I'll Be A Monkey's Uncle: Opinion

2008-05-13 09:50:27

A few weeks ago a mate told me that the Arctic Monkeys were ‘shit’ and ‘overrated.’ Of course everyone is entitled to their own opinions, but I can remember a few years ago when given the chance he would’ve dry humped Alex Turner because he was as big a fan of the Sheffield foursome as anybody else out there. I guessed tastes and opinions change and let it slide.
    
Then a few days after this I saw a different friend slagging the Monkeys off on Facebook, claiming that the Guillemots should have won the 2006 Mercury Music prize, but didn’t because it’s a “shit commercial venture” that gave the Arctic Monkeys the award instead. Funnily enough, this friend’s favourite band is Muse, who were also nominated, but he still cried out about the relatively unheard of Guillemots instead of the phenomenally successful Muse.
    
A whole lotta dissin' going on...
    
The Ting Tings, a two-piece indie/electronic band from Salford, recently packed out the Bodgea Social in Nottingham, and let’s face it, this is a pretty trendy venue that shuns the mainstream. The Ting Tings’ first two singles failed to chart, despite good radio and TV coverage. So by that stretch, you would expect their tour to flop as well, but it didn’t. What’s going on here? The commercial flop is adored in Nottingham’s trendiest venue while Mercury Music Prize winners are getting dissed left, right and centre.
    
This is not just a freak occurrence either and it stretches much further than these two bands. Compare Late Of The Pier, who have yet to chart but are championed on the scene, with the Klaxons, who are now commercially successful but disowned by the more dedicated indie followers. They both sound similar yet the more popular band is the one that has lost their original fanbase.
    
Casual knocks and mainstream shit
    
Or what about Uffie, widely unheard of but loved by the indie kids, and with a similar sound to New Young Pony Club. NYPC used to be a solid band to like if you wanted to sound cool but since their 2007 Mercury Music Prize nomination you’ve gotta go with Uffie to seem edgy, unheard of and therefore cool.
    
What started with a casual knock against the Arctic Monkeys began to spiral in my mind and it pointed to something that I think I already knew. If you want to be cool, you have to like (or at least claim to like) obscure music. Pretentious? You’re damn right it is. Just because a band is popular it doesn’t mean they’re shit. If anything, doesn’t it mean the opposite? Well perhaps not, there is a lot of shit in the mainstream too.
    
It's all commercial anyway!
    
I’m not calling for us all to pander to the charts and ignore smaller artists; I mean, everyone has to start small, and I appreciate that tastes change. But please, if you like a small band that gets commercially successful, don’t disown them, it just makes you a smug bastard. Accept that you might have to share good music with other people and enjoy music for its own sake, not just for how you can drop names to look informed and cool.
    
Opinion: Leslie Nichols
    

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