MetaChat - So what band did you turn your back on?

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26 May 2007

So what band did you turn your back on? →[More:]An exchange on this This MeFi thread got me thinking. There were definitely bands in jr. high and high school that I enjoyed on the down low (e.g.: Yes, Rush, Asia, the Outfield), but with one exception, I cannot recall a single band that I worshipped and then did a complete reversel on later.

My lone exception is, of course, U2. I loved their first three and a half records (I was starting to tune out at "Unforgettable Fire"), but still liked some of it well enough enough to call them my favorite band of all time (Sex Pistols and Zeppelin be damned). But by the time "Rattle and Hum" came out, I loathed them and their bloated egotistical souls with the fire of a thousand suns.

But different kind of thing, I think, I maintain that U2 sold me and their loving fans out with their bombastic tripe, but I stayed the same. Of course it's true, it has to be true.

At any rate, sorry for the long prelude, but was there a band or artist that you worshipped in your youth that, even today, you cannot bring yourself to have any fondness for?

post by: psmealey at: 19:19 | 27 comments

Captain & Tennille.

posted by miss lynnster 26 May | 19:33

Sorry, I meant other than the Captain and Tennille. ;-)

posted by psmealey 26 May | 19:35

Though, oddly enough, Muskrat Love still delivers.

posted by psmealey 26 May | 19:36

Are you saying that you stopped listening to U2's first three records as well? If so, then for myself, no bands met that fate.

I can name many bands that mutated into something I no longer found interesting, but I still liked their earlier stuff. Then, I can name a couple bands whose middle period I found most interesting, and others still whose late period work I found the best.

posted by mischief 26 May | 19:36

OK, that C&T video is unwatchable.

posted by mischief 26 May | 19:42

I can't think of any particular band, but I know there are a bunch. I hate how fickle I am when it comes to music...it's just what I currently love at the time, and I always end up hating what I loved in the past. So I'm not at all sentimental about music, and don't have a big CD collection or anything.

I don't like old music much for the same reason. Big bands, swing, etc., sure....stuff before my time. But oldies-type music and old rock and what is referred to as "classic rock" (I don't like that term)...I liked it when it was new but don't like it at all now. I want new music.

posted by iconomy 26 May | 19:44

Are you saying that you stopped listening to U2's first three records as well?

Sort of. I came to hate them so much in the late 80s/early 90s, that yeah, I came to associate their early stuff with the band they became and stopped listening altogether. I think it was only a few years ago that I forgave them and started listening to the early stuff again. It does sound a little dated today, but the songs ("Gloria", "I Fall Down", "I Will Follow", "Two Hearts", etc.) are still great.

posted by psmealey 26 May | 19:49

Jefferson Airplane. I lived and breathed them, but now it is embarassing to listen to them. The shark was jumped when the original drummer left, and the slick/kantner/balin troika started to assert their will on jorma and jack a bit more.

posted by danf 26 May | 19:58

In that case, psm, nope, no bands like that for me. The closest I have come are albums that I listened to so many times that I sold them, like LZ IV and Back In Black, but today I have copies of them again. Hell, nowadays with mp3 blogs, you really can't get rid of anything anymore.

posted by mischief 26 May | 20:07

The Doors. Most of the lyrics are good, but today, I don't like the sound.

Def Leopard, White Snake, and other hair bands. Although, I really never loved them. I did own Pyromania. The song "Photograph" makes me want to hurl.

Kiss. Well, I still like them sort of, except for Gene Simmons. I never knew until recently what a prick he is.

A ton of other stuff. I used to like the remake of Tommy James & the Shondells, "I Think We're Alone Now", by Tiffany. OMG!

posted by LoriFLA 26 May | 20:14

Rush. I never enjoyed them on any kind of ironic, guilty-pleasure downlow. I LOVED Rush. I was the total eighties kid when it came to Rush.

But the eighties are over now.

posted by jason's_planet 26 May | 20:18

Pink Floyd. I was obsessed with them in high school, then sort of came to be embarrassed about my obsession with them as I grew into my 20s. Ironically, it was that awful Scissor Sisters cover of "Comfortably Numb" that got me back into them- I was so pissed that this shallow, one-trick band were making fun of my teenage-year idols that I dug out the CDs again, and realized that, wow, I still love those guys. (I love them from Syd's first trip to The Final Cut, plus a few moments after that... "Dogs of War" is still a great song.)

posted by BoringPostcards 26 May | 20:59

Beastie Boys...but i still love the old stuff..

posted by Schyler523 26 May | 21:11

I just realized that my Pink Floyd experience is kind of the opposite of what psmealy was asking for... oops. Well, that's the closest I've got.

As for U2: if you always took them as grandiose Irish assholes with a belly full of beer and a head full of stars, then they're still pretty much what they always were- crazy guys who dream big, play well, and are sentimental suckers at heart. That's how I always saw them, so I didn't have that sense of betrayal that some fans seem to have felt when they realized they weren't God. Their recent stuff is kinda tepid, but I'll never stop loving everything up through Pop. And they still crank out at least one good song every album.

posted by BoringPostcards 26 May | 21:12

I kind of turned my back on Jethro Tull. In my late teens, I absolutely worshipped their early stuff (up through Minstrel in the Gallery). Now I find only certain songs/sections tolerable, and I have to be in the right mood for them.

Something similar about Tori Amos -- at one point in my life, she couldn't do wrong. Now a lot of what I used to like just grates on me, and strikes as far less "deep" than I thought it was.

Pink Floyd . . . I always thought of them as a band I would eventually grow out of, but I never have. As I get older, I keep discovering more to like.

posted by treepour 26 May | 22:55

after enduring sonic youth's last album, i don't think i'll bother buying anything by them again.

i almost gave up on rush (my favorite band as a teenager), but god damn it the last few things they've released have been pretty swell.

posted by syntax 26 May | 22:57

Styx. They were, like, the best band EVAR during my middle school years. When Paradise Theater came out, I finally got to see them and BOY did that album suck. Now it's hard to listen to the lyrics and ever imagine I liked the quality of vocals or the depth of the lyrics.

posted by Doohickie 26 May | 23:06

Now see, I never got tired of the GOOD Jethro Tull... I just sort of bailed out before they started releasing any crap. They were an amazing, amazing band.

posted by BoringPostcards 26 May | 23:24

I remember my BFF at the time saying, and I quote, "I don't know what I'm supposed to make of this whole Achtung Baby thing." I miss her.

posted by rainbaby 26 May | 23:34

Rush, without a doubt. I still think "Signals" is one of the most underrated records in rock history (almost as good as "Moving Pictures"), but when "Hold Your Fire" came out, I nearly vomited from it's adult-pop lameness. "Presto" was a good return to form, but when they followed it up with "Roll The Bones", I finally told those hosers to take off back to the great white north. Which is just as well, because by that time, I had become fully obsessed with The Pixies, The Young Fresh Fellows, Ramones and They Might Be Giants (as well as a C120 mixtape filled with songs by tons of great East Bay punk bands).

What I'm HORRIBLY embarrassed by, however, is that there was a time in my life when I listened to, purchased and *liked* the music of Spyro Gyra and Chick Corea. I even had a Spyro Gyra poster on my bedroom wall. Wow...that hurts even to write that.

posted by melorama 27 May | 03:45

I really bailed on the Boston Pops when John Williams initially took over, as every Pops concert started sounding like a boring movie score. And the kinds of things Keith Lockhart has 'em playing now are causing fights in the balcony. Hell, I'd probably get rowdy, too, if I had to sit through a Phantom of the Opera medley, as my tolerance for Andrew Lloyd Webber stuff is miniscule, but still...

Arthur Fiedler would've stopped that crap with a stern look, and never missed a beat.

posted by paulsc 27 May | 05:16

U2, no question. I refuse to support wankers and Bono is an extra-large wanker poser. Also, people should not take stupid names like The Edge.

posted by fenriq 27 May | 10:47

U2. Pink Floyd. Camper van Beethoven, to some extent.

posted by small_ruminant 27 May | 11:28

REM. I first heard them around the Fables/Reconstruction album, and really got into Lifes Rich Pageant. After they moved over to Warner Bros. records, they started losing me; Automatic for the People and Monster are in my opinion crappy albums with with nothing interesting on either one of them. Michael Stipe also became something of a joke during this time for me. Still like listening to their IRS stuff though.

Interestingly, I heard them live only once, with Camper Van Beethoven opening up for them. Fun show.

posted by deadcowdan 27 May | 11:49

U2, but it's been a road of ups-and-downs. I despised Rattle and Hum, but they won me back for awhile with Achtung Baby and (to a lesser extant) Zooropa. After that, they became so fucking boring that I couldn't even find much energy to mock Bono's idiocy anymore. Having said that, I will always have a soft spot for him given how incredibly cool he was when we met when I was in high school. Plus I still love the Red Rocks concert, and I find I still enjoy Achtung Baby once in awhile.

I'm another person who just got terribly bored of REM by Automatic for the People (though I do like a few individual songs off that record), after having been a devotee since junior high (I first saw them on the Reckoning tour when I was 14 or 15, and they were just totally incredible.)

I also stopped listening to anything David Bowie put out after Let's Dance, though I've briefly dipped into Earthling, Heathen, and Reality a few times. I still love his stuff from the '70s more than just about anything on earth, though.

posted by scody 27 May | 12:37

I agree on REM.

Metallica.

posted by halonine 27 May | 17:34

Led Zeppelin. I used to really love their stuff. Now I just tune out when I hear them.

posted by Kattullus 27 May | 18:44

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