, so I can't speak for what songs are actual quality over others, but all I have to say is Beethoven vs Justin Bieber. Who has more talent? Even though more people do listen to Bieber, there is no comparison here who's music is of better quality. For the record, I don't listen to classical at all, so my opinions are in no way, shape, or form, seeping through.
Like I said, simply LIKING something doesn't make you wrong, as taste is subjective. But, some things we enjoy are of lesser quality than others. I really like Batman and Robin for example, it's fun to watch. However, it is also a terribly made film.
Your first point completely discounts any sort of abstract art whatsoever. So by your definition, abstract art cannot be better than more straight forward forms of art.
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Prog, to about 90%, is absolutely contrived horse shit. The most generic statement you could make about prog listeners is that they are likely to listen to contrived horse shit.
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Are "prog" fans generally more open minded people?
You must be new to the forum.
I love you so much.
To the OP : no.
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Well, if I draw a picture, but you can't even make out what I drew, then you drew a picture which had clearly defined details and shades, your picture would be the better picture. Sure, someone could LIKE my picture better, but yours IS the better picture. The person that liked mine is liking something of lesser quality. It doesn't make that person wrong, because TASTE ITSELF is subjective. People can like what they like.
Take the movie THE ROOM, this is actually a great example. I'm sure Tommy Wiseau still thinks this movie is a masterpiece. However, the acting is terrible, the plot makes almost no sense and the characters are all over the place. Tommy is able to love this movie, but this movie that he loves so much is a terrible film, quality wise.
Now I don't know a whole lot about song writing or music theory, so I can't speak for what songs are actual quality over others, but all I have to say is Beethoven vs Justin Bieber. Who has more talent? Even though more people do listen to Bieber, there is no comparison here who's music is of better quality. For the record, I don't listen to classical at all, so my opinions are in no way, shape, or form, seeping through.
Like I said, simply LIKING something doesn't make you wrong, as taste is subjective. But, some things we enjoy are of lesser quality than others. I really like Batman and Robin for example, it's fun to watch. However, it is also a terribly made film.
Your first point completely discounts any sort of abstract art whatsoever. So by your definition, abstract art cannot be better than more straight forward forms of art.
Abstract art is different than being a bad artist. I can't make a bad drawing/painting and say it's abstract art. They even joke about it in some comedies.
Here's another example. Say I try and make a bench. I know nothing about bench making, but a carpenter, who probably knows how to make one a lot better than I do, will make the better bench. He is more skilled at making things, therefore his work will be of better quality. Haven't you ever heard people say "oh he's the best doctor/lawyer/whatever? They are good because the work they do is better than what other people do in the same field. It's the same with musicians or writers or directors. Some people make better things than others. Sure, I might like the shitty bench, for whatever reason, but it's not as good of a bench than the one the carpenter made. It's just how it is. I understand what "subjective" means. People are going to like different things, I get that, and there is nothing wrong with that. The fact is, though, certain things are just better than others. Now if you take different types of soda, such as Coke or Pepsi or Mountain Dew...they are of equal quality and this is where subjective is 100% on the subject. However, store brand Dr Pepper is of lesser quality than regular Dr Pepper. Some people might like store brand better (myself included) but it is the lesser of the two.
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That's because a bench has a definable purpose. Movies, music, art, they don't, except to be enjoyed. And enjoyment, then, is still subjective.
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Abstract art is different than being a bad artist. I can't make a bad drawing/painting and say it's abstract art. They even joke about it in some comedies.
Here's another example. Say I try and make a bench. I know nothing about bench making, but a carpenter, who probably knows how to make one a lot better than I do, will make the better bench. He is more skilled at making things, therefore his work will be of better quality. Haven't you ever heard people say "oh he's the best doctor/lawyer/whatever? They are good because the work they do is better than what other people do in the same field. It's the same with musicians or writers or directors. Some people make better things than others. Sure, I might like the shitty bench, for whatever reason, but it's not as good of a bench than the one the carpenter made. It's just how it is. I understand what "subjective" means. People are going to like different things, I get that, and there is nothing wrong with that. The fact is, though, certain things are just better than others. Now if you take different types of soda, such as Coke or Pepsi or Mountain Dew...they are of equal quality and this is where subjective is 100% on the subject. However, store brand Dr Pepper is of lesser quality than regular Dr Pepper. Some people might like store brand better (myself included) but it is the lesser of the two.
Is seems as if the first question you need to answer is: What is quality and how can it be measured?
Is quality simply a conformity to the norms of a group of people about how a certain product (music, soda, film, etc.) show be made and presented?
Also, you can't compare music across such a wide field in terms of raw quality. How can pop and prog be compared when they don't even usually share the same musical goals? And make no mistake, there is usually a lot of skill behind the hit pop songs (and many times the ones that aren't hits as well). It may not always be the name on the album that possesses that skill, it may not be the name that sells the concert tickets, but it is somewhere there nonetheless.
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Take the movie THE ROOM, this is actually a great example. I'm sure Tommy Wiseau still thinks this movie is a masterpiece. However, the acting is terrible, the plot makes almost no sense and the characters are all over the place. Tommy is able to love this movie, but this movie that he loves so much is a terrible film, quality wise.
This is bullshit.
Oh hi Mark
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That's because a bench has a definable purpose. Movies, music, art, they don't, except to be enjoyed. And enjoyment, then, is still subjective.
It depends on the artist. Also, music doesn't necessarily have to be for entertainment. I mean, part of it is, but depending on the group, person, or song, each has its own goals and trying to diagnose every single one of those will probably get you nowhere. You bring up a good point, but it's far more complicated then just enjoyment. I can't speak for how smart you are, but realistically I consider myself a bit above average (don't know my actual IQ) but going as deep into it as I proposed earlier won't be easy for me.
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Abstract art is different than being a bad artist. I can't make a bad drawing/painting and say it's abstract art. They even joke about it in some comedies.
Here's another example. Say I try and make a bench. I know nothing about bench making, but a carpenter, who probably knows how to make one a lot better than I do, will make the better bench. He is more skilled at making things, therefore his work will be of better quality. Haven't you ever heard people say "oh he's the best doctor/lawyer/whatever? They are good because the work they do is better than what other people do in the same field. It's the same with musicians or writers or directors. Some people make better things than others. Sure, I might like the shitty bench, for whatever reason, but it's not as good of a bench than the one the carpenter made. It's just how it is. I understand what "subjective" means. People are going to like different things, I get that, and there is nothing wrong with that. The fact is, though, certain things are just better than others. Now if you take different types of soda, such as Coke or Pepsi or Mountain Dew...they are of equal quality and this is where subjective is 100% on the subject. However, store brand Dr Pepper is of lesser quality than regular Dr Pepper. Some people might like store brand better (myself included) but it is the lesser of the two.
Is seems as if the first question you need to answer is: What is quality and how can it be measured?
Is quality simply a conformity to the norms of a group of people about how a certain product (music, soda, film, etc.) show be made and presented?
Also, you can't compare music across such a wide field in terms of raw quality. How can pop and prog be compared when they don't even usually share the same musical goals? And make no mistake, there is usually a lot of skill behind the hit pop songs (and many times the ones that aren't hits as well). It may not always be the name on the album that possesses that skill, it may not be the name that sells the concert tickets, but it is somewhere there nonetheless.
I like your approach to this. I'm going to sleep right now, but I will definitely get back to you tomorrow on this. This is fun.
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"And we’re gonna play the new Madonna where she rips a fart,
And then stand around talking about why it’s art"
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"And we’re gonna play the new Madonna where she rips a fart,
And then stand around talking about why it’s art"
Kevin Gilbert :heart
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OK, well for the film comparison, let's take that further. How do you define "good" acting? If there is some objective standard, why do people not agree on what constitutes good acting? And some film makers (David Lynch, I think) are revered for films where the plot makes no sense.
The thing it always comes down to is subjectivity.
Good acting is where the actor can clearly be convincing in becoming the person he is portrayed as. I do know some people who cannot tell good acting from bad acting. That is ok, but it is up to them to decide if they want to educate themselves on how to act or what good acting entails.
So basically, if anybody disagrees with you about whether or not an actor is convincing, they just don't understand acting as well as you do?
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He does consider his intelligence above average.
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Prog, to about 90%, is absolutely contrived horse shit. The most generic statement you could make about prog listeners is that they are likely to listen to contrived horse shit.
:lol
I don't think prog fans are any more open minded than other music fans. Of course many will be, but that goes for fans of any genre, including pop or whatever. And the idea kind of implies that not liking prog must be due to being close minded, rather than simply finding it to be crap. :lol
In my experience, prog fans aren't more open minded, just different minded. For every musical door they open up, they often seem to close up another.
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can't we all just agree that all music fans are awful
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The thing about quality in music is that like other forms of art, it's about giving you an experience. Literature gives you an experience totally different than music can give you, for example. Each experience is totally unique, you can't describe it 100% and hope that the other understands the whole thing, especially the subtle nuances - he may understand, but can't relive it with full details. It has to do with everybody's own previous experiences. Why do some people cry of joy with The Spirit Carries On while others just think it's cheesy and boring? The first one might remember a deceased relative and that song may have helped him to overcome it's death, while the second might have never liked songs in that style.
What I'm trying to say is that we can't determine the quality of something in an absolute objective way, because that's impossible for us human beings. About that film, the acting may be awful and the plot confusing, but if somebody enjoyed it, he'd think that despite all the "flaws", it was all connected in a way that gave him a certain experience, and later when he thought about the quality of the movie (because we can't analyze an experience while we're having it!), he'd have thought it was awesome. And a critic will have a different experience. He may notice the flaws during the movie, self-interrupting the immersion, and think it has a low quality, because his experience was bad. To analyze an experience you need to use introspection, and that is obviously subjective. Even when you say something has all the elements to be "objectively better" than something else, you're focusing in one or a few viewpoints. And, then, viewpoints are subjective. As Shadow Ninja said, «The thing it always comes down to is subjectivity».
About the OP, I agree with what Blob said.
In my experience, prog fans aren't more open minded, just different minded. For every musical door they open up, they often seem to close up another.
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This is one of those questions when you can't say "it's A or B", because we music fans are all different. But from my own personal experience, I actually feel the opposite. So many narrow minded Prog-fans, if it isn't progressive, it's not interesting.
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I think prog fans can be split into (at least) two groups:
A) Those who fall in love with prog so hard that they become snobby and consider every other kind of music inferior and "unintelligent" if there are no 20-minute songs and 100 time signature changes (close minded)
B) Those who discover other genres through prog by, say, introducing themselves to bands and artists their favorite musicians have been influenced by (open minded)
Although I still mostly listen to metal and prog, I belong to the latter group, as I've gotten into stuff like trip hop, synth pop, shoegazing, etc.
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Are "prog" fans generally more open minded people?
You must be new to the forum.
:lol
And no, they're not, but they're not any less open minded either. People are people.
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I think it would be helpful if you clearly defined what you mean by open-mindedness. I suspect you are equating people with a broad taste in music as being open minded, which I find as a flawed presumption, and frankly, arrogant.
To me, an open minded music fan would be someone who is willing to be exposed to any music...but that does not require them to enjoy it. As many others have pointed out, subjectivity plays into it way too much.
Conversely, what is a closed-minded music fan? I would answer, someone who refuses to try anything other than one genre? I've tried getting into hip-hop many times. Often when I've been told by someone, who's taste in music I admire, that "_______________ rap album is terrific." I've given it multiple listens and have been left unimpressed. Does that make me closed-minded or just that rap just isn't my thing?
I assume there are very open-minded people who've sincerely tried out a huge variety of music styles but still only truly enjoy one genre. Subjectivity is the key.
Besides, who's to say that having a broad taste in music is more desirable than having a narrow one? It would certainly be easier on the wallet.
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Liking more types of music objectively makes you a better person.
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:lol
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Whether it's prog you're listening to or not is irrelevant. It all depends on how you go about it.
Really, I feel like the more open-minded will listen to any form of music, or at least won't close themselves up to just one style of music.
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can't we all just agree that all music fans are awful
I was awful before it was popular.
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ITT: the OP indirectly proves his point in his responses :lol
I think you have to be open minded to get into prog, but people who champion it as a genre can be so closed minded (which, to be fair, is what happens with a lot of people who champion particular genres) that it amuses me.
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OK, well for the film comparison, let's take that further. How do you define "good" acting? If there is some objective standard, why do people not agree on what constitutes good acting? And some film makers (David Lynch, I think) are revered for films where the plot makes no sense.
The thing it always comes down to is subjectivity.
Good acting is where the actor can clearly be convincing in becoming the person he is portrayed as. I do know some people who cannot tell good acting from bad acting. That is ok, but it is up to them to decide if they want to educate themselves on how to act or what good acting entails.
So basically, if anybody disagrees with you about whether or not an actor is convincing, they just don't understand acting as well as you do?
Some people understand things better than others. I don't know anything about Calculus, but I'd be interested to hear what a Calculus major could be able to teach me, I love learning new things. It's not a disagreement when it's a true vs false. Someone who can act (the is, pulling off a character convincingly) is a better actor than someone who can't.
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I think prog fans can be split into (at least) two groups:
A) Those who fall in love with prog so hard that they become snobby and consider every other kind of music inferior and "unintelligent" if there are no 20-minute songs and 100 time signature changes (close minded)
B) Those who discover other genres through prog by, say, introducing themselves to bands and artists their favorite musicians have been influenced by (open minded)
Although I still mostly listen to metal and prog, I belong to the latter group, as I've gotten into stuff like trip hop, synth pop, shoegazing, etc.
I both agree and disagree with this. For "A", you can substitute prog with any other genre.
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Liking more types of music objectively makes you a better person.
I appreciated your responses before, but I do no appreciate this passive aggressive response. We're all adults here having a discussion. Let's keep it that way.
That is not what I said. I never said it makes you a better person. Please copy and paste where I said it makes you a better person. Like I said earlier, people like what they like, no genre makes someone intelligent. I was just trying to have a discussion on open mindedness and prog music. I'm enjoying this and want to keep it going. I don't know what's so hard about having a discussion without feeling the need to insult someone.
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Dude, that wasn't a serious response.
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ITT: the OP indirectly proves his point in his responses :lol
I think you have to be open minded to get into prog, but people who champion it as a genre can be so closed minded (which, to be fair, is what happens with a lot of people who champion particular genres) that it amuses me.
You actually hit the nail on the head. I think you have to be open minded to GET INTO prog. However, if you're open minded already before getting into prog, once you get into it and are saying it's "the best" and nothing is better, then you're...close minded? Are we running into a paradox here folks?
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Dude, that wasn't a serious response.
Ok, that's fine, but how was I supposed to know? It felt passive aggressive to me and a bit uncalled for. Since you can't tell affect on the internet, all I can go on is the words that are being typed. Just a miscommunication, don't worry about it.
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OK, well for the film comparison, let's take that further. How do you define "good" acting? If there is some objective standard, why do people not agree on what constitutes good acting? And some film makers (David Lynch, I think) are revered for films where the plot makes no sense.
The thing it always comes down to is subjectivity.
Good acting is where the actor can clearly be convincing in becoming the person he is portrayed as. I do know some people who cannot tell good acting from bad acting. That is ok, but it is up to them to decide if they want to educate themselves on how to act or what good acting entails.
So basically, if anybody disagrees with you about whether or not an actor is convincing, they just don't understand acting as well as you do?
Some people understand things better than others. I don't know anything about Calculus, but I'd be interested to hear what a Calculus major could be able to teach me, I love learning new things. It's not a disagreement when it's a true vs false. Someone who can act (the is, pulling off a character convincingly) is a better actor than someone who can't.
But if I find an actor convincing, how can you say that the actor is objectively not convincing? He convinced me, after all. You could argue that I don't know much about acting, but I could just as easily argue that you know so much about acting that you've developed biased about which acting styles you like. Regardless of those arguments, the fact is, he convinced one of us, but not the other. How do we know who is objectively right? Majority vote?
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Jesus...are you seriously attempting to make an argument that acting is a measurable, objective facet? You are wrong. It's not. :lol How about making an argument that cooking is an objective issue? Art? Sex? The argument you're attempting to make could be molded for anything...which is why, no offense meant by this at all...it's full of shit. Acting, much like anything in life, has suggestions, helpful advice, but the rest is up to the audience to simply 'like' or 'dislike' (or rather 'to be entertained' or to not). You cannot say that someone is 'acting wrong' as in 'these facts are false'. There are people that 'think' (an opinion) *Big name actor* is horrible, and a sect of people that think he/she is amazing. Now, you can rant all day about how said actor has encompassed this character perfectly...except...oopsie, that character is a creation of a writer, lest they're portraying a living person (and even then, it'd be extremely difficult for anyone to argue that a person portraying a once-living or living person has done it either 'right' or 'wrong' given that...well, they're not the person being portrayed. Now, if Jesse James rose from the grave and said "BRAD PITT YOU SUCK, THAT'S NOT HOW I WAS", you might have an argument...even then...maybe Jesse is lying cause he's a dick). At the end of the day the entire concept of acting has no measurable facts...there's nothing to be made into fact.
Also, why are you comparing calculus, the most measurable, set-in-stone, unarguable subject on the face of the planet, mathematics, to something that was created to kill boredom and has absolutely no laws? It seems to me that's actually an argument against your position.
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Yeah. I think Nicolas Cage is a hilariously bad actor and can't take anything seriously that he appears in. But if others like him that's cool, and there's nothing wrong with their opinion.
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Right. Everything about the subject is opinion. The very definition of acting is based around playing to the opinions and emotions of those the person is entertaining. There are no absolutes. The closest thing you'll get to trying to make acting into something that is 'right or wrong' is...nope, Chuck Testa.
For the record, I too think Nic Cage is horrendous, even in his best roles. That doesn't mean he's portraying the role 'wrong', it just means I don't like the way he's doing it. There's some people that will genuinely defend Cage to their dying breath, and even those insane people are not wrong. :P
Hell, the very words 'good' and 'bad' denote opinion. Good acting to one is bad acting to another.
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Personally, I like to argue both sides purely for the mental exercise. But in actuality, I don't think it is ALL subjective nor do I think it is ALL objective.
The problem is that while I agree that opinions vary greatly, and that the greatness of an art form is impossible to be quantified in any way that we can currently articulate....I also agree with the simple fact that, at some level, some things ARE just better than others.
I mean, think of this. If we take the "it's all opinion" argument to its *absolute* extreme, then my son is every bit as good a drummer as Neil Peart or Mike Portnoy. (he's 21 and has absolutely no sense of rhythm and has never actually played the drums...but for all you know, he's simply a master of an avant guarde new drumming method based on "the think system") You can't say he's not as good as those other two drummers...because it's all opinion. See how dumb that sounds?
As much as you guys say that art cannot be quantified....I argue even further that it is simply the line of objectivity that cannot actually be quantified.
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Some things.
Music isn't properly relatable to acting because music can in fact be measured in certain forms...it can be a fact that your son isn't technically as good as Peart; disregarding all opinion. For example, one can logically argue that Peart keeps more consistent time, that he can hit more notes, play faster, play a wider variety, etc. There are numerous ways to measure playing 'ability'. Whether or not one likes that type of style more than your son's is irrelevant; based purely in a numerical format...Peart is 'more skilled', and it can be stated as fact with proof, without ever uttering an opinion. Choice of words is vital as well. What I'm getting at is that there are in fact facets of the activity that can be quantified and measured, even if you throw out all subjective view from the argument, the argument is still there on a purely technical basis. Hell, I'm sure almost everyone here has had or seen that discussion at one point or another: "Sure, Petrucci (or whoever) is more skilled than *so and so*, but it's not all about technicality". When you get down to the nitty gritty, it doesn't matter about the technical side...but it's still there, it is something that can be measured without opinion.
My main point and eventual question is, how do you even begin to measure something like acting? There are no notes to hit, times to keep... it's all incalculable. That's mainly what I'm getting at is that there are absolutely no laws to acting. The first words out of anyone's mouth about acting is going to be a judgement based in nothing but their like or dislike of that person's acting; it is in no way technical, measurable...nothing about it. Even with something as subjective as music, there is a line where you cannot argue anymore about whether, again, based outside of any opinions, someone is 'more skilled'/'has more ability' than another. People seem to have a hard time keeping opinion out of it and it eventually degrades into a 'like'/'dislike' argument...but it does exist as something completely objective.
I just don't see how you can even begin to argue the point of acting without going back to 'it's what I think' not 'it is factual'. I'm not arguing that art can't be quantified, I'm arguing that acting can't be quantified. There are a lot of gray areas in the world, but just like no one is ever going to make an argument that 2 + 2 does not equal 4, you'll never be able to make an argument that Brad Pitt is an objectively 'more skilled' actor than Chandler Riggs quite simply because there's nothing to compare that isn't an opinion.
and I just realized that it's way past my bedtime AND that I'm way off topic...good talk, even if it is pointless as hell :lol My shits have run out...I'm sure I'll be back tomorrow though. Or not.
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I mean, think of this. If we take the "it's all opinion" argument to its *absolute* extreme, then my son is every bit as good a drummer as Neil Peart or Mike Portnoy. (he's 21 and has absolutely no sense of rhythm and has never actually played the drums...but for all you know, he's simply a master of an avant guarde new drumming method based on "the think system") You can't say he's not as good as those other two drummers...because it's all opinion. See how dumb that sounds?
No, I don't think it sounds dumb at all. Neil Peart and Mike Portnoy are more skilled than your son, in that they objectively and measurable have more skills than your son - as in, they can do things he cannot (presumably). That does not necessarily make them better. There's a difference between skill and quality. One can be measured; the other cannot.
EDIT: Basically, what Tio said, except I wouldn't discount certain objective facets of acting. If an actor can speak multiple dialects, he is objectively more skilled than an actor who cannot. If an actor can get through a long monologue without ever messing up, he is objectively more skilled than an actor who trips up and gets tongue-twisted every other line. Again, though - these are indicators of skill, not objective quality of performance.
EDIT2: Just saw that your JamminSon has never actually played the drums. In that case, I would concede that yes, Neil Peart is a better drummer than your son, in the same way that my desk is a better desk than I am.
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But even with acting... No one (and I mean this with every fiber of my being) NO ONE can quantify where the line actually is.
BUT OTOH if we go to either extreme of the acting spectrum, there's not a man alive who would say or argue with any sanity whatsoever that Tommy Wiseau is a "better" actor than Marlon Brando.
Somewhere, there *is* a line, but no one can actually quantify where that line is.
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BUT OTOH if we go to either extreme of the acting spectrum, there's not a man alive who would say or argue with any sanity whatsoever that Tommy Wiseau is a "better" actor than Marlon Brando.
Agreed. Because in my opinion, it's not sane to argue that any artist is better than any other artist. Might as well argue about which color is prettiest.
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The implication was that you *could* reasonably argue the reverse.
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I know. I was disagreeing with that implication and making one of my own: all such arguments are insane.
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I know. I was disagreeing with that implication and making one of my own: all such arguments are insane.
To disagree is to imply that Tommy and Marlon are equals. That...to me...is insane.
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No, I wouldn't argue that they are equals, either. That's sort of my point - I wouldn't argue about the objective quality of their performances, because I don't believe any such objective quality exists. I might talk about why I prefer one over the other, but I wouldn't take it much further than that.
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Equality could only exist where some form of measurement also existed, which several of us ardently dispute.
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I would never argue that there was a straight up, black and white "unit of measure"... There's not. But there are hazy outlines.
Example. Just getting an Oscar does not, in and of itself, mean you are "the best" or "better" than any other actor. However, if you have won *several* Oscars, and are generally praised across the board for your consistently well crafted and executed performances, then several unquantifiable hazy outlines suddenly begin to form a clearer overall picture....and it is at that point that you can probably point to that particular actor as being "better" than the schlup on your block who is constantly getting turned down for every acting job he tries out for, because he simply has not succeeded in convincing a single person (out of possibly hundreds of people that judge it for a living) that he can act in any way, shape or form.
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What you're doing is compiling opinions and trying to create facts out of them. Even if every single person on the planet shared an opinion, it would still be an opinion - never a fact.
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I think prog fans can be split into (at least) two groups:
A) Those who fall in love with prog so hard that they become snobby and consider every other kind of music inferior and "unintelligent" if there are no 20-minute songs and 100 time signature changes (close minded)
B) Those who discover other genres through prog by, say, introducing themselves to bands and artists their favorite musicians have been influenced by (open minded)
Although I still mostly listen to metal and prog, I belong to the latter group, as I've gotten into stuff like trip hop, synth pop, shoegazing, etc.
I both agree and disagree with this. For "A", you can substitute prog with any other genre.
Definitely. The ironic thing is that you get people in category B who are just as snobby and criticise/mock the people in category A, or look down on prog fans in general.
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My music lovin' head hurts.
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BUT OTOH if we go to either extreme of the acting spectrum, there's not a man alive who would say or argue with any sanity whatsoever that Tommy Wiseau is a "better" actor than Marlon Brando.
That's why people who only argue from extreme POVs are, well, extremists, and are seen by most other people not equally extreme as being crazy.
The question is not whether your non-drummer son is as good a drummer as Neil Peart (no he's not) but whether Mike Mangini is as good a drummer as Neil Peart (both are among the best in the world, so which one is "better" comes down to opinion/personal preference).
Likewise, the question isn't whether Tommy Wiseau is a better actor than Marlon Brando (because Wiseau is a talentless non-acting hack), but whether Al Pacino is a better actor than Marlon Brando (again, opinion/personal preference).
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EDIT2: Just saw that your JamminSon has never actually played the drums. In that case, I would concede that yes, Neil Peart is a better drummer than your son, in the same way that my desk is a better desk than I am.
Don't put yourself down, dude. You could be the best desk ever!
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EDIT2: Just saw that your JamminSon has never actually played the drums. In that case, I would concede that yes, Neil Peart is a better drummer than your son, in the same way that my desk is a better desk than I am.
Don't put yourself down, dude. You could be the best desk ever!
I agree. I think he's just allowing his opinions about himself to effect his performance. ;)
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:lol
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BUT OTOH if we go to either extreme of the acting spectrum, there's not a man alive who would say or argue with any sanity whatsoever that Tommy Wiseau is a "better" actor than Marlon Brando.
That's why people who only argue from extreme POVs are, well, extremists, and are seen by most other people not equally extreme as being crazy.
The question is not whether your non-drummer son is as good a drummer as Neil Peart (no he's not) but whether Mike Mangini is as good a drummer as Neil Peart (both are among the best in the world, so which one is "better" comes down to opinion/personal preference).
Likewise, the question isn't whether Tommy Wiseau is a better actor than Marlon Brando (because Wiseau is a talentless non-acting hack), but whether Al Pacino is a better actor than Marlon Brando (again, opinion/personal preference).
But that's my point! I agree with you! But if we take the "subjective" approach that so many here seem to advocate...who are you to say that Wiseau is a talentless hack? That's just your opinion, right? Maybe his style is just different. I mean, after all, The Room is now arguably more popular than some of Brando's lesser known films....so maybe Wiseau's a genius after all.
I personally think such a line of reasoning is laughable, but it seems that people actually advocate and follow that line of reasoning anyway. I personally take that view as a lowering of standards... ("What standards?" you may ask... But again, it's not quantifiable. But just because it cannot be quantified does not mean it does not exist at all...that is my point)
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I just don't understand why it is necessary to establish those standards. People either enjoy art or they don't - it's that simple. Why complicate it by trying to be objective when there's no need?
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I just don't understand why it is necessary to establish those standards. People either enjoy art or they don't - it's that simple. Why complicate it by trying to be objective when there's no need?
Because without them...I mean seriously...with *NO* standards whatsoever...we become that scene in Idiocracy. The one where a movie called "Butt" (consisting of an hour and a half of a butt farting) wins the oscar for best picture. I mean...who are you to say that Butt: The Movie doesn't deserve to be called a masterpiece of cinema? Maybe it's just different and you don't get it.
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Why would that matter? It's not like you're being forced to watch it.
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To be honest, it's kind of baffling to me that anybody on a Dream Theater forum would try to hold awards as objective indicators of quality. Is Beyonce objectively a better artist than Steven Wilson and Arjen Anthony Lucassen because she's won more awards than they have? No, of course not.
Awards are given based on the opinions of people who give out those awards. If everybody on the Academy really enjoys a movie about a butt farting, then that movie deserves to win an Academy Award. Whether or not that award means anything to you is up to you.
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You're implying that I have a much more 'black and white' opinion of awards than I actually do.
Awards are mostly meaningless.
I'm honestly not even sure I can quantify my own stance. For instance....rankings on Rotten Tomatoes. Mostly meaningless. But they *can* be a general indicator of quality. I am *more likely* to enjoy a highly rated movie than I am to enjoy a movie that scores a 9%. I may have a personal enjoyment of something with a 30% ranking and a distaste for the subject matter of a 96% ranking...but just because there are exceptions to the rule does not mean that the entire process of ranking is "meaningless". Even if I like a lower ranked movie and hate a higher ranked movie, I am still most likely going to have a level of respect for the higher ranked movie as a piece of art than I am for a lower ranked movie, which I may only like as "fluff" anyway.
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Right. You're more likely to enjoy a movie that lots of other people have enjoyed than a movie that everybody else has hated. But all of that is subjective and based on opinion.
I'm not trying to say we shouldn't rank things - hell, this is DTF, where ranking things is what we do. I'm just saying that those rankings are always going to be subjective, no matter how perfectly everybody agrees on them.
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I just realized that not only have we raped the OP, but have successfully shit all over that assumption while also slightly proving it...so basically we shit on it and then we cleaned it up a little bit but it still smells.
:rollin This place. Is bananas. B-A-N-A-N-A-S!
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Right. You're more likely to enjoy a movie that lots of other people have enjoyed than a movie that everybody else has hated. But all of that is subjective and based on opinion.
I'm not trying to say we shouldn't rank things - hell, this is DTF, where ranking things is what we do. I'm just saying that those rankings are always going to be subjective, no matter how perfectly everybody agrees on them.
Which means that it does *tend* to be an indicator.
There is a line somewhere...but it cannot be pinpointed or defined...nor can it ever be. But that doesn't mean it's not there.
Sortof like the line at the back of the batter's box by the third inning of a World Series game. It's there...but it's not there.
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I don't think you're getting my point, jammin. I'm not saying quality of art cannot be measured; I'm saying quality of art cannot be measured objectively. You can measure it subjectively all you like. It's just that your measurements will never add up to anything more than a bunch of opinions.
For instance, I can say that Lady Gaga is an extremely popular artist. This is an accurate assessment based on a collection of subjective opinions. What I cannot say is that she is definitely a good artist; that's for each and every person to decide for themselves.
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:rollin :rollin :rollin
It's all fucked, guys.
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I DID NOT SAY TOMATO, I SAID TOMATO. CAN'T YOU SEE?!
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I see the tomato...I...taste the tomato....
I AM THE TOMATO! /TheOneWhoKnocks
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I don't think you're getting my point, jammin. I'm not saying quality of art cannot be measured; I'm saying quality of art cannot be measured objectively. You can measure it subjectively all you like. It's just that your measurements will never add up to anything more than a bunch of opinions.
For instance, I can say that Lady Gaga is an extremely popular artist. This is an accurate assessment based on a collection of subjective opinions. What I cannot say is that she is definitely a good artist; that's for each and every person to decide for themselves.
Right. Something being more popular or highly regarded doesn't make it objectively good, it just makes it more likely that you'll also subjectively like it too. Popularity is only an objective measure of popularity, not of quality. Even if literally every single person on Earth loves something, it still doesn't make that opinion objective, just unanimous.
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Take the movie THE ROOM, this is actually a great example. I'm sure Tommy Wiseau still thinks this movie is a masterpiece. However, the acting is terrible, the plot makes almost no sense and the characters are all over the place. Tommy is able to love this movie, but this movie that he loves so much is a terrible film, quality wise.
This is bullshit.
The flying buffalo of truth agrees
(https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/55966936/pics/smilies/buffalotruth.gif)
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Take the movie THE ROOM, this is actually a great example. I'm sure Tommy Wiseau still thinks this movie is a masterpiece. However, the acting is terrible, the plot makes almost no sense and the characters are all over the place. Tommy is able to love this movie, but this movie that he loves so much is a terrible film, quality wise.
This is bullshit.
The flying buffalo of truth agrees
(https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/55966936/pics/smilies/buffalotruth.gif)
I think he was just quoting the movie.
But even if he isn't, I disagree. I mean, it's as if you guys are claiming that there are no such thing as bad acting or crummy actors.
I mean seriously guys. I'm sure you've seen this before https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jj7pDNDuoJ0 - it's the famous video of that amateur band butchering Comfortably Numb. If there's no such thing as good or bad, then this is just a re-interpretation. To me, this is the musical version of The Room and The Room is the film version of this.
I mean, these guys are capable of picking up their instruments and playing the actual notes...so you can't claim that they *can't* play...so therefore you must be judging as to whether or not they are good or bad.
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Of course I make judgments. I'm not claiming otherwise. I'm only acknowledging that the judgments I make are based on my own personal opinions, and nothing more.
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It's not like i haphazardly go through life telling people they are wrong because they don't like something i like, or vice versa. But if you think The Room is the best film ever made, i will state the FACT that you are out of your mind.
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But it still wouldn't be a fact, even if you say it is.
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:rollin
TIME IS A CIRCLE. /thetruestdetective
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Yes, we're close minded.
I can't stand bullshit like Avenged Sevenfold, Metallica, One Direction or Justin Bieber.
Someone was calling Tommy Wiseau's The Room a terrible film, BTW it's cult classic and it has to be that way.
And David Lynch is one fucking amazing god of cinema, if you don't understand him, don't watch, we surreal lunatics adore him.
:loser:
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See? Perfect! David Lynch I don't get. That is my opinion. I do not believe it to be a "fact" that Lynch makes bad films even if I don't care for them. It is simply my opinion. When it comes to things that I simply don't like...even with things that I can't understand how *anyone* could like it...then I tend to agree with Jaffa completely. It is my opinion. It is not fact.
But somewhere... somewhere undefined...somewhere that no one could ever possibly pinpoint...a line gets crossed. I don't even know where it is, but I know it exists.
The Room, even though I enjoy it because I sometimes enjoy hilariously crappy films, is still crap. Sorry, not my opinion, it is just a BAD film. That is a fact.
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So if someone genuinely enjoys The Room, their opinion machine is broken?
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So if someone genuinely enjoys The Room, their opinion machine is broken?
Apparently so ::)
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Opinions and facts...THEY'RE SO CONFUSING!
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Opinions and facts...THEY'RE SO CONFUSING!
And that's a fact!
I think.
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This whole thread :lol
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So if someone genuinely enjoys The Room, their opinion machine is broken?
I enjoy The Room...I just have to be in the mood to laugh at a short bus full of window lickers trying to make a movie...and failing miserably.
Show me someone who thinks that The Room is masterful film making, and I will show you a participant in the Special Olympics.
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As a matter of fact...simply as satire, I should do a Jammin Dude Show review of the greatest film ever made....The Room. I could even get Tommy to participate. All the time is be acting like Will Ferral's imitation of James Lipton. Just worshiping the guy.
Probably be hilarious.
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I honestly think that regardless of Wiseau's intentions, he created an absolutely hilarious comedic film. I genuinely enjoy watching it, the rare occasions I do (or watch a youtube greatest hits). I honestly think The Room is one of the funniest films made; but I also enjoy very dry and offbeat humor (I really like Tim and Eric, Comedy Bang Bang! type shows).
In this regard, The Room is not only good, it's spectacular. Disregarding your omniscient law making, there is a pretty sizable group that enjoys that kind of humor, and even if Wiseau thought he was making Titanic, the film does it's job even if it was a job it didn't mean to do. His collaboration with Tim and Eric is kind of telling; I don't purport to know the man, but he's a genius even if he is a moron. People have been playing up fabricated personalities for a very long time, perhaps the most well known being Andy Kaufman. Now I'm not saying Wiseau is doing this, but I really don't think it's farfetched to say it's a possibility; it's certainly inspired other comedians and brought out some great creative flare for a lot of skits/sketches.
I'm not sure how many more retard jokes are coming my way, but the fact that the movie cause(ed/s) so much discussion kind of makes the origin of why the movie was created or whether it was created with the knowledge that it'd be called horrible moot. At least that's the way I see it. Then again I only have opinions. :sadpanda: The only thing so black and white in this world is black and white. RACE WAAAAAAAAAAR.
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90% of prog is contrived horse shit, but is 90% of horse shit also prog? Quick, where's the Venn diagram.
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The Room is "popular" for the same reasons that dreck like Sharknado, Plan 9 From Outer Space, and Attack of the Killer Tomatoes are "popular."
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Yeah, but that doesn't invalidate anyone's opinion that it's shit or fabulous. The value of ANY artistic endeavor is completely subjective. Claiming an opinion as a "fact" is kind of silly.
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Yeah, but that doesn't invalidate anyone's opinion that it's shit or fabulous. The value of ANY artistic endeavor is completely subjective. Claiming an opinion as a "fact" is kind of silly.
Agreed. And for me, the value of music/film/television is all down to entertainment. If I enjoy it, then it's good. If it entertains me more than something else, then on some level, it's "better" in the only way that really counts.
Does it make a difference to me if it's more popular, or more highly regarded, or award winning, or more complex, or any other objective measure? Not one bit. Because none of these are measures of my enjoyment of that creation. So even trying to apply objective measures is using a subjective assessment of what defines the quality or value of something. In the end, the only measure that matters is your own personal opinion.
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I understand all of that, and I agree to a certain extent, but I also see where JD is coming from. I mean, you can like/dislike something or someone in spite of their relative skill level at their purported activity.
I enjoy the film Hudson Hawk immensely, but I would never ever characterize it as "good". It's crap, and I know it's crap. I still like it, though. Something in it appeals to me on a personal level, even though I recognize it is deeply, deeply flawed. It is not good art. It's bad art. But I like it anyway.
Likewise, something can be very very good, but not appeal to me personally. That doesn't mean that I can't recognize it as being of high quality. The English Patient was a hit film, and won 9 Academy Awards including Best Picture and Best Director, but it didn't appeal to me personally. I saw it and didn't like it. Doesn't mean it is bad or low quality in any way.
I would separate the personal enjoyment/lack thereof from the discussion of how good someone/something is. That's two different things. There are actors that I don't like, but there are also bad actors. Likewise, there are films I don't like, but there are also bad films. There is music that I dislike, but there is also bad music.
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OMG....someone gets it. :tup
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Yeah, I agree entirely with the two of you.
I would also add that just because it's pretty much impossible to definitively make a judgement of which is better between two things of approximately equal quality does not mean that it is impossible to say that some things are objectively better than others. Meaning that just because I can't say which of two great films is greater doesn't mean that I can't say that they're both better films than the Ryan Reynolds Green Lantern movie (though to reiterate what hef said, it's entirely possible that I could have a personal dislike for both great films and have some weird love for the Ryan Reynolds Green Lantern movie). Similarly, I can't definitively state whether Dream Theater or Opeth is an objectively better band, but I can state that both are better than whatever music I would make if I decided to record an album (I cannot play any musical instrument).
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No.
No they are not.
Not even close.
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What the fuck happened here? :rollin
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Open challenge: pick any piece of art and explain what makes it good or bad without using any opinions.
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Open challenge: pick any piece of art and explain what makes it good or bad without using any opinions.
We've *already said*....just because it cannot be defined or quantified does not mean that it does not exist.
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What the fuck happened here? :rollin
DTF happened here.
I love all aspects of this place honestly but I ain't even touching this :lol
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Open challenge: pick any piece of art and explain what makes it good or bad without using any opinions.
We've *already said*....just because it cannot be defined or quantified does not mean that it does not exist.
I'm not saying it doesn't exist; I'm saying it exists subjectively. As in, it cannot be defined in any objective way, and is thus subject to the interpretation and opinion of every individual person.
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Open challenge: pick any piece of art and explain what makes it good or bad without using any opinions.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_v_ubcYsTI
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Open challenge: pick any piece of art and explain what makes it good or bad without using any opinions.
jammindude is right with regard to the ability to say something to the effect of "The Dark Knight is a good film because it has seven actings and ten writings and nine-and-one-half visual effects."
However, I think I can give reasons that a particular piece of art is good. So, if you insist, I will give it a shot. And if you don't mind, I'll use a film that I'm pretty comfortable with:
The film Spider-Man 2 is a good piece of art because it effectively portrays the intended theme that "with great power comes great responsibility" through the story of Peter Parker, who is the masked, super-powered vigilante Spider-Man. The plot of the film shows Peter making decisions that reflect his commitment to the responsibility he feels toward the general public and the negative results that these choices have on his personal life (his work, his education his friendships, his romantic life). It then shows his change in attitude towards these feelings of responsibility as they continue to take their toll on his happiness, with the eventual decision to give up the Spider-Man identity. However, Peter then realizes the impacts of his decision on the people of New York, including his loved ones, and decides to return to his role as Spider-Man in order to protect the people of the city, even though he must give up his dreams in the process. This progression in Peter's attitude is believable since the series of events which befall him, none of which seem unlikely though a few make use of coincidence, would make a reasonable person with his attitude change viewpoints in the manner he does.
This theme is also expressed in the progression of the Dr. Otto Octavius character, who attempts to build a dangerous piece of technology—one that he has always dreamed of building—using stolen money. In the conclusion, Octavius realizes through the destruction that his creation causes and the words of Peter (who tells him that sometimes people must give up their dreams, paralleling advice that his aunt has given him and that he has taken to heart), that he must destroy his invention. Octavius's impulse to forsake responsibility is symbolized by an apparatus of mechanical arms that have artificial intelligence that are bonded to him. Octavius's shift in attitude is not presented as believably as Peter's, since the change is more sudden and fewer events precipitate it, but it is reinforced by the physical separation between his sense of responsibility and his desire to forsake it that the film portrays, in addition to the portrayal early in the film (before the arms are attached) of Octavius as a generally caring, responsible man.
The decisions of the character Harry Osborn, who despises and wishes to kill Spider-Man because he believes that Spider-Man murdered his father, further reinforce the theme. Late in the film, Harry is granted the power to kill Spider-Man when Octavius brings Spider-Man to him as a captive. Harry is ready to kill Spider-Man, even if it means killing his best friend Peter, until he learns that his cherished friend Mary-Jane Watson will die if he chooses to kill Spider-Man. Harry, too, opts for the rout of responsibility in realizing that he must use his power over Spider-Man to release him in order to prevent his friend from dying. Harry, also, gives up a dream for a worthy cause. This is a minor component of the overall action, but Harry's decision is shown as believable since it is clear that Mary-Jane represents a significant value to him (and since he is depicted as being not totally eager to commit murder).
The actors in the film generally do well at portraying the plot. Alfred Molina's performance as Otto Octavius is very believable and captures the essence of Octavius's struggle with his mad desire to complete his invention as well as his ultimate turn to a responsible course of action. Tobey Maguire's portrayal of Peter Parker is characterized at times by a more limited range of emotional expression, and is not as lively as Molina's, but it does portray Peter as a confused, uncertain young adult, which is a portrayal that complements the attitudes he is shown as possessing over the course of the film. James Franco plays the role of Harry Osborn well, vividly depicting the desire for revenge this character possesses, and his later confusion and hesitance towards the act of killing and decision of self-denial in choosing the path of responsibility. The weakest part of the acting is Kirsten Dunst, who plays Mary-Jane and, like Maguire, has a somewhat limited range of emotion. One of her and Maguire's weaknesses, that they sometimes speak too slowly, which can negate the dramatic tension of some scenes by pacing them too slowly, could potentially be chalked up to directorial decisions.
I am not qualified to comment on length on the directing and other visual elements of the film, but I will briefly say that throughout the film the visual elements do not detract and often enhance the immersion of the film. The Spider-Man web-swinging and wall-climbing scenes, in particular, depict with few visible lapses a realistic portrait of a man with such preternatural abilities.
Spider-Man 2 is a good film because it possess a compelling, believable plot (with only a few slight lapses) that expresses the intended theme of the choice that exists between personal desires and responsibility. This plot is depicted with mostly believable acting, though there are parts of the cast that are not as strong as they could be. The visual elements of the film do not at any time detract from the plot's believability and at times enhance it.
Edit: And I expect that you're going to reject this because it's "opinion-based." I'm not really sure what to do with such a rejection, except to say that there ARE objective truths to be stated that do not come down to a matter of numbers or of simple observations. "This plot is logical and believable" IS an objective statement that can be made, as is something else like "this actor accurately depicted this attitude or emotion." Just because I can't quantify the exact ways in which he did so does not mean that it is impossible to objectively state that he did it. So there's pretty much all I have to say about that.
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425, You almost wrote your one credit final report to get your Masters in film.
Edit, and Jaffa my buddy, my youtube link fights your battle perfectly.
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Yeah, that type of thing always happens to me. I don't ever really intended to write things that are so long, but once I get into the flow I can hardly help it. I don't think I said anything superfluous in there, though (which is something I forgot to say in there! The movie does not include a large number of superfluous scenes or subplots). Although, I don't suppose a lot of Masters theses are written about Spider-Man 2... :P
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The idea that the quality of art could be objectively quantified is so bizarre to me that I don't even really know what to say. As it's obvious none of us are going to convince the others, I believe I shall recuse myself from this.
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Yeah, that type of thing always happens to me. I don't ever really intended to write things that are so long, but once I get into the flow I can hardly help it. I don't think I said anything superfluous in there, though (which is something I forgot to say in there! The movie does not include a large number of superfluous scenes or subplots). Although, I don't suppose a lot of Masters theses are written about Spider-Man 2... :P
:lol
I just imagined how long it took you to think about, process it out and type it out. Way to long for me to invest doing! :lol
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I never said it could be objectively quantified. In fact, quite the opposite.
What baffles me is that people are saying that if a "line in the sand" cannot be objectively quantified, then it does not exist at all. I completely disagree.
If this "line in the sand" does not exist at all, then there is absolutely no difference between Lawrence of Arabia and Dumb and Dumber. Even though I personally get MORE enjoyment from Dumb and Dumber, you will never hear me claim that it is better than LoA. However you will hear me claim that LoA IS A BETTER FILM IN SPITE OF THE FACT THAT I DON'T ENJOY IT AS MUCH AS DUMB AND DUMBER.
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Your use of caps convinced me.
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Your use of caps convinced me.
Sorry, I was feeling like my point had been glossed over in several posts.
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Spider-Man 2 is a good film because it possess a compelling, believable plot (with only a few slight lapses) that expresses the intended theme of the choice that exists between personal desires and responsibility. This plot is depicted with mostly believable acting, though there are parts of the cast that are not as strong as they could be. The visual elements of the film do not at any time detract from the plot's believability and at times enhance it.
Edit: And I expect that you're going to reject this because it's "opinion-based." I'm not really sure what to do with such a rejection, except to say that there ARE objective truths to be stated that do not come down to a matter of numbers or of simple observations. "This plot is logical and believable" IS an objective statement that can be made, as is something else like "this actor accurately depicted this attitude or emotion." Just because I can't quantify the exact ways in which he did so does not mean that it is impossible to objectively state that he did it. So there's pretty much all I have to say about that.
You're right - I do think everything you're saying is based entirely on opinion.
You talk about the acting being believable, for instance - but believable to whom? Because that's going to vary from person to person. You singled out Alfred Molina's portrayal of Doctor Octavious as being particularly believable, but I actually thought Molina's acting was generally one of the weak points of Spider-Man 2. He had one shining moment (I love his delivery of 'brilliant but lazy' near the end of the film, with that little smirk on his face), but his performance was otherwise largely unimpressive to me. At time I honestly found it laughably bad.
So who's right? If there's some objective truth to the equation, then one of us must be objectively wrong.
Or we just experienced Molina's performance differently because we're different people, and both of our experiences are equally valid.
What baffles me is that people are saying that if a "line in the sand" cannot be objectively quantified, then it does not exist at all. I completely disagree.
If you'll refer to my last post, I'm not saying the the 'line in the sand' does not exist. I'm saying that the line in the sand is subjective.
If an idea cannot be objectively quantified, it is not objective. That doesn't mean the idea doesn't exist, it just means the idea is not universally true.
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If an idea cannot be objectively quantified, it is not objective. That doesn't mean the idea doesn't exist, it just means the idea is not universally true.
This is not a difficult concept to grasp. I'm baffled that the words objective and subjective continue to be redefined in this thread. I can only assume the word "consensus" is what's being groped around for but not being found.
The consensus opinion is: Laurence of Arabia is a great movie with great acting. There is no objective measure to verify this...no mathematical formula. One's personal subjective opinion either agrees or disagrees with this, yet nothing is inherently wrong with either opinion--other than the possible consequence of being looked down on from the group with the majority opinion.
*edited for unreadable sentence structure
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Conensus is an objective measure, for sure, but of popularity, not of quality.
I completely agree with Jaffa.
The one thing I would say that could be defined objectively is the extent to which a piece of art does what the artist wanted to do. But even that doesn't define something as good or bad.
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So you are saying that there are no "bad" artists or "bad" art? There are no people who produce art (film, pictures, books) who are just bad at it?
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No, just that there are no bad artists objectively. The extent that a movie, music or art is bad is purely subjective, or a matter of opinion.
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This started out as a silly discussion that derailed into "Can music be objectively good?" which is even worse.
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So you are saying that there are no "bad" artists or "bad" art? There are no people who produce art (film, pictures, books) who are just bad at it?
Whoever is suggesting this needs to go buy a Nickelback album.
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But they sell millions of albums, so clearly someone doesn't think they're bad. You just don't like them :lol
I don't like them, but that doesn't mean I think they're bad. Why is this so hard to understand? :rollin
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Yeah you can't argue about it really. Anything that's based on opinions is subjective and not objective. I know some people love to look for loopholes so that they can justify being "right" about something that's essentially just an opinion.
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Nickelback is not really what I'm talking about. Clearly, they have a large fanbase and have been successful for many years. They are clearly good at what they do, although what they do doesn't appeal to me very much.
People that are really bad at artistic endeavors are generally not going to have a large fanbase. Because they are just awful at what they do, so no one really likes them.
And I'm not arguing about anything. I love all of you guys. But the idea that there are no real talentless hacks out there is mindblowing to me.
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The main problem is that what makes someone better is a very subjective line to draw. Guitarist A might be more technically skilled than Guitarist B, but Guitarist B might have an unusual technique that results in a very atmospheric playing that Guitarist A doesn't achieve. I've heard several artists where they might not be the best when it comes to singing, or playing their instrument, but they know how to compose their songs. And I know artists who have all the benefits of being skilled at what they do, but the end result isn't very fascinating.
If you compare Dream Theater (a successful band of over 30 years) against a random garage progressive rock band who just started, you could easily draw the conclusion that DT are probably the more individually skilled band (with all the experience of playing), but if that random garage band made an album, some people might like it more than a DT album. So it's a very hard thing to draw a line with, because while we can discuss who has the more talent and stuff like that, it's pretty much impossible talking about quality as a measure, considering we all have different criteria for what qualifies as such.
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Nickelback is not really what I'm talking about. Clearly, they have a large fanbase and have been successful for many years. They are clearly good at what they do, although what they do doesn't appeal to me very much.
People that are really bad at artistic endeavors are generally not going to have a large fanbase. Because they are just awful at what they do, so no one really likes them.
And I'm not arguing about anything. I love all of you guys. But the idea that there are no real talentless hacks out there is mindblowing to me.
I would argue that Nickelback is the miraculous exception to the rule. They are terrible AND have somehow magically convinced people to love them. That's some pretty powerful black magic going on there. Like "Led Zeppelin sold their souls to the devil in order to sound like they did" kinda mojo.
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The main problem is that what makes someone better is a very subjective line to draw. Guitarist A might be more technically skilled than Guitarist B, but Guitarist B might have an unusual technique that results in a very atmospheric playing that Guitarist A doesn't achieve. I've heard several artists where they might not be the best when it comes to singing, or playing their instrument, but they know how to compose their songs. And I know artists who have all the benefits of being skilled at what they do, but the end result isn't very fascinating.
I agree with all of this. However, it doesn't take into account Guitarist C, who is just not very good at guitar and just makes awful noise with it. Guitarist C should probably just put down the guitar and pick a different hobby/profession.
Guitarist C exists. But some people seem to be saying that he doesn't.
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Guitarist C exists. But some people seem to be saying that he doesn't.
We already mentioned Nickelback.
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:rollin
And Hef, I've met many Guitarist Cs. And yes, they definitely do exist.
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And let me tell you, coming from a church background: there are plenty of Singer Cs out there.
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And let me tell you, coming from a church background: there are plenty of Singer Cs out there.
That's a bit different though, that's about a performer not being able to achieve what they want to achieve.
But where do you draw the line there? Some of the most successful artists get that way because they're always feeling inadequate and pushing themselves to do better. If they didn't achieve what they wanted to, doesn't that make them just as bad as the singer who can't sing in tune?
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And let me tell you, coming from a church background: there are plenty of Singer Cs out there.
That's a bit different though, that's about a performer not being able to achieve what they want to achieve.
But where do you draw the line there? Some of the most successful artists get that way because they're always feeling inadequate and pushing themselves to do better. If they didn't achieve what they wanted to, doesn't that make them just as bad as the singer who can't sing in tune?
This thread has taught me that he's not really singing off key at all....he's just singing between the notes. He is not better or worse than JLB.
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Is Beyonce objectively a better artist than Steven Wilson and Arjen Anthony Lucassen
Yes.
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The main problem is that what makes someone better is a very subjective line to draw. Guitarist A might be more technically skilled than Guitarist B, but Guitarist B might have an unusual technique that results in a very atmospheric playing that Guitarist A doesn't achieve. I've heard several artists where they might not be the best when it comes to singing, or playing their instrument, but they know how to compose their songs. And I know artists who have all the benefits of being skilled at what they do, but the end result isn't very fascinating.
I agree with all of this. However, it doesn't take into account Guitarist C, who is just not very good at guitar and just makes awful noise with it. Guitarist C should probably just put down the guitar and pick a different hobby/profession.
Guitarist C exists. But some people seem to be saying that he doesn't.
What if some people enjoy listening to Guitarist C?
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Please rename this thread to 'Octavarium'.
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The main problem is that what makes someone better is a very subjective line to draw. Guitarist A might be more technically skilled than Guitarist B, but Guitarist B might have an unusual technique that results in a very atmospheric playing that Guitarist A doesn't achieve. I've heard several artists where they might not be the best when it comes to singing, or playing their instrument, but they know how to compose their songs. And I know artists who have all the benefits of being skilled at what they do, but the end result isn't very fascinating.
I agree with all of this. However, it doesn't take into account Guitarist C, who is just not very good at guitar and just makes awful noise with it. Guitarist C should probably just put down the guitar and pick a different hobby/profession.
Guitarist C exists. But some people seem to be saying that he doesn't.
What if some people enjoy listening to Guitarist C?
If people enjoy guitarist C, then it's easily likely that they're being purposely obtuse, just to be edgy or hipster or pretentious or whatever.
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The main problem is that what makes someone better is a very subjective line to draw. Guitarist A might be more technically skilled than Guitarist B, but Guitarist B might have an unusual technique that results in a very atmospheric playing that Guitarist A doesn't achieve. I've heard several artists where they might not be the best when it comes to singing, or playing their instrument, but they know how to compose their songs. And I know artists who have all the benefits of being skilled at what they do, but the end result isn't very fascinating.
I agree with all of this. However, it doesn't take into account Guitarist C, who is just not very good at guitar and just makes awful noise with it. Guitarist C should probably just put down the guitar and pick a different hobby/profession.
Guitarist C exists. But some people seem to be saying that he doesn't.
What if some people enjoy listening to Guitarist C?
Then they need to have their ears checked. :lol
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People in this thread have claimed that while musicians at least have a tangible quality by which you can judge their ability, acting does not. I have come up with a definition that makes acting ability an objective tangible product.
Whether or not someone is a good actor, completely relies on wether or not they have the ability to immerse the majority of an audience into a roll. If they have failed in immersing the majority of the audience, they have failed as an actor.
Thus, acting MUST have concensus, or it fails.
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In fact, I'll do you one better.
All art must have the concensus of either the public, or the artistic community, or both. If it has neither, it fails as art.
And in this context, consensus of either hinges on praise of merit....not just satirical popularity of "so bad it's good"
As Michael Nelson from MST3K recently said..."praising someone for making a film with a ton of heart and no skill would be like praising a restaurant for having the desire and heart to cook...even though the food made everyone sick. Some people simply should not be making films, just like some people should not be cooking at a restaurant. "
(Or words to that effect)
EDIT: Also...I reserve the right to redefine my entire explanation should the need arise. :loser:
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Whether or not someone is a good actor, completely relies on wether or not they have the ability to immerse the majority of an audience into a roll. If they have failed in immersing the majority of the audience, they have failed as an actor.
Thus, acting MUST have concensus, or it fails.
All art must have the concensus of either the public, or the artistic community, or both. If it has neither, it fails as art.
I can't help but feel that there's something inherently wrong with this. Essentially, this is saying that art must have the general consensus of being deemed as "good" in order to be "good". What of those of a dissenting opinion? Sure, one could say that for every 100 undying fans of Dark Side of the Moon, only one person will hate it--but does that still make the 1% wrong? Is that opinion suddenly less valid?
I don't know, I've always figured that one could explain their subjective opinions using objective truths, but whether those truths make the piece of art in question successful or not is entirely subjective. You can objectively call a particular guitarist a sluggish player, but there's no axiom that states that that playing style couldn't sound pleasant to someone's ear.
Stating things such as "this sounds bland" or "this sounds riveting" are still subjective statements and fit into an entirely different ballpark from objective statements.
Although we can look at a red rose and agree that the rose is, in fact, red, there's really no way of knowing whether or not what we see is the same exact color. We're limited by our own personal ongoing experiences, unable to jump into someone else's conscious and experience the world through their eyes. Maybe your red is different from my red. And I think opinions work very much the same way.
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Well worst thread 2014 has definitely been decided. :angel:
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Well worst thread 2014 has definitely been decided. :angel:
Oh yeah :lol
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Well worst thread 2014 has definitely been decided. :angel:
in your opinion ;D
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In all sincerity, I've enjoyed the discussion. Sorry that some people find it so objectionable.
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:metal
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In fact, I'll do you one better.
All art must have the concensus of either the public, or the artistic community, or both. If it has neither, it fails as art.
And in this context, consensus of either hinges on praise of merit....not just satirical popularity of "so bad it's good"
As Michael Nelson from MST3K recently said..."praising someone for making a film with a ton of heart and no skill would be like praising a restaurant for having the desire and heart to cook...even though the food made everyone sick. Some people simply should not be making films, just like some people should not be cooking at a restaurant. "
(Or words to that effect)
EDIT: Also...I reserve the right to redefine my entire explanation should the need arise. :loser:
What about things that are panned by the majority but not loved until later? Vincent Van Gogh was absolutely laughed at for being a load of rubbish while we was alive. Was he objectively bad then?
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In fact, I'll do you one better.
All art must have the concensus of either the public, or the artistic community, or both. If it has neither, it fails as art.
And in this context, consensus of either hinges on praise of merit....not just satirical popularity of "so bad it's good"
As Michael Nelson from MST3K recently said..."praising someone for making a film with a ton of heart and no skill would be like praising a restaurant for having the desire and heart to cook...even though the food made everyone sick. Some people simply should not be making films, just like some people should not be cooking at a restaurant. "
(Or words to that effect)
EDIT: Also...I reserve the right to redefine my entire explanation should the need arise. :loser:
What about things that are panned by the majority but not loved until later? Vincent Van Gogh was absolutely laughed at for being a load of rubbish while we was alive. Was he objectively bad then?
I wasn't there for Van Gough...so I don't know all the details. But in every case I can think of, it had to have one or the other to survive.
Modern day examples include Office Space and Caddyshack. Both were completely panned upon release. Bombed at the box office (mostly because it was simply unknown) and panned by critics (who didn't see the humor). But once the public DID see it, it got legs because both movies then had the consensus of the public once it actually got to them. This forced critics to re-analyze their view. If they had gotten into the public eye and then never gotten legs (due to simply not being funny) they would have failed, and we would never have heard of either movie.
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In all sincerity, I've enjoyed the discussion. Sorry that some people find it so objectionable.
:tup
I know some folks are sick of this subject, but I just have to point out: Consensus is NOT an objective measure but is a subjective measure.
Okay, back to lurking. :corn
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In fact, I'll do you one better.
All art must have the concensus of either the public, or the artistic community, or both. If it has neither, it fails as art.
And in this context, consensus of either hinges on praise of merit....not just satirical popularity of "so bad it's good"
As Michael Nelson from MST3K recently said..."praising someone for making a film with a ton of heart and no skill would be like praising a restaurant for having the desire and heart to cook...even though the food made everyone sick. Some people simply should not be making films, just like some people should not be cooking at a restaurant. "
(Or words to that effect)
EDIT: Also...I reserve the right to redefine my entire explanation should the need arise. :loser:
What about things that are panned by the majority but not loved until later? Vincent Van Gogh was absolutely laughed at for being a load of rubbish while we was alive. Was he objectively bad then?
I wasn't there for Van Gough...so I don't know all the details. But in every case I can think of, it had to have one or the other to survive.
Modern day examples include Office Space and Caddyshack. Both were completely panned upon release. Bombed at the box office (mostly because it was simply unknown) and panned by critics (who didn't see the humor). But once the public DID see it, it got legs because both movies then had the consensus of the public once it actually got to them. This forced critics to re-analyze their view. If they had gotten into the public eye and then never gotten legs (due to simply not being funny) they would have failed, and we would never have heard of either movie.
Sure, sometimes (such as in your examples) it's because of a lack of exposure. Other times it's because it doesn't fit with what the industry/society considers to be good at that time. That was certainly the case for Van Gogh, and was the case for a number of classical composers/works as well. Stravinsky's "The Rite of Spring" is famous for being absolutely hated and inciting a riot at its premiere.
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The main problem is that what makes someone better is a very subjective line to draw. Guitarist A might be more technically skilled than Guitarist B, but Guitarist B might have an unusual technique that results in a very atmospheric playing that Guitarist A doesn't achieve. I've heard several artists where they might not be the best when it comes to singing, or playing their instrument, but they know how to compose their songs. And I know artists who have all the benefits of being skilled at what they do, but the end result isn't very fascinating.
I agree with all of this. However, it doesn't take into account Guitarist C, who is just not very good at guitar and just makes awful noise with it. Guitarist C should probably just put down the guitar and pick a different hobby/profession.
Guitarist C exists. But some people seem to be saying that he doesn't.
What if some people enjoy listening to Guitarist C?
No one "enjoys" listening to Guitarist C. Guitarist C is someone who can't play but wishes he could. Some people (like close friends or family members) may encourage him or come to see him perform, but they don't "enjoy" him because he's awful at it.
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Isn't that a bit different though? You're talking about technical ability/competence, rather than artistic quality. I thought we were talking about the latter.
I completely agree that to some extent the former can be measured objectively.
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Isn't that a bit different though? You're talking about technical ability/competence, rather than artistic quality. I thought we were talking about the latter.
What's the difference, to poor Guitarist C? That's all I'm saying.
I completely agree that to some extent the former can be measured objectively.
Well, OK.
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You know what CAN be measured objectively? The amount of fluid expelled in a pissing contest.
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You know what CAN be measured objectively? The amount of fluid expelled in a pissing contest.
Well, I'm about done. I'm not as fanatical (or as far to the extreme) as JD on this.
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I think prog fans are extremes, they're either too open minded or too narrow minded.
I'm a prog fan that enjoys Eminem, Backstreet Boys and any big pop hit that's too cheesy, it can't be just mildly cheesy, I'm talking Friday and Gangham Style cheesy.
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Thought experiment: if a musical genius intentionally and successfully writes the most annoying song ever, is the resulting song good or bad? Keep in mind that this theoretical artist is extremely skilled, simply choosing to use his skill to make an ugly sound rather than an attractive one. Also keep in mind that the song he writes annoys literally everybody who hears it, including him. Given these criteria - highly skilled artist creating art that nobody likes - is the song objectively good or objectively bad?
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Thought experiment: if a musical genius intentionally and successfully writes the most annoying song ever, is the resulting song good or bad? Keep in mind that this theoretical artist is extremely skilled, simply choosing to use his skill to make an ugly sound rather than an attractive one. Also keep in mind that the song he writes annoys literally everybody who hears it, including him. Given these criteria - highly skilled artist creating art that nobody likes - is the song objectively good or objectively bad?
I, for one, have no interest in such hypotheticals.
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I figured as much.
Oh well. I love hypotheticals.
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Neither.
The extent that it is 'good' or 'bad' is still a subjective measure regardless of the number (everyone by your criteria).
I would say there would be a good argument for it being objectively successful: he accomplished, perfectly, what he set out to do.
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Thought experiment: if a musical genius intentionally and successfully writes the most annoying song ever, is the resulting song good or bad? Keep in mind that this theoretical artist is extremely skilled, simply choosing to use his skill to make an ugly sound rather than an attractive one. Also keep in mind that the song he writes annoys literally everybody who hears it, including him. Given these criteria - highly skilled artist creating art that nobody likes - is the song objectively good or objectively bad?
And it all comes back to Nickelback. I win.
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I think that's a pretty good distinction, Podaar. Good is subjective, while successful is objective (and can be defined and measured in different ways).
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Thought experiment: if a musical genius intentionally and successfully writes the most annoying song ever, is the resulting song good or bad? Keep in mind that this theoretical artist is extremely skilled, simply choosing to use his skill to make an ugly sound rather than an attractive one. Also keep in mind that the song he writes annoys literally everybody who hears it, including him. Given these criteria - highly skilled artist creating art that nobody likes - is the song objectively good or objectively bad?
And it all comes back to Nickelback. I win.
:lol I don't really understand your hatred of Nickelback, but each to their own.
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You talk about the acting being believable, for instance - but believable to whom? Because that's going to vary from person to person. You singled out Alfred Molina's portrayal of Doctor Octavious as being particularly believable, but I actually thought Molina's acting was generally one of the weak points of Spider-Man 2. He had one shining moment (I love his delivery of 'brilliant but lazy' near the end of the film, with that little smirk on his face), but his performance was otherwise largely unimpressive to me. At time I honestly found it laughably bad.
So who's right? If there's some objective truth to the equation, then one of us must be objectively wrong.
Or we just experienced Molina's performance differently because we're different people, and both of our experiences are equally valid.
I would imagine that one or both of us is wrong. I would guess that we're looking at different aspects of his performance in evaluation it. Perhaps one or both of us is remembering some aspects of his performance incorrectly (i.e. maybe I didn't commit some of the weaker parts to memory or blotted them out because there were parts that I really liked).
Just because these things are objective does not mean that they can be known by the means of a simple computation or even a simple judgement in a set of criteria. Judgement of the arts, since it is more difficult to gauge than in other areas, is also far more prone to human error (and face it: we didn't exactly make our judgements of Molina's performance in Spider-Man 2 in the way one would want to in order to eliminate error—I'm willing to bet neither of us watched the movie again in preparation for our posts).
I think it is also important to reiterate the fact that those of who believe that the arts can be objectively judged draw a distinction between objective quality and personal preference. We've given examples like these many times before, but I'll give another one quickly here. I like Star Wars. I like Attack of the Clones. If someone said to me, "hey, wanna watch Attack of the Clones tonight?" I would be all over that. There are also people who hate Attack of the Clones. My personal liking of it stems from the fact that it is a Star Wars movie and that I personally enjoy the way the latter two prequels tell the story of Anakin Skywalker. However: I recognize that Attack of the Clones is objectively a mediocre film. The pacing is not the best and there are some seriously poorly written and poorly acted scenes. I do, however, think that because of the quality of the Anakin Skywalker progression, Attack of the Clones is not as bad a movie as a lot of people think.
Now, here are a few key details: my evaluation of Attack of the Clones, where I try to determine the quality of the film, is separate from my personal liking of it. Maybe I would rate it as a 5/10 film, but my enjoyment of it is 7/10. Another important detail is that my rating of it is not equivalent to the quality of the film. I called it mediocre. I said that it is a piece of art that does some things well and some things poorly. Someone else might evaluate it on the whole and find that it does more things poorly than I thought it does and says that it is worse than mediocre, that it is a bad film. Just because either of us says this does not mean that we are right. Attack of the Clones is a piece of art that exists in reality, which means that it does have an objective quality level. But because there are so many facets of this film, it's not really possible to determine exactly how good or bad it is. This is why you can only make objective statements about something like this as broad generalizations. I can say pretty safely that Attack of the Clones is worse than The Dark Knight and better than a movie I made in my basement starring my dog (he's a bad actor, and I'm hopeless as a director), but it's hard to say whether Attack of the Clones or The Phantom Menace is the better film. Even if there is one that I can say I like more.
What a movie review is, basically, is an attempt to give a rough estimate at the objective value of a movie compared to other movies. A critic has to do his best to be objective and not let his personal likes and dislikes blind him to the actual strengths and weaknesses of the film. My "5/10" rating for Attack of the Clones was my attempt to do so. It's hard to say how well I did, and this is where opinions and discussions and debates come in. For example, some might say that I let my personal liking of the film skew my review too favorably and that 3/10 might be a better rating for it.
That actually brings me to a relevant point: the statement that art has objective quality doesn't mean that we can just measure it and say "okay, done." It's hard for anyone to study every aspect of a piece of art, put aside all of their personal likes or dislikes, and come to a solid judgement on its aesthetic merits. Because of this, debates over the quality of a particular artwork are common, welcome and good. You're looking at different aspects of the artwork and trying to decide whose measurement of its quality is most accurate.
Aside: as hard as it is to judge the quality of a film, it's impossibly harder to judge music. With film, we have a vocabulary for these things. We know generally what makes a good or bad plot, good or bad acting, good or bad directing, etc. With music, we don't have a conceptual language of this sort (yes, we do know about melody and such, but I don't believe we know nearly as much about what makes a good melody as we do about what makes a good plot). I would argue that because of this problem, we can't say anything much more sophisticated about the quality of a musical composition than saying that Beethoven's 5th is good and a band consisting of five off-key tuba players (or: St. Anger) is bad.
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425, just because you (and many other people) have two different ways of assessing something doesn't make one of them objective. You have chosen to say that Attack of the Clones is objectively mediocre, but that you like it anyway.
However, you've subjectively chosen criteria with which to judge its apparent objective quality. Even more than that, the criteria you have mentioned are mostly subjective anyway. Pacing is an entirely subjective point. Acting quality is also mostly subjective, although there are technical objective aspects for sure. Some with writing quality.
You have two different ways of thinking about quality, as do lots of other people, whereas many other people would only really think about one or the other. But neither of them is objective.
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Thought experiment: if a musical genius intentionally and successfully writes the most annoying song ever, is the resulting song good or bad? Keep in mind that this theoretical artist is extremely skilled, simply choosing to use his skill to make an ugly sound rather than an attractive one. Also keep in mind that the song he writes annoys literally everybody who hears it, including him. Given these criteria - highly skilled artist creating art that nobody likes - is the song objectively good or objectively bad?
And it all comes back to Nickelback. I win.
:lol I don't really understand your hatred of Nickelback, but each to their own.
:lol Have you ever listened to Nickelback?
To be fair, they write songs about partying and drinking and getting blown. By that alone, I SHOULD like them. But I just cannot make myself like them. I don't like Chad Kroeger's voice, I really don't care for the musical accompaniment. They're the one of the only bands I know of that can make me NOT want to hear a song celebrating getting laid.
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Yeah, I'm not a fan but they're alright, and they have some songs I enjoy a fair bit. I've never understood why they've been singled out so much (not just by you) as I find them pretty inoffensive and decent enough.
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The whole gamut of bands that were popular around that time frame (Nickelback, Creed, Staind, Puddle of Mudd, etc.) have that effect on me. I can't change the station fast enough.
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arrich,
I wonder...perhaps the reason folks seem to be talking past each other on this issue is a result of assumed definitions of 'good' and 'bad'? You and I seem to be using them as place holders for 'desirable' and 'undesirable' while jammin and 425 seem to be using them as place holders for 'successful' and 'unsuccessful'. Seen in that light, perhaps we aren't really disagreeing at all! :lol
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Yeah, I'm not a fan but they're alright, and they have some songs I enjoy a fair bit. I've never understood why they've been singled out so much (not just by you) as I find them pretty inoffensive and decent enough.
They are the :TAC: if the 2000's. :lol
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arrich,
I wonder...perhaps the reason folks seem to be talking past each other on this issue is a result of assumed definitions of 'good' and 'bad'? You and I seem to be using them as place holders for 'desirable' and 'undesirable' while jammin and 425 seem to be using them as place holders for 'successful' and 'unsuccessful'. Seen in that light, perhaps we aren't really disagreeing at all! :lol
Can't speak for them, but for me, success has little, if anything, to do with it.
I'm just talking about talent & ability.
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arrich,
I wonder...perhaps the reason folks seem to be talking past each other on this issue is a result of assumed definitions of 'good' and 'bad'? You and I seem to be using them as place holders for 'desirable' and 'undesirable' while jammin and 425 seem to be using them as place holders for 'successful' and 'unsuccessful'. Seen in that light, perhaps we aren't really disagreeing at all! :lol
Can't speak for them, but for me, success has little, if anything, to do with it.
I'm just talking about talent & ability.
Yep. I am absolutely not talking at all about success. In fact, if you went back over my posts in this thread, I bet you wouldn't find the word "success" in any of them. Or "popularity." I think I used "consensus" once, but I did not suggest it as a criterion for aesthetic judgement.
425, just because you (and many other people) have two different ways of assessing something doesn't make one of them objective. You have chosen to say that Attack of the Clones is objectively mediocre, but that you like it anyway.
However, you've subjectively chosen criteria with which to judge its apparent objective quality. Even more than that, the criteria you have mentioned are mostly subjective anyway. Pacing is an entirely subjective point. Acting quality is also mostly subjective, although there are technical objective aspects for sure. Some with writing quality.
You have two different ways of thinking about quality, as do lots of other people, whereas many other people would only really think about one or the other. But neither of them is objective.
I would argue that none of those is subjective. "Pacing" is a term that applies to a specific element of plot. It has to do with the placement of action over the timespan of the narrative, and can be used either to keep the plot focused and dramatic. Acting also has objective criteria regarding how well the actor displays appropriate emotions, how well he delivers his lines with regard to these, and any number of other skills. Writing quality is certainly objective, though it, like the others, is too complex for us to delve all the way into. Writing can be judged on the sentence-by-sentence level by efficiency and precision of sentence structure and word choice, and grammatical correctness. In fiction, this all means also that the writer is choosing words and phrases that make sense for the particular characters to say (and also choosing whether a character speaks in a grammatical correct way!). On the scale of the overall narrative, it's important to look to how well the author communicates his intended themes and how logical and believable the progression of events in the narrative are.
None of these things are measurable as an exact science. You can't put a copy of a movie in a computer and get a printout of exact quantifications of how well it does at any number of things. This doesn't mean that these aren't objective, though.
Here's what I'm going to say by means of an attempt at a comparison, though I have doubts as to whether this will be effective: saying a piece of art is good or bad is like saying the same about a person. Like a person, a piece of art has thousands of little nuances that all come together to form the big picture. We can say that the music of my band of five off-key tuba players is bad music in the same way as we can say that Stalin was a bad person (note: you all seem like smart people who won't take it this way, but just to make sure: I'm not making any statement to the effect that bad tuba players are morally as bad as Stalin. They obviously aren't. The fact that they play the tuba poorly says nothing about their morality. I'm just saying that you can say their music is bad in the same way that you can say Stalin was a bad person). Similarly, if you have a friend who always treats people kindly and respectfully, works in a productive job, and always tips his waitress well, you might say that he is a good person, just as you can say, generally, that Jurassic Park is a good movie. But just how it's hard to say which of two people who fit the description I just gave is the better person, it's hard to say whether Jurassic Park or Raiders of the Lost Ark is the better movie.
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I find none of that persuasive, so in that case, I got nothing. The definitions being used for objective and subjective aren't computing for me and are out of the range of my experience so, best if I bow out.
Good luck,
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I'm completely with Podaar I'm afraid. Just as a few examples:
I understand what pacing means, but what counts as "good" or "correct" pacing? For example, I think Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy is absolutely brilliant at building tension, while plenty of people absolutely hate it because it's so slow and nothing happens. So in that case, is the pacing good or bad?
"Acting also has objective criteria regarding how well the actor displays appropriate emotions" - how do you objectively measure how well (s)he displayed appropriate emotions? Some people thought Keira Knightly was fantastic in A Dangerous Method, others thought she was completely over the top and unconvincing. So was that good or bad acting?
"Writing can be judged on the sentence-by-sentence level by efficiency and precision of sentence structure and word choice, and grammatical correctness." - Sure the quality of the language in a technical sense, such as grammar, can be judged obectively... but how does that mean the writing is good? The language could be perfect but people find the story and dialogue totally dull.
And I'm afraid the analogy to treating other people well or hurting other people simply doesn't work - we're talking about art here, not morals.
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Just to be clear, we are saying that there are in fact no bad writers, no bad actors, and no bad singers/songwriters. They simply don't exist. There are no people who are just bad at what they do.
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DTF: Where anyone can do anything and be awesome at it.
:hat
AndyDT for President.
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(I know, I said I was out)
Hef,
Speaking only for myself, I'll concede that there are objective ways to measure a person's skill at performance in execution of established skills. Such as a musician's ability to following a click track, or staying within an established scale, properly reciting a script, etc. Measuring one's talent should be at least a partially objective exercise but only as long as there a skill to weigh it against.
But here's where I think the goal-post has moved a bit. We started out discussing whether one could objectively value a piece of art as either being "good" or "bad". My contention is still no. To the extent that a piece of art (painting, music, performance, movie, play, etc.) can be measured as "good" or "bad" is purely a subjective exercise and no one's personal opinion can be definitively deemed as wrong or right.
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So it is possible to say that an artist is not skilled, but it is still possible to say that the art he produces is completely subjective?
It seems contradictory to say that there are objective ways to measure a persons's skill at performance in execution of established skills, but there is no objective way to measure the product of those skills.
That's all I'm saying.
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Thus the common phrase, "There's no accounting for taste." :)
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OK.
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So it is possible to say that an artist is not skilled, but it is still possible to say that the art he produces is completely subjective?
It seems contradictory to say that there are objective ways to measure a persons's skill at performance in execution of established skills, but there is no objective way to measure the product of those skills.
That's all I'm saying.
Yeah, well, that's just, like, your opinion, man.
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I think people often mistake skillful execution with art. After pondering a while ago over what I view as art, I came to the definition "Art is the successful transmission of a message not inherent to the medium".
So, for example, entertainment music isn't necessarily art if no discernible " out-of-band message" is present.
Or, to use examples closer to home, I think SDV is art, whereas TDOE isn't. The latter one is impressive and entertaining, but it's not art because (to my perception) there is no message. On the other hand, SDV successfully gets across the melancholy of a break-up.
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Attack of the Clones is a piece of art that exists in reality, which means that it does have an objective quality level.
Incorrect. The fact that it exist in reality means it has objective qualities (for instance, its length is objective - the movie objectively lasts a certain amount of time), but the idea of artistic quality relies entirely on interpretation by an audience. A joke can't be amusing if there is nobody to amuse. A scary story can't be frightening if there is no one to frighten. A movie can't be entertaining if there's no one to entertain. Put quite simply, art can't be enjoyed if there's nobody to enjoy it. The enjoyment is not a characteristic of the art, but a characteristic of the person enjoying the art. Which is pretty much the definition of subjective.
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Enjoyment is not a characteristic of art. You can thoroughly despise something and yet it is art.
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Is that supposed to contradict me? I'm honestly not sure. :lol
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Is that supposed to contradict me? I'm honestly not sure. :lol
You implied that art requires enjoyment. I enjoy things that I don't consider to be good art and despise things that I consider to be amazing pieces of art.
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Enjoyment was only one of Jaffa's examples, the others being fear and amusement. And there are plenty of others, it depends on what it is that the artist is trying to do.
But I think you've both missed the point. If a piece of art is trying to entertain, then it's irrelevant whether one person finds it entertaining or not. The point is, there needs to be a person experiencing the art to determine whether they are entertained by it or not. Without that audience, there is nobody to entertain (or disappoint). The quality of the art is not inherent in the art but defined by the impact it has on the people who experience it. Which is the exact definition of subjective.
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Then why are there art critics? Film/television/theater critics? Music critics? Award ceremonies?
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Then why are there art critics? Film/television/theater critics? Music critics? Award ceremonies?
Because opinions.
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Then why are there art critics? Film/television/theater critics? Music critics? Award ceremonies?
Because opinions.
No, that's the internet.
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Then why are there art critics? Film/television/theater critics? Music critics? Award ceremonies?
I'm not sure what you're getting at... why wouldn't there be critics? Interpretation is one of the interesting aspects of art and that's what critics give us an insight to. It it was all objective then all the critics would agree, but they never do. They simply put down their own opinions and interpretations of things for others to read/watch/whatever.
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Then why are there art critics? Film/television/theater critics? Music critics? Award ceremonies?
I'm not sure what you're getting at... why wouldn't there be critics? Interpretation is one of the interesting aspects of art and that's what critics give us an insight to. It it was all objective then all the critics would agree, but they never do. They simply put down their own opinions and interpretations of things for others to read/watch/whatever.
They don't agree completely, but they largely do. In any given "awards" season, for movies (as an example), there are usually the (now) 10 films nominated for Best Picture. These are normally the same (more or less) films that appear on most critics Top 10 lists. Which means that there are things that this particular group of films achieve that is widely seen by critics that the other thousand films released in a given year don't do. If it was all subjective, then more Top 10 lists would vary completely, but by and large that doesn't happen. There are differences in which ONE is the best, but there is rarely a difference in which films are in the group as "the best".
It is by no means all objective. But it is equally by no means all subjective. If that were the case, then no film/song/novel would be any "better" than any other, and there would be no reason to venerate Hitchcock, Lennon, or Hemingway (or Shakespeare) above anyone else, and there would be no awards for "best" ANYTHING.
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Again - consensus opinions are still just opinions. The fact that a lot of people tend to share opinions doesn't magically transform those opinions into facts.
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Again - consensus opinions are still just opinions. The fact that a lot of people tend to share opinions doesn't magically transform those opinions into facts.
This, exactly.
The reason people agree on things is because they have similar tastes in regards to whatever it is. It's not because there's any level of objectivity or fact to it, but because people interested in and exposed to similar things will likely develop similar opinions based on those things.
If it was objective, we wouldn't need award shows or critics, and everyone would agree. We'd just use these measurable facts and be done with it. But people disagree, and we give weight to critic's opinions based on how similar their opinions are to our own. They don't have greater importance or objectivity.
The point of awards is so people can credit the things they think were great. It's opinions. I can't believe this is even being debated.
This is worse than the objective morals debates. :lol
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Again - consensus opinions are still just opinions. The fact that a lot of people tend to share opinions doesn't magically transform those opinions into facts.
This doesn't really address anything I said. In fact, it's just an opinion.
I just don't get this "everything is relative, it's all just opinions" mentality. In all other areas of human experience, we can say that some people are good at certain things and bad at other things. But if it's an "art" that all goes out the window.
But whatever. I can't say any more than I have.
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Again - consensus opinions are still just opinions. The fact that a lot of people tend to share opinions doesn't magically transform those opinions into facts.
This doesn't really address anything I said. In fact, it's just an opinion.
I just don't get this "everything is relative, it's all just opinions" mentality. In all other areas of human experience, we can say that some people are good at certain things and bad at other things. But if it's an "art" that all goes out the window.
But whatever. I can't say any more than I have.
That's because a lot of other things are objectively measurable, and relatively comparable to other people to make that assessment. If you can eat more hotdogs than me in 1 minute, then I can objectively call you the better hotdog eater.
The same can't be said for movies or music, because now you're using subjective criteria.
I don't think anybody's saying there's something wrong with calling art good or bad, just pointing out that it can't be considered fact. There's nothing wrong with that. Weekend At Bernie's 2 is still shit, hef. All is well.
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Well, my position here can be outlined fairly simply: in order for something to be objective, it has to be measurable by objective criteria. Other areas of human experience can be measured by objective criteria. For instance, you can measure a professional athlete by the definite statistics of his performance - how many points he scores, how many games he wins, how fast he achieves a certain goal. And since sports are defined by these objective criteria, players can be measured objectively. Art, on the other hand, can really only be judged by the perspective of people who experience it. That's why objectivity goes out the window.
FAKEEDIT: Pretty much what Blob said.
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Hef, you seem to be conflating two ideas: the debate between whether or not art can be judged objectively and whether or not ability can be judged objectively.
No one is saying the latter. By objective standards, I am a lousy drummer. I have crappy handspeed and could lose the beat without trying hard. Any discussion of music I made could fairly say "that guy is a lousy drummer." The problem is, well, let's go back to Nickelback. People who say they are bad are saying they're bad subjectively but are claiming it's an objective opinion. Nickelback make easily digestible poppy hard rock. By that subjective standard, they're very good at what they do. Objectively, do they have the musical ability of Spiral Architect? Of course they don't. But any opinion on the merits of the bands artistically has to be done by your personal subjective opinion, which is no better or worse than anyone else's.
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Well, my position here can be outlined fairly simply: in order for something to be objective, it has to be measurable by objective criteria. Other areas of human experience can be measured by objective criteria. For instance, you can measure a professional athlete by the definite statistics of his performance - how many points he scores, how many games he wins, how fast he achieves a certain goal. And since sports are defined by these objective criteria, players can be measured objectively. Art, on the other hand, can really only be judged by the perspective of people who experience it. That's why objectivity goes out the window.
FAKEEDIT: Pretty much what Blob said.
But even statistics can be flawed.
For instance...most (not all...but most) would say that Barry Sanders was the greatest running back of all time. NOT because of the statistics, but because of the *WAY* he ran. No one in history (and this is a fact) could make a run for *a loss of yardage* look as beautiful as Barry Sanders did.
His statistics show that is is *one of the best* but statistics do not take style into account....which does account for something. I know a lot of people will say in the same breath that Emmit Smith was actually not as fantastic as his statistics would have you believe, and that there are many an "average" running back who's stats were bolsters by the fact that they had *an amazing* offensive line that created holes big enough to drive a Mac truck through. In those situations, even a high school running back could put up Hall of Fame statistics. Barry Sanders did what he did WITHOUT an offensive line...and that is not to be simply dismissed as being "an opinion"... Anyone who knows football knows that to be true.
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People are getting hung up on defining good/bad art, but to me, the real sticking point of this thread is the definition of open-mindedness. I think that terminology is pretty meaningless when it comes to music. Music is just too multi-faceted to try and pin down to such a trite concept.
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It it was all objective then all the critics would agree, but they never do. They simply put down their own opinions and interpretations of things for others to read/watch/whatever.
If it was objective, we wouldn't need award shows or critics, and everyone would agree. We'd just use these measurable facts and be done with it. But people disagree, and we give weight to critic's opinions based on how similar their opinions are to our own. They don't have greater importance or objectivity.
I can tell from both these posts that there is a degree of nuance to the points I, at least, am making that the two of you, at least, seem to be missing. I can't really blame you for that, because I've been tending to make posts that are absolute beasts (lengthwise), so I'm going to quote here an applicable sections from a previous post of mine that anticipated this type of stance.
...But because there are so many facets of this film, it's not really possible to determine exactly how good or bad it is. This is why you can only make objective statements about something like this as broad generalizations...
What a movie review is, basically, is an attempt to give a rough estimate at the objective value of a movie compared to other movies. A critic has to do his best to be objective and not let his personal likes and dislikes blind him to the actual strengths and weaknesses of the film. My "5/10" rating for Attack of the Clones was my attempt to do so. It's hard to say how well I did, and this is where opinions and discussions and debates come in. For example, some might say that I let my personal liking of the film skew my review too favorably and that 3/10 might be a better rating for it.
That actually brings me to a relevant point: the statement that art has objective quality doesn't mean that we can just measure it and say "okay, done." It's hard for anyone to study every aspect of a piece of art, put aside all of their personal likes or dislikes, and come to a solid judgement on its aesthetic merits. Because of this, debates over the quality of a particular artwork are common, welcome and good. You're looking at different aspects of the artwork and trying to decide whose measurement of its quality is most accurate.
This is worse than the objective morals debates. :lol
I'm not going to get into that other debate on the freaking Dream Theater Forum, but I'll just say this: both of those are important debates to have because they affect a huge swath of the way we look at life. So you can roll your eyes and their mention all you want, but you can't just declare them settled or unimportant. They ARE important conversations to have, the both of them.
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Thought experiment: if a musical genius intentionally and successfully writes the most annoying song ever, is the resulting song good or bad? Keep in mind that this theoretical artist is extremely skilled, simply choosing to use his skill to make an ugly sound rather than an attractive one. Also keep in mind that the song he writes annoys literally everybody who hears it, including him. Given these criteria - highly skilled artist creating art that nobody likes - is the song objectively good or objectively bad?
Have you been listening to KrotchRaut? :neverusethis:
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I can't speak for Blob, but I'm fairly sure there aren't any nuances that I've missed, I think we just fundamentally disagree. Yeah your posts were pretty epic, but I read and followed every word, and I'm fairly sure I understand you, I just don't agree.
Your 5/10 review of Episode II is your attempt to be objective, even though you like the film. But what criteria are you using to reach a rating of 5/10?
And what makes those the objectively correct criteria? What about all the people who couldn't give a rat's arse about any of those criteria, and who care about whether the film is enjoyable/entertaining, or are interested in the technical aspects, or all sorts of other alternative criteria by which a film could be judged.
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Hef, you seem to be conflating two ideas: the debate between whether or not art can be judged objectively and whether or not ability can be judged objectively.
No one is saying the latter.
I'm not conflating the latter. I'm suggesting that the two are connected. I don't understand how you can simultaneously believe that ability CAN be judged objectively, but the product of that ability CANNOT.
And going back to the beginning of my involvement, I have been largely talking about artists anyway, not necessarily their art. I had the gall to suggest that some people just aren't good at their chosen art form.
Well, my position here can be outlined fairly simply: in order for something to be objective, it has to be measurable by objective criteria. Other areas of human experience can be measured by objective criteria. For instance, you can measure a professional athlete by the definite statistics of his performance - how many points he scores, how many games he wins, how fast he achieves a certain goal. And since sports are defined by these objective criteria, players can be measured objectively. Art, on the other hand, can really only be judged by the perspective of people who experience it. That's why objectivity goes out the window.
An athlete CAN be judged by things like that, but it wouldn't be a complete picture, especially with an athlete in a team sport.
But guys, while I think this is an important subject (even though it has seemingly sidetracked this thread), if you aren't getting me by now, then I'm pretty much done.
And Tommy Wiseau is a talentless hack.
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I haven't read this entire topic, but I find the discussion quite interesting. I'm just going to respond to the inicial question. And say the answer is yes and no. This and that.
I think in general, you'll find a lot of prog fans to be quite open minded to varying degrees. I think you'll find one doesn't as easily discover something like prog without at least being somewhat open minded. BUT it can start going in the other direction if the prog fan starts becoming pretentious and uptight about music and condescending towards other music and start imposing their cynical preconcepts and expectations on everything they touch. (familiar traits to some prog fans I'm sure :P) Although I also think we fluctuate a bit with being open and closed minded depending on mood/experience. Sort of a bit like how sometimes we feel like growing and branching out, if we've outgrown or had enough of a particular experience, or if we're comfortable the way things are, we might not be as likely to let new things in, sometimes in fear of change, but sometimes out of just gladly feeling content at the time. I think it serves us best to be open minded and never deal in absolutes when possible, but when there's a goal or something to focus on, sometimes you just need to believe what you want and get on with it, that's the only way to get results. Because uncertainly can be crippling to progress.
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I would say prog fans are not open minded at all. No offense to you guys, but I see very few prog fans actively listen to music other than prog. Whether this is simply based on preference or the mindset that prog is actually "better" than some average pop song, I can't tell. I personally am beginning more and more to despise the mindset of "this music is better, and I am better for listening to it", from fans of ALL genres. The word "genre" in itself is really starting to bug me, as it puts artists into groups that they can no longer get out of. I don't know what I'm trying to say. Hmm... Take the "classical" genre, which is by far the most diverse genre of music we have today. In reality, we could divide up classical music into a huge amount of subgenres. The light, "poppier" classical music (string quartets, early symphonies in major, etc), the "heavy" classical music (full orchestra works, especially of the 19th and early 20th centuries), the "proggy" classical music (symphonic poems), musicals (opera), and extreme (atonal works of the 20th century) etc etc etc. But it's all called "classical". Fans of one genre might say "I hate all rap, it's just some guy talking into a microphone over a beat", and then never expose themselves to any of it, because they believe that all rap is of a lesser artistic value than what they are listening to, and some might even believe that in existence there is not a single rap song that could be "better" than whatever they are listening to. This is close-mindedness, they have literally closed their mind to all rap and refuse to listen to it. I feel as though this problem doesn't exist as much with "classical" music, as within the "genre", fans listen to all different types of instrumentation, tempo, style, and country of origin without a second thought (though some might close their mind from atonality, and I don't completely blame them).
tl;dr, No. I don't think prog fans are open-minded, if only because genres are stupid (and they are).
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I might be totally off-base, but are there that many people who are music fans for a long period of time who are only fans of one specific genre? I mean, I know that every genre has its blind devotees, but in my general experience, most people enjoy music of multiple genres.
The two main models I've seen from people's stories of how they became music fans are:
1) Didn't listen to much music at all, discovered a band that captured their attention, became devoted fans of that band, expanded their taste to related bands, then to bands related to those, etc.
2) Was raised to love music and embraced a number of artists from an early age.
Both of these models seem to be pretty conducive to gaining a broad set of music tastes. In the former, someone keeps expanding outward from a point of origin, and in the latter, someone is raised probably on a variety of musical styles (and if not, raised with enough background in music to make them likely to embrace multiples styles).
This is just a hypothesis, and I'm sure there are plenty of exceptions to this generalization, but I wonder if most people who are snobby towards genres besides their favorite are people in the early phases of the model #1 of music fan development I described above. I could see hints of this in my 14-year-old metalhead self, and imagine that other young people could develop a similar attitude if they were first introduced to music through another genre (i.e. if someone's first musical love was Yes, I could easily see them acting like a prog snob). I hypothesize that maybe a good number of these people are just one open-minded listening experience from breaking out of their genre elitism.
I will say this, though: Prog can be a pretty good gateway to a variety of other genres. Just to use my own development as an example, I started as a metal fan and got into prog through Dream Theater and Rush. In looking at other recommended artists in the prog genre, I found Porcupine Tree. In songs like Trains or Lazarus, Porcupine Tree demonstrated to me pretty clearly that any ideas I'd had before about pop music being inferior were mistaken. So while it's obvious that prog isn't everything and that prog fans can be plenty closed-minded, I think prog can be a good gateway style to a variety of other genres because of the way that prog or prog-related bands like Porcupine Tree incorporate a variety of types of music.
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Wow, I'm surprised this topic made it to this many posts. But I do have a few things to add.
If something is made badly, that is different then simply liking something. Anyone can like whatever they want, since entertainment itself is completely subjective. For example, the movie The Room by Tommy Wiseau can be your favorite movie of all time. However, it is a fact that it is a bad film. I like some bad movies and I admit it, but I'm not about to say "they're good". Now take this a step further with blockbusters. Here's where it gets trickier. When comparing, say, The Avengers to The Dark Knight, I just don't know enough about film to say which one is better. Still, I love both movies.
About the prog debate, I've thought a lot about it. You definitely need to be somewhat open minded to be able to appreciate polyrhythms, strange time signatures and more complicated song structures. The general mentality is that "if you need to work harder to get to it, or if something is harder to get the hang of, it must be better". For example, anyone can run a mile in 15 minutes, but 7 minutes is a bit harder to achieve, which obviously means you're better than the people who can't do it. Now, whether this applies to music or not is up for debate, but it is an interesting thought. I mean, anyone can listen to a catchy pop song, but put on something like death metal and the amount of people who are able to appreciate it is substantially less.
One of the main facts of life is that the brain grows and develops over time. When you're a kid, you're generally more immature than when you become an adult. You mature and broaden your horizons. Now, instead of thinking about life, think about music in this regard. Most of us start out liking a pop song, it's basic and easy to pick up. However, if you're interested in maturing and broadening your musical tastes, you branch out and find the genres that have more quality put into them. Again, you can like what you like, but with musical intelligence comes more musically intelligent tastes. Hey, some people are fine listening to catchy pop tunes and don't really care about music too much and that's ok. I still love watching Disney films, just like a kid, but a kid can't appreciate Citizen Kane, or Stephen King's The Stand (the book).
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I mean, anyone can listen to a catchy pop song, but put on something like death metal and the amount of people who are able to appreciate it is substantially less.
I think your analogy is inconsistent when you bring in death metal. I could understand saying that a Disney film ~ a pop song and that a complex film ~ a complex prog song or classical symphony. But I think the accurate comparison to death metal would be more like this:
An upbeat pop song ~ a Disney film and death metal ~ a horror film. Because death metal is not necessarily more complex or ambitious than popular music, but it is less accessible because to some people it is unbearably ugly (like a horror film). Meanwhile The Dance of Eternity or a Beethoven symphony IS more complex/ambitious than popular music, which is the reason for its relative inaccessibility.
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Good point, thanks. I got mixed up with accessibility vs complexity. There is a fine line between the two though, as the two frequently overlap. Death Metal does have a lot of talent behind it though. I just personally can't get into it. I respect it as much as I do heavy metal, prog and classical, but it just doesn't do it for me. That's the thing, it's a mature outlook on something. I have tremendous respect for Death Metal, even though I can't stand it, because I know it's good. It's ignorant to say prog, classical and heavy metal in general is "bad". These 3 genres (along with blues, jazz, probably a few others i'm forgetting) take an insane amount of talent that stuff like pop or rap just can't stand up to. Unless you want to be immature and ignorant, there should be at least a respect and realization that these genres are extremely talented. It doesn't piss me off that people listen to pop and such, I don't care what people like. But there's a reason why there are such things as "guilty pleasures". If you listen to bad music, at least have the self awareness to know it's bad. I love Linkin Park, it's my number 5 band, but they're not good, it's just a fact. Again, I don't care either way and I guess ignorance is bliss, but...suit yourself.
I notice that a lot of people get very sensitive when dissing their music. Myself included, I definitely do. But I also have a reason to. To say that Skrillex, which is clearly a "fad" "artist", is better than Iron Maiden, is a complete and utter joke. Lack of self awareness is a huge pet peeve of mine, and it irritates the crap out of me that we have so many people in this world that clearly have no self awareness whatsoever, about anything. I'll admit, I tend to be a bit too condescending when it comes to music, but at least I admit it. It's one of my many flaws.
Again, like what you like, but please don't try to tell me that pop or rap, or dubstep is anywhere near the level of heavy metal. Seriously, it's a joke. I actually do like a lot of dubstep by the way, but it's not good at all. I do prefer the heavy side of dubstep. Now before you say "can YOU make a rap", let me say that "no I can't, but I also don't claim to be anything better than a toddler at it".
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So death metal is objectively good and pop and rap are objectively bad? And you talk about a lack of self awareness.
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So pop is simple?
I love metal, but ......
Hmm. I think I will put some guitar here. This next section will have guitar. Then we can move into a nice guitar part.
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The main problem I have encountered with some Prog Fans is not only the close-mindedness, but the stance that Prog is somehow superior to other genres. Whether they talk about Prog as being more technical, more advanced or talk down other genres. "Anyone can write a good 3 minute song" hell no. It's like some people have to justify their music taste by lifting it up above other genres, or bashing others. And I think this goes hand in hand with why Prog Fans (generally speaking) are less open minded than many other people, at least to me. They lift Prog up so high that nothing else no longer compares. I also have a pet peeve with Prog Fans who say bullshit like "I listen to most genres, I'm pretty open minded about music", and the music they listen to boils down to Prog AND Metal.
Not all Prog Fans are like this of course, and there are plenty of open minded ones as well. This is just a general picture I have after interacting with fans of the genre for years.
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You probably think it's more common with prog fans simply because you encounter so many prog fans. Seriously, it's the same with any genre.
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You probably think it's more common with prog fans simply because you encounter so many prog fans. Seriously, it's the same with any genre.
Isn't this really all about people's ego?
I'm smart. What do I like? That must be what smart people like. Great minds think alike.
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Isn't this really all about people's ego?
I'm smart. What do I like? That must be what smart people like. Great minds think alike.
:clap: I think you nailed it
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You probably think it's more common with prog fans simply because you encounter so many prog fans. Seriously, it's the same with any genre.
Maybe, but DTF is far from the only music-related forum I browse, and so I try to "mingle" with fans of all genres. There are bad seeds in all genres, but prog fans, generally speaking are often the worst to me. But yeah, there are annoying fans of most genres, so it's far from being just one genre.
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At the OP hell no. Most prog fans, from my experience, are the most closed minded people musically I have ever met. Super elitist and really unable to appreciate other genres for what they are.
It's fine though, because everyone has their opinions, but you can look at the lack of posts in the hip hop thread or the fact we don't have a single country music thread to realize that prog fans are closed off.
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I don't think musical taste has such strong correlation with personality. Would be different if we were talking about open-mindedness towards music, not towards views of life...
Are people who drink coffee black more philosophical than people who drink coffee with milk? Would I be a completely different person if I liked my brown shirt more than my green one instead of vice versa?
Just throwing another thought in... A nice topic/conversation nonetheless!
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I have tremendous respect for Death Metal, even though I can't stand it, because I know it's good. It's ignorant to say prog, classical and heavy metal in general is "bad". These 3 genres (along with blues, jazz, probably a few others i'm forgetting) take an insane amount of talent that stuff like pop or rap just can't stand up to. Unless you want to be immature and ignorant, there should be at least a respect and realization that these genres are extremely talented. It doesn't piss me off that people listen to pop and such, I don't care what people like. But there's a reason why there are such things as "guilty pleasures". If you listen to bad music, at least have the self awareness to know it's bad. I love Linkin Park, it's my number 5 band, but they're not good, it's just a fact. Again, I don't care either way and I guess ignorance is bliss, but...suit yourself.
How do you know death metal is good? How did you come to that conclusion when you "can't stand it"?
It's ignorant to say prog, classical and heavy metal in general is "bad". These 3 genres (along with blues, jazz, probably a few others i'm forgetting) take an insane amount of talent that stuff like pop or rap just can't stand up to. Unless you want to be immature and ignorant, there should be at least a respect and realization that these genres are extremely talented. It doesn't piss me off that people listen to pop and such, I don't care what people like. But there's a reason why there are such things as "guilty pleasures". If you listen to bad music, at least have the self awareness to know it's bad. I love Linkin Park, it's my number 5 band, but they're not good, it's just a fact. Again, I don't care either way and I guess ignorance is bliss, but...suit yourself.
So the sole measure of good music is talent involved? If I find the fastest, most technically guitar player in the world, then, and record an album of him wanking around on his guitar for 75 minutes, is that then one of the best albums of all time?
I certainly agree that there are many people of talent in those genres, however, I don't think that it's wise to go around in essence saying that even people who don't like those genres should pay them lip service.
Plus, as I just alluded to, pop music =/= bad music. And simple music =/= bad music. If you don't believe me on the second count listen to some Steven Wilson, a prog icon who often decides "simpler is better" and simplifies his songs. On the song The Raven That Refused To Sing, as Steven and his guitar player Guthrie Govan put it, the guitar player only plays around three notes, but they're the right three notes.
Again, like what you like, but please don't try to tell me that pop or rap, or dubstep is anywhere near the level of heavy metal. Seriously, it's a joke.
Disagree. Whatever metric you're using, it's hard to argue that heavy metal forever and always beats out pop music. If all you're looking for is complexity—which, as I pointed out above, is not the only thing that matters—I would say that most modern pop is more complex than, say, Motörhead. If you really listen to a pop song, you'll hear that there's usually more than what you're expecting. It's not just a four chord synth pattern repeated for three and a half minutes. As Zantera said, no, it is not easy to write a good pop song.
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I just read this thread and now my brain is melting out of my ears.
Objectively.
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You probably think it's more common with prog fans simply because you encounter so many prog fans. Seriously, it's the same with any genre.
Maybe, but DTF is far from the only music-related forum I browse, and so I try to "mingle" with fans of all genres. There are bad seeds in all genres, but prog fans, generally speaking are often the worst to me. But yeah, there are annoying fans of most genres, so it's far from being just one genre.
Fair enough if that's your own experience, but I do think it's an unfair statement. I interact with people with all sorts of musical interests too, but ultimately notice this sort of snobbery in the genres where I know the most fans (prog, metal and indie, and recently I've been noticing it with electronic music as I've been getting into it more). And honestly, the snobbery is almost identical in each, just with a different underlying reason/mentality.
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I would also like to point out that "snobbery" is almost always a fan thing, and not an artist thing.
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So death metal is objectively good and pop and rap are objectively bad? And you talk about a lack of self awareness.
Like I said, if you like pop and rap that's awesome, there's many fans of every genre. I like a lot of dubstep, but it's bad. Liking something and thinking it's good are completely different. Every time I see a movie and someone asks me if it was good, I'll always say, yeah it was a very good film, but I personally hated it, or "it was terrible, but I actually liked it".
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I'm probably going to regret this, but why? Why is dubstep bad? What objective measures can you possibly be using to derive objective quality for a piece of music? I could just as easily say the opposite, "I like metal, but it's bad. I hate dubstep, but it's good", and it would have just supporting evidence (i.e., none).
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Music is completely subjective, there is no "bad" music. Saying something is "good" is COMPLETELY PERSONAL OPINION, meaning if you actually like something, it will be "good" TO YOU. Saying you like something but also saying it's "bad" makes it sound like a guilty pleasure to you, which is wrong.
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(https://gintruth.com/gnt/wpver/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/oh-no.jpg)
but Lucien is correct
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(https://media.giphy.com/media/4Dy1Btpt0qUZa/giphy.gif)
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Music is completely subjective, there is no "bad" music. Saying something is "good" is COMPLETELY PERSONAL OPINION, meaning if you actually like something, it will be "good" TO YOU. Saying you like something but also saying it's "bad" makes it sound like a guilty pleasure to you, which is wrong.
Liking and disliking are opinions. Good and bad are fact. If the best runner in the world runs a 20minute mile on purpose, he's still the best runner, because he already proved it, but this particular performance was terrible, just like how the best guitarists can right terrible songs on purpose, or for fun, it's still a terrible song.
Something like the taste of food is entirely subjective, because it varies from person to person. It's simply taste, nothing else. What I'm trying to get at here is that when it comes to music, there's are two main things going on. The person making the music and the person receiving the music. The person receiving the music can form an opinion on whether he/she likes it or not, but whether it's actually good or bad depends on the person making the music. I don't know if anyone here watches Survivor, but take Russell Hantz. I like him a lot, he's a great villain and very entertaining. Anyone can like/dislike him, it's an opinion, but it is a fact that he is a terrible player.
Dubstep is bad purely based on the fact of what it is trying to achieve. It's simply not music. You can't judge it based on anything else, because it claims to be a genre of music, which is incorrect. A computer is not an instrument. Music has harmonies and actual notes. So I guess it's bad by default. Like I said, I like it, but I don't pretend it's music for a second.
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That post is wrong on so many levels.
First of all, Russell Hantz is one of the best Survivor players ever. No, he's never won the game, but finished runner-up once and second runner-up once. He was even one of the first five players inducted into the Survivor Hall of Fame.
Secondly, you can't just say dubstep isn't music. It is, in fact, music. I don't have to pretend it's music. It is music.
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Liking and disliking are opinions. Good and bad are fact.
Not in music they aren't. Music is artistic expression, not trying to run a god damn mile in 7 minutes. There is no good or bad in music. Virtuosity is simply embellishment, it doesn't need to be there, and it doesn't prove ANYTHING. It sounds cool. Who cares if you can play 32nd notes at 200 beats on the quarter note? It has nothing to do with emotional expression, which is what music was made for, not to prove you're better than someone else. There IS no "better".
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Yeah there's just as much validity to Dubstep being music as Progressive Rock being music. Whether you like or dislike the genre, it just comes off as incredibly narrow-minded to dismiss it completely.
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No guys. Stahp. He's right and you're wrong. Opinions? Shmominions.
So let it be written, let it be done. UPDATE THE WIKI!
:| God damn, I hope that post was a well played troll.
(PSSSSSSSST, NOW IS YOUR CHANCE. HERE, USE THIS!)
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That post is wrong on so many levels.
First of all, Russell Hantz is one of the best Survivor players ever. No, he's never won the game, but finished runner-up once and second runner-up once. He was even one of the first five players inducted into the Survivor Hall of Fame.
Secondly, you can't just say dubstep isn't music. It is, in fact, music. I don't have to pretend it's music. It is music.
I understand I'm rubbing people the wrongw ay and I apologize. I came off as arrogant when I could have handled it better. Let's just agree to disagree then with the music thing.
However, I am interested in discussing why you think Russell is one of the best. He has zero social game. I admit, his strategic game is fantastic, and him orchestrating Tyson voting himself out was GENIUS. However, Russell himself has even said that he doesn't care about the jury. The jury is the whole point of the game. It doesn't matter how far you make it, whether it's 20th place or 2nd place. A lot of people get brought to the end just because everyone knows they can beat them. Phillip came in second, is he a good player? Hell no, Boston Rob brought Phillip because he's terrible. That's why Russell will never win. He's a goat that everyone wants to bring to the end. Survivor is a social experiment, the social aspect is more important that anything else. If the whole point of the game is to vote everyone out, Russell will be the best. But the point is to make it to the end, while being able to balance voting people out and having them vote for you in the end. Russell doesn't focus on any of this and instead chooses to be a bulldozer and screw over everyone. If you're playing chess and just try to eliminate every piece the opponent has without protecting your King, you will lose. Russell COULD be a good player if he just chills out a bit and thinks more about what he's doing. But he lost to Sandra, who didn't do anything the whole game, that's pretty bad.
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EYYYYE just really love that this thread answers the thread title perfectly.
It's good stuff. Because it's just peeps. Some people are. Some people aren't. Some people are one day and aren't the next. SOME PEOPLE are actually just highly destructive bots that have formed a mind of their own and are just trying to get by.
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EYYYYE just really love that this thread answers the thread title perfectly.
This.
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It's simply not music. You can't judge it based on anything else, because it claims to be a genre of music, which is incorrect. A computer is not an instrument. Music has harmonies and actual notes. So I guess it's bad by default. Like I said, I like it, but I don't pretend it's music for a second.
(https://www.reactiongifs.com/r/cf-dafuq.gif)
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Someone is either troll or they have their head so far up their own ass, they can't see straight.
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Like all genres, a lot of dubstep is shit but I've heard some great tracks. And like a lot of genres there is a LOT of variations and artists of the genre that you don't hear about a lot that come out with fantastic music. One example that comes to mind is Burial's Untrue which is dubstep but sounds nothing like what a causal listener would think of dubstep.
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I tend to lump prog fans into three groups.
When most if not all people get into prog, they're going through a phase where technicality and talent and complex, lengthy composition are huge factors in their taste, and it hits the right spot, and it's a glorious thing.
For Group 1ers, this phase never ends, and with relatively few exceptions in their listening, they just adore prog, and a few "neighbouring" genres, like classical or power metal or more technical metal, for life. Those characteristics of music I mentioned before continue to be extremely important to them.
For Group 2ers, this phase cools, and they will be able to continue to, or return to, or start appreciating music without quite so lofty ambitions as well as that with them. They stretch out, though mostly remaining in rock/metal territory, and while those prog qualities continue to play a big part in their taste, they don't dominate or define it. (I would say a fair majority of DTFers are Group 2ers).
And then there's Group 3ers, whose "affiliations" with prog eventually become very distant, a minute angle in their overall taste, or cease to exist at all (in which case they obviously become an ex-fan). They traverse a shit-ton of genres, and some will become (though most simply like to think they've become) ultra-enlightened consumers of any music regardless of genre.
In terms of personality, I see no reason to think there are more or less assholes or good sorts in any group over any other, or over people with no interest in prog. Not to the extent that I'd generalise about it, anyway. Obviously, when it comes to music, the groups become more and more open-minded, not that that makes any group better than the other. Music ain't a competition, it's something you put on to amuse yourself and pass time, and as long as you aren't an ass about it, I don't really care what you listen to.
TL;DR:
(https://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_ksr1m89c1F1qzbxjgo1_400.jpg)
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I think people who appreciate prog are quite open-minded about hearing different styles, breaking musical conventions, and pushing the boundaries of music. At the same time, however, exposure to prog music makes one appreciate technique, so I would imagine that like my case, we are not quite open-minded about lousy musicianship.
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For Group 1ers, this phase never ends, and with relatively few exceptions in their listening, they just adore prog, and a few "neighbouring" genres, like classical or power metal or more technical metal, for life. Those characteristics of music I mentioned before continue to be extremely important to them.
For Group 2ers, this phase cools, and they will be able to continue to, or return to, or start appreciating music without quite so lofty ambitions as well as that with them. They stretch out, though mostly remaining in rock/metal territory, and while those prog qualities continue to play a big part in their taste, they don't dominate or define it. (I would say a fair majority of DTFers are Group 2ers).
And then there's Group 3ers, whose "affiliations" with prog eventually become very distant, a minute angle in their overall taste, or cease to exist at all (in which case they obviously become an ex-fan). They traverse a shit-ton of genres, and some will become (though most simply like to think they've become) ultra-enlightened consumers of any music regardless of genre.
In terms of personality, I see no reason to think there are more or less assholes or good sorts in any group over any other, or over people with no interest in prog. Not to the extent that I'd generalise about it, anyway. Obviously, when it comes to music, the groups become more and more open-minded, not that that makes any group better than the other. Music ain't a competition, it's something you put on to amuse yourself and pass time, and as long as you aren't an ass about it, I don't really care what you listen to.
I think this goes, more or less, for the musical trajectory of any people who start listening to one genre and get very attached to it, at least in rock/metal circles.
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I am interested in discussing why you think Russell is one of the best. He has zero social game. I admit, his strategic game is fantastic, and him orchestrating Tyson voting himself out was GENIUS. However, Russell himself has even said that he doesn't care about the jury. The jury is the whole point of the game. It doesn't matter how far you make it, whether it's 20th place or 2nd place. A lot of people get brought to the end just because everyone knows they can beat them. Phillip came in second, is he a good player? Hell no, Boston Rob brought Phillip because he's terrible. That's why Russell will never win. He's a goat that everyone wants to bring to the end. Survivor is a social experiment, the social aspect is more important that anything else. If the whole point of the game is to vote everyone out, Russell will be the best. But the point is to make it to the end, while being able to balance voting people out and having them vote for you in the end. Russell doesn't focus on any of this and instead chooses to be a bulldozer and screw over everyone. If you're playing chess and just try to eliminate every piece the opponent has without protecting your King, you will lose. Russell COULD be a good player if he just chills out a bit and thinks more about what he's doing. But he lost to Sandra, who didn't do anything the whole game, that's pretty bad.
Right, he has no social game. That's how he was able to make it to the finals twice, because that can be done without a social game.
Dude, everyone is entitled to their opinion. I guess.
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It's simply not music. You can't judge it based on anything else, because it claims to be a genre of music, which is incorrect. A computer is not an instrument. Music has harmonies and actual notes. So I guess it's bad by default. Like I said, I like it, but I don't pretend it's music for a second.
(https://www.reactiongifs.com/r/cf-dafuq.gif)
:|
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I think this goes, more or less, for the musical trajectory of any people who start listening to one genre and get very attached to it, at least in rock/metal circles.
You're probably right, actually.
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Dubstep is bad purely based on the fact of what it is trying to achieve. It's simply not music. You can't judge it based on anything else, because it claims to be a genre of music, which is incorrect. A computer is not an instrument. Music has harmonies and actual notes. So I guess it's bad by default. Like I said, I like it, but I don't pretend it's music for a second.
The funny thing about technology is that I'm sure there is some kind of program, out there, that let the keys of a computer keyboard sound a musical note, thus allowing a computer keyboard to turn into some kind of musical ...... keyboard.
As for the question in the OP, I think so. One of the beautiful things about this forum is that we can talk about all kinds of different bands in all kinds of different genres (including non-rock genres) and those people discussing these different bands/genres would not feel out of place. I do not know if other bands, that plays prog rock, forums does it, but for optimism, I like to think that they do.
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I am interested in discussing why you think Russell is one of the best. He has zero social game. I admit, his strategic game is fantastic, and him orchestrating Tyson voting himself out was GENIUS. However, Russell himself has even said that he doesn't care about the jury. The jury is the whole point of the game. It doesn't matter how far you make it, whether it's 20th place or 2nd place. A lot of people get brought to the end just because everyone knows they can beat them. Phillip came in second, is he a good player? Hell no, Boston Rob brought Phillip because he's terrible. That's why Russell will never win. He's a goat that everyone wants to bring to the end. Survivor is a social experiment, the social aspect is more important that anything else. If the whole point of the game is to vote everyone out, Russell will be the best. But the point is to make it to the end, while being able to balance voting people out and having them vote for you in the end. Russell doesn't focus on any of this and instead chooses to be a bulldozer and screw over everyone. If you're playing chess and just try to eliminate every piece the opponent has without protecting your King, you will lose. Russell COULD be a good player if he just chills out a bit and thinks more about what he's doing. But he lost to Sandra, who didn't do anything the whole game, that's pretty bad.
Right, he has no social game. That's how he was able to make it to the finals twice, because that can be done without a social game.
Dude, everyone is entitled to their opinion. I guess.
Social game=getting people to like you so that even after you vote them out they will still vote for you in the end. The entire jury hated Russell both seasons. The reason why he made it to the end is because he's a very good strategist. Like I said, if Survivor was a strategy only game Russell would be the best player ever. But he keeps threatening everyone's place in the game and voting them out. He has not tried to make one friend. If you keep screwing everyone over, they will not give you the million, no matter how good of a strategy you had. A good player knows this and keeping people happy through you is a key element in winning the game.
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I'm going to adjust the way I'm saying this so people don't feel like I'm attacking them personally. Anybody can like any band, music group, whatever, that's their opinion. It's all good, every genre needs its fans. Take Nickelback for example. They have many fans. However, people often confuse "liking" a music group with thinking they are "the best". Nickelback is not anywhere near the best bands of all time, not even close. Here's the thing. Nobody likes to hear that their favorite band sucks. Nobody does. My favorite band, Megadeth, is pretty good. I LOVE Megadeth, a LITTLE more than I like Dream Theater, but I would never tell anyone that Megadeth is better than Dream Theater. DT is on a whole different level. I can't stand Rush personally. That's my opinion. But Rush is WAY better than 99% of the bands I listen to, there's no denying that. Saying "Rush sucks" is like saying The Flash is slow. You can say "I don't like Rush", because you know, opinions. But you'd be wrong in saying they sucked.
Anyone can "like" anything. If you're the type of person that just don't care about musical talent, that's ok. You don't have to like anything else. Pretty much everyone started liking music with radio songs. Some people just stick with that their whole lives and that's great. I don't judge people who listen to any music and I hope nobody else here does. However, if you're really into music, want to learn an instrument and are looking for the well written works or something that has a lot more complexity into it, you want to listen to a band that knows what they're doing. That know how to play really well, so you can learn from "the best".
I would never tell anyone in person that they listen to a bad band. People just don't like hearing that and, as evident in this thread, just don't understand where I'm getting at. I'm not saying "I don't like them, they suck". In fact, my personal opinion has nothing to do with whether they're good or not. Some bands I don't even know if they're good or bad. I'm sure there's some amazing undergrounds bands out there that I may or may not like...but I don't know which ones because I haven't found them.
Enjoyment, likability and emotion from music is completely and entirely opinionated. What the person receives from the music itself is an opinion. Like, I said, everyone has different tastes. It's the people writing and playing the music that determines whether it's good or not.
I hope to God that someone understands where I'm coming from here. It seems like everyone gets so offended when I say that something they like is bad, that they act like I committed a crime. Like I said, nobody wants to hear their favorite group sucks. But I even admitted that Linking Park is in my top 5 and I KNOW they suck. I meant nothing personal, and if someone wants to discuss in a mature way what makes a band better than another, I'd be ok with that. We're just having a discussion after all.
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Saying "Rush sucks" is like saying The Flash is slow.
No it is not. Speed can be objectively measured and compared. Miles per hour. The two situations are in no way similar.
EDIT: As for the rest of your post, it has some top notch stuff about opinions and anyone being able to like anything, but I cannot disagree more strongly that art can be objectively good or bad. I'm not going to go into detail though, because we've had this discussion hundreds of times on this forum.
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It seems like everyone gets so offended when I say that something they like is bad, that they act like I committed a crime.
Didn't this thread start out about being open minded? Seems we have approached a full 180.
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The thing is, measuring something like speed is possible. You can have a contest with all guitar players in the world and measure who plays the most notes in 5 minutes. In theory that is within the realms of possibility. Quality is not the same. You can't measure quality, because quality is defined by different things for all of us. If you honestly think that technical skill is the only factor that plays into overall quality, then you are very wrong. Music as an art form is very subjective thing in itself, it means different things to all of us, and we all look for different things in music. Technical skill is such a minor part of the whole thing, and other factors also play a big part, like songwriting. You can be as technical if you want, but if you can't write a good song, who cares?
I wouldn't have an issue if you said "Dream Theater is a more technically skilled band than The Beatles", but if you instead say "Dream Theater is objectively better than The Beatles", then I do have a problem. Again, Quality can't be measured because we all have different criteria for it. Just with the case of Dream Theater, I would say that they have the individual skill as musicians to blow most musicians out of the water on their instruments, but still they have failed to deliver a single good album in 12 years now. If you agree or disagree, that is beside the point. What I mean is, technical skill is far from everything. Some musicians have limited skill, but they play to their strengths perfectly and are able to craft perfect music despite these flaws. Other musicians can play pretty much everything possible, but they lack the imagination to craft something memorable.
If it can't be objectively measured, then it can't be considered as facts. And I think the argument falls flat, because within the world of music, different bands and musicians aspire to achieve different things.
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Saying "Rush sucks" is like saying The Flash is slow.
No it is not. Speed can be objectively measured and compared. Miles per hour. The two situations are in no way similar.
EDIT: As for the rest of your post, it has some top notch stuff about opinions and anyone being able to like anything, but I cannot disagree more strongly that art can be objectively good or bad. I'm not going to go into detail though, because we've had this discussion hundreds of times on this forum.
You're completely right. Art is interpreted differently from person to person. You may find a picture I painted more captivating than Picasso's. Or it may speak to you in a way that a better painting doesn't. But my painting is not as good as one that Picasso would make. I may write a song that grabs your heart and makes you cry. But, in actuality, is it as good as a song written by Iron Maiden? Hell no. Because when it comes down to it, I suck at playing guitar and writing music. I'm not even close to the level that they are. Everyone has a different perception on something, that's life in a nutshell. Everyone's different. But if you take the piece of art by itself, with nobody listening to it/looking at it, there is a quality there that makes it better or worse than something else. It's hard to understand because it's a different way of looking at things than what we're used to. It's extremely difficult to not put your personal opinion on something when deciding whether it's good or bad. I'm not going to lie, I read the first Twilight book (until the movie came and I hated it) and I loved it. It was interesting, entertaining, etc...but it's terribly written. She can't write. I know a lot of people who hate Stephen King, and I understand that, he's not for everybody. But he's a fantastic writer. You may not AGREE with his style, but the man knows how to write.
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You know, this is a REALLY tough question to answer, and I doubt if there will ever BE a definitive answer.
I think that there are a lot of people like me, who are very open-minded in some areas, but very close-minded in others.
I've known some people who don't like prog OR metal, and they've made up their minds. That's that. Period.
I have posted many times on this forum regarding my opinions about rap, and some people will certainly say that my view in that area is VERY close-minded. Which is fine. You can see it that way if you so choose.
But I don't think I HAVE been close-minded, because as I have already said many times: over the last 20-30 years, I have heard MORE than ENOUGH rap to know that I don't like it and make that decision for myself.
On the OTHER hand, I've known some people-and this is regardless of age, race, or any other demographic that you would care to name-who ONLY want to hear the latest "hip, hot" new thing that's coming out, weather it's rap, pop, punk,new wave, alternative, country, industrial, electronica, house music, or some weird underground rock band that makes sounds that most human beings would never recognize as music!
And I'm sure I left a lot of things OUT of that statement.
Anyway, the point is that a lot of THOSE people are very close-minded about the kind of music that I and a lot of the other people on this forum like.
To them most of the prog and/or metal bands that WE like are often considered "too old," "too melodic," "too heavy," or "not heavy enough" or "too repetitious," etc.
So I don't think you can say that prog fans are better or worse than anyone else when it comes to open-mindedness.
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The thing is, measuring something like speed is possible. You can have a contest with all guitar players in the world and measure who plays the most notes in 5 minutes. In theory that is within the realms of possibility. Quality is not the same. You can't measure quality, because quality is defined by different things for all of us. If you honestly think that technical skill is the only factor that plays into overall quality, then you are very wrong. Music as an art form is very subjective thing in itself, it means different things to all of us, and we all look for different things in music. Technical skill is such a minor part of the whole thing, and other factors also play a big part, like songwriting. You can be as technical if you want, but if you can't write a good song, who cares?
I wouldn't have an issue if you said "Dream Theater is a more technically skilled band than The Beatles", but if you instead say "Dream Theater is objectively better than The Beatles", then I do have a problem. Again, Quality can't be measured because we all have different criteria for it. Just with the case of Dream Theater, I would say that they have the individual skill as musicians to blow most musicians out of the water on their instruments, but still they have failed to deliver a single good album in 12 years now. If you agree or disagree, that is beside the point. What I mean is, technical skill is far from everything. Some musicians have limited skill, but they play to their strengths perfectly and are able to craft perfect music despite these flaws. Other musicians can play pretty much everything possible, but they lack the imagination to craft something memorable.
If it can't be objectively measured, then it can't be considered as facts. And I think the argument falls flat, because within the world of music, different bands and musicians aspire to achieve different things.
Thank you for this response, very insightful. I do agree with you...to an extent. Yes, DT would be considered a more technically skilled band than The Beatles, but what else does "technically skilled" mean? They are more skilled in that area of expertise. More skilled=better, unless you have another definition for it.
Also, we keep coming back to"what we think", or "how people feel about it". I already stated that yes, these are opinions. How someone feels about something, or relates to something, or enjoys is opinionated. But if you take it by itself no other factors added in, one is better than the other. Song writing is a huge part of this, but it's equally difficult to say if a song is good or bad without throwing how you feel about it into the mix. I have two different DT Top 50 lists saved on Microsoft Word. One is my opinion, and the other is where I tried to narrow down the BEST DT songs, opinion not included. It's extremely tough, because we're so used to using our perception, and I guarantee that list will still be off when I'm done and the honest answer is that it's probably just not possible since there's so many factors at play here and it's impossible to separate personal feelings towards every single aspect of every song. Not to mention that you would need to be a master of music theory to objectively break it all down.
I get what you're saying and I think the truth underneath all of this is that the debate itself doesn't matter. You like what you like, I like what I like, everyone likes what they like. That's ok. I think art, in general, CAN be measured objectively and by itself, but there is just way too many factors involved, plus the fact that it's too hard to separate personal feelings from it, that it's near impossible.
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You know, this is a REALLY tough question to answer, and I doubt if there will ever BE a definitive answer.
I think that there are a lot of people like me, who are very open-minded in some areas, but very close-minded in others.
I've known some people who don't like prog OR metal, and they've made up their minds. That's that. Period.
I have posted many times on this forum regarding my opinions about rap, and some people will certainly say that my view in that area is VERY close-minded. Which is fine. You can see it that way if you so choose.
But I don't think I HAVE been close-minded, because as I have already said many times: over the last 20-30 years, I have heard MORE than ENOUGH rap to know that I don't like it and make that decision for myself.
On the OTHER hand, I've known some people-and this is regardless of age, race, or any other demographic that you would care to name-who ONLY want to hear the latest "hip, hot" new thing that's coming out, weather it's rap, pop, punk,new wave, alternative, country, industrial, electronica, house music, or some weird underground rock band that makes sounds that most human beings would never recognize as music!
And I'm sure I left a lot of things OUT of that statement.
Anyway, the point is that a lot of THOSE people are very close-minded about the kind of music that I and a lot of the other people on this forum like.
To them most of the prog and/or metal bands that WE like are often considered "too old," "too melodic," "too heavy," or "not heavy enough" or "too repetitious," etc.
So I don't think you can say that prog fans are better or worse than anyone else when it comes to open-mindedness.
This is exactly why this debate is pretty much impossible to reasonably discuss. Nobody wants to hear that what they like "could possibly be anything worse than good". Tell anyone that their favorite group sucks and they'll be pissed off. Nobody wants to even CONSIDER a world where what they like isn't good. It makes them feel like their judgement or opinion is wrong...which it's not. Something being good or bad has nothing to do with how people perceive it or like it. It's an entire planet of close mindedness. This is why looking at something or listening to something without putting your personal feelings into it is impossible, and this is why we'll never get to the root of which group is better than another.
If we all just sat back and relaxed, no feelings involved and looked at everything, actually LOOKED at everything, I think we'll find that we're a lot closer to figuring this out than we think.
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I also think it's very unfair to generalize music like everything has the same purpose or goal. It's not like discussing Football statistics where you can analyze statistics and measure who is the best kicker in NFL history. Music is such a broad thing, and discussing quality in such broad terms is just very impossible. To me, your argument is like trying to measure who is the best athlete in the world. Not within one specific sport, but all sports. And you can't really measure that since all sports are different and there are different criteria to each of them. Music is similar with genres instead. Like, how do you even measure a 40 minute experimental Drone/Noise song VS a 3 minute pop ballad meant for radio play? They are two very different things, and so trying to measure bands and artists in overall quality, when they have so different backgrounds, and act in different genres, it just becomes impossible.
I could understand comparing a band like Dream Theater to other bands within their style. Bands like Symphony X or Circus Maximus who operate within the same sets of rules and craft music from the same "guidebook" so to speak. It just becomes very different when you throw all genres into the mix and try to generalize music as one thing, and trying to measure the quality, when the genres themselves are so different.
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Saying "Rush sucks" is like saying The Flash is slow.
No it is not. Speed can be objectively measured and compared. Miles per hour. The two situations are in no way similar.
EDIT: As for the rest of your post, it has some top notch stuff about opinions and anyone being able to like anything, but I cannot disagree more strongly that art can be objectively good or bad. I'm not going to go into detail though, because we've had this discussion hundreds of times on this forum.
You're completely right. Art is interpreted differently from person to person. You may find a picture I painted more captivating than Picasso's. Or it may speak to you in a way that a better painting doesn't. But my painting is not as good as one that Picasso would make. I may write a song that grabs your heart and makes you cry. But, in actuality, is it as good as a song written by Iron Maiden? Hell no. Because when it comes down to it, I suck at playing guitar and writing music. I'm not even close to the level that they are. Everyone has a different perception on something, that's life in a nutshell. Everyone's different. But if you take the piece of art by itself, with nobody listening to it/looking at it, there is a quality there that makes it better or worse than something else. It's hard to understand because it's a different way of looking at things than what we're used to. It's extremely difficult to not put your personal opinion on something when deciding whether it's good or bad. I'm not going to lie, I read the first Twilight book (until the movie came and I hated it) and I loved it. It was interesting, entertaining, etc...but it's terribly written. She can't write. I know a lot of people who hate Stephen King, and I understand that, he's not for everybody. But he's a fantastic writer. You may not AGREE with his style, but the man knows how to write.
You have yet to explain this. How? What criteria is this? How does one determine objective quality of art?
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Saying "Rush sucks" is like saying The Flash is slow.
No it is not. Speed can be objectively measured and compared. Miles per hour. The two situations are in no way similar.
EDIT: As for the rest of your post, it has some top notch stuff about opinions and anyone being able to like anything, but I cannot disagree more strongly that art can be objectively good or bad. I'm not going to go into detail though, because we've had this discussion hundreds of times on this forum.
You're completely right. Art is interpreted differently from person to person. You may find a picture I painted more captivating than Picasso's. Or it may speak to you in a way that a better painting doesn't. But my painting is not as good as one that Picasso would make. I may write a song that grabs your heart and makes you cry. But, in actuality, is it as good as a song written by Iron Maiden? Hell no. Because when it comes down to it, I suck at playing guitar and writing music. I'm not even close to the level that they are. Everyone has a different perception on something, that's life in a nutshell. Everyone's different. But if you take the piece of art by itself, with nobody listening to it/looking at it, there is a quality there that makes it better or worse than something else. It's hard to understand because it's a different way of looking at things than what we're used to. It's extremely difficult to not put your personal opinion on something when deciding whether it's good or bad. I'm not going to lie, I read the first Twilight book (until the movie came and I hated it) and I loved it. It was interesting, entertaining, etc...but it's terribly written. She can't write. I know a lot of people who hate Stephen King, and I understand that, he's not for everybody. But he's a fantastic writer. You may not AGREE with his style, but the man knows how to write.
You have yet to explain this. How? What criteria is this? How does one determine objective quality of art?
There is no objective quality in art. If you write a song, and there is very little to it, like some ambient song, someone could consider it better than Beethoven's 9th Symphony. Would they be right? Yes, in their own opinion, which is all that matters. I wouldn't agree, but they are correct because they like it more. It is one's personal opinion what is better. Someone could say Nickelback is better than Dream Theater, and to himself or herself they would be correct. Perhaps not to us, because we have different opinions. The only thing you can measure objectively is the virtuosity of a player, which in the grand scheme things, means absolutely nothing. I don't think I'd be wrong if I said the only people that care Dream Theater plays faster are Dream Theater fans. Musically, as I have said before, virtuosity only adds embellishment, which is unimportant in emotional expression, which is what music is all about.
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Saying "Rush sucks" is like saying The Flash is slow.
No it is not. Speed can be objectively measured and compared. Miles per hour. The two situations are in no way similar.
EDIT: As for the rest of your post, it has some top notch stuff about opinions and anyone being able to like anything, but I cannot disagree more strongly that art can be objectively good or bad. I'm not going to go into detail though, because we've had this discussion hundreds of times on this forum.
You're completely right. Art is interpreted differently from person to person. You may find a picture I painted more captivating than Picasso's. Or it may speak to you in a way that a better painting doesn't. But my painting is not as good as one that Picasso would make. I may write a song that grabs your heart and makes you cry. But, in actuality, is it as good as a song written by Iron Maiden? Hell no. Because when it comes down to it, I suck at playing guitar and writing music. I'm not even close to the level that they are. Everyone has a different perception on something, that's life in a nutshell. Everyone's different. But if you take the piece of art by itself, with nobody listening to it/looking at it, there is a quality there that makes it better or worse than something else. It's hard to understand because it's a different way of looking at things than what we're used to. It's extremely difficult to not put your personal opinion on something when deciding whether it's good or bad. I'm not going to lie, I read the first Twilight book (until the movie came and I hated it) and I loved it. It was interesting, entertaining, etc...but it's terribly written. She can't write. I know a lot of people who hate Stephen King, and I understand that, he's not for everybody. But he's a fantastic writer. You may not AGREE with his style, but the man knows how to write.
You have yet to explain this. How? What criteria is this? How does one determine objective quality of art?
It's extremely difficult to explain but I'll try my best. Ok, imagine a world where all of humanity has died off. The music still exists but there's nobody around to hear it. One is better than another. It comes down to music talent, skill, and how well he/she uses said talent and skill, but that's not the only thing. If a song or passage is harder to accomplish, that means the amount of skill required is higher, so people who aren't good at guitar, or even people that are good but not great, won't be able to do it. It also has to be with the members involved and how talented they are in general.
Take Rush again for example. Tell me this: How can you have an amazing guitarist (fact), an amazing singer (fact), an amazing drummer (fact) and an amazing bassist (fact) and come to the conclusion that when you put these together, it all becomes ONLY an opinion? It makes no sense. Sure you can dislike the band, or you may even dislike the band members, but if each individual member is amazing, then why is the band as a whole regarded as just an opinion? It seems to me like nobody wants to ruffle any feathers or get into a "which is better" debate, so the safer route is to be nice to everyone. A type of "agree to disagree" easy solution. There is an opinion side and a factual side, I'm not saying that there is no opinion here. But you guys are saying that it ONLY comes down to an opinion. I'm saying it's both, but you have to approach it from different angles. Liking/disliking= opinion, good/bad=fact. You can have a band of amazing musicians or a band full of a bunch of clown who don't know C Major from D Major. Sure, you may think the song that the clowns made sounds better to YOU, or resonates well with YOU, but, taken at face value, with nobody around to form an opinion, they are just not as good as the other band, plain and simple.
I hope this makes sense, I explained it as best I could.
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Again, it sounds like you're basing the entire thing around technicality, which as has been said (SO MANY TIMES) doesn't really mean anything. That would mean that the most insanely technical composition ever would be the "best" music ever made, even if literally nobody can stand listening to it. You seem to be saying that music is good if it's composed by technically skilled musicians, and bad if it's not, and frankly the entire premise seems fallacious to me.
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Again, it sounds like you're basing the entire thing around technicality, which as has been said (SO MANY TIMES) doesn't really mean anything. That would mean that the most insanely technical composition ever would be the "best" music ever made, even if literally nobody can stand listening to it. You seem to be saying that music is good if it's composed by technically skilled musicians, and bad if it's not, and frankly the entire premise seems fallacious to me.
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This thread makes my head hurt. :lol :lol
And no one is a bigger Rush fan than me :biggrin:, but saying that it's a fact that Geddy Lee is an amazing singer is just ridiculous.
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Just because you have amazing individual musicians, that doesn't necessarily mean they are able to write good music together. Think of it like mixing chocolate sauce, pizza, bacon, whipped cream and cookies, all great on their own, but that doesn't mean they would go well together.
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Another thing that just occurred to me. What if you had Rush play a song written by some pop/whatever band. Would it be a great song because it's played by great musicians, or terrible because it was written by not great ones? (Again, just taking for granted that technicality=great musicianship, which isn't true, but whatev at this point)
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Again, it sounds like you're basing the entire thing around technicality, which as has been said (SO MANY TIMES) doesn't really mean anything. That would mean that the most insanely technical composition ever would be the "best" music ever made, even if literally nobody can stand listening to it. You seem to be saying that music is good if it's composed by technically skilled musicians, and bad if it's not, and frankly the entire premise seems fallacious to me.
But if you can compare 2 guitarists with one another and one can obviously play better and more technical, he would be the better player. So yes it would be the best, which you're right it means nothing if liking and disliking (different from good/bad) comes down to an opinion. Again, you can like anything you want.
If nobody can stand listening to it, that doesn't mean it's bad, like I said people's opinions have nothing to do with whether it's good or not. Every single person in the world can hate a song, but it may not actually be a bad song. People say all the time "I can't stand this band, but I respect them". What does that mean? You don't like them, but you respect them? Why do you respect them? Because you know they're good?
Also, you CAN compare playing ability. I can't stand Slash, but he is a great guitarist. That's a reasonable thing to say, because he is a great guitarist, whether I like him or not. Replace my best friend (who can't play guitar very well) with him in my band, my band suddenly becomes better.
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Another thing that just occurred to me. What if you had Rush play a song written by some pop/whatever band. Would it be a great song because it's played by great musicians, or terrible because it was written by not great ones? (Again, just taking for granted that technicality=great musicianship, which isn't true, but whatev at this point)
Good question. It would be a terrible song that is played very well, odds are making it into a slightly better song, but you can only make a terrible song so good. It would be like covering a turd in ice cream.
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Damn it, I'm not saying you can't compare playing ability! I'm not saying that a guitarist's technical ability can't be determined! What I'm saying is that the music that guitarist creates ISN'T OBJECTIVELY GOOD JUST BECAUSE THE GUITARIST WHO WROTE IT IS. The quality of music is subjective and entirely dependent on opinion, the technicality of the musician in question isn't.
What if an extremely talented musician plays a very simple song? Is it good because he's talented? But he's not using any of his technical ability, so does that make it bad?
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Damn it, I'm not saying you can't compare playing ability! I'm not saying that a guitarist's technical ability can't be determined! What I'm saying is that the music that guitarist creates ISN'T OBJECTIVELY GOOD JUST BECAUSE THE GUITARIST WHO WROTE IT IS. The quality of music is subjective and entirely dependent on opinion, the technicality of the musician in question isn't.
What if an extremely talented musician plays a very simple song? Is it good because he's talented? But he's not using any of his technical ability, so does that make it bad?
That honestly depends. If it's a cover of a simple song, that would depend on if the simple song was even good in the first place. A great musician knows how to make a simple song a good one. Subtlety is key. Dream Theater for example knows how to make a great simple song, with a lot of emotion and meanings. Now, these emotions may not resonate with you and that's fine, but the emotions are in the song itself, whether they affect you or not. For example, I never felt really any emotion for "Scenes From a Memory". I like the album a lot (my number 5) but it never hit me emotionally. But I know the emotion is there in the song itself, it just doesn't do anything for me. But just because I can't feel the emotion doesn't mean I disregard it completely. Some songs have little to no emotion or expression in them. A good musician also knows how to PUT emotion into a song that has none, just by the way he/she plays. Lyrics play a huge part too. Do the lyrics have a meaning, or are they shallow, juvenile and immature? It's not JUST about technicality.
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This thread makes my head hurt. :lol :lol
It's making ME want to take an entire bottle of aspirin!!!
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Here we go again. How do you know what emotion is present? By what metric can you measure it?
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Lyrics, playing style, and the way the song is constructed as a whole. The message that the song is conveying is usually obvious. If it hits you, that's great, if not, oh well. But there is emotion there, even if it doesn't hit you personally. So now we have:
Playing Ability
Technicality
Emotion
These are all qualities of a great band, whether these qualities are important to me or not. Think of Dream Theater's "The Best of Times". Perfect example of a song with passages of technicality and emotion, while still being a bit on the simple side. It combines positive elements of good individual instrument playing. It's all there. It's not a perfect song obviously, but way better than anything Nickelback has written. To say that "The Best of Times" has no emotion is ridiculous. It may not resonate with you personally, but it's in the song.
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You're not offering any evidence for determining the emotion in a song. You're just saying it's there, and that people are wrong if they think otherwise. Anyway I think I'm done here, this is hurting my head. Carry on, folks.
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I think we're ALL going to end up with terrible headaches because of this thread...!...
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It's not a perfect song obviously, but way better than anything Nickelback has written.
There was a point in time that I quite enjoyed listening to How You Remind Me, and would still consider it a pretty decent pop/rock song. I’m not sure if I ever felt like listening to The Best of Times, even when initially digesting Black Clouds.
You claim to have different criteria for deciding if you like/dislike a song, or if a song is good/bad/better/worse than others (this one clearly revolving more or less entirely around technicality and musicianship). If you need to believe that to justify liking some music that isn’t oh so amazingly written, that’s your business. But as much as you treat your evaluation of a song’s intrinsic quality based on those traits as you tapping into something objective, it is still nothing more than your own personal way of evaluating the question.
Other people are going to approach “what makes a song good or bad?” in a completely different way. There are people to whom technicality in playing means nothing, who are completely indifferent to it, that it’s actually totally different things that matter; or to whom it is a matter of diminishing returns, ie a song should be well played and composed to a certain extent to be good, but there is a point after which technicality does nothing to help a song, and may even hinder it, and the point at which any two people judge that threshold to have been passed could be completely different; or to whom it is important, up to a point, but can’t stand on its own, and can become irrelevant if other things aren’t up to scratch. They might be extremely important factors to you, but that doesn’t make technicality and musicianship objectively divining rods for good music.
You can wax poetic about how great the playing in The Best of Times is in passages and the skill of the guys in DT and so on, but I have never remotely wanted to listen to it. The lyrics are atrocious, and it feels forced and formulaic, like a DT song by numbers, albeit not such a heavy one. How You Remind Me, regardless of its inferior musicianship and simpler ambitions, succeeds in what it tries to achieve; it’s a catchy, listenable rock song that feels genuine. In other words, it’s a far better piece of music. To me.
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This thread makes my head hurt. :lol :lol
It's probably cancer. I'm pretty sure that some of these posts are giving me brain cancer.
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Just because you have amazing individual musicians, that doesn't necessarily mean they are able to write good music together. Think of it like mixing chocolate sauce, pizza, bacon, whipped cream and cookies, all great on their own, but that doesn't mean they would go well together.
I think if we can make a dessert pizza, with chocolate sauce as the sauce, bite-sized cookies as toppings, with small bacon bits, and topped it with whipped cream, it can work.
Anywho, people have different ideas of good songs or bad songs. I mean people in the Foo Fighters forum do not like Foo Fighters' Wheels a lot. They hate the vibe, they felt that it's not the best representation of what the band's got to offer. For me, I love the song a lot. I love the tone of the song, I love the lyrics, etc. It reminds me of what I'm currently going through in life, atm. Is it technically proficient and shows the best in the bands' abilities to make a song? Maybe, not really. However, I found that song to be one of the most important song that I'm ever going to listen to in my life.
Being technically proficient, while it's always a great ability to have, does not always mean that the band is going to create a song that can captivate someone as much as a simple pop song or something.
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This thread makes my head hurt. :lol :lol
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I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: the only way to measure something objectively is by establishing objective criteria. And we can do that with music. The problem is, that criteria is always going to be arbitrary.
Thought experiment: on a scale of one to ten, which is better, one or ten? We have a lot of objective facts to work with in answering this question, but the question itself is meaningless until we define what exactly makes a number ‘good’ or ‘bad’. If low numbers are good and high numbers are bad, one is better than ten. If high numbers are good and low numbers are bad, ten is better than one. If prime numbers are good and composite numbers are bad, one is better than ten. If even numbers are good and odd numbers are bad, then ten is better than one. In short, the quality of the numbers depends not only on the objective mathematical facts, but on the criteria you use for determining quality.
So it goes with music. You have chosen to use ability to play difficult passages as a criteria for determining the skill of a guitarist. Based on that criteria, John Petrucci is a better guitarist than Kurt Cobain was – but only because you chose to focus on that criteria, and only within the frame of that criteria. You could just as easily have chosen to measure guitar players based on other objective facts – number of albums sold, for instance – and the results would be much different.
It all depends on the criteria you use.
That is why music is subjective. There are objective facts, but everyone has to decide for themselves whether or not those objective facts actually matter, and that decision is always going to be subjective. There is no cosmic universal law about which criteria dictates quality. We just make it up as we go along.
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No. Prog fans are like any other grouping of fans. It's a melting pot of closed minded, open minded and everything in between people. Just because music is complex, long, etc doesn't necessarily mean it attracts open minded people. I'm also not one to make generalized blanket statements. I came from a background of Classical music, and I've observed many classical music aficionados are very closed minded, and I've also took notice of some that are open minded to other types of music. Eventually, I grew to appreciate prog rock from my parents, pop and indie from friends, etc. I now listen to dozens of different types of music and I've noticed the same consistency in pretty much them all in regard to the fans of each genre.
P.S. Nice response, Jaffa.
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Again, it sounds like you're basing the entire thing around technicality, which as has been said (SO MANY TIMES) doesn't really mean anything. That would mean that the most insanely technical composition ever would be the "best" music ever made, even if literally nobody can stand listening to it. You seem to be saying that music is good if it's composed by technically skilled musicians, and bad if it's not, and frankly the entire premise seems fallacious to me.
But if you can compare 2 guitarists with one another and one can obviously play better and more technical, he would be the better player. So yes it would be the best, which you're right it means nothing if liking and disliking (different from good/bad) comes down to an opinion. Again, you can like anything you want.
He would be better purely at playing ability/skill. Which has nothing to do with artistic quality. That's something you don't seem to understand.
The quality of art purely comes down to how it affects the reader/listener/viewer/whatever.
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I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: the only way to measure something objectively is by establishing objective criteria. And we can do that with music. The problem is, that criteria is always going to be arbitrary.
Thought experiment: on a scale of one to ten, which is better, one or ten? We have a lot of objective facts to work with in answering this question, but the question itself is meaningless until we define what exactly makes a number ‘good’ or ‘bad’. If low numbers are good and high numbers are bad, one is better than ten. If high numbers are good and low numbers are bad, ten is better than one. If prime numbers are good and composite numbers are bad, one is better than ten. If even numbers are good and odd numbers are bad, then ten is better than one. In short, the quality of the numbers depends not only on the objective mathematical facts, but on the criteria you use for determining quality.
So it goes with music. You have chosen to use ability to play difficult passages as a criteria for determining the skill of a guitarist. Based on that criteria, John Petrucci is a better guitarist than Kurt Cobain was – but only because you chose to focus on that criteria, and only within the frame of that criteria. You could just as easily have chosen to measure guitar players based on other objective facts – number of albums sold, for instance – and the results would be much different.
It all depends on the criteria you use.
That is why music is subjective. There are objective facts, but everyone has to decide for themselves whether or not those objective facts actually matter, and that decision is always going to be subjective. There is no cosmic universal law about which criteria dictates quality. We just make it up as we go along.
Great post, Jaff. :tup
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I would say prog fans are not open minded at all. No offense to you guys, but I see very few prog fans actively listen to music other than prog. Whether this is simply based on preference or the mindset that prog is actually "better" than some average pop song, I can't tell. I personally am beginning more and more to despise the mindset of "this music is better, and I am better for listening to it", from fans of ALL genres. The word "genre" in itself is really starting to bug me, as it puts artists into groups that they can no longer get out of. I don't know what I'm trying to say. Hmm... Take the "classical" genre, which is by far the most diverse genre of music we have today. In reality, we could divide up classical music into a huge amount of subgenres. The light, "poppier" classical music (string quartets, early symphonies in major, etc), the "heavy" classical music (full orchestra works, especially of the 19th and early 20th centuries), the "proggy" classical music (symphonic poems), musicals (opera), and extreme (atonal works of the 20th century) etc etc etc. But it's all called "classical". Fans of one genre might say "I hate all rap, it's just some guy talking into a microphone over a beat", and then never expose themselves to any of it, because they believe that all rap is of a lesser artistic value than what they are listening to, and some might even believe that in existence there is not a single rap song that could be "better" than whatever they are listening to. This is close-mindedness, they have literally closed their mind to all rap and refuse to listen to it. I feel as though this problem doesn't exist as much with "classical" music, as within the "genre", fans listen to all different types of instrumentation, tempo, style, and country of origin without a second thought (though some might close their mind from atonality, and I don't completely blame them).
tl;dr, No. I don't think prog fans are open-minded, if only because genres are stupid (and they are).
I agree with this. I used to be one of those people who listens almost exclusively to prog. These days, I'm a fan of all music. The way I was (and a lot of prog fans are) is like this: a lot of times, people who love prog believe they've "discovered" the ultimate music, and believe that things just don't get much better from prog. Sure, most prog fans do dabble in other genres (they have token "pop" or "metal" or even "rap" releases they like), but they do not explore music much outside prog. It gets really interesting when I've seen prog listeners mention a band like Porcupine Tree as one of their "more mainstream / pop" bands. I've seen a lot of comments like, "Oh, I don't just like prog, I like poppier bands too like Blackfield, Flying Colors, etc.", and it just makes me realize how insular and narrow-minded the whole genre has become. Granted, not all prog fans are like this, but as someone who listens to a lot of music and has been on the prog-fanboy side of the fence, I do prog is nowhere near about being open-minded or exploring these days.
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I think the nature of Progressive Rock/Metal as a genre lends itself well to fans starting those debates. I will echo what Ariich said earlier, and I do think every genre has this type of fan, the fan who claims that their genre is the best one, and that all other genres are below it. But I think the nature of Progressive Rock/Metal, the fact that main aspects of the music comes down to complex playing and long songs, as well as very technically skilled musicians who can play difficult parts, this makes it easier for that type of fan to claim it's a higher form of music, because now they have some factors that could help them prove their point. Of course it's all subjective in the end, but I think the nature of Prog, and even some other genres like Avant-Garde Metal just lends themselves perfectly to creating those kind of discussions.
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I'm not even going to read this thread. ;)
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I'm not even going to read this thread. ;)
:lol
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I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: the only way to measure something objectively is by establishing objective criteria. And we can do that with music. The problem is, that criteria is always going to be arbitrary.
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That is why music is subjective. There are objective facts, but everyone has to decide for themselves whether or not those objective facts actually matter, and that decision is always going to be subjective. There is no cosmic universal law about which criteria dictates quality. We just make it up as we go along.
Your post is the one that I've come closest to agreeing with on this topic. Personally, I am of the opinion that it is possible to establish objectively which criteria dictate quality, but that to determine which those are, we'd have to understand exactly how the mind processes and experiences music, which we do not understand too well at all right now—which means that we ought to treat quality in music as subjective.
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Is John Cage's piece considered music by you guys? Good? Bad?
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Is John Cage's piece considered music by you guys? Good? Bad?
4'33'' isn't the only piece of music he's ever written :lol
But yes, I call it music. I myself wouldn't call it "good" music (stop using those words! :lol), but there is a purpose to the piece.
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I find 4'33'' is just so overplayed. Especially when you're trying to get away from it all, you drive into the woods for a nice walk, and you hear that stupid tune.
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I find 4'33'' is just so overplayed. Especially when you're trying to get away from it all, you drive into the woods for a nice walk, and you hear that stupid tune.
:lol
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I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: the only way to measure something objectively is by establishing objective criteria. And we can do that with music. The problem is, that criteria is always going to be arbitrary.
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That is why music is subjective. There are objective facts, but everyone has to decide for themselves whether or not those objective facts actually matter, and that decision is always going to be subjective. There is no cosmic universal law about which criteria dictates quality. We just make it up as we go along.
Your post is the one that I've come closest to agreeing with on this topic. Personally, I am of the opinion that it is possible to establish objectively which criteria dictate quality, but that to determine which those are, we'd have to understand exactly how the mind processes and experiences music, which we do not understand too well at all right now—which means that we ought to treat quality in music as subjective.
Interesting point. To which I would add that each mind will process and experience music (and indeed any art form) differently. So to develop objective criteria such as those you suggest, you'd have to look at common occurences, probabilities etc., and then you end up going down the route of popular = good. Which, to be honest, is in reality the only objective measure of quality, just not one I think is very important or relevant. :lol
I find 4'33'' is just so overplayed. Especially when you're trying to get away from it all, you drive into the woods for a nice walk, and you hear that stupid tune.
:clap:
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I'm not even going to read this thread. ;)
:rollin
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Again, it sounds like you're basing the entire thing around technicality, which as has been said (SO MANY TIMES) doesn't really mean anything. That would mean that the most insanely technical composition ever would be the "best" music ever made, even if literally nobody can stand listening to it. You seem to be saying that music is good if it's composed by technically skilled musicians, and bad if it's not, and frankly the entire premise seems fallacious to me.
But if you can compare 2 guitarists with one another and one can obviously play better and more technical, he would be the better player. So yes it would be the best, which you're right it means nothing if liking and disliking (different from good/bad) comes down to an opinion. Again, you can like anything you want.
He would be better purely at playing ability/skill. Which has nothing to do with artistic quality. That's something you don't seem to understand.
The quality of art purely comes down to how it affects the reader/listener/viewer/whatever.
I agree, but I'm not talking about how it affects the listener: that is purely opinion. I'm saying the music itself as it stands on its own, without anyone there to form an opinion on it. It's like comparing 2 different cars. Take a Dodge Viper or a Corvette...I know a lot of people who like Vipers better and I know a lot of people who like Corvettes better. It's entirely opinionated when it comes to what people prefer. But the viper is the better car. Someone may not be looking for a better car and just want what they prefer, for a number of reasons, but going by which car is better, with no opinions involved would be the Viper.
I was wrong before about emotion. You guys are right...you can't judge emotion on its own, since emotion means something different to everyone But there are some things you can judge on its own without opinions involved. These are playing ability, technicality, how well scales and notes are used with one another and how musically advanced the song is.
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I'm saying the music itself as it stands on its own, without anyone there to form an opinion on it. It's like comparing 2 different cars. Take a Dodge Viper or a Corvette...I know a lot of people who like Vipers better and I know a lot of people who like Corvettes better. It's entirely opinionated when it comes to what people prefer. But the viper is the better car. Someone may not be looking for a better car and just want what they prefer, for a number of reasons, but going by which car is better, with no opinions involved would be the Viper.
This analogy is wrong because there are objective facts as to why a car might be better than another; it is a physical, tangible thing that can be measured. Music, again, cannot be measured objectively except for the things, like virtuosity, that don't really matter.
I was wrong before about emotion. You guys are right...you can't judge emotion on its own, since emotion means something different to everyone But there are some things you can judge on its own without opinions involved. These are playing ability, technicality, how well scales and notes are used with one another and how musically advanced the song is.
This cannot be measured. How "well" scales and notes are used together is personal opinion.
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I respect your outlook on it. Can you give me a reason why virtuosity doesn't matter? Talent=better than no talent, at anything. Yes, it doesn't matter to certain people, but I'm not talking about people here. I'm talking about music as it stands on its own. A talented guitarist who clearly knows a lot about music like Satriani is leagues better than Brittany Spears. "Talented" and "better"can be switched around, they both mean the same thing.
Also, nobody answered my previous question: Why do you hear people say "I hate so and so band, but I respect them"? What does that mean? Have you ever heard someone say "I hate Lil' Wayne, but I respect him"? You only hear that for actual talented musicians, because they are the best at what they do and these people that are saying "I don't like so and so but I respect them" know that even if you don't like them, they deserve respect, because while their music might not fit your tastes, they're extremely good at what they do. Why are bands like Rush and Iron Maiden much more respected than Lil' Wayne and Nikki Minaj, yet they both have a lot of fans? What does "respect" mean when it comes to music? If music was all entirely opinionated, why not just say "I don't like them" and leave it at that? Why does everyone feel the need to add the respect part? Hm...maybe there's another part of them that knows they're good, despite not liking them personally?
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Counter question: if respect is an indicator of objective quality, why doesn't everyone agree about which artists deserve respect and which ones don't?
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Technicality and musicality are two completely different animals. You could be as technically brilliant as you want but not know how to harness it to actually make good music. That's why in music the objectively talented musician doesn't always make objectively better music, since better in terms of songs is more of a result of songwriting and cohesiveness than skill.
I didn't always used to think that way but once the wow factor of crazy fast guitar runs and pure skill wore off I began to discover a lot more well crafted music by musicians not as talented skill-wise but knew how to writes songs worth a damn.
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Believe it or not, not everyone is a master in music. Myself included. I already said before that it's hard to tell which bands are better than others sometimes...I just don't know enough about music. Anyone that has an inkling of how music theory works would say that they at least respect Iron Maiden and Rush (for example). But the uneducated in music just doesn't know enough, but in general, many, many more people in this world have respect for the bands that are talented vs the ones that aren't. The ones that say (for example) "I hate Linkin Park, but I respect them because they're talented" is a very small minority and a statement like this is ignorant, because it's just not true. I mean, yeah they're talented, but nowhere near Iron Maiden.
Why is "The Who" considered one of the greatest bands of all time, but not "My Chemical Romance"? Because the former has the talent.
You can use any criteria you want for deciding on if you personally like the band or not, because opinions, but someone more talented is better than someone less talented.
You still didn't answer my question regarding respect.
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You can use any criteria you want for deciding on if you personally like the band or not, because opinions, but someone more talented is better than someone less talented.
You still didn't answer my question regarding respect.
My answer is that whether or not you respect a musician is still going to depend on what criteria you choose to measure them by.
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Is John Cage's piece considered music by you guys? Good? Bad?
I would say 4'33" is not music for the same reason that 200 blank pieces of paper bound together is not a novel and 2 hours of a blank screen and silence is not a film.
Interesting point. To which I would add that each mind will process and experience music (and indeed any art form) differently. So to develop objective criteria such as those you suggest, you'd have to look at common occurences, probabilities etc., and then you end up going down the route of popular = good. Which, to be honest, is in reality the only objective measure of quality, just not one I think is very important or relevant. :lol
I'm not so sure that would be the case. To be clear, I'm not talking about the specific interpretations or experiences that the mind has of a specific piece of music; I'm talking about mental processes of interpreting and experiencing music in a very general sense. Of course different people are going to have different responses to music, but I think that the actual mental mechanism of processing auditory input would work the same way for everyone.
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Is John Cage's piece considered music by you guys? Good? Bad?
I would say 4'33" is not music for the same reason that 200 blank pieces of paper bound together is not a novel and 2 hours of a blank screen and silence is not a film.
Interesting point. To which I would add that each mind will process and experience music (and indeed any art form) differently. So to develop objective criteria such as those you suggest, you'd have to look at common occurences, probabilities etc., and then you end up going down the route of popular = good. Which, to be honest, is in reality the only objective measure of quality, just not one I think is very important or relevant. :lol
I'm not so sure that would be the case. To be clear, I'm not talking about the specific interpretations or experiences that the mind has of a specific piece of music; I'm talking about mental processes of interpreting and experiencing music in a very general sense. Of course different people are going to have different responses to music, but I think that the actual mental mechanism of processing auditory input would work the same way for everyone.
Do I see a science experiment coming on here?
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You can use any criteria you want for deciding on if you personally like the band or not, because opinions, but someone more talented is better than someone less talented.
You still didn't answer my question regarding respect.
My answer is that whether or not you respect a musician is still going to depend on what criteria you choose to measure them by.
Please tell me you're not suggesting that someone would respect a MUSICIAN for something other than talent. Because respecting a musician for their hair, or the color of their guitar is one of the dumbest things I have ever heard and if someone DID make a statement like that, they clearly have no idea what they're talking about. Sure, you can respect Skrillex for his bass drops and whatnot, but someone that has MORE RESPECT for Skrillex than Maiden is either uneducated in music, or just hasn't heard Maiden before. You can like either one better, but one is clearly more talented than the other.
Also, I like how you only keep answering one of two sentences of my posts and continue to disregard the rest of them.
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Why is "The Who" considered one of the greatest bands of all time
Are they? Can't say I hear that sentiment uttered very often.
but someone that has MORE RESPECT for Skrillex than Maiden is either uneducated in music, or just hasn't heard Maiden before.
Lol. I think you are woefully ignorant as to the skill involved in crafting the sounds that go into a Skrillex song. Those sounds aren't just "Program #221" on whatever keyboard he owns, you know.
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Why is "The Who" considered one of the greatest bands of all time
Are they? Can't say I hear that sentiment uttered very often.
Really? Look online, take a music theory class, The Who is known to be one of the greatest of all time.
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I see them being referred to as "great", and "classic band", but usually I don't see them traded in the "Greatest band of all time" list. Case in point, just randomly pulled one list up, this list puts them at #29 (https://www.rollingstone.com/music/lists/100-greatest-artists-of-all-time-19691231/the-who-20110420) of greatest artists of all time. That's by no means bad, but it's also nowhere near the top.
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I think he meant one of the greatest bands, not THE greatest.
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I see them being referred to as "great", and "classic band", but usually I don't see them traded in the "Greatest band of all time" list. Case in point, just randomly pulled one list up, this list puts them at #29 (https://www.rollingstone.com/music/lists/100-greatest-artists-of-all-time-19691231/the-who-20110420) of greatest artists of all time. That's by no means bad, but it's also nowhere near the top.
Not that I'm a big The Who fan, but take out the singular artists and Rolling Stone has them still in the Top 10 of actual bands, and they have Velvet Underground and The Ramones ahead of them.
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Please tell me you're not suggesting that someone would respect a MUSICIAN for something other than talent. Because respecting a musician for their hair, or the color of their guitar is one of the dumbest things I have ever heard and if someone DID make a statement like that, they clearly have no idea what they're talking about. Sure, you can respect Skrillex for his bass drops and whatnot, but someone that has MORE RESPECT for Skrillex than Maiden is either uneducated in music, or just hasn't heard Maiden before. You can like either one better, but one is clearly more talented than the other.
Also, I like how you only keep answering one of two sentences of my posts and continue to disregard the rest of them.
Talent is something one finds when they try a new hobby. Talent is when a person seems to be naturally good at something very early. It is their responsibility to WORK to nurture that talent, and if they do nothing and just rely on the talent, it will do them no good. If someone with no talent works really hard they will undoubtedly be better than the person who does not nurture the talent they have, and if they work even harder they can become better than even the person who works hard to nurture their talent. In reality, "talent" is also rather meaningless.
Skrillex is an example of someone who worked REALLY HARD for his position. He was not helped to fame, he worked very hard to obtain it.
Why is "The Who" considered one of the greatest bands of all time
Are they? Can't say I hear that sentiment uttered very often.
Really? Look online, take a music theory class, The Who is known to be one of the greatest of all time.
:lol I'm sorry, but I'm currently taking theory in college, and I don't get why being musically educated would suddenly make me appreciate The Who. They have a few great songs, sure, but there are a ton of bands in that era that also have songs that are in my opinion equally as great.
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Eh, TVU deserve to be like #2 IMO.
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I see them being referred to as "great", and "classic band", but usually I don't see them traded in the "Greatest band of all time" list. Case in point, just randomly pulled one list up, this list puts them at #29 (https://www.rollingstone.com/music/lists/100-greatest-artists-of-all-time-19691231/the-who-20110420) of greatest artists of all time. That's by no means bad, but it's also nowhere near the top.
Ok, great we're getting somewhere. As a critic, music or film, it is not their job to rate a film/band based on how much they LIKE it. They are supposed to give a score based on how good it is. Since there's so many variables to film and music, it's very hard to pin point everything and you just can't completely master the craft of giving something a rating. But as you can see, a band like The Who pretty much fluctuates between #5-30 or so. Seeing as how many bands are out there, that's amazing. Now, when you get to comparing the top 50 or so bands of all time, this is when it gets very complicated, but comparing The Who to Miley Cyrus is a joke. Why is there such a thing as "professional critic"? Why do they need to go to school for it? Why not just go to the theater and tell their boss if they liked it or not? If everything is "just an opinion", then what do they need to learn?
The very fact that we're even discussing this for 10 pages speaks volumes about what I'm trying to say. This would only go to 10 pages on something like Dream Theater forums. Go to a Justin Beiber forum and try talking about this...they will be confused about what music theory even is, and that's ok. They don't listen to Beiber for musical talent, they listen to him for their own reasons. That is completely fine. But compare Dream Theater and Justin Beiber, and there is no comparison as to which is the more talented artist. Ok, it may be unfair because Bieber is only one person. Yeah, he can sing really well, but can't play guitar very well, can't play drums very well, so DT already has the edge. There's a reason why Rebecca Black is so hated...she doesn't know what the hell she is doing. She is incompetent at the craft of making music. Sure, you can like her music, anyone can LIKE anything. I can bang on my table, call it a song and like it. But the talent difference is night and day. And talent=something you're good at. If you're talented at something, you're good at it.
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Ok, great we're getting somewhere. As a critic, music or film, it is not their job to rate a film/band based on how much they LIKE it. They are supposed to give a score based on how good it is. Since there's so many variables to film and music, it's very hard to pin point everything and you just can't completely master the craft of giving something a rating. That being said, when something is rated by many many critics, it gives a ballpark indication on how good/bad it is, objectively. If it wasn't objective, then why is there such a thing as "professional critic"? Why do they need to go to school for it? Why not just go to the theater and tell their boss if they liked it or not?
That totally explains why no critic who makes a list like that will end up with the same list as every other critic. No matter what, subjectivity will always be involved, because, again, there is no way to measure music objectively, only parts of it that don't really matter. When you get a degree in critical analysis of whatever, you're analyzing stuff in the same way we analyze stuff here. Opinions will still exist, and they are sure to always be different in some way, no matter how "objectively" you try to analyze, at least when talking about art.
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Ok, great we're getting somewhere. As a critic, music or film, it is not their job to rate a film/band based on how much they LIKE it. They are supposed to give a score based on how good it is. Since there's so many variables to film and music, it's very hard to pin point everything and you just can't completely master the craft of giving something a rating. That being said, when something is rated by many many critics, it gives a ballpark indication on how good/bad it is, objectively. If it wasn't objective, then why is there such a thing as "professional critic"? Why do they need to go to school for it? Why not just go to the theater and tell their boss if they liked it or not?
That totally explains why no critic who makes a list like that will end up with the same list as every other critic. No matter what, subjectivity will always be involved, because, again, there is no way to measure music objectively, only parts of it that don't really matter. When you get a degree in critical analysis of whatever, you're analyzing stuff in the same way we analyze stuff here. Opinions will still exist, and they are sure to always be different in some way, no matter how "objectively" you try to analyze, at least when talking about art.
Then what is the school trying to teach them? What's the point of going to critic school if it's all opinions anyway?
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Being a good critic is much more about putting a certain piece of art into context, than saying "this sucks" or "this is great".
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Also, I like how you only keep answering one of two sentences of my posts and continue to disregard the rest of them.
Sorry if that offends you. I'm trying to make specific points, and so I'm addressing the parts of your posts that are relevant to those specific points. I could address everything you say on a line-by-line basis, but it wouldn't further the discussion I'm trying to have in any meaningful way.
Please tell me you're not suggesting that someone would respect a MUSICIAN for something other than talent. Because respecting a musician for their hair, or the color of their guitar is one of the dumbest things I have ever heard and if someone DID make a statement like that, they clearly have no idea what they're talking about. Sure, you can respect Skrillex for his bass drops and whatnot, but someone that has MORE RESPECT for Skrillex than Maiden is either uneducated in music, or just hasn't heard Maiden before.
What I'm suggesting is that you are wrong to imply that musical talent is the same thing as technical skill. I don't respect Skrillex for his technical skill with an instrument. I respect him for the massive amount of influence he has had on modern popular music, and for the way his creativity has helped advance a genre. This is completely independent of technical skill, but it does factor into talent, as far as I'm concerned.
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Can you guys please stop being ignorant about Skrillex' skill? The guy is being hired for major Hollywood movies to design their sounds.
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Can you guys please stop being ignorant about Skrillex' skill? The guy is being hired for major Hollywood movies to design their sounds.
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I didn't mean to imply anything negative about his skill level.
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I didn't mean to imply anything negative about his skill level.
I didn't hear any implication from you, I was agreeing with rumbo
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Fair enough. I just wasn't sure whether or not his post was meant to be addressing me, so I thought I'd clarify my position. I think Skrillex is massively talented, just not necessarily in the purely technical sense that npiazza has been focusing on.
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I was just listening to "Bangarang", and the main part is just jaw-droppingly good, both technically and creatively.
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Trying it back to the OP point, people like Skrillex are truly progressive. The prog genre, for the most part, has a bunch of flies flying over it. It's just all technical skill at this point and regurgitation of tired concepts.
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What's a Skrillex?
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Trying it back to the OP point, people like Skrillex are truly progressive. The prog genre, for the most part, has a bunch of flies flying over it. It's just all technical skill at this point and regurgitation of tired concepts.
I completely agree
:corn
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What's a Skrillex?
https://youtu.be/YJVmu6yttiw
Do yourself a favor and turn it up, and wait until 0:25.
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WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?? :lol
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Yeah, I've tried multiple times to listen to Skrillex, but I just don't get it.
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This one is probably my favorite song of his:
https://youtu.be/WSeNSzJ2-Jw
And again, crank it up. Its incredible.
I mean, it doesn't have to be your next "best music ever", but listen to how he constructs those bizarre sounds into a cohesive whole that is truly progressive, at the literal meaning of the word.
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It's very clear that Skrillex and other dubstep artists have loads of talent and are pushing many envelops, but the music just doesn't do it for me. It really doesn't have anything to do with me "not getting it", and if people dig it, that's fine. They hear something in it that I don't. It's not bad or anything, but I feel many dubstep songs end up being a tad formulaic. I don't want that to be a sweeping generalization though. I think someone earlier in the thread mentioned Burial's album Untrue, which is a great album. Skrillex is just one artist that doesn't do it for me, progressive or not.
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This one is probably my favorite song of his:
https://youtu.be/WSeNSzJ2-Jw
And again, crank it up. Its incredible.
I mean, it doesn't have to be your next "best music ever", but listen to how he constructs those bizarre sounds into a cohesive whole that is truly progressive, at the literal meaning of the word.
Oh yeah, not denying that, I just don't enjoy listening to it.
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Is that what dubstep is, cuz I was unclear on that too.
Well, there is certainly talent in the construction of the sounds. But seriously, how could anyone listen to that?
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@ThatOneGuy: And that's totally fair. It's not that I listen to the stuff in my spare time either. It gets played at the rock gym I go to, and it has a unique energy to it.
But the main point here is, many prog fans will go out of their way to discredit other genres based on those genres' supposed lack of skill, where in reality they are listening to a genre that is virtually dead, and the only progressive part is in its title.
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This one is probably my favorite song of his:
https://youtu.be/WSeNSzJ2-Jw
And again, crank it up. Its incredible.
I mean, it doesn't have to be your next "best music ever", but listen to how he constructs those bizarre sounds into a cohesive whole that is truly progressive, at the literal meaning of the word.
On the contrary, I've found that the bizarre sounds tend to detract from the overall cohesiveness of his music. They have a way of distracting me from the brilliance of some of the underlying music. But that's just me, of course.
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I blame the Japanese programmers that work for Nintendo. :lol
It takes skill to program that but it's an assault on my ears.
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This one is probably my favorite song of his:
https://youtu.be/WSeNSzJ2-Jw
And again, crank it up. Its incredible.
I mean, it doesn't have to be your next "best music ever", but listen to how he constructs those bizarre sounds into a cohesive whole that is truly progressive, at the literal meaning of the word.
On the contrary, I've found that the bizarre sounds tend to detract from the overall cohesiveness of his music. They have a way of distracting me from the brilliance of some of the underlying music. But that's just me, of course.
To explain my enjoyment of this a bit, it's that exact (sometimes intentionally jarring) transitions that make it what it is. Like, he will hint at a harmonic backing, but then this incredibly awesome and aggressive sound will tear it to shreds, only to join back in with the harmonic stuff later.
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Is that what dubstep is, cuz I was unclear on that too.
Well Skrillex belongs to a subgenre called brostep. There's also dubstep like this (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eHjxJItKbLQ).
I'm generally not a fan of brostep but I am a fan of the other stuff.
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It's all noisestep to me. :)
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Trying it back to the OP point, people like Skrillex are truly progressive. The prog genre, for the most part, has a bunch of flies flying over it. It's just all technical skill at this point and regurgitation of tired concepts.
Yeah (and I need to be careful not to resurrect that old prog/progressive debate), but personally I would much rather listen to a genre that produces music that I personally enjoy while not going into as many new styles than a genre that tries a bunch of new things stylistically but produces music that I personally don't want to listen to.
That said, I listened to one of the Skrillex songs you posted (Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites). It's pretty cool, and definitely took skill to make. A little weird for me in parts but so is a lot of prog. So I guess I'm mostly with you on the virtues of Skrillex, I just wanted to register my disagreement with the implication that it's bad if a genre is not always doing new things stylistically.
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Yeah like I already said I like dubstep a lot. Scary Monsters is my favorite Skrillex song by far. The only thing I hate about it is after the bass drops, it keeps doing that higher pitched de-ne-ne-ne-ne-ne (best way to describe it lol) rhythm over and over again. It's extremely annoying and sounds like a generic pop beat. It breaks up the bass drops. But I LOVE the bass drops themselves, I love how the rhythm never stays consistent, it has a lot in common with prog.
Check this out by the way:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wh4CQgWKv9Q
This is my kind of dubstep.
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It's all noisestep to me. :)
Really not sure how you find Burial noisy but fair enough. ;)
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I think Dubstep is a genre that produces little timeless music (Burial being one of the the exceptions) but, still, there is creative stuff (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rIfisFMnWu4) if you dig.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wh4CQgWKv9Q
This is my kind of dubstep.
And that is indeed GOOD music. It is not a guilty pleasure AT ALL to like that.
thanks for showing me that
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I wouldn't be surprised if in 20 years or less, Skrillex and really the whole dubstep genre of sorts goes the way of Grunge, Nu-Metal and the more forgettable bands and genres that are just regarded as a fad and not really historically, incredibly significant.
It wouldn't surprise me if the same happened with Djent.
The best value I can see from them is some artists may take a little of that style and combine it with other styles and frankly, artists that actually WRITE GOOD SONGS, which wouldn't surprise me if it has to do with their ability to do some fundamental things in music well, like sing, come up with a memorable/catchy melody or rhythm.
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I think Dubstep is a genre that produces little timeless music (Burial being one of the the exceptions) but, still, there is creative stuff (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rIfisFMnWu4) if you dig.
I'm no fan of dubstep, but isn't it too early in any event to say that it's not timeless?
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I wouldn't be surprised if in 20 years or less, Skrillex and really the whole dubstep genre of sorts goes the way of Grunge, Nu-Metal and the more forgettable bands and genres that are just regarded as a fad and not really historically, incredibly significant.
I don't see how grunge could be considered a fad when you can still hear the influence of Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Soundgarden and Alice in Chains in a lot of current music.
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I wouldn't be surprised if in 20 years or less, Skrillex and really the whole dubstep genre of sorts goes the way of Grunge, Nu-Metal and the more forgettable bands and genres that are just regarded as a fad and not really historically, incredibly significant.
Grunge was historically insignificant? Lol, OK then.
I'm assuming you view prog metal as historically significant?
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I wouldn't be surprised if in 20 years or less, Skrillex and really the whole dubstep genre of sorts goes the way of Grunge, Nu-Metal and the more forgettable bands and genres that are just regarded as a fad and not really historically, incredibly significant.
Grunge was historically insignificant? Lol, OK then.
I'm assuming you view prog metal as historically significant?
I get that his statement on grunge was ignorant, but let's not tear down any straw mans here.
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God, this thread is so many levels of awesome. :rollin
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I used to be one of those guys who thought Prog metal was superior to everything, but I don't know how to finish this sentence.
I've actually stopped looking for new prog metal bands because the genre is so stale now. I await my existing favorites to release new stuff, but otherwise I'm looking for other kinds of music. For a while now I've been searching for new female fronted bands, and have found albums I like by artists I don't like, Paramore for example. Another shocker is Taylor Swift's latest album. Her country stuff is complete bollocks, but her new pop album is great, and aside from a couple crappy moments (Bad Blood's shitty chorus and Shake It Off's shitty bridge) I enjoy 1989 more than Dream Theater's newest, and I think DT12 is great too and has NO crappy moments.
So I've definitely broken out of my Prog is God shell, but prog isn't the only genre with close minded fans. In fact, I think thrash and death metal have worse close minded fans than prog.
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Honestly, they can do A LOT with dubstep. I for one, want to see dubstep combined with Prog Metal. Imagine if, in the middle of ITNOG, the bass drops or something. Or instead of the bebot solo in AROP, we can have a cool bass drop solo. I think dubstep would work extremely well as a sort of backdrop to a song, or a solo of some kind.
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I used to be one of those guys who thought Prog metal was superior to everything, but I don't know how to finish this sentence.
I've actually stopped looking for new prog metal bands because the genre is so stale now. I await my existing favorites to release new stuff, but otherwise I'm looking for other kinds of music. For a while now I've been searching for new female fronted bands, and have found albums I like by artists I don't like, Paramore for example. Another shocker is Taylor Swift's latest album. Her country stuff is complete bollocks, but her new pop album is great, and aside from a couple crappy moments (Bad Blood's shitty chorus and Shake It Off's shitty bridge) I enjoy 1989 more than Dream Theater's newest, and I think DT12 is great too and has NO crappy moments.
So I've definitely broken out of my Prog is God shell, but prog isn't the only genre with close minded fans. In fact, I think thrash and death metal have worse close minded fans than prog.
Taylor Swift's Speak Now is easily her best in my opinion. Haven't heard the new one yet, but I prefer her country than her pop. Pop isn't my thing.
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Honestly, they can do A LOT with dubstep. I for one, want to see dubstep combined with Prog Metal. Imagine if, in the middle of ITNOG, the bass drops or something. Or instead of the bebot solo in AROP, we can have a cool bass drop solo. I think dubstep would work extremely well as a sort of backdrop to a song, or a solo of some kind.
You mean like what's actually in the song before "justifying violence", but instead of the little techno thing we have BWWWWWWWAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHBBBBWWWEEEEEEEEEWUBWUBWUBWUB?
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Honestly, they can do A LOT with dubstep. I for one, want to see dubstep combined with Prog Metal. Imagine if, in the middle of ITNOG, the bass drops or something. Or instead of the bebot solo in AROP, we can have a cool bass drop solo. I think dubstep would work extremely well as a sort of backdrop to a song, or a solo of some kind.
You mean like what's actually in the song before "justifying violence", but instead of the little techno thing we have BWWWWWWWAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHBBBBWWWEEEEEEEEEWUBWUBWUBWUB?
Yup, or even TDEN, instead of that weird techno hermony thing. I happen to love those weird, out of place techno solo things DT puts into their songs to break up the solo, but I think a crazy bass drops for a couple seconds would be even more awesome.
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I actually dabble a lot in Hans Zimmer soundtracks nowadays. I don't know why I am saying this in this thread but it feels so appropriate. :lol
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Another shocker is Taylor Swift's latest album. Her country stuff is complete bollocks, but her new pop album is great, and aside from a couple crappy moments (Bad Blood's shitty chorus and Shake It Off's shitty bridge) I enjoy 1989 more than Dream Theater's newest, and I think DT12 is great too and has NO crappy moments.
1989 is probably my favourite release this year. :metal
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I used to be one of those guys who thought Prog metal was superior to everything, but I don't know how to finish this sentence.
I've actually stopped looking for new prog metal bands because the genre is so stale now. I await my existing favorites to release new stuff, but otherwise I'm looking for other kinds of music. For a while now I've been searching for new female fronted bands, and have found albums I like by artists I don't like, Paramore for example. Another shocker is Taylor Swift's latest album. Her country stuff is complete bollocks, but her new pop album is great, and aside from a couple crappy moments (Bad Blood's shitty chorus and Shake It Off's shitty bridge) I enjoy 1989 more than Dream Theater's newest, and I think DT12 is great too and has NO crappy moments.
So I've definitely broken out of my Prog is God shell, but prog isn't the only genre with close minded fans. In fact, I think thrash and death metal have worse close minded fans than prog.
Taylor Swift's Speak Now is easily her best in my opinion. Haven't heard the new one yet, but I prefer her country than her pop. Pop isn't my thing.
I haven't heard either Red or 1989 yet, because I only recently regained interest in her music, but Fearless and Speak Now are fantastic albums (and her debut isn't half bad either). My album of the year is probably Coldplay's Ghost Stories (as seen in my avatar), so my pop credentials are strong... :biggrin:
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You can use any criteria you want for deciding on if you personally like the band or not, because opinions, but someone more talented is better than someone less talented.
You still didn't answer my question regarding respect.
My answer is that whether or not you respect a musician is still going to depend on what criteria you choose to measure them by.
Please tell me you're not suggesting that someone would respect a MUSICIAN for something other than talent. Because respecting a musician for their hair, or the color of their guitar is one of the dumbest things I have ever heard and if someone DID make a statement like that, they clearly have no idea what they're talking about. Sure, you can respect Skrillex for his bass drops and whatnot, but someone that has MORE RESPECT for Skrillex than Maiden is either uneducated in music, or just hasn't heard Maiden before. You can like either one better, but one is clearly more talented than the other.
And there we have it - this is exactly the kind of snobbery that this thread was all about in the first place.
I guess this thread has come... full circle.
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I'm sure the guys in Maiden can play circles around Skrillex with their instruments, but Skrillex can probably play circles around them with his. It's silly to compare such artists anyway.
Although, knowing Bruce, he probably already mastered dubstep.
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I'm pretty certain Skrillex started out as a musician in a rock band. That's what I seem to remember from the documentary I saw where he was collaborating with the (then) surviving members of the doors.
I think Skrillex is a master of his particular art. I don't see how the same could be said for any of the individual musicians in Iron maiden. This is going to sound controversial but I would say he's more dedicated to perfecting his art and craft than Niko Mcbrain is with his.
However, who one respects more, or likes more is totally subjective.
I respect Skrillex and the members of Iron Maiden a lot more than someone who proclaims idiocy on another for respecting any particular musician above others.
There is and always has been this "elitist" attitude among rock fans in general. Prog fans often (but as shown in this thread not always) epitomise this. You try and tell a Led Zep fan that you just don't get their music and that you think there are better bands and you're almost verging on heresy. Chastising someone for suggesting the same about Skrillex and IM falls into the same sort of area of discussion. It's ignorant.
Skrillex (and others like him) regularly get flack for their art and I just don't understand why. Sure, it's not the easiest music to listen to....but then what is? How about Opeth? DT? You think a Cliff Richard fan is going to find either of those two bands easy to listen to?
It is all subjective but to the original post....no I don't think prog fans are always more open minded. Some are very open minded but some are just as close minded as your average Justin Bieber fan.
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So I've definitely broken out of my Prog is God shell, but prog isn't the only genre with close minded fans. In fact, I think thrash and death metal have worse close minded fans than prog.
I think it's easy to think that prog fans are the most close-minded if you frequent prog-related sites more than any other music-related ones, but my goodness, talk to "regular" people about music some time and the close-mindedness just oozes off of them. I've lost track of how many girls I've talked to over the years who have little to no interest in anything that isn't modern pop and/or country. :lol :lol
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So I've definitely broken out of my Prog is God shell, but prog isn't the only genre with close minded fans. In fact, I think thrash and death metal have worse close minded fans than prog.
I think it's easy to think that prog fans are the most close-minded if you frequent prog-related sites more than any other music-related ones, but my goodness, talk to "regular" people about music some time and the close-mindedness just oozes off of them. I've lost track of how many girls I've talked to over the years who have little to no interest in anything that isn't modern pop and/or country. :lol :lol
What do you mean? Regular people usually have very diverse musical tastes. They listen to a bit of everything! :neverusethis:
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So I've definitely broken out of my Prog is God shell, but prog isn't the only genre with close minded fans. In fact, I think thrash and death metal have worse close minded fans than prog.
I think it's easy to think that prog fans are the most close-minded if you frequent prog-related sites more than any other music-related ones, but my goodness, talk to "regular" people about music some time and the close-mindedness just oozes off of them. I've lost track of how many girls I've talked to over the years who have little to no interest in anything that isn't modern pop and/or country. :lol :lol
I think that's fair, and I would say that even "regular" people with fairly diverse music tastes can have odd places in which in they are closed minded. I knew someone once who definitely didn't listen solely to modern pop and country and actually had decent music taste, but had a complete block on any songs longer than, say, 8 minutes. She outright refused to even consider the merit of writing a song much longer than a typical radio single. So while it is certainly valid to note that prog fans have their own forms of closed-mindedness, I think you're right to bring us back to the broader context that, really, almost everyone—basically everyone outside of serious music fans who make a conscious effort to explore a variety of genres—is somewhat musically closed minded.
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So I've definitely broken out of my Prog is God shell, but prog isn't the only genre with close minded fans. In fact, I think thrash and death metal have worse close minded fans than prog.
I think it's easy to think that prog fans are the most close-minded if you frequent prog-related sites more than any other music-related ones, but my goodness, talk to "regular" people about music some time and the close-mindedness just oozes off of them. I've lost track of how many girls I've talked to over the years who have little to no interest in anything that isn't modern pop and/or country. :lol :lol
"You mean this has been around for more than nine months? Why would you listen to it then?"
It's always interesting when you spot yourself being close-minded though. I'm really in folk / singer songwriter mode at the moment, and thus the universe has been pointing me in the direction of Ed Sheeran, but I haven't even brought myself to put on a youtube video, which would take less time than typing this message, because he looks like a knob, and there's a part of me that figures any artist that's that popular just HAS to be bad (and this coming from a guy who loves Coldplay). So there's simultaneously a part of me thinking, "you're a dick, you know that?"
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What do you mean? Regular people usually have very diverse musical tastes. They listen to a bit of everything! :neverusethis:
"I listen to everything," always makes me chuckle.
So I've definitely broken out of my Prog is God shell, but prog isn't the only genre with close minded fans. In fact, I think thrash and death metal have worse close minded fans than prog.
I think it's easy to think that prog fans are the most close-minded if you frequent prog-related sites more than any other music-related ones, but my goodness, talk to "regular" people about music some time and the close-mindedness just oozes off of them. I've lost track of how many girls I've talked to over the years who have little to no interest in anything that isn't modern pop and/or country. :lol :lol
I think that's fair, and I would say that even "regular" people with fairly diverse music tastes can have odd places in which in they are closed minded. I knew someone once who definitely didn't listen solely to modern pop and country and actually had decent music taste, but had a complete block on any songs longer than, say, 8 minutes. She outright refused to even consider the merit of writing a song much longer than a typical radio single. So while it is certainly valid to note that prog fans have their own forms of closed-mindedness, I think you're right to bring us back to the broader context that, really, almost everyone—basically everyone outside of serious music fans who make a conscious effort to explore a variety of genres—is somewhat musically closed minded.
For sure. I sometimes wonder why some would want to rob themselves of something they'd get enjoyment out of, but then I have to remind myself that I went through that spell of close-mindedness as well (in the later 90s), so i was not immune to it. I am just glad I wised up. :lol :biggrin:
It's always interesting when you spot yourself being close-minded though. I'm really in folk / singer songwriter mode at the moment, and thus the universe has been pointing me in the direction of Ed Sheeran, but I haven't even brought myself to put on a youtube video, which would take less time than typing this message, because he looks like a knob, and there's a part of me that figures any artist that's that popular just HAS to be bad (and this coming from a guy who loves Coldplay). So there's simultaneously a part of me thinking, "you're a dick, you know that?"
:lol :lol
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Preeeeeeetty sure by the time this thread ends it's just gonna be a fuckin' resounding, unanimous...
NOPE.
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The best use of "I listen to everything" always comes from someone listening to Prog AND Metal, or 90% prog with a few bands like Muse thrown into the mix. I do agree the statement as a whole is often far from the truth. I used to throw it around a couple of years ago and it wasn't very true at all, but these days I can say things like "I listen to a little bit but I always make sure to point out that it isn't everything. As many different music styles I listen to, there are still a few genres like Opera for example, that I just don't have much of an interest in.
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The best use of "I listen to everything" always comes from someone listening to Prog AND Metal, or 90% prog with a few bands like Muse thrown into the mix.
Well, yes that would be silly, but I can't say I've ever heard it in that context. I believe what Blob was referring to was people who say that but literally only listen to chart pop.
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I don't listen to all styles of music but I am very varied indifferent genres and use that term a lot. As a matter of fact my friends as teen mocked me for listening to Duran Duran and Iron Maiden in the same day. Now the same guys say, "Duran Duran's Rio album is so damn good" and I laugh. :lol
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Duran Duran's Rio album really is good.
I wouldn't say I listen to everything, but I listen to a lot (of different genres, I mean). So I must admit it pisses me off to hear people who only listen to pop & country say that.
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This thread reminded me of this comic:
(https://30.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lviaknAbZ41r71uaao1_500.png)
It just seemed relevant.
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lol
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"You mean this has been around for more than nine months? Why would you listen to it then?"
I find this one particularly funny and perplexing. Personally even after I move on from something I like to be able to come back and enjoy it to an extent later on. While I understand listening to chart pop, I don't really understand throwing away entirely a song you loved last year just because it's last year's song.
It's always interesting when you spot yourself being close-minded though. I'm really in folk / singer songwriter mode at the moment, and thus the universe has been pointing me in the direction of Ed Sheeran, but I haven't even brought myself to put on a youtube video, which would take less time than typing this message, because he looks like a knob, and there's a part of me that figures any artist that's that popular just HAS to be bad (and this coming from a guy who loves Coldplay). So there's simultaneously a part of me thinking, "you're a dick, you know that?"
I have that sometimes, too. It also sometimes bothers me when a lot of people like a song that I like, and I have to talk myself out of that ("people like it because it's good, which is the same reason that you like it, so please stop being an idiot").
Also, high five for loving Coldplay.
The best use of "I listen to everything" always comes from someone listening to Prog AND Metal, or 90% prog with a few bands like Muse thrown into the mix. I do agree the statement as a whole is often far from the truth. I used to throw it around a couple of years ago and it wasn't very true at all, but these days I can say things like "I listen to a little bit but I always make sure to point out that it isn't everything. As many different music styles I listen to, there are still a few genres like Opera for example, that I just don't have much of an interest in.
I'll admit to having been guilty of that in the past as well, because it's such an easy and brief explanation to give. I'm trying to use something more like "a number of different things" and if I'm asked to specify, I clarify that much of my music library is prog.
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It's always interesting when you spot yourself being close-minded though. I'm really in folk / singer songwriter mode at the moment, and thus the universe has been pointing me in the direction of Ed Sheeran, but I haven't even brought myself to put on a youtube video, which would take less time than typing this message, because he looks like a knob, and there's a part of me that figures any artist that's that popular just HAS to be bad (and this coming from a guy who loves Coldplay). So there's simultaneously a part of me thinking, "you're a dick, you know that?"
I have that sometimes, too. It also sometimes bothers me when a lot of people like a song that I like, and I have to talk myself out of that ("people like it because it's good, which is the same reason that you like it, so please stop being an idiot").
It happens me a lot when a popular/viral song is actually good (IMO). I'm like, "this is cool, but it's also quite popular - you don't like that kind of stuff or at least don't expect good things from it. But it's good dude... fuck my biases."
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I get really excited when something I like prior becomes popular.
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I wouldn't say I'm ever surprised when something popular is good, but I am sometimes pleasantly surprised when something popular is very unusual or experimental. I found this particularly with Alt-J's second album.