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Well, let's hear it. What are the square-ass bands you love? I'm listening to Herb Alpert and the TJB right now. I've always loved them and never given a fuck. I'd rather be a dork and have Herb Alpert records than be cool if it means pretending I like (insert terrible currently popular band I'm not cool enough to know about here).

Bert Kaempfert and his orchestra, Mantovani, Hugo Montenegro, I love that pop orchestra music, from the "dining room music" to the kooky stuff.

C'mon dorks, spill.

dave brubeck. dude has some super catchy songs that you don't even realise are in odd time signatures. i've heard some jazz fans call it square jazz or breakfast jazz, but fuck it, i eat a more healthy breakfast when listening to brubeck.

shostakovich. honestly, most classical music kinda goes over my head but when i watched tantacrul's video on shostakovich, i kinda got it. his chamber ensemble stuff is beautifully dark but his big orchestral stuff is basically him being commissioned by stalin and using it to poke fun at stalin with instrumental music. if you've not seen tantacrul's video on shostakovich, here it is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MCxzMYVvHBg

This is a good record I got into because I love the TV show Taxi. Dork x 2!

I like the first 5 or so Steely Dan albums and that definitely fits the bill.

Dave Brubeck ? Steely Dan? Totally mainstream

I had a period when I was playing accordion when I watched
and liked the Lawrence Welk Orchestra and went so far as
to go to a show featuring Myron Floren, I still have a picture
when I talked with him after the show.

That, my friends, is dorky. But then again again I’m half Polish.

Al Stewart?

mcbrandt wrote: ↑

Thu Jan 14, 2021 11:15 am

Al Stewart?

Year Of The Cat is as amazing today as it was in 1976.

With all the bashing of Blooz Lawyers over the last couple of months, I'm going to die on the hill of my love for Blues music.

I got curious after seeing The Blues Brothers when I was really young. Not much actual Blues in the film, but I loved what I heard and it was my first proper exposure to quote/unquote 'Black' music in its more vintage forms. Using our encyclopedias (I'm not old but I'm not exactly young) I dug into the genre more and more, learned the Delta and Chicago OGs names and tried to track down what music I could with the resources I had. It really grounded my musical tastes for about the next decade and was a pretty convenient conduit to a lot of older music I may not have immediately stumbled across, especially as a tween/teen.

The stuff played these days is a mostly well meaning abstraction in my opinion. I rarely listen to modern artists unless they're cats like Derek Trucks who have something else entirely going on. I definitely listen to more Jazz than Blues now, as well as a lot of forms of rock/music that is decidedly not blues-based - my tastes have shifted over the last two decades. Having said that, I think it's really interesting what musicians were able to express in a comparatively constrained form of music.

mackerelmint wrote: ↑

Thu Jan 14, 2021 1:56 am

I'm listening to Herb Alpert and the TB right now. I've always loved them and never given a fuck.

I absolutely love HA&TTB.
My first ever LP was one of his I bought back in about 68 when I was 6 years old.
I would play it loud (ha! loud, that was just turning the "phonogram" up to 5) when ever mum was out the back in the garden.

Years later I discovered that the backing musicians were the Wrecking Crew from L.A.. wow!
I find it interesting how a lot of people I know (aged 40 - 50 laugh at me when I play HA&TTB … apparently they do not think it is music that is worth listening to. But those two albums Whipped Cream & Other Delights (1965) & Going Places (1965) just rock!

Veitchy wrote: ↑

Thu Jan 14, 2021 3:08 pm

With all the bashing of Blooz Lawyers over the last couple of months, I'm going to die on the hill of my love for Blues music.

For me blues is not uncool … it is one of the bedrock musical styles that has shaped western music over the past 90 odd years.
I love me some blues …. I woke up this morning....

sookwinder wrote: ↑

Thu Jan 14, 2021 4:25 pm

Veitchy wrote: ↑

Thu Jan 14, 2021 3:08 pm

With all the bashing of Blooz Lawyers over the last couple of months, I'm going to die on the hill of my love for Blues music.

For me blues is not uncool … it is one of the bedrock musical styles that has shaped western music over the past 90 odd years.
I love me some blues …. I woke up this morning....

It's never been uncool to me a such. Robert Johnson, Son House, Muddy Waters to name a few are foundational to the Western popular music cannon. Even some of the white players like Peter Green and Mike Bloomfield are killer in my books. I think it's more what the genre morphed into that makes it a bit cringe to me.

mackerelmint wrote: ↑

Thu Jan 14, 2021 1:56 am

I'm listening to Herb Alpert and the TJB right now. I've always loved them and never given a fuck.

My Dad loved Herb Alpert and I won't hear a word against him and the Tijuana Brass. Their arrangements are consistently amazing. Casino Royale slams.

Speaking of largely instrumental bands, another thing that I dig that I consider a tad obscure, if not a bit dorky, is a lot of that late 50s/early 60s, pre-British Invasion instrumental music - from both sides of the Atlantic. Surf Rock is an obvious one, but I find there to be something funky about stuff like Roy Lanham, Roy Clark, The Shadows, The Tornados, etc. It's a really interesting slice of pop history to me. I feel like Herb Alpert slots in there a bit - great musicians from a time where, for whatever reason, vocals weren't considered essential.

Veitchy wrote: ↑

Thu Jan 14, 2021 4:35 pm

Even some of the white players like Peter Green and Mike Bloomfield are killer in my books.

Peter Green's "come back" album in 1979 "In The Skies" (after he had been out of the music scene for 8 or so years, because he was drugged with LSD spiked drink at a party he attended in Germany after a gig ) is magnificent. The guitar tone is still there and his voice is bluesy and creamy.

While in highschool, my buddies and I were allowed to spend a weekend at his family's trailer in a trailer park somewhere. It had an 8-track setup and a box of 8-tracks, and after figuring out how it worked, I played through some of the tapes and found Herb Albert and the TB Greatest Hits. Was great and I ended up finding the CD not long after.

When I was younger, a lot of the music I got into was from movies, and so I liked a lot of film scores. That was pretty uncool and dorky for a grade-schooler in the early 90s.
I remember special-ordering the Empire Strikes Back soundtrack on cassette from HMV, and after I picked it up at the mall, I went across the street to my friend's place to play Super Nintendo and he was like WTF at my music. He put it on and he said the only good thing was the 20th Century Fox Fanfare.

Stratelejazzuar wrote: ↑

Thu Jan 14, 2021 5:28 pm

I remember special-ordering the Empire Strikes Back soundtrack on cassette from HMV, and after I picked it up at the mall, I went across the street to my friend's place to play Super Nintendo and he was like WTF at my music. He put it on and he said the only good thing was the 20th Century Fox Fanfare.

That sucks you never got to play Super Nintendo again.