Is it comprehensive? Is it limiting? Why the hell doesn't it include Classical?
This was my intro to being a music nerd years ago so I had a lot of formative experiences as a teen listening to this stuff so to me it's good. As an adult and a leftist, these kinds of attempts to create an indie "canon" come off as chauvinistic and I don't like it.
I honestly like the idea of a community coming together to create a list of their most discussed and beloved interests. I really don't think that's chauvinist, unless they're exporting it forcibly.
I was on /mu/ at the time and how familiar you were with the "basics" and how far you had moved past it into more niche and obscure genres was a source of prestige and was justification for making fun of the "plebes" who were still just listening to Neutral Milk Hotel for the first time, so it was not like friends just sharing some great albums with each other it was a mostly toxic culture based around a narrow understanding of what is good music and what it is to be "cultured."
I think this site is very much elitist in terms of political and cultural views. There's a large push here to try to make DemSocs and AnComs feel welcome, but anyone that doesn't directly conform to ML stuff gets shit on, which is much different than the sub. Lib = anything I don't like essentially. Like I get it was started as a joke, but it's starting to get a bit sincere and offputting.
Music taste and political views are not really equivalent I would say. I don't think the lib thing was a joke really, at least not completely, it is meant to spur self-reflection and self-criticism which, whether you are ML or not, is a good trait to have.
I wouldn't say that I'm equating those entirely, although many of the aspects are the same. /Mu/ used to (I haven't used it in years) demand conformity and diversity in music taste. Certain things in certain genres were deemed better than others for various reasons while leaving room in a lot of ways to diversity in many genres. Classical, blues, country, etc. were largely left open to interpretation. Chapo has a ton of cultural views shaped by politics or otherwise that act in a similar manner. The dynamic is similar in a lot of ways.
I think lib has become a catchall for "the thing I don't like". I've been called a lib for the dumbest shit on here before. Do I need to expand on either of these points?
I simply don't agree, I think politics should be materially and historically informed and people get upset when you point out that what they believe doesn't really meet that standard. It's not the same as bullying people for not having that same "conformity and diversity" of taste (which I think is a really good description of /mu/ culture btw) because theory and history isn't just some literary culture, it should be the basis of political thought and it should be approached critically because not all ideas are equally up to the task of bringing about communism.
MLs literally scream about Anarchists being children online. I agree that that should be how it's approached, but it's simply not the reality in most online left spaces, especially here.
Tbh, I don't see this stuff very often and never really have despite how much people bring up MLs and how viscous they are on this site. Maybe I don't go on the threads where it happens or something, but I would say those people are just taking the piss out of anarchists and maybe it's a bit rude and not useful to the anarchist being made fun of and should be avoided, but it isn't a "cultural elitism" but a real substantive political difference.
MLs can get toxic (as can Anarchists occasionally). When that political difference becomes the norm, one group tends to dominate the other. IDK if I can provide you with any concrete examples on here since I didn't star any of my or other peoples' discussions. I'm going to try to go to bed now though. Have a nice night.
absolutely not lol
it was a very depressing place filled with very depressed people. even if we get the occasional flamewar or whatever, it's still missing the adolescent resentment with women that eventually lead to /mu/ having HOURLY feel threads, plus we don't have swedes pretending to like a 2 hour-long record of a literal fucking sine wave that would later admit their posting habit was a coping mechanism.
Doesn't include much punk either... or pop, disco... :/
Seems like there is a lot of good stuff there, but a lot of it is pretty narrow to the typical 4chan/reddit music board taste. I wonder if the person who made this has actually listened to all those albums.
Yeah, I've generally found that the combination of holier-than-thou thinking, elitism, and contrarianism in Internet forum nerd culture doesn't make for good recommendation lists
There's a good chunk of Punk in Sub-/mu/core and "classics". This is just a basic snapshot of what gets/got discussed on /mu/ at one point. I doubt many have gone through the whole list. Would be nice for them to include it, but I doubt many of those nerds are into much punk.
I personally want Funk added to this list.
You're right, on closer look I did find some in there. Still, there's more of Radiohead alone than of some genres/sub-genres.
For real. Where’s the pop music? Pop music is good. I used to be the kind person who hates on pop music, but then I realized that I actually love pop music and was denying myself joy for no reason other than to feel a particular kind of superiority to people who listen to pop music.
No Four seasons of love, the greatest album is the 70s is an egregious mistake
What would you add genre and album wise? What would you take away?
I was about to say "The fact that the metal category does not have any Boris in it invalidates the whole thing", but now that I've looked closer, Boris is indeed there, so never mind.
My bad, carry on.
Completely snubs R&B, soul and funk except for a few tokens like What's Going On and Superfly
Punk
I think you're right on most of this. Frankly I think punk deserves it's own category, but you're lucky to get a decent punk thread going at /mu/. Punk's dead to a lot of people unfortunately, despite the impact it had and continues to have. Bad Brains' S/T titled is seminal though. Everytime I hear hardcore outside of Punk circles I hear Bad Brains and Minor Threat. Zen Arcade is also included in the list.
Metal
I think it's good, Although I wish they had less Black Metal. I would also change out the Death, Deftones, and Mastodon albums for their more popular counterparts. I'd chuck in Cynic's debut in there too.
80s/early 90s shoegaze and post punk get covered decently well for a broad list, but it could use some newer recs. Leaving off Jawbreaker is a huge miss as well, even though they aren't shoegaze/post punk
This list is also clearly made by someone in their late 20s or 30s who takes it for granted that someone is already familiar with a lot of 2000s/2010s music as well. Where's the "pop punk"/"scene" representation? Thursday's Full Collapse, Title Fight's Floral Green, something by Turnover and something by Taking Back Sunday and Fall Out Boy should be on there somewhere. That shit was everywhere, and is just as defining/important as all of these 80s bands were.
Screams “I took a chance on music 7 years ago and never looked back. I never looked forward either, so I’ve been listening to the same 5 albums since 2013”
I downloaded the whole list off What back when. It's incredibly comprehensive for a very specific kind of music snob, tbh. I could do with less Radiohead, but that's just me.
This list helped me open up to new music genres awhile back, so it holds a special place in my heart. I get where you're coming from.
Honestly, the biggest thing I liked about it when I first encountered the list was that it was the first evidence I ever had that another person listened to Neubauten and Swans.
I love Swans, I think they're the best and most diverse band that has ever happened, but 5 spots on this list is a bit much, maybe replace To be Kind and Children of God with something else?
At a glance there's way too much Radiohead on it and it looks like it was made by someone in their mid-30s
They got some of my shit on there for sure but how old is this
2016 is the latest album I think. 4chan kind of became /pol/ over the last 4 years. /a/ and /v/ seem to be kicking and that's it.
Butthole surfers and Massive Attack are an instant upbeat from me
hip hop list is super basic. it omits underground hip hop almost entirely. almost nothing post 2010, which is a great era of hip hop. some glaring omissions: good kid m.A.A.d city, The Miseducation Of Lauryn Hill, Supa Dupa Fly, cannibal ox, Black on Both Sides, Shabazz Palaces, fugees - the score, UGK - ridin dirty, aesop rock - labor days, watch the throne, barter 6, rich gang tha tour..
also Blowout Comb but no Reachin? that's insane
I'm guessing that outside of a few krautrock albums and the metal section all of the musicians are American or British or Canadian.
Which is something that really limits online essential music lists to me. But it's an adequate representation of the institutions that produces them (unless thats a tautology).
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