Any time we mull a Hold Steady post, we know one thing for sure: you guys will definitely give your bashing/loving comments. More so than with most bands. And maybe it’s fair — ’cause the Hold Steady take every opportunity to do just the same. A month ago it was Craig Finn taking down the Doors’ L.A. Woman in the Guardian. This time it’s Franz Nicolay, but the mustachioed piano man is walking the fields of love. He joins folks like Peter (of Bjorn & John fame), Art Brut’s Jasper Future, Sam from the Narrator, and the mighty Battles in Blender.com‘s piece on musicians defending their fave “bad albums” (i.e. critically panned, unpopular to admit liking, etc.). Particularly enjoyed Battles’ pick…
Battles’ Choice: Purple – Stone Temple Pilots
It’s been hard to understand why Stone Temple Pilots get a bad rap when so many of their contemporaries were much worse ? here’s looking at you, Pearl Jam. Unfortunately, the haters always have love for Pearl Jam and none for STP. So on the Pearl Jam vs. STP rivalry tip, STP kicks Pearl Jam’s ass wholeheartedly. Looking back, their recorded output is way better than anything Pearl Jam released during a long career of churning out complete shit.
Purple underrated? We say it all the time. He’s not doing himself any favors by referring to Pearl Jam’s recorded output as “complete shit” by comparison, but we’re just focusing on the ‘love,’ man. After the jump, more cool rockers choose their uncool pleasures.
Decided we’d take one (possibly) representative sentence from their write-ups and include ‘em for the tl;dr set. We know you’re all just waiting to bash Battles’ PJ slag, anyway.
Peter Morén (of Peter Bjorn & John)’s Choice: Hunting High and Low/Scoundrel Days – A-ha
“I’m starting an A-ha revival right now!”
Felix White (of the Maccabees)’s Choice: Hits – Mike & the Mechanics
“I don’t know anything else about them, and I hate Genesis, but it’s just one of those records that make you smile no matter how hard you try to stop yourself.”
Sam Axelrod (of the Narrator)’s Choice: Self Portrait – Bob Dylan
“The haters just need to chill the fuck out.”
Jasper Future (of Art Brut)’s Choice: Animalympics Soundtrack – Graham Gouldman (of 10cc fame)
“The tome chronicles the tragi-comic events that unfold when a collection of animals compete in their own bizarre take on the Olympic games.”
Franz Nicolay (of the Hold Steady)’s Choice: Singles 1969?1981 – The Carpenters
“Even disqualifying covers like the devastating, sui generis elegy of groupie abandonment “Superstar” and the truly batty “Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft,” it’s a devastating (and often harmonically surprising) catalog almost smothered by the worst kind of coke-thinned studio drums and milquetoast string arrangements, waiting for a Neil Hannon or Jens Lekman to bite. ”
Matthew Dear’s Choice: Chocolate And Cheese – Ween
“Who else could warp such a web of hysterics and great instrumentation into an album?”
Xavier de Rosnay (of Justice)’s Choice: Staying Alive Soundtrack – Various Artists
“It’s so good!”
Marcus Congleton (of Ambulance LTD)’s Choice: Invincible – Michael Jackson
“And there was even a video that featured comedian Chris Tucker, who was popular at the time.”
Willy Mason’s Choice: Totally Krossed Out – Kris Kross
“I think that was the first time I used a screwdriver.”
Brett Dennen’s Choice: New Miserable Experience – Gin Blossoms
“This is a record I feel needs to be defended as one of the great releases of the early ’90s.”
John Nolan (of Straylight Run)’s Choice: Greatest Hits Volume I & Volume II – Billy Joel
“Growing up on Long Island, you’re sort of indoctrinated into the cult of Billy Joel.”
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Head over for the non-excerpted write-ups. Props to Dennen for defending New Miserable Experience — it takes a strong man. Sure, it was Friends-rock (think we just outed ourselves as once owning the Friends soundtrack CD), but those were some catchy ass hits. Finally, Straylight Run, don’t get us started on Billy Joel and/or Long Island…
FREE HOLD STEADY BONUS: Brooklyn Vegan has rounded up lots of info on Hold Steady stuff. Like, head here to find out about how you can have a photo booth pic used for the Hold Steady’s forthcoming-single art. AND lots of cool NYC live show stuff: Craig’s playing a solo set on 9/13 as part of the Upstairs In The Square series at Barnes & Noble, upstairs at their Union Square location (see what they did there?); the band’s playing a free show 9/17 at World Trade Center Park (near the WTC); and most immediately, they’re playing a free show at Prospect Park on 8/9.
All free! We’re out of breath.
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whats wrong with Gin Blossoms and Ween?
I wouldn’t have the guts to run a music blog and defend both Pearl Jam and STP, but hey, I guess that’s just me. Gin Blossoms? No comment…
Did that cunt just say that Ween wasn’t cool?!
yeah, pearl jam sucks. arcade fire rules, we get it, ThePlaylist.
Well, fair enough, obviously the guys from Battles are all too familiar with “complete shit.”
Battles’ Primus-lite Smurf rock can’t go away fast enough.
it’s glass houses for battles i’m afraid
Thank you Battles! STP is ridiculously underrated. “Purple” and “Tiny Music” are both completely killer. I also agree that Pearl Jam is garbage. They’ve never done a damn thing for me.
PB&J should have said “our first two albums” HA. Talk about shit. And for my money John Denver is the best.
Sadly, no one had the nerve to include George Strait’s Ocean Front Property album. Yeesh.
Chase…are you serious? If so, I will check it out. Why the hell not?
boys and girls in america is my favorite uncool record.
SO glad someone defended STP! I do not why they were bashed. however, no need to bash Pearl Jam, dude. They rocked and still do rock. No comparison between the two. Got love for both.
all you battles bashers are f’ing complete morons. go learn to play an instrument and then tell me they suck, you f’ing pansies.
John, are you a tough guy? I get that impression.
hahahaha, touche, nick.
dannygutters and Nick get stars for their comments.
Props to the Carpenters guy and the A-Ha guy. Sad to see nobody mentioned ELO or Slade.
…or Shakane, better yet.
I will also stand in defense of the Gin Blossoms. They’ve sort of embarrassed themselves since by refusing to hang it up, long after the guy who wrote the good songs left them and up and died.
i refuse to believe any “underrated” list unless shalamar is involved.
STP has kind of all of Smashing Pumpkins’ problems in one guy. bad solo albums, decade-too-late political/cultural statements, are-you-kidding-me ego, etc. both put out some era-defining stuff at their peak, though.
I totally agree with Dennen’s choice of New Miserable Experience by the Gin Blossoms. Someone through this on randomly at my work a few weeks ago and it really is a great album of the 90′s.
I just pulled out New Miserable Experience a few weeks ago, and it really holds up.
when is some one gonna do the Atlas/Longview mash up. Battles may not have peers (according to advertising) but that shit still sounds like green day to me.
Gotta agree w/ the Ween pick. Chocolate and Cheese is the quintessencial ween album, artisticaly mocking genres ranging from funk (voodoo lady) to spanish folk (Buenos Tardes Amigos), while also making references to the movie Mannequin, ponies with fucked up lungs, and giving us the words of advice “don’t shit where you eat my friend.”
Classic.
People who think Battles are bad are the same people who kick puppies in the face when no one is looking.
re: battles- being able to play an instrument does not a musician make
why is it uncool to like chocolate and cheese? anyway I gotta go with SkeeLo’s “I Wish” here. Like THE WHOLE ALBUM.
Some of the STP stuff has held up pretty well..the problem they had was always that, more or less rightly, they were bandwagon jumpers. But they also knew how to put some strong tunes together, ‘Vaseline’ for example, and Weiland abandoned that Vedder grunt pretty quickly. Pearl Jam, on the other hand, holds up about as well as it did then..as mid-period styled Who, and as dreadfully earnest as Bob Seger. Didn’t like ‘em then, don’t now, but I can certainly see why people do.
Propping up the Carpenters is pretty late in the game…nobody doubts the beauty of Karen’s voice, the arrangements were top notch, and they always worked with the best of songwriters (Burt Bacharach, etc.). The ‘prom’ aspect of their music probably didn’t help in one generation, but I seriously doubt most of the people under 30 ever slowdanced to ‘Close to You’ in high school, so there’s no reason to do anything but praise them ( see also The Free Design, although I’m grateful that Chicago hasn’t been afforded the pleasure of ‘re-evalutation’). The Carpenters have already been through their ‘cool’ period, so this is kind of a lazy pick. It’s like praising Scott Walker’s first four solo LPs. Ten years ago people smirked when I played Scott..now they gush. Just sayin’. By the way, there’s no doubt that the best cover song of all time is the version of ‘Superstar’ that Sonic Youth did. It is still tremendous.
Amazingly, I just heard a Gin Blossoms song in the bank today, and it does hold up pretty well. I am biased, however, as I lived in Tempe before the band broke big (pre-Hopkins suicide), so I also know that, live, they were a much more riotous occasion than this fairly tame record seems to offer. Still, tunes are tunes, and Doug wrote a bunch of ‘em. Actually, he wrote all of ‘em, hence the reason that the Gin Blossoms now play all occasions which involve a ferris wheel and guys with large belt buckles (non-Brooklyn division.).
Un-cool is so lost in context it’s ridiculous. In college, it was uncool to play Black Sabbath or the Beach Boys. Now, they are the standard-bearers of where ‘indie’ is derived from. Time is an amazing equalizer.
I don’t have the attention span to read that post.
Yeah, sorry it was so long. I should’ve just written….
STP not suck so much, Pearl Jam kinda do, the Carpenters leftover hipster praise, Gin Blossoms do and don’t. Oh, and Battles good…no bad..no… but, oh, Ween? I wish they were never born. Hopefully this helps.
“I hate Genesis” Wow, fuck the Maccabees.
Franz, I love ya. That said… I have no idea what you just said.
stp were always better than their reputation, which was deservedly bad because of the way they got onto radio (i.e. pretending to be pearl jam). they made some great radio hits. no comment on pearl jam, i’m too much of a believer to say anything meaningful. i couldn’t stand watching more than 30 seconds of that f’in battles video. the fucking chipmunk band is qualified to make this call? fuck them and their furry lead singer.
Charlie,
Good call on Doug Hopkins. I remember reading an article in Rolling Stone back in the day about how he was kicked out of the Gin Blossoms, who then withheld his royalties until he signed half of them away. Then after he commits suicide, one of the guys in the band mentions how they still might record some more of his songs. Scumbags. Actual article can be found at http://www.users.on.net/~ord/losthorizons/articles/1994-02-10-rolling_stone.html
Charlie Kane, thanks for your insightful comment. What music was cool with your group of people when you were in college?
gerry rafferty–city to city
the ‘furry lead singer’ of battles is anthony braxton’s kid man, and that shouldnt qualify him as good, but unless you know who the fuck anthony braxton is, dont pass judgment
“The ‘prom’ aspect of their music probably didn’t help in one generation, but I seriously doubt most of the people under 30 ever slowdanced to ‘Close to You’ in high school … ”
Either Kane meant people under 50, or todays’ prom couples slow dance to Expose and Amy Grant.
the funniest thing about this whole thing is it seems Battles commenting on Pearl Jam vs. STP took about as long as it takes them to program their ‘computers’ to writer their music for them!!! And, no wonder, they sound like the Chipmunks; for artistic value, are we really going to compare the total value of each member of Pearl Jam and their band’s work vs. each member of STP and their work???
if so, it will surely make those fools feel like real, moronic, pieces of shit… well, not for Chipmunks anyway, thanks to a not so ok computer.
It’s funny how some GARBAGE Warp Records band can hate on Pearl Jam (in favor of STP???)… hey, care to argue why Eddie Vedder was chosen to induct Neil Young, The Ramones, and REM into the RNR Hall of Fame but you guys are still covering the Chipmunks greatest hits?
LOL, dirty pieces of crap, recording dirty pieces of crap…
Does Stereogum give mad props to STP all the time because your money comes from the MTV people that STP actually made videos for?