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Grex > Music2 > #273: he's mad as hell, and he's not gonna take it anymore: Pat Metheny v. the G-man |  |
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lelande
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response 5 of 50:
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Jul 22 20:49 UTC 2000 |
resp:3
'we'?
certainly there's a lot of music i hear and dismiss because it isn't to
the liking of my personal tastes.
willie nelson, for example; some of his stuff i really dig, but for the
most part i don't enjoy him. yet i know it has more to do with my
reaction to his voice, which is gentler than what i prefer with country
musicians, than the quality of his music.
unless i'm at a wedding reception or watching a movie about wwII, i
don't care much for the arrangements of glenn miller. it's too
'pizazzy' for me. yet i know that glenn miller is a spectacular
musician, and understand why people admire and respect the music he's
responsible for.
joni mitchell i've never cared for, yet i know it isn't her music so
much as her approach to the bluesy/folksy underbelly of the world that i
don't get along with, not her musical ability.
and so on.
i agree you can't be "wrong" about music, whether listening or playing,
and i don't think metheny would disagree entirely (he pointed out that
he had no real opinion about kenny g or his music until the 'satchmo
incident'), except that his acknowledged personal tastes would be based
on a much more complex musical rubrick. i think this has more to do with
industry than it does with music, and more to do with kenny g being a
tool posing as a musician than with how many fans he has.
now, kenny g outselling pat metheny (i'm guessing that he does, but i
don't know that), having a larger fan-base and altogether greater fame,
being an effeminate, glammy male in a culture that is not always
friendly to such attributes, these are reasons why pat metheny should
not criticize his music, or peg him as a phony?
maybe it could be asked "who does pat metheny think he is, speaking out
as though the voice of satch were channelling through him?" perhaps.
metheny isn't the strongest element in the jazz continuum. what, then,
is the smarmier aesthetic insult, speaking in defense of a dead artist
from a snobbish pillar of sophistication, or using a song the dead
artist recorded, one that still gets a lot of airplay on its own, not as
a parody or an homage or a cover, but reprocessed as a duet?
all of which tells me that kenny g, and those who dig his music, are
excellent targets for all forms of ridicule, from here to eternity.
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other
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response 6 of 50:
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Jul 22 21:16 UTC 2000 |
Metheny was asked his opinion, and that is what he supplied.
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jerryr
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response 7 of 50:
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Jul 22 21:30 UTC 2000 |
most folks are suprised to learn that glenn miller is considered a jazz
artist.
i can't play a lick on a trombone but i sure has hell can when someone else
is playing it badly.
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lelande
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response 8 of 50:
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Jul 22 21:37 UTC 2000 |
my friend's stepmom will occasionally make fun of me for something i
said 5 years ago. "do you mind if i play some tony bennett?" she said to
me, back then. "sure, i love jazz," i said.
her ridicule is based on my confusing tony bennett for jazz.
she lives in flat rock. i can overlook her error.
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danr
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response 9 of 50:
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Jul 22 22:23 UTC 2000 |
The whole tone of the Metheny interview is one of sour grapes. Someone who is
supposedly superior to another should keep his or her mouth shut about the
supposedly inferior person. Denigrating someone's work is not a good way to win
folks to your side.
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jerryr
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response 10 of 50:
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Jul 23 00:01 UTC 2000 |
so that about puts the screws to a lot of book reviews then
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happyboy
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response 11 of 50:
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Jul 23 00:02 UTC 2000 |
kenny g having ANYTHING to do with satchmo is an
abomination.
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other
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response 12 of 50:
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Jul 23 01:11 UTC 2000 |
The real question is, where did KG get the rights to use that original LA
recording, and who sold them to him? Armstrong's estate?
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drew
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response 13 of 50:
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Jul 23 02:51 UTC 2000 |
Kenny G gets killed in the latest _Babylon Park_ episode.
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other
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response 14 of 50:
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Jul 23 02:57 UTC 2000 |
is this _south_park_ meets _babylon_five_?
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krj
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response 15 of 50:
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Jul 23 04:49 UTC 2000 |
((( Summer Agora #349 <--> Music #273 )))
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md
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response 16 of 50:
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Jul 23 06:49 UTC 2000 |
It sounds like Pat Metheny had been waiting a long time for Kenny G to
do something like a Louis Armstrong overdub. It also sounds like
Metheny would have been happier if G had overdubbed "Dem Dere Eyes," or
some other Armstrong classic, and I think it would have served Metheny
better to wait for just such a sacrilege, even if it never came. But
he just couldn't wait any longer, obviously.
I grew up listening to my dad's Okeh 78s of Armstrong. I am going to
disagree with Mary's position that you can't be "wrong" about music.
You can. You may argue about the gray areas and about who sets the
standards, but at the very least there is genius and there is dreck,
and if you champion the dreck, you're wrong. Simple as that. Louis
Armstrong's "What a Wonderful World" is dreck. It's the aged master
appealing to the lowest and commonest taste. He did it for the
perfectly understable purpose of paying his bills, but is there any
honest lover of Armstrong's music who can listen to "WAWW" without
squirming in embarrassment?
There were other Armstrong forays into the Top 40: "Hello Dolly"
retains a glimmer of the Armstrong wit and style; "Mack the Knife" is a
small masterpiece. A Kenny G overdub of either of those singles would
have been sacrilegious. But "WAWW"? Puh-leez. Water seeks its own
level. "WAWW" is the only Armstrong recording Kenny G could've gotten
away with sliming. So, nauseating smarm is all Kenny G does; Louis
Armstrong descended to it only that once. So what? Karma, old man.
He has to be laughing his ass off in whatever paradise he now inhabits.
Mind you, I haven't actualy *heard* the Kenny G overdub and have no
intention of listening to it. I imagine it as something like the
passage in Milton where sin gave birth to death. But it can't be more
vulgar than Metheny's us-against-them pontificating -- with Metheny's
wishful "us" club consisting of John Coltrane and Metheny himself, as
if "Phase Dance" and "Giant Steps" belong right next to each other. As
if.
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twinkie
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response 17 of 50:
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Jul 23 06:54 UTC 2000 |
re: 3 -- It depends on the person. I don't necessarily wish him great harm,
but I don't think he's done anything that your average high school band
student couldn't play.
I played tenor sax for about 8 years, and soprano (which Kenny G usually
plays) for about 4. I'm no virtuoso by any definition of the term, but it's
insulting to hear people say "Now Kenny G...HE can play the sax!".
Think of it like this...pretend you're a big Sarah Brightman fan, and everyone
you know thinks that Britney Spears is the Second Coming in terms of female
vocalists.
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mary
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response 18 of 50:
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Jul 23 11:41 UTC 2000 |
Who decides whose tastes are right and wrong, Michael?
And based on what criteria?
I've never heard a Brightman or Spears song so I'm not
qualified for the job.
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tod
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response 19 of 50:
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Jul 23 13:43 UTC 2000 |
Al DiMeola would whip Kenny G's behind in a solo ensemble competition.
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katie
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response 20 of 50:
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Jul 23 15:27 UTC 2000 |
It's funny. I am a big Sarah Brightman fan, but it's the 'real' opera
singers who think *she's* the neophyte.
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jerryr
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response 21 of 50:
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Jul 23 15:42 UTC 2000 |
one of the biggest laughs i ever had, using the knowledge gained from years
of studying the trumpet, was the listening to one of the first george winston
albums. he was all the rage. the people who had me listen to the ablum were
all a giggle over how wonderful it was. they looked at me as if i had just
shot their dog when i burst out laughing. on one of the cuts he is playing
over-orchestrated piano scales. now, it could be that i found his stuff
crap, which i did, and i didn't know what i was talking about (often this is
true) but years later i am sitting with a collegue in a san francisco
restaurant. the topic of music came up and he disclosed to those gathered
that in a former life he had been a professional musician. when george winston
was mentioned, he floored me by saying - oh, that guy that plays scales?
it was nice to be validated.
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scott
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response 22 of 50:
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Jul 23 15:51 UTC 2000 |
As a sometimes pro musician myself, I'll agree it's usually easy to tell when
somebody is faking it for money. Some of the people doing it are technically
quite good, but how can anybody really enjoy playing music that repetitive?
There's money in it, quite good money actually. Where do you suppose all that
Muzak comes from? It's actually an industry.
Story: My main instrument is bass guitar, which I came to from double bass
in orchestra. I've been playing off and on for 20+ years, and while I've got
my weaknesses I'm quite competent. I used to do sound for bands, and one o6f
the bass players I knew from one of the bands was a pretty good but not
fantastic player. A couple years after the band he was in had broken up and
disappeared from the area, the bass player turned up in an opening act for
some big show. He had a fancy 6 string bass by now, and a very nice haircut.
His solo was the most laughable thing I've seen in a while, but it *looked*
like he was doing something really tricky.
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brighn
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response 23 of 50:
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Jul 24 05:31 UTC 2000 |
Re: Kenny G outselling Pat Methany. According to RIAA.com, Kenny G has sold
44.5 million albums, career, while Methany doesn't make the "top artists" list
(which stops at N Sync at 20 million). So Kenny G has sold at least twise as
many, probably more.
Re: Sour grapes and "supposedly superior" people dissing "supposedly
inferior." Bullshit. Methany has a right to his opinion, and a right to
express it. It doesn't show that you're "better than" somebody else when you
don't criticize them for being less artistic, intelligent, well-reasoned,
vivacious, or whatever... *shrug* I personally couldn't care less what Methany
has to say about Kenny G, though, because I've never been "turned on" to
Methany... I've never heard enough of his music to form an opinion. What I've
heard of Kenny G's seems aesthetic enough, if not all that technically
advanced. Somebody's gotta record the easy stuff.
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lelande
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response 24 of 50:
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Jul 24 09:29 UTC 2000 |
'perhaps with less chutzpah' may be among p.m.'s points about g.
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tod
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response 25 of 50:
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Jul 24 10:58 UTC 2000 |
Spice Girls sold many albums too. What's the point?
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jerryr
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response 26 of 50:
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Jul 24 12:23 UTC 2000 |
yeah, look at elwood parsley.
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brighn
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response 27 of 50:
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Jul 24 14:23 UTC 2000 |
#25> *My* point was inreference to somebody earlier suggesting that Methany
was just rippin' on Kenny 'cuz Kenny sold more albums, but that somebody
didn't know what the comparable sales were, so I was verifyin' that yes,
indeed, Kenny has sold many more.
Of course, record sales mean nothing about talent... doesn't even necessarily
mean that much about long-term popularity. While The Beatles are #1, Elvis
ain't #2 -- that belongs to Garth, who in 20 years probably won't be remember
ed anywhere near as fondly as Elvis (and, ironically, it's roughly the same
demographic that made each famous, and a different "same demographic" that
made each rich).
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tod
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response 28 of 50:
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Jul 24 14:46 UTC 2000 |
It's a Walmart world. :)
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danr
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response 29 of 50:
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Jul 24 15:51 UTC 2000 |
I took Metheny's views to be less of a reasonable criticism than sour grapes.
If his music is so superior, he should let the music speak for itself. To get
into a pissing contest about it just diminishes him.
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