If I had a dollar for every band hat went down the slippery slope from "let's have backing tracks" to "this song is all programmed beats" to "this band is now a solo project of the singer-cum-producer-cum-DJ"...

And if I had a dollar every time a celebrity DJ or pop act talks about their hardcore punk roots while producing pablum for the masses...

Now I am far from a purist. I've never been in a band that fit into one genre, and my favorite music covers a lot of ground. But it seems like such a cynical ploy to add trap or auto-tuned clean vocals or ukulele or whatever the cellphone-commercial music du jour is, to a band whose sound and style implies authenticity, such as hardcore and punk music aspire to do. Comments about Turnstile in another thread got me thinking about this today, but there are many more offenders and I'd like you to list some that you feel fit the description.

Consider the poll options to exclude bands that are multifaceted from the get-go, or that defy genre. We're talking about bands that explicitly add flavor A to genre Z once they get some success.

Personally I'd probably pick a pop song over a hardcore song 9/10. After lets say '85 anything I've ever heard that gets lumped under hardcore is some of my least favorite music ever. The grating noises I like in music are too slow and androgynous to get classified as hardcore.

Any hardcore dude making pop music is probably equally as bad. Tie for me in that regard.

I'd abstain. Whether I enjoy the direction or not, there are definitely some bands for whom the shift is an authentic one. More power to them when that's the case, even if they lose me as a listener along the way.

Wire
The Damned
The Fall
Cabaret Voltaire

Too many to list here.

I don't care if it's done well. I love a good pop song.

Not crap. Waffles for the bands that suck, I guess.

A_Man_Who_Tries wrote: I'd abstain. Whether I enjoy the direction or not, there are definitely some bands for whom the shift is an authentic one. More power to them when that's the case, even if they lose me as a listener along the way.

Yeah that's where I'm at. I haven't and won't be 'playing the game' any time soon, but can't fault anyone for wanting to make music more people relate to. And whether we olds like it or not, processed music is contemporary music.

I may be in the minority, but I hate The Fall post-pop-conversion, especially after it turned Smith ranting over dance music.

When a band goes pop, it’s often because they’ve found that they really like cocaine but really can’t afford it.

Crap, with waffles for the extremely small number who somehow pulled it off.

Listened to that new Turnstile record today thanks to this and the other thread. It has its moments, but overall comes off as mediocre alt.rock like the first couple Therapy? albums. I'm all for throwing pop hooks wherever one can imagine them, on principle, but sometimes they're just ordinary window dressing.

Example that I do like: Hot Hot Heat's first two pop releases (the pink EP and Make Up The Breakdown) are way better than the faceless hardcore with synths they were doing earlier.

enframed wrote: Tue Jan 11, 2022 1:42 pm Cabaret Voltaire

Can you point to anything of theirs that fits this topic? Granted I'm not familiar with all of their stuff but even the later 80's material while easier on the ear for the uninitiated, would not qualify as pop, IMO.

kaleb wrote: Tue Jan 11, 2022 4:27 pm
Example that I do like: Hot Hot Heat's first two pop releases (the pink EP and Make Up The Breakdown) are way better than the faceless hardcore with synths they were doing earlier.

Absolutely agreed. It was kinda funny when they'd started down that road but were still playing w/ hardcore and screamo bands, saw them play a great show with Three Inches of Blood and the Red Light Sting just before that first EP came out.