Taking Sides: Rocking the House vs. "Doing what we do, and if anyone happens to like it, that's a bonus."

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Which attitude better represents the goals of the artists you listen to? Which attitude is closer to your own goals, as far as your creative endeavors?

― Mark (MarkR), Friday, 6 December 2002 18:17 (twenty-three years ago)

its the frisson that occurs when music attempts to do both. how to achieve two aims, that in many circumstances, might be viewed as contradictory

― gareth (gareth), Friday, 6 December 2002 18:24 (twenty-three years ago)

Anyone who considers themself an artist (or artiste) will say they're doing it for it's own sake, or for their own personal satisfaction... but most of us also wish to 'rock the house'.

There's one level of satisfaction to be gained from an artistic endeavour, and another one from knowing that loads of people love what you're doing. I don't think the aims are contradictory unless you're extremist about them.

― Zora (Zora), Friday, 6 December 2002 23:24 (twenty-three years ago)

Yeah, bands that do either/or without consideration for the other tend to disgust or at least bore me. I always liked artists who started with a weird take on sound and then did their best to rock the house with it. Jeff Mills might be a good example.

Me, I want to rock the house more than do my own thing, but mostly because 'doing my own thing and fuck everybody else' seems nigh-impossible. If I'm stuck with being unoriginal I might as well be a floor-filling pogo-inducer.

― Tom Millar (Millar), Friday, 6 December 2002 23:30 (twenty-three years ago)

I'm moving from a "rock the house" position in my taste to a "do what we fucking well like" but maybe that's because I'm on a Coil / Nurse With Wound tip at the moment ...

oh ... but I also just downloaded Messiah's "There is no law", Urban Hype's "Trip to Trumpton", Happy Hardcore versions of "99 Red Balloons", "Over the Rainbow" and Alphaville's "Forever Young" Maybe I'm more conflicted on this than I first thought ...

― phil jones (interstar), Friday, 6 December 2002 23:36 (twenty-three years ago)

Being a bedroom TASCAM 4-track artist myself, I'm gonna side with the "Doing what we do, and if anyone happens to like it, that's a bonus." crowd, because, really, if you're not doing exactly what you want to/are inspired to do, it's like you're faking it, which a lot of times comes through during a live show, barring excellent acting lessons or something.

I think, that unless you're doing something pretty uninteresting to begin with (hey, maybe you're just eccentric, and that's cool too, there's an audience for everything), just about anything will "rock the crowd" as long as there's the honest of loving what you do and being pretty excited about it.

2 examples of folks that fall into my favorite catagory, that being that they do what they want, and it rocks the crowd (I'm talking live shows here) are Ween and the Supersuckers.

― Helltime Producto (Pavlik), Saturday, 7 December 2002 00:42 (twenty-three years ago)

I think, that unless you're doing something pretty uninteresting to begin with (hey, maybe you're just eccentric, and that's cool too, there's an audience for everything), just about anything will "rock the crowd" as long as there's the honesty of loving what you do and being pretty excited about it.

2 examples of folks that fall into my favorite catagory, that being that they do what they want, and it rocks the crowd (I'm talking live shows here) are Ween and the Supersuckers.

― Helltime Producto (Pavlik), Saturday, 7 December 2002 00:43 (twenty-three years ago)

As for the artists I listen to I'd say it was 60% "doing what we do" and 40% "rocking the house".
As for my own goals, if I had a music project going. I'd create the music the way I wanted, but at live gigs I'd rather see people thinking it was fantastic and really going for it. The idea of having people stroking their chins and muttering about "avant-guard stylings" and other trite phrases in a live setting doesn't appeal to me at all.

― fractal (fractal), Saturday, 7 December 2002 02:13 (twenty-three years ago)

rockin the house is what we do
natch

― horace mann, Saturday, 7 December 2002 06:12 (twenty-three years ago)

If you do what you want, you'll draw a crowd. If you do it well, you'll rock the house.

― David Allen, Saturday, 7 December 2002 06:27 (twenty-three years ago)

If you do what you want, you'll draw a crowd. If you do it well, you'll rock the house.

What if what I want to do is rock the house? And I'm mediocre? Does that make me like U2 or something (picking the most commonly despised metaphor available, there's plenty more)?

― Tom Millar (Millar), Saturday, 7 December 2002 09:03 (twenty-three years ago)

I think if ALL you want to do is rock the house, you may achieve it if you're lucky and get good marketing. But wouldn't it be scary to have no pose to strike if you don't make it? (i.e. "It doesn't matter if nobody likes it, the music is it's own reward, blah blah blah")

― Zora (Zora), Saturday, 7 December 2002 11:50 (twenty-three years ago)

the important thing for us, the listeners, is that they rock the house. I don't care how they do it. But I mean, who isn't doing what they do? And why are they onstage if they don't hope people like it?

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Saturday, 7 December 2002 18:36 (twenty-three years ago)

Somehow, I'm surprised that Andrew WK hasn't been named here.
I was certainly invoking him in my earlier facetious post. But, like, all he does is RTH, that's his whole RDE.
So does that make him more like U2 or more like REM?

― Horace Mann, Saturday, 7 December 2002 22:22 (twenty-three years ago)

that's a toughie. God if every song didn't sound like Ween leading the E Street Band I'd say that would make him better than either group livewise.

― Anthony Miccio (Anthony Miccio), Saturday, 7 December 2002 22:31 (twenty-three years ago)

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