He was weird. Weird was often misconstrued as innovative and cutting edge. Being an artist as well as a musician was considered cool at the time.
Damn, I fucking love Spotify's Year In Review - such a great use of data to engage users.
-7,094 different songs streamed
-First song of 2018 - "She Talks to Angels" - Black Crowes
-60,656 minutes of listening time
-50 hours listening to Mom Jeans. (I love emo music; fell hard and fast for this band :wtftard
-Top Artists: Mom Jeans., The Black Crowes, The Get Up Kids, Led Zeppelin, Avett Brothers
-I listen to non-mainstream artists 77% more than the average spotify user
-Oldest Song I listened to: "Round Midnight" (1951) by Thelonious Monk
-Top Genre: Rock
Damn, I fucking love Spotify's Year In Review - such a great use of data to engage users.
-7,094 different songs streamed
-First song of 2018 - "She Talks to Angels" - Black Crowes
-60,656 minutes of listening time
-50 hours listening to Mom Jeans. (I love emo music; fell hard and fast for this band :wtftard
-Top Artists: Mom Jeans., The Black Crowes, The Get Up Kids, Led Zeppelin, Avett Brothers
-I listen to non-mainstream artists 77% more than the average spotify user
-Oldest Song I listened to: "Round Midnight" (1951) by Thelonious Monk
-Top Genre: Rock
Some of the stuff other than Trout Mask is a little more approachable. But yeah, avant-garde experimental pop stuff. It can be grating for sure, but I like to play it sometimes and shake things up. Part of it for me, too, is wondering WHY I'm uncomfortable listening to it, and going beyond "well, it sounds weird." Same thing happened to me at a recent show featuring a John Cage piece. I also totally get the sentiment that if one has to do that to get anything out of it, then what's the point, but that's where I'm at.
But yeah, also the sound of people tearing shit up whilst on drugs (you and/or the performer) can be fun.
When that opening dissonance cuts beneath Don Van Vliet’s gorgeous melody (“My smile is stuck / I can’t go back to your frown land!”) the basic formula for this album is pretty clear: hot hooks obfuscated by tentacles of music. A method compounded by the fact that many of these gorgeous melodies were recorded away from the band in a separate room, live, where Vliet had to rely on the vague sound leakage through the walls. It’s obtuse shit, and consequently Trout Mask Replica has had its proponents slinging around any number of theories about why it’s good over the years: it’s philosophically erudite once you get past the dense imagery of his lyrics; the music sounds like free jazz but it’s actually rehearsed; you just don’t get what a genius Beefheart is! Yes and no. It is a work of genius, and John Peel was pretty close when he said that (at the time he said this anyway) “if there has been anything in the history of popular music which could be described as a work of art in a way that people who are involved in other areas of art would understand, then Trout Mask Replica is probably that work.” But it has its drawbacks, too. The album goes on for an eternity, for one, which is only a problem insofar as the difficulty of the music makes this one of those albums that is a strain to sit with. The sheer uniformity of vision (there are no breaks here; it’s all wild) is both breathtaking and maddening, and should you choose to unpack the image-laden lyrics (referencing everything from politics to Steve Reich to in jokes with producer Zappa about jellies) it’s quite the exercise. On the other hand, even as it unfolds deliberately and unstoppably at you it’s also built with a variety of ways into the euphoria: stray garage licks, free jazz, Vliet’s blues vocals, and those pristine, gorgeous melodies. Gorgeous and strange, Trout Mask Replica is still a unique document almost 50 years later. Who could improve on this?