Celebrity Death Match: Emerson Vs. Picasso

eric usually starts out an IM conversation with me by proclaiming his love for one folk artist or another. then he wonders why i pigeon hole him as my "folk friend", but i digress...yesterday was no different. love was proclaimed. songs were pushed. and the following conversation happened...weigh in with your thoughts...!

ericf (4:02:48 PM): regina fucking spektor. I love this girl

jendcarlson (4:04:15 PM): i don't know if i've heard her

ericf (4:04:23 PM): reginaspektor.com

jendcarlson (4:04:43 PM): cool yo

ericf (4:04:45 PM): click on music, go down to the second album and listen to "Oedipus"

ericf (4:05:18 PM): or "consewquence of sounds", or just about anything

jendcarlson (4:05:36 PM): in a sec. i'm very busy and important you see.

ericf (4:05:46 PM): hehe.

ericf (4:08:39 PM): listen to consequence of sounds... I think you'll like that one

jendcarlson (4:09:35 PM): sounds like ani difranco in some parts

jendcarlson (4:09:43 PM): all these chics sound the same to me, seriously

ericf (4:10:08 PM): that's the thing.. she breaks out of that more often than she gets sucked into it. and when she's out she's amazing

ericf (4:10:22 PM): totally know what you're saying, though

jendcarlson (4:10:45 PM): not all that original. except she did use the word "cubicle" in her song. she gets points for that.

jendcarlson (4:11:55 PM): i just tend to think all singer/songwriters - esp folkie types - tend to sound the same. its like there is no room to be original anymore. except there is. it's just no one is doing anything very different. and when someone does do something different, everyone copies that.

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ericf (4:12:14 PM): it's worth putting the time in to dig into her stuff a bit... it becomes totally entrancing... and this is from a guy who doesn't dig on annie difranco

ericf (4:13:09 PM): yes! you're absolutely fucking right... I'm trying to get some of these folks to break out of that problem... they've got a lot of the right ideas, but get stuck in this stupid fucking "solo acoustic guitarist" shit

ericf (4:13:21 PM): that only works for a VERY select few

ericf (4:13:58 PM): lots of good songs that just don't get brought forth in a meaningfully creative manner, mostly because they're limited in their mindset

ericf (4:14:23 PM): and it gets fucking boring, and far too demanding of the audience (in the wrong way)

ericf (4:15:26 PM): i love hearing your comments on this stuff, btw.... it confirms everything I think about why the folk scene gets no respect from the rest of the music scene

jendcarlson (4:18:03 PM): yeah, people can do different things with folk. they just aren't. i think, well i know, emerson wrote about this...mimicing your predecessors. you don't get anything new out of it.

jendcarlson (4:18:37 PM): have you ever listened to the fiery furnaces? they're sooo sooo good and so weird and different. i love it. it's new.

ericf (4:18:46 PM): yes! I fucking love their record

jendcarlson (4:22:31 PM): with folk it is so old, so defined...i think that in order to do something new with it...would it be folk anymore? do these singer/songwriters even want to be folk. oh wait, i think i just figured out this anti-folk thing. but anyway, i don't know, no one is pushing any boundaries with it. there's not a lot of original thought.

ericf (4:25:45 PM): no no...it's not folk anymore. it hasn't been for a long time... you have to be in there to see what the difference is, but there's not a really convincing genre to put these people in yet... the point is that this is all marketing: people need a simplified way to think about the musicians that they love. like for instance, would you ever think of Beck as folk or even antifolk? fuck no, but he ran in those circles when he was getting started

ericf (4:26:02 PM): or rufus wainwright, for that matter

ericf (4:26:21 PM): he used to play solo shows, and probably suffered from the same lack of genrefication

ericf (4:26:52 PM): is he folk? fuck no again

ericf (4:26:59 PM): is he pop? fuck no

ericf (4:27:06 PM): is he indie rock? not really

ericf (4:27:39 PM): but you find a scene and run with it until you can break out because you've gotten so stylistically innovative that you no longer belong in any category but your own

jendcarlson (4:28:44 PM): eh, a rose by any other name

jendcarlson (4:29:00 PM): i just know what i like, unfortunately everything gets labeled

ericf (4:29:43 PM): so you've got this thing that's just all called "folk" becuase there's nothing else to call it yet, but the key players sound NOTIHGN like folk: Ivan Sandomire sounds like radiohead, Alex Lowry sounds like a better version of coldplay. Ian sounds more and more like a countrified rolling stones, and Langhorne Slim sounds like Jack White in a bluegrass band...

ericf (4:30:05 PM): no no, the labeling is good, it just needs to be broken out of when the time is right

jendcarlson (4:31:01 PM): but see...still...you are saying all these people sound like other people. why aren't they trying to create their own sound. thom yorke created a very original sound with radiohead...ivan sandomire may sound like them, but what's the point

ericf (4:31:10 PM): and at a certain point, everything just gets labelled 'indie" or "pop"

ericf (4:32:01 PM): I agree... but he;s just young. all young artists pluck from their influences... that's how you figure out what you are, by eventually defining what you're not

ericf (4:32:25 PM): Picasso: "Mediocre artists imitate. Great artists steal"

jendcarlson (4:32:45 PM): jim morrisson did that then he burned all of his lyrics and notebooks and songs b/c he realized he was a cheap imitation of his influences, his heros. then he started anew. and the doors were born.

ericf (4:34:30 PM): yeah man! that's the way to do it. you just need to keep moving until you find yourself. but nobody does it by just suddenly appearing as a singular artistic voice

ericf (4:34:49 PM): all art exists in context, which is what picasso was trying to say

jendcarlson (4:35:10 PM): what about the first musician ever. that was pure and original.

ericf (4:35:11 PM): and emerson said too, along with his admonitions against cheap imitation

ericf (4:36:03 PM): but (s)he was only mimicing the sounds that they heard around them. hearbeats, likely, and thunder

jendcarlson (4:36:04 PM): emerson said "imitation is suicide"

ericf (4:37:02 PM): right. but there's a huge difference between imitation and borrowing--you need to put your art in context in order to be understood.. it's a language, with words and phrases and syntax

jendcarlson (4:37:05 PM): oscar wilde said: Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation.

jendcarlson (4:37:17 PM): but look at us, just quoting others to make a point.

ericf (4:37:24 PM): hhahahaha

ericf (4:37:26 PM): fuck

ericf (4:37:44 PM): oh, but actually, that's a good representation of what I'm saying:

ericf (4:38:02 PM): we're using what has come before in order to express our singular (if not entirely original) thoughts

ericf (4:38:26 PM): these are our own ideas, and we're using the "long song" of literature to help get them into one another's heads

jendcarlson (4:38:53 PM): i should post this on my site and get comments

ericf (4:39:32 PM): (Charlie Parker used to refer to jazz as the "long song", implying that all of jazz has been an improvisation on the same theme... all development builds on that which came before... where do you draw the hash marks?)

ericf (4:39:57 PM): post away, baby

jendcarlson (4:39:58 PM): that's the perfect way to put it. the long song.

ericf (4:40:03 PM): damn straight

ericf (4:40:41 PM): and he was a herion addict nutcase... but a creative Genius (capital G and all)... point is, he had a singular vision, but he never would have existed without those who came before

jendcarlson (4:41:24 PM): i have to start doing heroin

...later that day...

ericf (6:25:35 PM): very interesting capoff to our conversation... this is just fucking weird: I opened up my timeout new york, and what do I see, but an interview with Lach, and he says this: "Beck had been playing on the scene doing Leadbelly covers, and I took him aside and said, 'Kid, you've got to write a song'"

Comments

[The American Mastodon]

First of all, I love Leadbelly. His life was even more amazing than his music and his legacy. If I had any motivation, I'd write a biopic of his life and sell it for literally 5's of thousands of dollars. Secondly, though I only ever lived in NYC for about 6 months, I was fortunate enough to get a chance to see Langhorne Slim play live. He opened for that family band that plays slides and everybody laughs cause they're kind of bad. But LS - Jesus, he had my blood going. And that was two years ago. I can't believe he's not bigger than he is. I agree with the Jack White/bluegrass band thing. He could be a hipster crossover dream - a modern day Flat. Or Scruggs? Or maybe I wrote way too much for a comment.

[Your Brother]

Jen, this is your brother...don't do heroin....stop talking about making out with bassists and embrace your roots...did the Backstreet Boys rip off the New Kids on the Block?

[jen]

Hi Chris, I didn't listen to the New Kids on the Block. I don't know what you're talking about. But for the record they did pave the way for the more recent boy bands. No one can take that from them!
See...if no one imitated anyone then boy bands would have died with NKOTB! Or I guess they would have died with Menudo. But whatever. This comments section is dangerously close to being redirected...