10. Sex Pistols
9. Cream
8. The Police
7. Yes
6. The Who
5. Pink Floyd
4. Led Zeppelin
3. The Rolling Stones
2. Black Sabbath
1. The Beatles
My first thoughts were that Andy batted 0.7 on this. I never got Zeppelin. Too loud, too crude... sixth form Grammar School music. Rock music for people who don't understand rock music. I never got Black Sabbath either. I get they invented Metal, but Andy says that like it's a good thing. In my musical universe, even Rap is preferable to Metal. And Yes. No. I mean, I get why Andy has put them in, because he’s a prog-rock fan, but play The Yes Album to someone under fifty and you may find yourself saying `you had to be there’. Jon Anderson’s lyrics can hit the twee bone hard.
We need to discuss the sheer 1970’s-ness of this list. Did nothing come out of the 1980’s? Or the 1990’s? There are people who look back on, say, Bittersweet Symphony,
with genuine affection and deep nostalgia. Read their comments on the video.
In Andy’s list, the bands have to write their own material, which excludes Bananarama and all the other Stock-Aiken-Waterman acts, and all the Trevor Horn acts. It can't be producers or DJ's, or I would put John Digweed, Stock-Aiken-Waterman, and Trevor Horn in. They have to have had worldwide hits, top ten albums or a string of chart singles. They had to play their own instruments in the studio, they had to tour, and they had to be influential.
So there’s a thing here. Some musical acts sell because they sound like unto themselves (The Beatles, U2, Lizzy Mercier Descloux, Traffic, Pink Floyd) while others sell because they sound like other musical acts (The Shadows, every girl / boy band ever, lots of Britpop acts, lots of 1980s UK jazz-funk-soul). The ones with a unique sound and style are rarely influential, because you can’t sound like them without sounding like you’re copying them. Whereas lots of people could write and produce perfectly listenable 1980’s UK soul without sounding like they are copying David Grant. The influential bands are the ones who give shape to a genre - hence Andy’s inclusion of Black Sabbath. The Sex Pistols did the same for punk. I’m going to drop the `influential’ requirement for that reason.
As for writing their own material? The prominence in the the pop music scene of singer-songwriters or songwriters-with-bands or bands-that-wrote-the-songs, with fairly minimal input from producers and arrangers, was in music-historical terms, a fluke. Sure jazz musicians improvised, but on chords and tunes written by professional composers, and later by themselves. So I’m going to extend the range to include acts who used a lot of input from producers (after all, The Beatles worked with George Martin, who composed string and horn parts for their songs), and maybe used professional songwriters. (Edit: it turns out my list consist of bands who mostly wrote their own stuff.)
My first thought was to replace I’m going to replace Zeppelin with U2 (even though U2 are Irish), and Black Sabbath with David Bowie. As for Yes, their slot could go to… well, I would put The Beat in, but they miss the world-famous bit. How about Roxy Music? How often are they played now? Frankie Goes To Hollywood? They were world-famous and sold gajillions, even if Trevor Horn was responsible for the sound. Or Spandau Ballet? Or Sade? George Michael? Eurythmics? Elton John? Queen (imagine, Andy left Queen out)? Ed Sheeran? Coldplay? (I’m listing the high sellers now.) Phil Collins? Fleetwood Mac? Rod Stewart? Oasis? Robbie Williams? (He outsold the Police) The Spice Girls? The Prodigy? Dire Straits? I couldn’t quite make it work, and the list started to change a lot.
I did what I did with the 12 Albums You Should Listen To, and a film list I have somewhere. This isn’t supposed to be The Classics or the GOATs. It’s a list of ten successful bands that show the continuing creativity and variety of the UK music scene over the decades, and who sold, and mostly who had a distinctive sound and wrote a lot of their own stuff, even if the producers had a lot of influence on the final product. In no real order…
Spandau Ballet
My first thoughts were that Andy batted 0.7 on this. I never got Zeppelin. Too loud, too crude... sixth form Grammar School music. Rock music for people who don't understand rock music. I never got Black Sabbath either. I get they invented Metal, but Andy says that like it's a good thing. In my musical universe, even Rap is preferable to Metal. And Yes. No. I mean, I get why Andy has put them in, because he’s a prog-rock fan, but play The Yes Album to someone under fifty and you may find yourself saying `you had to be there’. Jon Anderson’s lyrics can hit the twee bone hard.
We need to discuss the sheer 1970’s-ness of this list. Did nothing come out of the 1980’s? Or the 1990’s? There are people who look back on, say, Bittersweet Symphony,
with genuine affection and deep nostalgia. Read their comments on the video.
In Andy’s list, the bands have to write their own material, which excludes Bananarama and all the other Stock-Aiken-Waterman acts, and all the Trevor Horn acts. It can't be producers or DJ's, or I would put John Digweed, Stock-Aiken-Waterman, and Trevor Horn in. They have to have had worldwide hits, top ten albums or a string of chart singles. They had to play their own instruments in the studio, they had to tour, and they had to be influential.
So there’s a thing here. Some musical acts sell because they sound like unto themselves (The Beatles, U2, Lizzy Mercier Descloux, Traffic, Pink Floyd) while others sell because they sound like other musical acts (The Shadows, every girl / boy band ever, lots of Britpop acts, lots of 1980s UK jazz-funk-soul). The ones with a unique sound and style are rarely influential, because you can’t sound like them without sounding like you’re copying them. Whereas lots of people could write and produce perfectly listenable 1980’s UK soul without sounding like they are copying David Grant. The influential bands are the ones who give shape to a genre - hence Andy’s inclusion of Black Sabbath. The Sex Pistols did the same for punk. I’m going to drop the `influential’ requirement for that reason.
As for writing their own material? The prominence in the the pop music scene of singer-songwriters or songwriters-with-bands or bands-that-wrote-the-songs, with fairly minimal input from producers and arrangers, was in music-historical terms, a fluke. Sure jazz musicians improvised, but on chords and tunes written by professional composers, and later by themselves. So I’m going to extend the range to include acts who used a lot of input from producers (after all, The Beatles worked with George Martin, who composed string and horn parts for their songs), and maybe used professional songwriters. (Edit: it turns out my list consist of bands who mostly wrote their own stuff.)
My first thought was to replace I’m going to replace Zeppelin with U2 (even though U2 are Irish), and Black Sabbath with David Bowie. As for Yes, their slot could go to… well, I would put The Beat in, but they miss the world-famous bit. How about Roxy Music? How often are they played now? Frankie Goes To Hollywood? They were world-famous and sold gajillions, even if Trevor Horn was responsible for the sound. Or Spandau Ballet? Or Sade? George Michael? Eurythmics? Elton John? Queen (imagine, Andy left Queen out)? Ed Sheeran? Coldplay? (I’m listing the high sellers now.) Phil Collins? Fleetwood Mac? Rod Stewart? Oasis? Robbie Williams? (He outsold the Police) The Spice Girls? The Prodigy? Dire Straits? I couldn’t quite make it work, and the list started to change a lot.
I did what I did with the 12 Albums You Should Listen To, and a film list I have somewhere. This isn’t supposed to be The Classics or the GOATs. It’s a list of ten successful bands that show the continuing creativity and variety of the UK music scene over the decades, and who sold, and mostly who had a distinctive sound and wrote a lot of their own stuff, even if the producers had a lot of influence on the final product. In no real order…
Spandau Ballet
Jimmy Cauty, aka The KLF / The Orb
The Shadows (with and without Cliff Richard)
Oasis
The Smiths
The Sex Pistols
The Prodigy
Cream
The Rolling Stones
The Beatles
On another day I might substitute Underworld for The Prodigy, but The Prods sold way more. I am not saying that The Smiths had the same musical significance as the Beatles. They were uniquely themselves, wrote good material and sold. You can substitute your favourite 80’s band.
This list runs out in the 1990’s. That’s because most of the genres that were developed since - dubstep, drum ’n bass, garage, ambient and the like - don’t revolve around bands so much as a couple of composer / producers (or even just one). Also because, though Burial is in my Favourites on Qobuz, he hasn’t shifted the units.
And yes, The Beatles and The Stones are there, but that’s because you haven’t listened to Magical Mystery Tour album recently, and you should.
On another day I might substitute Underworld for The Prodigy, but The Prods sold way more. I am not saying that The Smiths had the same musical significance as the Beatles. They were uniquely themselves, wrote good material and sold. You can substitute your favourite 80’s band.
This list runs out in the 1990’s. That’s because most of the genres that were developed since - dubstep, drum ’n bass, garage, ambient and the like - don’t revolve around bands so much as a couple of composer / producers (or even just one). Also because, though Burial is in my Favourites on Qobuz, he hasn’t shifted the units.
And yes, The Beatles and The Stones are there, but that’s because you haven’t listened to Magical Mystery Tour album recently, and you should.
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