1318 Queensrÿche - Fear City Slide
1318 Queensrÿche - Fear City Slide
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| From: Operation: Mind Crime II, Year: 2006 |
This concept album is a continuation of the story begun on their '88 Operation: Mindcrime album. I can just imagine what the music critics were like when they first heard about this album: a concept album from a Progressive Metal band? They must've went completely apoplectic.
Here is the studio version on YouTube.
My song pick a year ago today: Dream Theater - Light Fuse and Get Away
My song pick two years ago today: The Doors - Ghost Song
My song pick three years ago today: Badfinger - Day After Day
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But look how often people OTHER than music critics hail these narrative albums as the best ones in those bands' catalogs, be it Mindcrime, DT's Scenes From a Memory, 2112, The Wall, etc...
ReplyDeleteI've always had an affinity for these "mini operas;" way too many to count. It seems like almost every one of my top favouite bands have released at least one narrative concept album in their history, and it's usually one of, if not, their best.
ReplyDeleteTo me it's almost one of the pinnacles of modern music to put together over 40 minutes of music based on a theme and not only to have the lyrics work, but the music written to match the mood and action in the narrative.
I'm not saying that a musical act isn't good until they create a "magnum opus," but for the most part, history usually looks at those concept albums as defining pieces in music no matter what a reviewer thinks.
The critics really are not the ones that bother me; in fact I find them quite comical at times with their overblown egos and opinions. It's the people that rely on them to form their own opinion or the ones who dismiss anything with the "Progressive" label as pretentious, showing off, or overly technical that bother me.
Anyway, my comment is longer than my initial post again, yikes!
Dammit, I had some huge response ready to go, but I got an error when I went to preview my post and lost it all.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, yeah, I get annoyed by anti-prog kneejerkiness as well. At McCovey Chronicles (SF Giants blog I frequent), bagging on Rush is an ongoing meme. In fact, someone there called Rush "worse" than that God-awful "Friday" song. I don't know what's more offensive, that opinion or the fact he even made that comparison at all.
Sorry about Blogger eating your post. I kind of got into the habit of copying my text before I post ever since MySpace kept losing entire posts.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, I think a lot of Rush haters have become more vocal since the their new increased popularity as of late. As they said on the new Rush documentary; a lot of long-time "nerdy" fans are now in positions of power and the hipsters are feeling the wall at their backs.
Just curious and I know I must come out from under my boulder I live under every now and then, but what is the "Friday" song and who does it? I'll have to at least hear it once before I damn it to oblivion. I don't know how anyone can compare a Rush song with modern compuvocalpop; I would really like to know what goes through their minds when 2112 starts playing; they must be complete bores to be around.
It must be the one by a Rebecca Black? Man you'd think the autotune would take care of that whiny voice; I guess that even in this day and age of computers singing top 40 hits there are still limits to what sound engineers and modern tech can do.
ReplyDeleteHell, in Japan they actually have a 3D animé character called Miku Hatsune that does live shows = no real flesh having to be involved in the process. It's quite weird looking, but I can't help but think I'm seeing the future when watching it; it can't get old, pregnant, addicted to drugs, etc. and they don't have to even pay it to perform. Just Type Miku Hatsune into YouTube and you can see for yourself.
Yes, sorry, I meant the Rebecca Black "song."
ReplyDeleteWhat most people don't realize is just how badly you need to be singing to make the auto-tune effect that obvious. It wouldn't shock me if they were being told to sing awful on purpose just to make it sound like that.
"I would really like to know what goes through their minds when 2112 starts playing":
- Where's the beat?
- Where's the hook?
- You can't dance to this.
- Isn't this song over YET??
- That voice sucks. It doesn't sound at all like Coldplay.
- What awful songwriting. I'm gonna go listen to some Belle and Sebastian.
- This is so pretentious. (fart) (sniff) Aaaaaah...
That's funny; to tell the absolute truth I couldn't tell one of these compuvocalpop stars from another; they all sound mostly the same. My critique, for what it's worth: it's nothing special. You could plug in any compuvocalpop star in and it would be the same.
ReplyDeleteI don't know how people couldn't find the beat/rhythm/hook or dance to it. Mayhap they can only count by 2's. I bet you the ones who do Ethnic Greeks dances could easily find it; now there are some fun meters to play with.