Jump to content

same band- different incarnations??


windy1

Recommended Posts

  • Replies 265
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

Who do you think is a relevant Spanish singer (or band) on an international scale - other than Julio Iglesias and, maybe, his son.

I don´t think there is a relevant Spanish musician on an international scale. Spanish is not the tongue... for rock. Maybe Andres Calamaro, he´s Argentinian but also lives and works here part of the time. There was Alaska y Dinarama :bow: but that was so long ago...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I see some are still not "getting past" this. I've been taught that direct-and-honest responses to direct-and-honest requests are not "rude." In fact, I cannot see why responding with a simple "no" to a request that didn't say "please" would be considered "rude" in any way, shape, or form. I would go insofar as to say the member who requested me to stop talking about music in this music topic was rude to do so in public instead of discussing this matter with me in private (thereby, not bringing anyone else into this issue).

All right then.

I don't think the 'no' is the only thing that has been perceived as rude. Are you of the opinion that your posts are, not polite, but at least courteous?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think there are more than a few Spanish bands and singers who are relevant in an international scale, not just for Rock, but for Pop and singer-songwriter type of work. You would disagree with the quality of their albums when compared with bigger acts that are in English, but Miguel Bose, Camilo Sesto, Rocio Durcal, Jose Luis Perales, Miguel Gallardo, Mecano, Ducan Dhu, Jeanette, and some others, are very popular artists from the country of Spain. They easily rival airplay in Spanish-speaking radio stations to this very day against popular bands and singers from Mexico and South America (not only in Latin America, but also here in the United States). Radio format is very rigid and Spanish stations are not about to play English-only music for the majority of the time, so who fills that gap? Internationally-relevant artists.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

In Spain they don´t play anything you mention, only some of them (Durcal,who is dead, Perales, who is mainly a songwritter) who are just for "spanish singing" stations. Others are never heard (Gallardo had only one hit in all is life and was mainly a songwriter, now he´s dead), Jeanette had four hits and doesn´t sing anymore. For personal reasons I don´t like Mecano at all, but sure, I know they´re very rich. But I also know how they started and cannot respect them nor their music

If you mean artists that can compete on hispanic radios, I don´t know, I don´t listen to Mexican or latin radios in the US. But yes, I know they sell more there than here.

I still think that Dinarama (now Fangoria), Bunbury, Paco Ibañez would be better for the international scene.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If you don't mind me asking, how did Mecano get their start? (Was it a simple case of nepotism?). I recall their album Cielo Y Asfalto (or something like that) was pretty big in the mid 80s and got a couple of their other singles played in the late 80s. I only liked one or two songs, but they get mentioned often whenever one talks about Spanish music. As usual, the local scene is ten times better than what gets put out there for foreign markets. I, for one, would never have guessed people here would like Shakira's gargling songs or the son of Julio Iglesias's "bathroom-struggle" singing... or that Miami Sound Machine/Gloria Stefan and Ricky Martin would skyrocket in popularity. They are, plain and simple, some of the worst examples of Latin, or music by Hispanics, out there. However, there are some very popular performers who have done it on ability: Luis Miguel, Jose Jose, Jose Maria Napoleon, Jose Luis Rodriguez "El Puma," Emmanuel, Juan Gabriel, Los Iracundos, Diego Verdaguer, Carlos Mata, etc. Oldies, but goodies. Then, there are also the Freestylers (Johnny O, Cover Girls, Safire) in the US, but they're as regional as any of the ones from other countries.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Funny, BitterAlmonds... Passolini, El Puma, Jose Jose... reminds me of someone. I don´t think you´re new here... :shades:

Madrid was a very small town 30 years ago and we all knew each other, at least, the young people and the ones who were making music, movies, art... so I have my reasons (and many people do) for not respecting -nor liking- Mecano.

By the way, are you a fan of Japan? :beatnik:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Japan is one of the greatest bands that ever lived. It was a band which everyone as a musician, and an artist in general, should aspire to become. They are the embodiment of what Oscar Wilde once said of artists: The best ones never gradually become better (i.e. they have no incline and decline in the quality of their work) - their work is a full circle.

Duran Duran is the best facsimile of Japan. This is not a bad thing per se. After all, the catch-phrase "New Romantic" came from Duran Duran's 1981 single, "Planet Earth." But Japan crafted and perfected the New Romantic sub-genre with 1979's Quiet Life and 1980's Gentlemen Take Polaroids before there was a coin phrase for it. They are choice albums if you want to hear what the early 80s were truly about.

Can "new" and "improved" really co-exist?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Here's an easy one: Echo And The Bunnymen are The Doors of the 80s. They are so much so that they covered "People Are Strange" for The Lost Boys song collection.

Surely for Artist X to be "Today's Artist Y", there must be more in common than pilfered riffs/ melodies, sonic similarity. Sure, Echo & The Bunnymen were influenced by The Doors. Hell, that isn't so unusual: so were The Stranglers, Joy Division, Teardrop Explodes and doubtless many more. But as phenomena they have insufficient in common to qualify as inter-generational equivalents. Similarly, Oasis can plagiarise The Beatles all they like, but couldn't really be regarded as "The Beatles of the 90s". At least they were hugely successful in the UK,(albeit in a completely different way), so I suppose that comparison, whilst rather simplistic and reductivist, is slightly less spurious.

A little more lateral-thinking could go a long way on this thread, methinks. For a modern-day Bowie, how about Beck? Okay, very little in the way of sonic similarity, but: maverick genius, experimental, creative, tendency for re-invention, capable of throwing up the occasional embarrassing stinker, yet manages to retain credibility and aura of cool.

This year's Jim Morrison? Pete Doherty. Mystifyingly over-rated, tediously over-publicised, pretentious charlatan with substance abuse issues, in want of good kicking.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well, Oasis are regarded by some people as the Beatles of the 90s, and not only because of the amount of records they sold.

I don't belong to that group of people though. I like Oasis a lot, they are (maybe only were, but that's debatable) one of the best bands around in my opinion, but to be another generation's Beatles it takes more.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Surely for Artist X to be "Today's Artist Y", there must be more in common than pilfered riffs/ melodies, sonic similarity. Sure, Echo & The Bunnymen were influenced by The Doors. Hell, that isn't so unusual: so were The Stranglers, Joy Division, Teardrop Explodes and doubtless many more. But as phenomena they have insufficient in common to qualify as inter-generational equivalents.

It depends by what you are referring to as "intergenerational." From talking with people from Asia, the Middle East, and Latin America they got a lot of airplay in the 80s - more than the other bands you mentioned (of which only Joy Division got their one hit single played to death on their radio stations). Hit single for single, Echo can match The Doors on recognition by casual radio listeners. Echo are a famous New Wave band. New Wave was a whole different generation from where The Doors came from. I'd venture to say someone who tunes in to their Classic Rock station can name 5 or 6 Doors songs and name 3 or 4 by Echo from listening to an 80s flashback hour from a Modern Rock station (I'm guessing they'd be: "The Cutter," "Lips Like Sugar," "The Killing Moon," and "People Are Strange"). Similarity in sound plays a HUGE part in this thread; at least in my mind. If a band doesn't like the other, then it simply does not belong in this topic.

Similarly, Oasis can plagiarise The Beatles all they like, but couldn't really be regarded as "The Beatles of the 90s". At least they were hugely successful in the UK,(albeit in a completely different way), so I suppose that comparison, whilst rather simplistic and reductivist, is slightly less spurious.

What are you talkin' about? Oasis was enormous in the 90s and they are renown for sounding a lot like The Beatles. It's not as if I'm comparing Real Life to The Scorpions (a very obscure comparison). Virtually most people who have albums by both bands will undeniably admit they sound like each other. I could probably find you various articles making such claims.

A little more lateral-thinking could go a long way on this thread, methinks. For a modern-day Bowie, how about Beck? Okay, very little in the way of sonic similarity, but: maverick genius, experimental, creative, tendency for re-invention, capable of throwing up the occasional embarrassing stinker, yet manages to retain credibility and aura of cool.

Except they sound nothing like each other nor do they share thematic tendencies in their albums. The description you used could be applied to many other artists. Beck, to me, is more like the Prince of the 90s rather than David Bowie.

Edited by Guest
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Except they sound nothing like each other nor do they share thematic tendencies in their albums. The description you used could be applied to many other artists. Beck, to me, is more like the Prince of the 90s rather than David Bowie.

My point was that sonic similarity and plagiarism are not sufficient basis for equating artists from different generations, and to encourage some more imaginative " outside-the-box thinking": there are other significant factors contributing to artistic and cultural phenomena.

As it happens, I'm more a fan of Echo And The Bunnymen than of The Doors ("The Back Of Love" was my "Single of the Year" in, erm...1982), but I would hotly dispute your assertion that, on an international scale they have achieved anything like a similar stature or recognition. I'd like to see empirical evidence to substantiate your suggestion that The Bunnymen receive similar amounts of airplay, public recognition and that "8 out of 10 cats recognised "The Cutter"". Sounds a bit of a hairy canary to me.

How many Brazilians could pick Ian McCulloch out of an ID parade?

Will iconic images of Mac continue to decorate the bed-sit walls and T-shirts of students around the world some 30 years after his heyday/death?

Will any top film-makers blast a lavish budget on "The Story Of The Bunnymen" (as you've never heard it before!)?

Do American Idol contestants give any consideration whatsoever to The Bunnymen oeuvre when choosing what to wow the audience with this week?

Get real.

If I may digress momentarily to reiterate a point, (because, boy, do I like to reiterate): a man of your taste and demographic is surely familiar with the band Bauhaus. Now Bauhaus undeniably bore some stylistic comparison with David Bowie, even before scoring a hit with their slavish, sycophantic cover of "Ziggy Stardust". Do these factors alone justify the epithet "The 80s Bowie"? I suggest NOT.

The Sex Pistols. (I can hear your tangible groans as I write). Over the last 25 years, quite a number of bands have been dubbed "The New Sex Pistols", ranging from Anti-Nowhere League (who? exactly...), The Jesus And Mary Chain, Manic Street Preachers, even The Beastie Boys! The legitimate application of the tag is naturally a matter of subjective opinion, but I would contend that it is not the case that the most legitimate application would be that accorded to the artist who most accurately replicates the sound or fashion sense of the original. Need I explain why? I'd just end up repeating myself again.

(By the way, the correct answer is "Public Enemy were the new Sex Pistols)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Try doing a bit of a poll asking international New Wave fans here:

http://www.nwoutpost.com/forum/default.asp

I can tell you from having lived in Latin America during the 80s that Echo got more airplay during those years than The Doors. They might not have recognised Ian since this was still an era of radio and MTV had not reached our side until the mid-80s, but those songs definitely got played. But, sure, the Pacific Islander or Persian (where European music is banned) markets aren't going to ever reach the heights of the US, UK, and Western European markets - it would be preposterous to want to get something of equal value, as you are asking, because they are completely different markets (as in, there is NONE and they're left at the mercy of what stations want to play). You really think Echo are that exclusive to only be heard in the UK and North America? I'd say it's harder to prove that. Try to prove Echo did not get played in Argentina, or Colombia, or Guatemala, or Mexico, or Japan, or the Philippines, or insert name of far-away remote place during the 80s. In other words, get real, man.

Here's an article on an album of theirs proclaiming their sound-alike nature to The Doors:

http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&token=&sql=10:2s320roac48v

It's the way I approach this topic. Sure, you can choose artists that do not sound like each other or approach their music from a totally different perspective and equate them to each other. You'd be hard-pressed trying to compare David Bowie to Beck since it's something which most casual listeners and fans have most likely never read. I'll even go ahead and apply my own random comparison of The Sex Pistols with The Backstreet Boys: Both had their "image" carefully crafted and were equally untalented.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Please sign in to comment

You will be able to leave a comment after signing in



Sign In Now

×
×
  • Create New...