Kids want a faster beat

[Zelönka 22]

The more I think about it, the more of a problem I have with that line. (And I already think about it too much to be able to stop. )

Kids don't want a faster beat.. Kids need something flashy to get their attention. So "a faster beat" would only be the genre of "Pop".
Now from the sound of it, Jason doesn't like Pop all too much - unless the song is not about him but just a song with this concept.

What's wrong with a slower beat?
Will it turn SF59's sound into something the kids will think is Old?
Why should music be on the fast beat side? Only to grab attention?

What's the rush?

I like all of Jason Martin's work, but just can't get enough of the older more alternative albums.
From what I hear, it seems as if Jason's work has been getting more and more Pop.
And the Please Please Please  song on SF59's myspace doesn't make me want to preorder Dial M.

I really do hope that the lyrics in I Love You like the Little/Early Bird  are not about him..


Thoughts?


(also been on a Japanese music kick lately, a lot of Japanese music is fast paced - what's the rush for?)

[Jono]

I think the point is that the music Jason writes is not the kind that appeals to young people. Generally speaking.

(It'd actually be interesting to poll for the average age of the sf59 fan. I'm guessing mid-twenties.)

Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want is a cover song, and it's not going on Dial M...

[Metaphizzle]

The complete chorus is:

Sometimes I feel, feel so obsolete
because the kids want a faster beat.
If I was free, free to leave,
but it's my kids, they need to eat.

Assuming the song is meant to be autobiographical, Jason is saying that the music he wants to play is not the stuff that the kids want to listen to these days. And that he feels so unappreciated that he'd like to just call it quits, but his family is depending on him to put food on the table. He is not citing what the kids want as some kind of justification for changing his style.

I don't know what definition of pop music you're using, but Starflyer has done plenty of slow pop tunes. "20 Dollar Bills", "The Party", "Old", "Night Life", "Softness, Goodness".

As for Starflyer's progression from rock to pop, well, the current period of Starflyer history is too tangled to really say. Silver, Gold, and Americana were clearly rock, heavy on the guitars and distortion, but they were also slow. The Fashion Focus, Everybody Makes Mistakes, and Leave Here a Stranger were a definite shift towards the pop end, but they also sped things up. And then things went crazy. Old was a union of rock Starflyer and pop Starflyer, and it was fast. I Am the Portuguese Blues was the single most "rock" album Starflyer's ever done, and it was fast. Talking Voice vs. Singing Voice was the single most "pop" album Starflyer has ever done, and it was slow. My Island was like IATPB, but with slightly less "rock" (but still more than, say, Old) and also the fastest beats Starflyer has ever done.

"Please Please Please" isn't going to be on Dial M. Also, it's a cover of a song by The Smiths.

[Skelton]

The Pixies are Pop and they are cited as an influence on Starflyer's myspace page. Also the notes from easy come easy go talk about Jason being into brit pop.

[danielmarkham]

maybe this is his response to always having to play festivals with bands that all sound alike...

i've seen sf59 follow a full day of emo, hardcore, emocore, emo, emo, emo, hardcore, nu-metal, emo, hardcore, etc.

there's a lot more black "metal" shirts in the crowd than there are smiths shirts.

i totally understand what he's saying.

jason is awesome!

[Juniquex]

I think the point is that the music Jason writes is not the kind that appeals to young people. Generally speaking.

(It'd actually be interesting to poll for the average age of the sf59 fan. I'm guessing mid-twenties.)

Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want is a cover song, and it's not going on Dial M...

Who originaly did "please please please" then?

I think the point is that the music Jason writes is not the kind that appeals to young people. Generally speaking.

(It'd actually be interesting to poll for the average age of the sf59 fan. I'm guessing mid-twenties.)

Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want is a cover song, and it's not going on Dial M...

And I AM the younger generation. I'm only 15 and I LOVE his music. Not everything should have a faster beat, and I hate most pop.

[mintshows]

Who originaly did "please please please" then?

It's a cover of The Smith's - "Please, Please, Please, Let Me Get What I Want" from their Hatful of Hollow album.  The Smith's have been noted as one of Jason's (and quite a few other's) favorite bands.

[Metaphizzle]

Morrissey and Johnny Marr were the songwriters for The Smiths, hence the line from the chorus of "Minor Keys": "Like Johnny Marr I want my please, please, please."

[Zelönka 22]

Assuming the song is meant to be autobiographical, Jason is saying that the music he wants to play is not the stuff that the kids want to listen to these days. And that he feels so unappreciated that he'd like to just call it quits, but his family is depending on him to put food on the table. He is not citing what the kids want as some kind of justification for changing his style.

Doesn't that tell you that he would need to change something in order to feed his kids?

I don't know what definition of pop music you're using, but Starflyer has done plenty of slow pop tunes. "20 Dollar Bills", "The Party", "Old", "Night Life", "Softness, Goodness".

Definitely not those tracks. I'd even call those tracks more Jazz than Pop (and that would be way off). The most Pop song I can think of is SF59's cover of Please Please Please, which is the latest song released.

The Pixies are Pop and they are cited as an influence on Starflyer's myspace page. Also the notes from easy come easy go talk about Jason being into brit pop.

The Pixies aren't all that Pop.. especially if you compare them to other Pop artists like ummmm... Britney Spears. lol

As for Starflyer's progression from rock to pop, well, the current period of Starflyer history is too tangled to really say. Silver, Gold, and Americana were clearly rock, heavy on the guitars and distortion, but they were also slow. The Fashion Focus, Everybody Makes Mistakes, and Leave Here a Stranger were a definite shift towards the pop end, but they also sped things up. And then things went crazy. Old was a union of rock Starflyer and pop Starflyer, and it was fast. I Am the Portuguese Blues was the single most "rock" album Starflyer's ever done, and it was fast. Talking Voice vs. Singing Voice was the single most "pop" album Starflyer has ever done, and it was slow. My Island was like IATPB, but with slightly less "rock" (but still more than, say, Old) and also the fastest beats Starflyer has ever done.

I love Talking Voice vs. Singing Voice. But imagine it without any background electric guitars, with double vocals, long high notes, more plastic drums, more pop samples and plastic electronica. That's what I've been hearing from SF59 lately. Songs like Compulsion. Compare Ghosts of the Future with any SF59 album. Most Pop - ever.

I just hope the tracks on Ghosts of the Future are demos compared to the remixed Dial M album with a more SF59 classical sound. (I hope)

[Metaphizzle]

Assuming the song is meant to be autobiographical, Jason is saying that the music he wants to play is not the stuff that the kids want to listen to these days. And that he feels so unappreciated that he'd like to just call it quits, but his family is depending on him to put food on the table. He is not citing what the kids want as some kind of justification for changing his style.

Doesn't that tell you that he would need to change something in order to feed his kids?

Except Jason hasn't changed, at least not in the direction you think he is. Ghosts is slower than My Island, and the song in question is one of the slowest from Ghosts.

I don't know what definition of pop music you're using, but Starflyer has done plenty of slow pop tunes. "20 Dollar Bills", "The Party", "Old", "Night Life", "Softness, Goodness".

Definitely not those tracks. I'd even call those tracks more Jazz than Pop (and that would be way off).

If you don't think those songs are pop, then your definition of pop music and my definition are too different to allow any meaningful discussion between us.

The most Pop song I can think of is SF59's cover of Please Please Please, which is the latest song released.

It was Side B on the very first disc of Ghosts of the Future. Jason released 16 other tracks after it, and then he rerecorded ten songs for Dial M (and "Please Please Please" was not one of those songs).

As for Starflyer's progression from rock to pop, well, the current period of Starflyer history is too tangled to really say. Silver, Gold, and Americana were clearly rock, heavy on the guitars and distortion, but they were also slow. The Fashion Focus, Everybody Makes Mistakes, and Leave Here a Stranger were a definite shift towards the pop end, but they also sped things up. And then things went crazy. Old was a union of rock Starflyer and pop Starflyer, and it was fast. I Am the Portuguese Blues was the single most "rock" album Starflyer's ever done, and it was fast. Talking Voice vs. Singing Voice was the single most "pop" album Starflyer has ever done, and it was slow. My Island was like IATPB, but with slightly less "rock" (but still more than, say, Old) and also the fastest beats Starflyer has ever done.

I love Talking Voice vs. Singing Voice. But imagine it without any background electric guitars, with double vocals, long high notes, more plastic drums, more pop samples and plastic electronica. That's what I've been hearing from SF59 lately. Songs like Compulsion.[/quote]

"Compulsion" is also a cover song. So you're worried about the direction Starflyer's heading because of two songs that Jason didn't write?

Compare Ghosts of the Future with any SF59 album. Most Pop - ever.

Most synthesizers maybe, but for the most part it's synth-rock, not synth-pop. "Minor Keys", "Mr. Martin" (the electric version), "Black Jacket", "Altercation", "Broken Arm" and "Easy" all have prominent guitars, and "Concentrate" and "Taxi" are too heavy--even with the synths--to be pop.

[PlaneRidesToTokyo]

broken arm is going to be on the next david bazan record.

[Zelönka 22]

Except Jason hasn't changed, at least not in the direction you think he is. Ghosts is slower than My Island, and the song in question is one of the slowest from Ghosts.

Well not literally "a faster beat"...
But I guess slower wouldn't really make it all that much more appealing to kids.

It was Side B on the very first disc of Ghosts of the Future. Jason released 16 other tracks after it, and then he rerecorded ten songs for Dial M (and "Please Please Please" was not one of those songs).

Latest song on MySpace at least.
Point is, the new stuff is very much more Pop sounding than everything before it. And I don't mean Pop by the Pop genre standards/requirements, I mean that by ear it sounds more Pop.

"Compulsion" is also a cover song. So you're worried about the direction Starflyer's heading because of two songs that Jason didn't write?

No.. Songs like Compulsion. If you want me to throw out more song names: Mr. Martin (Acoustic - which is on the album instead of the electric), Minor Keys, Concentrate, I Love You Like The Little Bird.

I like almost all of SF59's songs still. I'm just saying Jason says himself that fans/kids want something more appealing and comes out with the most minimalist tracks yet. Kids like that emotion in vocals.

So the point - Jason should play whatever he feels like playing no matter of the beat. It just bothers me that he didn't quite have a problem with this when he played more hard rock but now that he's playing more acoustic and less-noisy stuff, now he does.
I sorta wish he would go back to the older style. Maybe not all the way back to Silver/Gold, but 1997-99. It seems to me he was most comfortable with music during that time.

[Jono]

Point is, the new stuff is very much more Pop sounding than everything before it. And I don't mean Pop by the Pop genre standards/requirements, I mean that by ear it sounds more Pop.

In other words... lots more synthesizer.

[Zelönka 22]

No. It's like.... compare Pop drums with Rock drums. Pop samples you could say, but that's too specific.

And, since when has SF59 been doing double vocals?

[Jono]

I've talked with you before about these sorts of things and I still don't exactly get where you're coming from.