Are Jazz Drummers Overrated?

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Abe, re: disrespect to Max. Thing is, if a young drummer knows nothing of his rep or place in jazz's evolution, and then sees this old time guy in a suit playing single kick drum with no pyrotechnics, isn't there are good chance that he'll be disrespectful without having any idea how that may tread on people's toes? And young guys in general are not famed for their diplomacy ...

Pol, I'm all for questioning conventional wisdom and tossing holy cows out the window.

I also understand that no matter what, kids will always rattle cages, but a quick check on the man you claim to have checked out will tell you that he was a foundation for an entire era of jazz with a discography that reads like a phone directory.

If I was a serious music lover of any genre, I would give that some weight. At worst, my attitude would be," I don't get it' or 'I dont want it', or ' I hate it' and thats cool. I'm not big on Shakespeare, haven't read much of him either, but I'm not going to go around saying JK Rowling could smoke him, and he writes in this funny English which nobody reads thesedays anyway.
If I go, ' whats the big deal about Max Roach, any metal drummer can show him up', then its more than treading toes, its thumbing your nose, and I for one will not thumb my nose at any musician... including Kenny G ; )



.....( ..hmmmmm, on second thoughts, can i take that last bit back? )


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YES!! See, to ME, that is how it's done. Interplay between instruments. A -dialog-, and man it sounds sweet.

The second video's very, very good as well, but again I'm not huge on drum solos so I kinda drifted after a few minutes. However, to my ears, that kind of solo is just in a different league from Max Roach's semi-abstract clacks and rattlings.
 
Pol, I'm all for questioning convention wisdom and tossing holy cows out the window.

I also understand that no matter what, kids will always rattle cages, but a quick check on the man you claim to have checked out will tell you that he was a foundation for an entire era of jazz with a discography that reads like a phone directory.

If I was a serious music lover of any genre, I would give that some weight. At worst, my attitude would be," I don't get it' or 'I dont want it', or ' I hate it' and thats cool. I'm not big on Shakespeare, haven't read much of him either, but I'm not going to go around saying JK Rowling could smoke him, and he writes in this funny English which nobody can read anyway.
If I go, ' whats the big deal about Max Roach, any metal drummer can show him up', then its more than treading toes, its thumbing your nose, and I for one will not thumb my nose at any musician... including Kenny G ; )



.....( ..hmmmmm can i take that last bit back? )


...

Haha, you'd already thumbed your nose at The Big G in the brushfire you lit a while ago :)

Well, according to Alan (aka Matt aka Jay aka Mike aka Dubya) the metal boys have it all over Max. They are spectacular and exciting rather than subtle and cerebral. They are now and Max is then. He might say the latest horror slasher film is heaps better than Casablanca too.

Plenty of people think that what they personally like and what is high quality are synonymous. I won't agree with them but I can see where they're coming from. It's not disrespect, it's inexperience. He'd see himself as not being seduced by hype and pointing out that the emperor has no clothes.

To be frank, there are lots of old jazz guys I'd rather listen to than Max - Art, Papa Jo, Philly, Buddy, Shelley Manne, Billy Higgins, Joe Morello, Elvin, Tony ...
 
Haha, you'd already thumbed your nose at The Big G in the brushfire you lit a while ago :)

Well, according to Alan (aka Matt aka Jay aka Mike aka Dubya) the metal boys have it all over Max. They are spectacular and exciting rather than subtle and cerebral. They are now and Max is then. He might say the latest horror slasher film is heaps better than Casablanca too.

Plenty of people think that what they personally like and what is high quality are synonymous. I won't agree with them but I can see where they're coming from. It's not disrespect, it's inexperience. He'd see himself as not being seduced by hype and pointing out that the emperor has no clothes.

To be frank, there are lots of old jazz guys I'd rather listen to than Max - Art, Papa Jo, Philly, Buddy, Shelley Manne, Billy Higgins, Joe Morello, Elvin, Tony ...


True, then you realize that you favorite metal drummer idolizes Max Roach. It's inexperience; but it's also disrespect. I never had that level of overblown self-confidence when I was young, or is it cocky idiocy?
 
Polly, I have watched all of the Max vids that are on you tube. Anyone that has any clue about the drums can see from the vids that Max had it together.
I don't care if you were raised by roadies of a metal band. You can see and hear for yourself that Max could play.
When I was a kid I could respect Max! I wasn't into jazz then but I knew a great drummer when I saw one!

Ahhh, but compared to some dude with a fourteen piece kit, and 19 cymbals that go above his head and behind his back with two bass drums, and twelve different pedals and various electronic thingos that he also whacks and that everything consists of 32nd notes is various nonstop, loud forms it's going to look a thousand times better than some other old dude in a suit playing with a bunch of other suits on a black and white clip with a tiny little outdated, non heavy duty hardware, shiny drumkit, that also doesn't have white or black painted cymbals (literally white or black. I saw black cymbals in a drum store the other day when I went to get more sticks....?) and that is playing music that doesn't have a repetitive hook or riff to latch onto for instant gratification and is also played by weird instruments like the double bass? Huh? The sax? What the hell is that? Trumpet? Like anyone plays that thing except old dudes and army people? Piano? That's what my sister plays! lol

Where is the guitar and long hair and headbanging man?
 
I think his argument was more that no matter how technical it is it sounds bad, which as I pointed out is a matter of opinion, what one person thinks sounds bad, another believes sounds good, it's all perspective.

Yeah, I can understand that, but not coming from a death metal drummer. From anything else maybe, because I could see someone growing up never having heard it and so it would sound utterly foreign to them.

The possibility of his argument being that it sounds bad, no matter how technical, I find hard to figure coming from a metal drummer, which is literally more about technical mathematics and speed than it is about sounding nice.

What he hears when he hears metal drumming is "Sick, they go so fast man! That's insane! Listen to that double bass drum wobble my intestines and those blast beats rattle my teeth! Yeah!"

It is all perspective. But some perspectives are stupid. Some may disagree and get all PC on me but some really are stupid. Although this is extreme, some would have the perspective that killing is cool. It's a stupid perspective. Like Aydee said earlier, when I was a young punk kid wailing away making a racket and my teacher told me to listen to these tunes (classic jazz tunes) to practice my brushes along to, I did and I disliked it. He loved it and used to always talk about them but I didn't once think "Man, those dudes don't compare to John Bonham. They are totally, like, overrated" I simply thought "How boring" and that was it.

It wasn't until years later that I heard Autumn Leaves off Something Else by Adderley and it struck a weird note in the emotive section of my brain and I may have fallen over. Anyway though, he gave me a CD of his to practice to. Can't remember who it was. Horace Silver or something and I remember him asking me if I liked it and what I thought of it as he had gone through jazz basics with me etc etc and we had been working on brush stuff and I really never remember thinking anything like "What is this technical rubbish? Why does he always rave about it. That drummer doesn't do cool snare, tom, bass triplets and awesome rock grooves". All I remember thinking, and saying to him, was "Nah, I don't like it. It's boring" and I didn't like that there was no singing in it. I was only twelve or thirteen or something after all. He just laughed and said "You practiced with it though yes?" It just sounded like music I didn't like then.

Oh well, some people just think differently.
 
Yeah, I can understand that, but not coming from a death metal drummer. From anything else maybe, because I could see someone growing up never having heard it and so it would sound utterly foreign to them.

The possibility of his argument being that it sounds bad, no matter how technical, I find hard to figure coming from a metal drummer, which is literally more about technical mathematics and speed than it is about sounding nice.

What he hears when he hears metal drumming is "Sick, they go so fast man! That's insane! Listen to that double bass drum wobble my intestines and those blast beats rattle my teeth! Yeah!"

It is all perspective. But some perspectives are stupid. Some may disagree and get all PC on me but some really are stupid. Although this is extreme, some would have the perspective that killing is cool. It's a stupid perspective. Like Aydee said earlier, when I was a young punk kid wailing away making a racket and my teacher told me to listen to these tunes (classic jazz tunes) to practice my brushes along to, I did and I disliked it. He loved it and used to always talk about them but I didn't once think "Man, those dudes don't compare to John Bonham. They are totally, like, overrated" I simply thought "How boring" and that was it.

It wasn't until years later that I heard Autumn Leaves off Something Else by Adderley and it struck a weird note in the emotive section of my brain and I may have fallen over. Anyway though, he gave me a CD of his to practice to. Can't remember who it was. Horace Silver or something and I remember him asking me if I liked it and what I thought of it as he had gone through jazz basics with me etc etc and we had been working on brush stuff and I really never remember thinking anything like "What is this technical rubbish? Why does he always rave about it. That drummer doesn't do cool snare, tom, bass triplets and awesome rock grooves". All I remember thinking, and saying to him, was "Nah, I don't like it. It's boring" and I didn't like that there was no singing in it. I was only twelve or thirteen or something after all. He just laughed and said "You practiced with it though yes?" It just sounded like music I didn't like then.

Oh well, some people just think differently.

Jazzin' is right about one thing, metal sucks.
 
all perspective. But some perspectives are stupid. Some may disagree and get all PC on me but some really are stupid.
Not leaving a lot of wiggle room for anyone else to have an opinion, are you? I think your perspective is as stupid as it is predictable and ignorant. You're actually trying to somehow equate kids playing metal with killing? That's freaking RETARDED.

And your description (stereotype) of metal drummers is ridiculous. I'm not a metal drummer but there are metal drummers who I admire; who put in the time and who aren't just "kids running on double pedals" - AND who don't sit around knocking jazz drummers for sport (or spite). There are a lot more open-minded drummers out there than you imagine, even if not all of them like Max Roach.
 
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For the most part I agree with you; about jazz being good and how a lot of people develop a taste for it as they get older, not your opinion of metal drummers. Art does exist in metal but so does a lot of unimaginative music which is more just about speed and math. You shouldn't put a massive blanket over metal drumming due to a few drummers who do nothing but strive to play quicker and reuse the same beats over and over without dynamics, there are a lot of fantastic metal drummers out there.

I disagree with the whole point of, "No it sounds good, you need to agree it sounds good."

Some people do enjoy blasting, it doesn't make it wrong, I'm sure you don't enjoy every jazz song ever written while a lot of others do. I believe that a lack of appreciation is wrong, I don't believe you need to enjoy listening to it. You can't control peoples tastes in music.

Personally, my beef is more with pop then metal, I don't know when music stopped becoming an art form and resorted to repetition and almost no actual instruments except for vocals.

Yeah, I can understand that, but not coming from a death metal drummer. From anything else maybe, because I could see someone growing up never having heard it and so it would sound utterly foreign to them.

The possibility of his argument being that it sounds bad, no matter how technical, I find hard to figure coming from a metal drummer, which is literally more about technical mathematics and speed than it is about sounding nice.

What he hears when he hears metal drumming is "Sick, they go so fast man! That's insane! Listen to that double bass drum wobble my intestines and those blast beats rattle my teeth! Yeah!"

It is all perspective. But some perspectives are stupid. Some may disagree and get all PC on me but some really are stupid. Although this is extreme, some would have the perspective that killing is cool. It's a stupid perspective. Like Aydee said earlier, when I was a young punk kid wailing away making a racket and my teacher told me to listen to these tunes (classic jazz tunes) to practice my brushes along to, I did and I disliked it. He loved it and used to always talk about them but I didn't once think "Man, those dudes don't compare to John Bonham. They are totally, like, overrated" I simply thought "How boring" and that was it.

It wasn't until years later that I heard Autumn Leaves off Something Else by Adderley and it struck a weird note in the emotive section of my brain and I may have fallen over. Anyway though, he gave me a CD of his to practice to. Can't remember who it was. Horace Silver or something and I remember him asking me if I liked it and what I thought of it as he had gone through jazz basics with me etc etc and we had been working on brush stuff and I really never remember thinking anything like "What is this technical rubbish? Why does he always rave about it. That drummer doesn't do cool snare, tom, bass triplets and awesome rock grooves". All I remember thinking, and saying to him, was "Nah, I don't like it. It's boring" and I didn't like that there was no singing in it. I was only twelve or thirteen or something after all. He just laughed and said "You practiced with it though yes?" It just sounded like music I didn't like then.

Oh well, some people just think differently.
 
... the metal boys have it all over Max. They are spectacular and exciting rather than subtle and cerebral. They are now and Max is then. He might say the latest horror slasher film is heaps better than Casablanca too.
I don't get this; it's an oversimplification of what's happening here, IMO.

Plenty of people think that what they personally like and what is high quality are synonymous. I won't agree with them but I can see where they're coming from. It's not disrespect, it's inexperience. He'd see himself as not being seduced by hype and pointing out that the emperor has no clothes.
Most (maybe all?) people think they have a taste for the good stuff. I've never heard anyone say, "Oh, I have atrocious taste in music; I can't stand listening to my own favorite stuff! Maybe when I get some experience... "

The jazz guys may knock the Beatles for being hacks at their instruments, and the Beatle-types might knock the jazz people for not being able to compose a melody that can stick in your head for longer than it takes to execute it. So who's right? Both, in my opinion. They're both totally different forms of the same thing: music.

Similarly, metal types generally don't want to sound melodic and organic (whether or not they could is irrelevant). They want to sound like industrial-strength machines; it's the aesthetic they're going for and not some coincidence. I think there are many that do that very well, and if you listen hard enough with an open mind (and perhaps ignore the cookie monster vocals, which isn't for everyone - including me), you'll actually hear the creativity and smarts behind a lot of it. It's a totally different ballgame, though; there is no direct comparison between metal and jazz, except that they both place technique very high on their list of priorities.

To be frank, there are lots of old jazz guys I'd rather listen to than Max - Art, Papa Jo, Philly, Buddy, Shelley Manne, Billy Higgins, Joe Morello, Elvin, Tony ...
Speaking of Tony, while I don't "get" Max Roach, I do get Tony. And dig those 2oo2s! I think he's about to crack one of them, too :D
 
The jazz guys may knock the Beatles for being hacks at their instruments, and the Beatle-types might knock the jazz people for not being able to compose a melody that can stick in your head for longer than it takes to execute it. So who's right? Both, in my opinion. They're both totally different forms of the same thing: music.

Starting to like you Mike, that's a good analogy.I also get your point about wanting to sound like powerful machines, though not all metal drummers actually think about the tone they are trying to create, they are happy to just imitate and play fast and loud because that's what metal drummers do. You get good and bad, the same as any genre of music, and that's not subjective what I do and don't like good and bad, that is creative and uncreative, expressive and unexpressive
 
Plenty of people think that what they personally like and what is high quality are synonymous. I won't agree with them but I can see where they're coming from. It's not disrespect, it's inexperience. He'd see himself as not being seduced by hype and pointing out that the emperor has no clothes.

Most (maybe all?) people think they have a taste for the good stuff. I've never heard anyone say, "Oh, I have atrocious taste in music; I can't stand listening to my own favorite stuff! Maybe when I get some experience... "

I think what Polly meant in her post (and correct me if I'm wrong Polly) is that personal favorites should not always be considered the best. For example, I don't really care for Jeff Beck's recordings. However, I would rate him as one of the five greatest rock guitarists of all time, even though there are many other rock guitarists that I prefer to listen to, but would still not rate higher on my own personal list of greatest rock guitar players.

Buddy Rich is probably not in my top five of favorite drummers., but if somebody asked me "Who do you think was the greatest drummer of all-time?" I'd say Buddy Rich.

So I think what Polly is saying is that people should think subjectively about how good a musician is, not merely "I like this guy the most, so he's the best".
 
I don't doubt that there are kids out there with limited viewpoints.

When I was 14, I could play "I'm Going Home" (Alvin Lee thing from the original Woodstock) on the guitar. I could also playing anything on any of the Cream records (at by playing the notes I thought I could). I had just moved from the SF area to the country side of Oahu and there was nobody else out there who could do that stuff. There was a guy at school who's dad taught jazz guitar and another guy who also took from his dad. Everyone kept saying that I should get lessons from the same guy. But neither of those dudes could play what I could play. Why would I want to go to their teacher. My parents (classical music aficionados) would play me Chet Atkins and such and suggest that I look into "jazz", but all I heard was boring stuff with no distortion or the "energy" of Jimi and others I was in to.

Then, a few years later, I heard a guy from the town side of the island who also took lessons from the jazz teacher in my home town. Guy's name is Charles Johnson and he played in a prog rock band at the time. Later when on to play with George Duke, Stanley Clarke and Manhattan Transfer among others. He totally rocked and blew my mind that anyone could play like that. But I still didn't get the jazz connection.

Then I got into the drumming of folks like Garibaldi and Gaylord Birch (on the early Cold Blood albums) and would sit down and play these rudiment based things across the ride/kick and snare, dropping in various off time "accents" on the snare. Thinking I sounded like Dave. It was actually a mess. No precision or groove, just the technical part of trying to do the finger control thing with my left hand and hit lot's of "grace" notes.

It's not limited to youth either. I know lots of musicians who simplify things down to the notes on a page and think they're playing "the song". They dissect down, and focus on different elements, much like the blind men and the elephant. Some folks, especially guitarists, for example, think that the tone is in the gear and not in the musician. I used to play with one very analytical drummer who had a pile of top flight stuff. He had studied with big league teachers and wrote down full charts for every song. He could swing a couple of different patterns, but on many songs there was no groove and he would either rush or drag to try and find the energy or pocket. Once at a sound check I told him to go out front and listen (the soundco was getting a great kick sound amongst other things) while I played on his kit. During a break the keyboardists came over and asked how come the drums sounded better when I was playing on them. I told him that it was because I had worked at getting a sound out of the drums, rather than just hitting them as the notes on the chart said. This drummer could play far more complicated patterns than I can, but he didn't have the feel or tone. He had a different, and somewhat singular focus on the sophistication of the parts.

There's no way to know when someone will break out of a limited viewpoint and embrace all that is happening in music.

And as some people have alluded to here, there is so much different music out there that one can keep oneself plenty occupied with things that appeal to you, without forcing you to stretch your horizons to things you "don't get". That expansion happens at different rates, and sometimes in stops and starts, for different people.

e.g. for myself, I don't really enjoy highly intellectual music. Where the players have exhausted themselves in some conventional musical vein and the only way forward for them is to be more and more outside. I love the drama of outside playing when it's used to set up tension and release. I don't enjoy constant outside playing. Just doesn't sound musical to me. Folks that listen with highly intellectual viewpoints may love it, reveling in the cleverness and sophistication. Cool. Different strokes, and I hope I've grown enough that I can leave them to that, expose myself to it when I'm in the mood, hope that my horizons broaden enough to encompass it someday, but not worry about them or it in the meantime.

Maybe what the OP needs is to find some jazz drumming that crosses over enough that it sounds familiar enough to his ear that he can appreciate what is going on. Much later in life I found some albums by Howard Roberts that were greasy, distorted and wailed. If someone had played these (instead of the wonderful but pristine Chet Atkins) for me when I was 14, I probably would have been all over those jazz lessons. My loss.

The first thing that comes to mind if someone's focus is on speed would be some burning bebop along the lines of Cherokee or Impressions. Trying to keep that speed up without flipping the beat takes mastery. Or some samba stuff. Maybe a modern recording of Spain with someone like Gambale shredding guitar all over it in a high gain tonality that is familiar to the OP.
 
I think I get what you guys are driving at, but it starts to smack of a competition when you try attributing "best" to anything so subjective as drumming, music, or art, and I just can't see any validity in that.

I personally don't see the point in trying to rate guitarists (or drummers) in order of greatness if you personally don't like them. Why not just list your favorite guitarists and be done with it?

I love Buddy Rich, but I don't think I'd say he was the greatest of all time if someone were to ask me that. I don't think I could answer that question. I'd be more inclined to give a long list of my favorite drummers (Buddy's high on that list).

I guess it's the exercise of separating the "great" from the ones you "like" that is creating my cognitive dissonance.

It's like that line from "Roxanne" (Steve Martin flick) where at the end when all the misfit firefighters are toasting each other after miraculously putting out a small barn fire, one raises his glass and says, "I'd rather be with you people than with the greatest people on Earth!" Everybody cheered and nobody took offense.
 
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I agree with this, you almost need to give a politician answer to those sort of questions, you could say that the general consensus is that he was one of the greatest drummers of all time or that many people regard him as the greatest that ever lived because... There isn't any point trying to classify something past that point as you can't. Opinions are circumstantial, they change over time and are not always objective.

I think I get what you guys are driving at, but it starts to smack of a competition when you try attributing "best" to anything so subjective as drumming, music, or art, and I just can't see any validity in that.

I personally don't see the point in trying to rate guitarists (or drummers) in order of greatness if you personally don't like them. Why not just list your favorite guitarists and be done with it?

I love Buddy Rich, but I don't think I'd say he was the greatest of all time if someone were to ask me that. I don't think I could answer that question. I'd be more inclined to give a long list of my favorite drummers (Buddy's high on that list).

I guess it's the exercise of separating the "great" from the ones you "like" that is creating my cognitive dissonance.

It's like that line from "Roxanne" (Steve Martin flick) where at the end when all the misfit firefighters are toasting each other after miraculously putting out a small barn fire, one raises his glass and says, "I'd rather be with you people than with the greatest people on Earth!" Everybody cheered and nobody took offense.
 
I think I get what you guys are driving at, but it starts to smack of a competition when you try attributing "best" to anything so subjective as drumming, music, or art, and I just can't see any validity in that.

I personally don't see the point in trying to rate guitarists (or drummers) in order of greatness if you personally don't like them. Why not just list your favorite guitarists and be done with it?

I love Buddy Rich, but I don't think I'd say he was the greatest of all time if someone were to ask me that. I don't think I could answer that question. I'd be more inclined to give a long list of my favorite drummers (Buddy's high on that list).

I guess it's the exercise of separating the "great" from the ones you "like" that is creating my cognitive dissonance.

It's like that line from "Roxanne" (Steve Martin flick) where at the end when all the misfit firefighters are toasting each other after miraculously putting out a small barn fire, one raises his glass and says, "I'd rather be with you people than with the greatest people on Earth!" Everybody cheered and nobody took offense.

That's cool. We all have our own opinions. I just don't see what the big deal is about using the term "best". It's an opinion and everybody has an opinion, and so long as you're not treating your own opinion as gospel, I really don't see why it would be such a big deal. After all, any of us who said we don't ever use the term "best" would be full of crap. We all use it. "This is the best ice cream", or "This restaurant has the best pizza", or "This is the best club in the city for live music". There are a million examples I could use.

I think people have become too uptight about being politically correct. We're so afraid of offending people that it's like having an opinion has become a bad thing. Hey, you have your opinions, I have mine, and if we disagree on something I'm always up for a friendly debate. Maybe in the end we'll end up agreeing. Maybe we'll end up agreeing on some things and not others. Maybe we'll still have completely different opinions, but at least respect the other person's views.

I think we need to throw this p.c. garbage out the window and stop apologizing for having an opinion. Come on people! Where's your spirit? Where's your individuality? This p.c. way of thinking is stripping people of their individuality. I respect somebody who is honest about their opinion more than somebody who hides it. For example, I'm a Catholic and I have more respect for somebody who would tell me straight to my face "I don't like Catholics" than somebody who acts nice towards me and then talks crap about me behind my back because I'm Catholic.

Without opinions this forum would be absolutely pointless. Isn't pretty much everything on here an opinion? Someone might start a thread like "I really like these cymbals" or "What do you think is the best practice book for a beginner?". You name it, it's all people responding with their own opinions. What's wrong with that?

I agree with this, you almost need to give a politician answer to those sort of questions, you could say that the general consensus is that he was one of the greatest drummers of all time or that many people regard him as the greatest that ever lived because... There isn't any point trying to classify something past that point as you can't. Opinions are circumstantial, they change over time and are not always objective.

Why do we have to give a politician answer? Do we all just have to be one giant, faceless crowd keeping our opinions silent out of fear that we might offend somebody?

Please don't take my comments as anything personal, because it's not. It's just that this is something that gets me a little heated. I'm tired of everybody being such a conformist and having this "keep your opinions to yourself - you might end up offending somebody" attitude.

I don't want to see people watering down their posts to be more politically correct. If the rules of the forum are being upheld, I'm all for hot topics!

Bob's quote is taken from another recent thread, but I couldn't agree more.
 
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Wow, so much stuff here since I last posted I'm not sure where to start.

Abe & Ken - I see your point in that the OP is disrespectful. But it's hardly surprising, is it?

Not all young people are disrespectful but let's face it, over the generations - from the mods to the hippies to the disco boys to the punks to the rappers, the grungers and metalheads - young people have turned disrespect into an art form. Out with the old and in with the new! The king is dead, long live the king! Nothing wrong with that. It probably goes back to basic impulses where the young stag challenges the old, tired stag for leadership of the herd.

Should we oldies who better understand the significance of the things kids thumb their noses at get upset about it? I don't think that's the way forward, although it might be a good way to get high blood pressure. We have to give understanding before getting it.

So I'd rather acknowledge that, yes, the big metal drummers are much more overtly spectacular than the old jazz guys and then point out some of the cool things going on in jazz. It might not change opinions but it fosters respect. From there, anything can happen ...


Aeolian said:
e.g. for myself, I don't really enjoy highly intellectual music. Where the players have exhausted themselves in some conventional musical vein and the only way forward for them is to be more and more outside. I love the drama of outside playing when it's used to set up tension and release. I don't enjoy constant outside playing. Just doesn't sound musical to me.

Really good observation - "Where the players have exhausted themselves in some conventional musical vein and the only way forward for them is to be more and more outside".

I say this as a mad keen King Crimson and Henry Cow fan. I adore "out" music but there are times when I'd rather listen to blues, soul, pop etc. It's true that sometimes I "revel in the cleverness" of "out" music; but I also enjoy the freshness of it - non-standard sounds, beats, melodies and harmonies. To me, convention is a filter through which we express ourselves and there are times when I want my musical food raw. Convention came about because over time it was found that those musical conventions had universally pleasing qualities. Yet beautiful ugliness can sometimes be more touching than sheer beauty (eg. like comparing a slobbering but endearing mongrel with a graceful but dumb Afghan hound).

I can revel in treading over old, clichéd ground with the best of them but after a while I pine for some crazy "out" stuff. You may need the grounding of conventional tonality in almost every song, but I only need it every week. The dynamic of our listening pleasure is still the same ... "the drama of outside playing when it's used to set up tension and release", just the preferred dosage is different :)

MikeM said:
I've never heard anyone say, "Oh, I have atrocious taste in music; I can't stand listening to my own favorite stuff!

lol no, but there can be recognition that just because you like it, it ain't the best. We all have elements of solipsism in our makeup, some more than others.
 
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