Antone's Nightclub
Does Your Favorite Band Suck?
RECEIVED Thu., Aug. 7, 2008
Dear Editor,
I am writing in regards to Tom Bowman's Postmark "The Question: How Good Are the Musicians?" (July 25) in which he asserts that a glut of deluded, poor-quality local musicians are causing clubs to book out-of-town bands instead of offering employment opportunities to local ones.
There are two obvious points to me here: 1) There will always be a market to see out-of-town bands because of the novelty of seeing a band from out of town, especially a famous one, and 2) a good deal of the out-of-town bands booked here fit the very description of knowing (far) less than the 10 chords that he decries.
And why not? What's so great about being "great"? I'd rather see a fun and energetic punk band crank out one three-chord barrage after another and have an entertaining stage presence than watch someone who took music theory in college play some wanky set showing off all the (more than 10!) chords they learned and the progressions that they go in, because there are some very talented and skilled musicians "who think they rock, dude," when I personally think that they do not.
Of course, I can make the distinction that that is just my own humble opinion and that there are people who are into that kind of music, and that's cool, too. On the other end of the spectrum, the pop charts tend to indicate that "insipid lyrics" still command a draw and suggest that strong musical skills may not be required to sell out shows.
Let everyone have their turn, and the live music fans will ultimately decide if a band just gets booked at their friends' house parties or headlines at Emo's outdoors on a Saturday night or pulls off both in the same evening.
I am writing in regards to Tom Bowman's Postmark "The Question: How Good Are the Musicians?" (July 25) in which he asserts that a glut of deluded, poor-quality local musicians are causing clubs to book out-of-town bands instead of offering employment opportunities to local ones.
There are two obvious points to me here: 1) There will always be a market to see out-of-town bands because of the novelty of seeing a band from out of town, especially a famous one, and 2) a good deal of the out-of-town bands booked here fit the very description of knowing (far) less than the 10 chords that he decries.
And why not? What's so great about being "great"? I'd rather see a fun and energetic punk band crank out one three-chord barrage after another and have an entertaining stage presence than watch someone who took music theory in college play some wanky set showing off all the (more than 10!) chords they learned and the progressions that they go in, because there are some very talented and skilled musicians "who think they rock, dude," when I personally think that they do not.
Of course, I can make the distinction that that is just my own humble opinion and that there are people who are into that kind of music, and that's cool, too. On the other end of the spectrum, the pop charts tend to indicate that "insipid lyrics" still command a draw and suggest that strong musical skills may not be required to sell out shows.
Let everyone have their turn, and the live music fans will ultimately decide if a band just gets booked at their friends' house parties or headlines at Emo's outdoors on a Saturday night or pulls off both in the same evening.
Gwendolyn Norton