I hate categorizing music for people. I have a friend who will always ask me what a bands music is like when I recommend bands to him. This usually leads to me saying something like "Uuuuh... its kinda indie..... rock..... maybe sort of folk. But not like folky folk, you know?". Like I said, I hate trying to categorize music.
But we live in a day and age, when that is happening to extreme amounts. Case in point, the newest Big D and the Kids Table cd I wrote about a little bit ago. Did Big D really need to invent the Stroll genre for themselves? Granted, ska is a very broad term these days, but I don't see their music as that drastically different enough to warrant a new distinction.
It turns out that however, that I'm being WAY too light on this trend of overdefining our music. I haven't raised much of a stink about it, and now this has happened:
This is the band Attack Attack. They are the worlds first crabcore band. That's right, crabcore. Why have they created the worst named genre in the world? Because they stand like crabs while playing their instruments. Yes. I'm not lying. That's it.
This has got to be a joke right? Please? Are we really stupid enough to categorize our music by the way the artists stand? Apparently we are.
Either the guys from Attack Attack have an IQ of somewhere around 40, or they have discovered a brilliant way to get publicity. And it's working. But isn't that really just because it's pointing out the scary fact that we are overdefining our music way too much? Attack Attack is like a magnifying lens to our sick, disturbing habits.
You can laugh at them, but first stop and think. Have you ever added the suffix, core, to something you listen to? How about the prefixes, pre or post? Ever described one bands genre by using more then 3 words? If you've done any of things, you might be just the kind of person that Attack Attack is taking advantage of to get more publicity.
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5 comments:
I gotta say that I've never been one to overdefine music. I got with the more traditional terms for rock music. Rock, Progressive rock, metal, hardcore. I've heard the Fall of Troy under the cadegory mathcore which just sounds fucking stupid. They make rock music.
I own a cd by a band called Cinemechanica that is supposedly mathcore. I have no idea what makes something mathcore. Isn't core normally used for screaming? They don't scream. They call mc chris nerdcore rap which I think is stupid. He's just rap about nerdy topics. We don't need to call it nerdcore.
Right. He raps. Why add more to that? He's a rapper. The subject on which someone raps about doesn't need to be involved in the name
If you seek new ways to describe your genre people will think oh look they are new and inventive. I never really noticed genre abusing until the "emo" bashing came on board. OH and also the death/black/scream/folk/everything metal.
I understand there is a difference but it starts to take away from the music when you have to start categorizing what you enjoy listening to. You start to only enjoy music from certain spectrums of genres.
I think we should demand music be defined in full sentences, not only what it sounds like but what it does to you.
"Rock music with salsa influences, makes you want to dance until your feet can't moveand sing along even without really understanding a word of spanish."
"Instrumental Rock music, excites memories of dreams and night time walks. Also makes me think of winter all of a sudden."
Or we could just stick with the standards Alex has pointed out
"Post-apocolyptic faire folk indie"
Sounds like every note has been prescribed to the point that listening to it is not needed.
Most bands these days name themselves whole sentences, so why not have genres that long too? You've come up with a genius idea Kyle.
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