The DJ's that play 60's Motown/garage rock in Cleveland draw a really great crowd.

 

https://www.facebook.com/SecretSoulClub/

 

fye's on the Crosley train as well. They don't seem to get great reviews. I got a Technics 1200 about 13 years ago so that I don't have to take any crap from crummy record players.

 

 

Yeah I looked them up and predictably people said that the sound quality is bad and the cheap needles will destroy your records after 10 plays.  But truth be told, most records aren't played 10 times by their original owners.  I probably have 100 20+ year-old cd's that I have popped in the cd player fewer than 10 times and a few that have been played 50+ times. 

 

Back when photographs were real things and anyone who printed their own spent many hours in a dark room several dozen days each year, I had a small coterie of CD's that I listened to many dozens of times because they were strong throughout.  For example, I probably listened to the Rolling Stones' Exile on Main St. over 50 times straight through.  I know my CD copy of The Stooges' Funhouse was scratched to death but that was caused by moving it to the car and letting people borrow it.  Some people were completely incapable of borrowing a CD without scratching the hell out of it.  My copy of In Utero somehow still plays perfectly despite my having bought it the week it came out and having played it upwards of 50 times.     

 

But that's really the max.  Few records or CD's were played all the way through by anyone more than 50 times.  ITunes of course records how many times you've listened to a song, and I only have a few that I've listened to more than 50 times...most of them Lou Reed or Bob Dylan. 

 

^ the question is who will know about that music without him publicizing it like that?

 

You're kidding? How does anyone know about all the music out there that isn't lame dance claptrap?  Concerts, maybe?  Talking to other people with similar musical tastes?  Browsing record stores

 

Damn, how's the 20th century doing?  :)

 

Youtube and Pandora, yep.  Other online sources as well.  A lot of bands hype similar sounding ones on their websites and Facebook pages, I know Bound By Fate does.

 

The last time I bought an album without hearing at least one song was the Pipettes and that was 2007.

Dude from Blink 182 introduces himself to teenagers wearing Blink 182 shirts and they don't know how he is:

http://www.cnn.com/2017/07/21/entertainment/blink-182-singer-t-shirts-twitter-trnd/index.html

 

Blink 182 was a terrible band but this episode illustrates just how little music means to younger people.  It used to be that wearing a particular band's shirt was a huge deal.  Like, in 1995 I blew off a girl coming after me because she was wearing a Bush shirt.

Dude from Blink 182 introduces himself to teenagers wearing Blink 182 shirts and they don't know how he is:

http://www.cnn.com/2017/07/21/entertainment/blink-182-singer-t-shirts-twitter-trnd/index.html

 

Blink 182 was a terrible band but this episode illustrates just how little music means to younger people.  It used to be that wearing a particular band's shirt was a huge deal.  Like, in 1995 I blew off a girl coming after me because she was wearing a Bush shirt.

 

I personally think we're a couple years away from the guitar becoming as "lame" as the accordion.

 

Also, if I owned the rights to the Beatles catalogue I'd sell it immediately. There will be a resurgence when Paul and Ringo pass away, but soon they'll be viewed in the same way we view Duke Ellington or Benny Goodman....amazing talent but very very culturally distant to the point of being almost unrelatable.

 

[did I spell "catalogue" and "unrelateable" incorrectly? I'm seeing red underlines and I've had a few.....]

 

 

Dude from Blink 182 introduces himself to teenagers wearing Blink 182 shirts and they don't know how he is:

http://www.cnn.com/2017/07/21/entertainment/blink-182-singer-t-shirts-twitter-trnd/index.html

 

Blink 182 was a terrible band but this episode illustrates just how little music means to younger people.  It used to be that wearing a particular band's shirt was a huge deal.  Like, in 1995 I blew off a girl coming after me because she was wearing a Bush shirt.

 

I would be mortified if I wore a shirt of a band I didn't know well.

 

Also, if I owned the rights to the Beatles catalogue I'd sell it immediately. There will be a resurgence when Paul and Ringo pass away, but soon they'll be viewed in the same way we view Duke Ellington or Benny Goodman....amazing talent but very very culturally distant to the point of being almost unrelatable.

 

 

 

 

 

I disagree somewhat. 50+ years is a loosing time for people to care about a particular pop group and a lot of young people can indeed carry on an intelligent conversation about the Beatles. As someone who was in their 20s in the 1960s explained "College students sure as hell weren't talking about 1920s music back then!"

I think people will always love The Beatles, Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin for some reason. I'm not sure why but growing up in the 90s, I loved Classic Rock just as much as the current rock and rap I was listening to. I still listen to Classic Rock even though I don't listen to the current stuff I was listening to back then. That era is just timeless, at least with particular musicians. I was never a big Beatles fan though. I just couldn't get into it.

Like, in 1995 I blew off a girl coming after me because she was wearing a Bush shirt.

 

The band, the president(s), or the hair style?  :wink: :wink: :wink:  All were in play in the 90's, to some degree.

 

Like, in 1995 I blew off a girl coming after me because she was wearing a Bush shirt.

 

The band, the president(s), or the hair style?  :wink: :wink: :wink:  All were in play in the 90's, to some degree.

I liked Bush, they were English? Grunge dam near killed English rock bands.

I feel as though the fact that the fact that the general structure of a pop single hasn't really changed since the 50s helps make some of these bands so enduring. Obviously we all know how rock is rooted in blues and jazz, but for a lot of people jazz is a completely foreign art form with the exception of its occasional revivals and crosses into the mainstream as a Lady Gaga/Tony Bennet single or whatever here and there. Even with the EDM-splosion of recent years, two-guitars-and-a-drum-kit is still really common. So when you have these bands from the 60s playing in a familiar style but in a way that's still a unique sounding today, it can still cut through all the noise fifty years on.

 

As for the Beatles being the end-all, I'm personally more of a Brian Wilson fan, but Rubber Soul, Hard Day's Night, and Help! are all phenomenal records. They have the unique Beatles sound at its prime, right before they got trippy and weird.

Dude from Blink 182 introduces himself to teenagers wearing Blink 182 shirts and they don't know how he is:

http://www.cnn.com/2017/07/21/entertainment/blink-182-singer-t-shirts-twitter-trnd/index.html

 

Blink 182 was a terrible band but this episode illustrates just how little music means to younger people.  It used to be that wearing a particular band's shirt was a huge deal.  Like, in 1995 I blew off a girl coming after me because she was wearing a Bush shirt.

 

Holly was watching "Rock Of Love" one time and I had to explain to her that Bret Michaels had been the lead singer of Poison (who she had sort of heard of) and he was just getting away with doing in his 40s what he did in his 20s.  Of course the smartass she was she said the obvious :)  What was also funny was the next day I noted that her ringtone was "Comfortably Numb" (a song older than her) and mine was Bone Thugs.

 

Her sister's boyfriend once wore a Zeppelin '77 tour shirt to the bar, he was born in 1984.  I saw it and am like "man, I almost went to that show".

 

Fashion is fashion and like Michael Stanley said, you can't fight it.

 

Even at my most punk I would never have blown off a girl in a Bee Gee's shirt I would have just tried to get her to "change".  :evil:

Most crappy acts from the past didn't even have shirts. Like, you never saw someone wearing a Milli Vanilli or Autograph shirt. It was always Maiden, Priest, Dokken, Metallica, Slayer, Ozzy, Scorpions, Megadeth, Ratt, Def Leppard.

A Milli Vanilli t-shirt would be super hipster right now. Especially since tapes are back in style.

Most crappy acts from the past didn't even have shirts. Like, you never saw someone wearing a Milli Vanilli or Autograph shirt. It was always Maiden, Priest, Dokken, Metallica, Slayer, Ozzy, Scorpions, Megadeth, Ratt, Def Leppard.

 

Always found Autograph to be underrated, though having a black sports car and a blonde girlfriend (who dolled up way more for me than her ex because I noticed and encouraged) may have influenced that. lol  (You may have to know a bit of their library to get those references)

 

But any bad that went on an organized tour had t shirts.  It was always tradition to wear the concert shirt the next day, at least at Maple HS.

Like, in 1995 I blew off a girl coming after me because she was wearing a Bush shirt.

 

The band, the president(s), or the hair style?  :wink: :wink: :wink:  All were in play in the 90's, to some degree.

I liked Bush, they were English? Grunge dam near killed English rock bands.

Bush was grunge, by English standards.  Britpop thrived in the UK (duh) and was way better than mid 90s American rock.

 

I've heard that grunge was a music insiders effort to kill off hair metal with something pessimistic. 

Like, in 1995 I blew off a girl coming after me because she was wearing a Bush shirt.

 

The band, the president(s), or the hair style?  :wink: :wink: :wink:  All were in play in the 90's, to some degree.

I liked Bush, they were English? Grunge dam near killed English rock bands.

Bush was grunge, by English standards. Britpop thrived in the UK (duh) and was way better than mid 90s American rock.

 

I've heard that grunge was a music insiders effort to kill off hair metal with something pessimistic. 

Are those bands household names in the USA?

Most crappy acts from the past didn't even have shirts. Like, you never saw someone wearing a Milli Vanilli or Autograph shirt.

 

For 100 bucks you can lead the way....

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/VINTAGE-1990-Milli-Vanilli-Concert-T-Shirt-Size-M-38-40-Mint-Deadstock-/232419142942?hash=item361d42ad1e:g:eoUAAOSwPDZZckME

What Milli Vanilli did with their lip-synching was completely unacceptable here but totally normal in Europe. Tons of the European pop stars from the '80s still lip-synch live such as the Italo Disco acts and other pop stars like Sandra do it.

What Milli Vanilli did with their lip-synching was completely unacceptable here but totally normal in Europe. Tons of the European pop stars from the '80s still lip-synch live such as the Italo Disco acts and other pop stars like Sandra do it.

 

Lots of acts lip sync live, including American pop stars. 

 

Milli Vanilli never even sang on "their" records.  That's way different.

Like, in 1995 I blew off a girl coming after me because she was wearing a Bush shirt.

 

The band, the president(s), or the hair style?  :wink: :wink: :wink:  All were in play in the 90's, to some degree.

I liked Bush, they were English? Grunge dam near killed English rock bands.

Bush was grunge, by English standards. Britpop thrived in the UK (duh) and was way better than mid 90s American rock.

 

I've heard that grunge was a music insiders effort to kill off hair metal with something pessimistic. 

Are those bands household names in the USA?

 

Only Oasis and the Cranberries, if them.  But a nation of 60 million was able to maintain the genre well enough.

 

Oh, Chumbawumba had a massive US hit and they were probably considered the least likely band in the UK to ever do so.

What Milli Vanilli did with their lip-synching was completely unacceptable here but totally normal in Europe. Tons of the European pop stars from the '80s still lip-synch live such as the Italo Disco acts and other pop stars like Sandra do it.

 

Lots of acts lip sync live, including American pop stars. 

 

Milli Vanilli never even sang on "their" records.  That's way different.

 

It's much more common than it was.  In the mid 80s, WGCL in Cleveland was having Slade do a free show downtown and they were going to lip sync.  WMMS found out and had an absolute blast with that info.

Right on cue, a Facebook friend just posted a photo of herself with the 50+ year-old lead singer of Bush:

For the longest time I thought Milli Vanilli was an Italian girl from Queens. Today's music is so abysmal it's virtually unlistenable. As a couple of examples, can someone explain how someone like Lorde and a group like Haim became such superstars? All of these "artists" sound like contrived and affected retreads from the past. Honestly, I've tried listening to them objectively. Although maybe I'm being too harsh. Compared to some of the nihilistic garbage of the past generation, at least their music possesses some identifiable melodic lines--lol.  They're no McGarrigle Sisters.

 

 

 

As for the Beatles being the end-all, I'm personally more of a Brian Wilson fan, but Rubber Soul, Hard Day's Night, and Help! are all phenomenal records. They have the unique Beatles sound at its prime, right before they got trippy and weird.

 

That era, to me, represents the pinnacle of studio recording.

 

Listen to "Don't Worry Baby" and there is something there, an essence, that 99.9 percent of today's recordings just can not capture.

Always found Autograph to be underrated

 

TURN

UP

THE RADIO

Most crappy acts from the past didn't even have shirts. Like, you never saw someone wearing a Milli Vanilli or Autograph shirt. It was always Maiden, Priest, Dokken, Metallica, Slayer, Ozzy, Scorpions, Megadeth, Ratt, Def Leppard.

 

You're leaving out the band that I saw open for Cinderella AND Poison at Germain Ampitheater in 2004.

As for the Beatles being the end-all, I'm personally more of a Brian Wilson fan, but Rubber Soul, Hard Day's Night, and Help! are all phenomenal records. They have the unique Beatles sound at its prime, right before they got trippy and weird.

 

That era, to me, represents the pinnacle of studio recording.

 

Listen to "Don't Worry Baby" and there is something there, an essence, that 99.9 percent of today's recordings just can not capture.

 

I'm still amazed at how well-mastered Beatles records were. Almost all of them sound like they could have been recorded yesterday. All of The Beach Boys albums are in mono but the stereo tracks that have gotten released over the years just sound so crisp. I still listen to Pet Sounds in mono most of the time but the stereo isolated vocal recordings are mind-blowing.

I heard a segment about Sgt. Pepper on NPR a couple weeks ago.  The original, British, mono version was fussed over in the mixing room for an amount of time that was considered pretty lavish, but the American stereo version was done pretty quickly.

Glad I never jumped on the vinyl bandwagon. The only time I was serious about vinyl was when I was a kid. I would save up my grass cutting money to buy KISS albums at Gold Circle. Twenty-five years later my Mom sells them all at a garage sale for .25 each.

 

I'm slowly thinning out my CD collection. Converting them to high-res digital files which stream to a pretty decent home stereo. I really dig using Airplay.

Why Vinyl’s Boom Is Over

Old LPs were cut from analog tapes—that’s why they sound so high quality. But the majority of today’s new and re-issued vinyl albums—around 80% or more, several experts estimate—start from digital files, even lower-quality CDs. These digital files are often loud and harsh-sounding, optimized for ear-buds, not living rooms. So the new vinyl LP is sometimes inferior to what a consumer hears on a CD.

“They’re re-issuing [old albums] and not using the original tapes” to save time and money, says Michael Fremer, editor of AnalogPlanet.com and one of America’s leading audio authorities. “They have the tapes. They could take them out and have it done right—by a good engineer. They don’t.”

https://www.wsj.com/articles/why-vinyls-boom-is-over-1500721202?mod=e2tw

I just tried to rip all my CD's to a USB drive, so I can listen to them all in my car.  I was surprised how many have errors in them, though.  Even cd's with no serious looking scratches.  Also the program I was using didn't have a setting for ripping full lossless bitrates, so the CD's stay for now.

Glad I never jumped on the vinyl bandwagon. The only time I was serious about vinyl was when I was a kid. I would save up my grass cutting money to buy KISS albums at Gold Circle. Twenty-five years later my Mom sells them all at a garage sale for .25 each.

 

I'm slowly thinning out my CD collection. Converting them to high-res digital files which stream to a pretty decent home stereo. I really dig using Airplay.

Why Vinyl’s Boom Is Over

Old LPs were cut from analog tapes—that’s why they sound so high quality. But the majority of today’s new and re-issued vinyl albums—around 80% or more, several experts estimate—start from digital files, even lower-quality CDs. These digital files are often loud and harsh-sounding, optimized for ear-buds, not living rooms. So the new vinyl LP is sometimes inferior to what a consumer hears on a CD.

“They’re re-issuing [old albums] and not using the original tapes” to save time and money, says Michael Fremer, editor of AnalogPlanet.com and one of America’s leading audio authorities. “They have the tapes. They could take them out and have it done right—by a good engineer. They don’t.”

https://www.wsj.com/articles/why-vinyls-boom-is-over-1500721202?mod=e2tw

 

The whole idea of a brickwalled LP is so wrong I don't even know where to start. I've never bought one to my knowledge.

I only buy vinyl records of bands that I know for a fact take the remastering process very seriously. For example Radiohead just remastered OK Computer from the original tapes and released it as a 20th anniversary edition. Anything out of Third Man Records is also going to be mastered for vinyl in an optimal way. They're definitely not just taking the audio files that were mastered for a CD or digital and putting them on vinyl.

I feel as though the fact that the fact that the general structure of a pop single hasn't really changed since the 50s helps make some of these bands so enduring. Obviously we all know how rock is rooted in blues and jazz, but for a lot of people jazz is a completely foreign art form with the exception of its occasional revivals and crosses into the mainstream as a Lady Gaga/Tony Bennet single or whatever here and there. Even with the EDM-splosion of recent years, two-guitars-and-a-drum-kit is still really common. So when you have these bands from the 60s playing in a familiar style but in a way that's still a unique sounding today, it can still cut through all the noise fifty years on.

 

As for the Beatles being the end-all, I'm personally more of a Brian Wilson fan, but Rubber Soul, Hard Day's Night, and Help! are all phenomenal records. They have the unique Beatles sound at its prime, right before they got trippy and weird.

 

The Beach Boys > Beatles.  Their albums after Pet Sounds up to Holland are criminally underrated by the public as well.  For that matter pretty much all of their music is underrated by the public. 

Dude from Blink 182 introduces himself to teenagers wearing Blink 182 shirts and they don't know how he is:

http://www.cnn.com/2017/07/21/entertainment/blink-182-singer-t-shirts-twitter-trnd/index.html

 

Blink 182 was a terrible band but this episode illustrates just how little music means to younger people.  It used to be that wearing a particular band's shirt was a huge deal.  Like, in 1995 I blew off a girl coming after me because she was wearing a Bush shirt.

 

I recently saw a video where these people played a Nirvana song to a girl who had a Nirvana shirt on, but she had no idea what band it was.  Pretty funny.

I heard a segment about Sgt. Pepper on NPR a couple weeks ago.  The original, British, mono version was fussed over in the mixing room for an amount of time that was considered pretty lavish, but the American stereo version was done pretty quickly.

 

Some old recordings that were recorded in the leading studios sound great because much more work was necessary back then with mic placements and physically prepping the instruments and recording space.  There wasn't much that could be done to fix errors in post-production, so the acoustics and the takes had to be perfect.  One big issue with tape was that a faster tape speed reduced tape hiss, but new acts couldn't afford to burn through 2x as much tape.  I recorded two short records with a band in the 90s and when we did the second recording a year later we simply taped over the previous year's 2" tape.  I seem to recall that the tapes cost $150 for 15 minutes at the higher speed or $150 for 30 minutes at the slower speed.  Yes we did the slower speed, obviously.  Actually, we bought a second tape for that second recording, and had some space left and so we did two takes of a reggae instrumental.  We did it with no expectation that we'd use it but it turned out pretty well.  Stuff like that can't happen with digital because there is no limit to the tracks or the time.  Spontaneous decisions like that can't happen.  Tons of creativity comes from limitations.  There are no "limits" with digital recording, and that's why it is so uninspiring.       

 

Now, there is a belief that everything can be fixed in post-processing, and so their is less emphasis on the input.  Mic placements and the mics themselves don't matter so much and people fix up sloppy takes.  Because you aren't burning $250/hr in a real studio, you don't show up to the recording session totally ready to go.  And because there is no time constraint, you probably never finish the damn record. 

 

There is an analogy with old view cameras and fiber printing as opposed to 35mm and now digital photographs.  Ansel Adams had 10 glass plates strapped to a donkey when he hoofed around Yosemite back in the 30s.  10 shots then he had a day's hike out to "reload". Go see fiber prints from those negatives and be amazed.  The quality of landscape photography has generally deteriorated in the 80 years since because the temptation to create more overall images instead of just a few outstanding ones has been too great. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dude from Blink 182 introduces himself to teenagers wearing Blink 182 shirts and they don't know how he is:

http://www.cnn.com/2017/07/21/entertainment/blink-182-singer-t-shirts-twitter-trnd/index.html

 

Blink 182 was a terrible band but this episode illustrates just how little music means to younger people.  It used to be that wearing a particular band's shirt was a huge deal.  Like, in 1995 I blew off a girl coming after me because she was wearing a Bush shirt.

 

I personally think we're a couple years away from the guitar becoming as "lame" as the accordion.

 

Also, if I owned the rights to the Beatles catalogue I'd sell it immediately. There will be a resurgence when Paul and Ringo pass away, but soon they'll be viewed in the same way we view Duke Ellington or Benny Goodman....amazing talent but very very culturally distant to the point of being almost unrelatable.

 

[did I spell "catalogue" and "unrelateable" incorrectly? I'm seeing red underlines and I've had a few.....]

 

 

I'm only going by a data set of 3, but my kids are all big Beatles fans (and classic rock fans in general). I had to download a bunch of Beatles onto their ipods for camp, among other things. My daughter, especially, is getting into a lot of 80's metal....maybe being a little influenced by me.....

 

That same daughter is going to be building her own electric guitar in school this coming school year as part of her engineering elective. She's 11 BTW.

Most crappy acts from the past didn't even have shirts. Like, you never saw someone wearing a Milli Vanilli or Autograph shirt. It was always Maiden, Priest, Dokken, Metallica, Slayer, Ozzy, Scorpions, Megadeth, Ratt, Def Leppard.

 

You're leaving out the band that I saw open for Cinderella AND Poison at Germain Ampitheater in 2004.

 

They played a WSOR at the Rubber Bowl in '89 or so and the Bulletboys dissed them pretty hard by coming out into the crowd during their set.

Dude from Blink 182 introduces himself to teenagers wearing Blink 182 shirts and they don't know how he is:

http://www.cnn.com/2017/07/21/entertainment/blink-182-singer-t-shirts-twitter-trnd/index.html

 

Blink 182 was a terrible band but this episode illustrates just how little music means to younger people.  It used to be that wearing a particular band's shirt was a huge deal.  Like, in 1995 I blew off a girl coming after me because she was wearing a Bush shirt.

 

I recently saw a video where these people played a Nirvana song to a girl who had a Nirvana shirt on, but she had no idea what band it was.  Pretty funny.

 

My daughter has a Nirvana shirt, sort of.....

 

 

Her mom thought it was the funniest thing ever so I got it for her for Christmas.

As a couple of examples, can someone explain how someone like Lorde and a group like Haim became such superstars?

 

Lorde had the right song at the right time, and her minimalist look in the video struck a note as well.  Plus her age was a factor.

 

The Haim family had major connections in the creative end of the industry, and the sisters had enough ability to carry it and some really good advice on how to take maximum advantage of their looks without looking like they were trying too hard.

I hear about these newer pop people and I look up how many hits their videos have on youtube and it's always really, really upsetting.  Lorde has a video with 600 million hits.  The song is a D-.  She's boring.  Haim is boring. 

 

Not boring:

I hear about these newer pop people and I look up how many hits their videos have on youtube and it's always really, really upsetting.  Lorde has a video with 600 million hits.  The song is a D-.  She's boring.  Haim is boring. 

 

Boring isn't a negative apparently, where music is concerned.  I find Drake to be mind numbingly boring and Future would be too except his utter suckitude overwhelms it, and they both sell a ton.

I personally think we're a couple years away from the guitar becoming as "lame" as the accordion.

 

Ever hear of a guy named Dick Rowe, or a label called Decca Records?

I hear about these newer pop people and I look up how many hits their videos have on youtube and it's always really, really upsetting.  Lorde has a video with 600 million hits.  The song is a D-.  She's boring.  Haim is boring. 

 

Boring isn't a negative apparently, where music is concerned.  I find Drake to be mind numbingly boring and Future would be too except his utter suckitude overwhelms it, and they both sell a ton.

 

It's because the only thing that matters with all that stuff is vocals. It's the same as hearing someone sing by themselves in church.

As a couple of examples, can someone explain how someone like Lorde and a group like Haim became such superstars?

 

Lorde had the right song at the right time, and her minimalist look in the video struck a note as well.  Plus her age was a factor.

 

The Haim family had major connections in the creative end of the industry, and the sisters had enough ability to carry it and some really good advice on how to take maximum advantage of their looks without looking like they were trying too hard.

 

What's funny is that Lorde recently worked on her new album while living in NYC. As big as she is, she hung out in a nondescript Greek diner in Chelsea for hours at a time while writing songs, undetected by people. Maybe she's not that popular here.  :laugh:

^^ the amazing thing about Dick Rowe is that even after rejecting the Beatles, his family still somehow managed to get ownership in their songs. Stranger than fiction.

As a couple of examples, can someone explain how someone like Lorde and a group like Haim became such superstars?

 

Lorde had the right song at the right time, and her minimalist look in the video struck a note as well.  Plus her age was a factor.

 

The Haim family had major connections in the creative end of the industry, and the sisters had enough ability to carry it and some really good advice on how to take maximum advantage of their looks without looking like they were trying too hard.

 

What's funny is that Lorde recently worked on her new album while living in NYC. As big as she is, she hung out in a nondescript Greek diner in Chelsea for hours at a time while writing songs, undetected by people. Maybe she's not that popular here.  :laugh:

 

Small college age woman in casual clothes, little to no makeup, sitting in a diner writing songs without trying to draw attention to herself?  NYC has to be full of them.  When Ardyn first saw the "Royals" video she thought it was her mom singing, and Holly could totally blend in unnoticed when she decided to, so looks alone wouldn't do it.  And her megahit was four years ago.  No surprise here.

 

As a couple of examples, can someone explain how someone like Lorde and a group like Haim became such superstars?

 

Lorde had the right song at the right time, and her minimalist look in the video struck a note as well.  Plus her age was a factor.

 

The Haim family had major connections in the creative end of the industry, and the sisters had enough ability to carry it and some really good advice on how to take maximum advantage of their looks without looking like they were trying too hard.

 

What's funny is that Lorde recently worked on her new album while living in NYC. As big as she is, she hung out in a nondescript Greek diner in Chelsea for hours at a time while writing songs, undetected by people. Maybe she's not that popular here.  :laugh:

 

Small college age woman in casual clothes, little to no makeup, sitting in a diner writing songs without trying to draw attention to herself?  NYC has to be full of them.  When Ardyn first saw the "Royals" video she thought it was her mom singing, and Holly could totally blend in unnoticed when she decided to, so looks alone wouldn't do it.  And her megahit was four years ago.  No surprise here.

 

 

I recently asked a barista friend if she liked Jason Mraz. She loves him, she said. Well I had to fill her in that she just spent the last five minutes waiting on him at her coffee shop. She had absolutely no idea. I think it's easy for celebrities to blend in with everyone else when they're just doing normal things.

 

Prince was different. If you were in his band, the rule was you had to be in your goofy stage outfit at all times.

 

 

I recently asked a barista friend if she liked Jason Mraz. She loves him, she said.

 

That reads like a Lou Reed lyric. 

 

 

Candy Says

Lisa Says

Stephanie Says

Caroline Says

Sally Can't Dance

 

 

 

Without MTV people don't remember what performers look like.