Any music designed to be listened to under the influence of psychedelic drugs is ok in my book.
I have a shoegazer obsessed friend and he has played me some stuff that just blew me away. One of my first shows ever was MBV and it still ranks up there as one of the loudest I've ever seen, and that can't be a bad thing.
Not Crap.

MBV's Loveless and Isnt Anything are great. I am also a fan of Galaxie 500, though I met Damon and Naomi and they weren't very nice people. Well, they wern't nice until they had learned that I loaned them my fender twin for the performance. hmm.

I think Loop were great as well.

mbv is the only one i really give a damn about. shit, slowdive, catherine wheel, that's some new-age crappola for ya..

the new life and times record is pretty shoegazer sounding, but still rocks. it's good.

The fact of the matter is that "Shoegazer" is a marketing term, pure and simple. Inspecific, clumsy, and devoid of meaning, the term is CRAP.

The bands subsumed underneath this rubric are so very different. MBV and (early) Pale Saints were fantastic. Ride were merely OK. Catherine Wheel and Chapterhourse were pure SHITE. As such, it is not possible to deem shoegazer "music" crap or not crap. It simply does not exist.

(Note: pretentious philosophy follows.)

Artists will always find themselves tagged with a designation not of their making, where one will find charlatan hacks lumped with brilliant artists. Whether its intent is commercial or merely convenient, linguistic activity detracts from the appreciation of art on its own terms. Of course, this is ironic given that art's primary purpose is to express that which is ineffable.

BadComrade wrote:

tipcat wrote:SHITE.

Americans saying "shite" is what's crap.

The first Chapterhouse and Catherine Wheel LPs are about 100 times less crap than your use of the word "shite".

That's low, mate. It doesn't matter though, because these bands are still SHITE whether I refrain from using the term.

SHITE, I tell you, SHITE!

i've heard good things about the chapterhouse, but have yet to actually hear them. will look into this first album, whatever it's called. (is it really any good, BadComrade?)



you guys ever hear seefeel? they're a little too "electronic" to be a proper shoegazer band (whatever that means), but they had their roots in this supposed genre, and they most certainly ruled, despite or because of it. their long oop album quique is now on eye toons.

Old Skull are better...

All of my friends are into shoegaze stuff, and it's the most pretentious pile of poo one can experience...

I once recorded a shoegaze band that had some stuff played on MTV. Every song on the album was recorded on a 120 bpm click track with the same guitar tone. Every song sounded the same. Nothing to exhibit any sort of talent...

Normally, I would let sleeping dogs lie, but a lot of the people into shoegaze are such stuck up, G.Q., pretentious pseudo-art turds, it's hard to like the stuff... Even if there was some sort of artistry going on... but there isn't!

Shoegaze is a case of making moods and atmosphere with ethereal open guitar "chords" and lots of effects. It's a pretty confined genre of music, where the overall structure and timbre of the sound are explicitly dictated...

I guess the irony is that these guys think they're real artists... They're the types that tend to look down on, say death metal, because it's "dirt music" (as I have been told by many a poo gazer).

Most death metal bands have more talent in their guitarist's pinky than the entire shoe gaze genre... (every shoe gazer band combined!)

But I've learned not to talk about these things with these friends. They're still good friends, and some of them have other interests in music... Some of them don't... It's all shoe gaze all the time.

My favorite thing is when hippy friends listen to the shoegazer music, and they say it sounds like Pink Floyd... I will immediately agree, just to get the shoegazer's goat... They get so pissed off at that. They think shoegaze was developed in some sort of vacuum, and is above all influence -- ha! It's like a really bad take on Pink Floyd and Krautrock... They just haven't heard enough older music to realize how unoriginal that stuff is...

That's OK, though... There are plenty of people who haven't heard older music, and are enamoured by the look... For the ladies, I can understand this... But guys? There's something latent going on when the guys are so into Kevin Shields... LATENT!!!

tipcat wrote:Artists will always find themselves tagged with a designation not of their making, where one will find charlatan hacks lumped with brilliant artists. Whether its intent is commercial or merely convenient, linguistic activity detracts from the appreciation of art on its own terms. Of course, this is ironic given that art's primary purpose is to express that which is ineffable.

Oh, blow it out your ass... Shoegaze is a genre and the bands we're talking about all have the same shtick with the delay pedals, latent G.Q. looks, and melancholia... This is exactly what I mean about the misapplication of postmodernism into some poo where everything is the same (or better yet, it can't be explained in words -- Yes, shoegaze has so profoundly dumbfounded me, I'm at a loss for words! The thick delay and soupy reverb have mesmorized me! Those "cute" guys in the cardigan sweaters have brought out funny feelings in my groinal region)

I can see someone saying art rock is a genre where none of the constituent bands sound the same... But shoegaze is so constrained, it's not even funny... Go put in a MBV record, and count the beats per minute the songs are written in...

Even hip-hop is a more diverse genre!

This is what I dislike about shoegaze and the fans... They're so pretentious about this stuff it's not even funny.

given that art's primary purpose is to express that which is ineffable

OK, shoegaze is "art"? Naw... It's a craft just like the homies bustin' rhymes to loops. Shit, Dream Theater is more artistic than shoegaze crap... Even Old Skull could be considered art, when compared to the musical oatmeal that is shoegaze...

154 wrote:the new life and times record is pretty shoegazer sounding, but still rocks. it's good.

Yeah... I saw Shiner do a cover of that MBV song from loveless... Haven't heard the life and times, tho... They broke up and reformed at the time I was starting to lose interest in independent rock...

But t'wouldn't surprise me if they are into the gazing of their shoes. All the more reason for me not to listen to them... no offense, tho... They're great folks...

Bartok wrote: I think Loop were great as well.

These guys were WAY under rated. Like Swell Maps, they only really did one thing, but they did it well.
I think Wayne Coyne was taking notes every time he spun "Black Sun."

-A