I say "used to" because of two things: I literally (literally) just figured out that Beach House and Best Coast are two different bands, and when I played "Sun Was High (So Was I)," I turned it off after a minute, thinking, "What exactly did I like so much about this song?" I obviously couldn't've liked the song that much if I was unwilling to keep straight what band actually released that song and what band was another band that I ended up just conflating with the first band because they're names are both two-word names that begin with "Be-" and have oceanic implications. Or, rather, they imply the ocean. "Oceanic implications" sounds like someone writing a review of a Cult of Neurisis band in the mid 00's.
(Do you think people wear their Isis shirts these days thinking, "I don't care. The band was here first. You're just too lame to know who this band is. You're also an Islamaphobe, so who the fuck are you to judge me?" Or do you think people just don't wear the shirt even though they want to do the first thing?)
At some point, describing your taste in music (or any media, really) becomes incredibly referential. It can be a way to contextualize a band's sound to someone who hasn't listened to that band yet, a way to make yourself sound knowledgable about something that the person you're talking to might not care at all about, or a way to hierarchize similarly styled bands for seemingly no reason.
The last thing. That shitty last thing. That's what I wanted to do in this post. I wanted to write, "Why don't people who like Beach House just listen to Camera Shy instead? I mean, yeah, that song 'Sun Was I (So Was I)' was cool, but Camera Shy is doing the woman-fronted saccharine dreamo-pop thing way better."
And then, well, you (probably) saw what happened in the the first few sentences. But now that I've listened to 3 songs of the new Beach House album (why are the songs so long?) and one half of the first song on the new Best Coast album (that shit is straight arena pop, huh?), I think my point remains: Camera Shy is better and you should renounce your allegiance to Beach Coast and get with the shimmery summery program.
Or, at least, you should listen to the new Camera Shy album after you've finished with the latest Best House albums. The songs are short(/ier), catchy(er), sweet(er), sad(der), bright(er), whiny(/ier), cute(r), lovely(/ier), (more) heartwarming. They float and drift in a waning summer early evening like a fucking dandelion blown towards your smiling face by a pair of lips you want to kiss (better than those other two albums).
See how annoying all of those parenthetical additions are to that sentence? See how distracting they are? Why do we do this? Just to look/sound cool(er than someone else)? That's almost certainly why I do it. But don't let that stop you from listening to Camera Shy (members of Whirr and Nothing!). The self-titled album is a breathy delight that can be enjoyed while walking around on a sunny morning on your way to take the train half a mile to a coffee shop you could've walked the extra half-mile to or while you're lying in bed at night with the lights out enjoying the little bit of cool air slipping in the window to briefly relieve you from the fact that your apartment's AC doesn't work in your room.
And it might make you feel more things than albums by some other bands. But that's not important, right?
No comments:
Post a Comment