more about the music

Yeah.... I sort of gave up on the comparing Buffalo's music scene to that of Raleigh. At least in the depth that I was initially dreaming about.

I wouldn't have included any bands who were/are in the mainstream, but it would have been worth noting that 10,000 Maniacs were from close enough to Buffalo that it would be fair to include them in that scene. Really, all I would have done is spewed out the name of a few bands from the early nineties, and rapped about them a little.

For the Buffalo scene, I was going to say that I don't really care for Ani DiFranco, that I am indifferent to the Goo Goo Dolls, and that I think Mercury Rev is pretty freakin' amazing. Goo Goo Dolls gained a fair amount of mainstream success, but never got too big for their britches. I kind of admire the fact that they said "no thanks" to the Los Angeles lifestyle, opting to stay in Buffalo. Ani isn't at all my preference of music, but she enjoyed enormous popularity in the early/mid nineties among the lesbian/hippy community that ran rampant at my college. I honestly think, though, that her popularity had more to do with that "scene" than with people actually liking the music. Mercury Rev was right up my alley. When they released their debut record, Yerself is Steam, their psychedelic space age noise pop style immediately earned comparisons to the brilliant Flaming Lips. They were even were mentioned in the same breath as My Bloody Valentine and The Jesus and Mary Chain. The Lips comparison is easy to see. The others, not so much. Like the Lips, Mercury Rev went through lineup changes and subtle stylistic reinventions over the years, but unlike the Lips, I think they hit their peak early. I've liked them less and less as time goes on.

There's not a lot to choose from in bands that are from Raleigh proper. Only The Connells. Chapel Hill, which is only 20 miles away, is full of great alternative bands that came out of there around the same time that those three were coming out of Buffalo. Chief among them is Superchunk. I never get tired of tha Chunk. Despite the fact that they never change stylistically, and every song sounds almost identical, I love them. Mac is a terrible singer, but the music is great and so energetic and sweaty (yes, sweaty) that it more than makes up for it. Oh, and it helps that Laura is a looker. I would have gone on to say that Archers of Loaf were another awesome early nineties Chapel Hill-style punk band worthy of mention. Their debut record Icky Mettle was really amazing, but each subsequent record had diminishing appeal to me. Since the band broke up and Eric Bachman started Crooked Fingers, I have a newfound respect for him. He's no longer a drunken buffoon who can't remember the words to his own songs. He's a good songwriter, a good guitar player, and a pretty decent singer now that he's not screaming. Then, out of desperation, I would have thrown Ben Folds Five into the fray, simply because they came out in the early nineties, just like the other bands mentioned. In the early days, they were a little more rambunctious and their punk and/or metal influences were pretty obvious. I liked them a lot back then. However, as the bands star began to rise in the mid-to-late nineties, and they became more polished, I liked them less and less. Nowadays, I can't even listen to the old stuff anymore.

At this point, I would have realized that I wasn't going anywhere with this. There's no direction to it at all.

I sincerely apologize for what has just been a colossal waste of your time.