September 17th
Elf Power-Needle In The Camel’s
Eye-When The Red King Comes
I’m sure I
mentioned this before but any band with the word “fuck” (or derivation thereof)
in their name has a bit of a head start. It would be like giving an athlete a
10m start in a race with Usain Bolt. Bolt may still reach the finish line first,
but that 10m would make them look a bit more competitive.
(See Holy Fuck (Bolt
would win), Fuck Buttons (a closer thing but still Bolt), The Fucking Ocean (a
photofinish)).
Of course, I’ve
bought and got hold of many records based entirely on the name of the band.
This is working on the principle that if it sounds good then it must sound
good. There are many records (much more so in the vinyl years) that I bought
just because the sleeve art looked good; but that’s another piece altogether.
Applying a principle that a good name for a band results in music of a certain quality
is a bit hit and miss. So much miss in fact that there isn’t really a
principle. I’ve got a lot of music-usually by American bands-with such good
names that I felt it was a bit of a given the music would be equally as
challenging and exciting. Sadly, for the majority of cases this has proved to
not the best starting point.
Actually, most of the time it seems as if the band
have spent more time, effort and creativity in deciding what they would be
called rather than the music they would make. It’s as if they had a finite amount
of artistic thinking to use and most of it was used up in dreaming of a cool
name that they could be called.
When it came to producing the music itself , then
everything was gone and it would suffice to put out any old generic rubbish.(Examples
of this include tracks that have already shuffled up this year; Chin Up Chin Up
and You. May. Die. In.The. Desert etc). Whilst I can’t recall if I wrote that
they were particularly special or even competent at the time, it would be
considerably difficult for anyone to come up with music which is as good as what
they called themselves.
As we all love
lists here are a few bands with cool names that make cool music; Sonic Youth, Sun
O))), Die! You Bastard, Big Star, American TV Cops. Some bands with crap names
who make good music; The Fall, Vampire Weekend, The National.
As for bands who have both crap names and make
crap music you can’t go wrong with the rule of thumb that any band with a four
letter name is inherently shite; Blur, Ride, Lush… and Ladies and Gentlemen, I
give you the absolute paragons of this rule…Muse.
Where do you think
that Elf Power falls into this all of this?
Part of the Elephant 6 collective
from Athens, Georgia, Elf Power have been around since 1994 and this track is taken
from one of their early albums. They’re kind of lo-fi, indie, concept-albumish.
Kind of.
But there’s something a lot more under that surface. They’ve ploughed
their own furrow and even though lo-fi and indie are now terms of ridicule and
abuse, I do like their ramshackle approach. The thing is, I am unsure if I’d
like them as much if they had a four letter name rather than Elf Power.
Branding; that what it all boils down to.
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