Music Snob

 

Archive's first album "Londonarium" before they were considered Prog is mostly rap but in a trip hop style.  It's actually not too bad, though it's not their best.

 

 

Here then is an actual example and you make of it what you will.  

This colleague who has safe and comfortable tastes in Indian music noticed me listening to rock music a lot.  He got curious and asked me to show a sample.  I played Bohemian Rhapsody on my mp3 player and he listened through earphones.  Before he could get much further beyond the harmonised "This is the real life" vocal prelude, he was through.  He looked disgusted and asked me how could I listen to this and it wasn't music.  

So...here you go.  A gentleman who doesn't understand harmony concludes that something beyond his understanding = not good music.  How many times will you hear ME saying something like that?  Almost never.  Irrespective of my general preferences, I will and have given anything a chance.  Do I see people like this chap do that?  No.  In my opinion, and as Tapfret said, it is them, it is the journalists who blindly bashed prog as 'pretentious' without attempting to engage with it, who are the snobs because it's they who go "how can anybody listen to this?" (to be clear, some prog may indeed be pretentious but the notion that it is wholly a bad thing and three chord music is ALWAYS preferable doesn't fly).  

I know why somebody would listen to Justin Bieber even if I don't like his work because I can figure out where the appeal lies.  The people who dismiss music out of hand without attempting to find out how it works are the real snobs, imo.  If you were a music lover living in my city, you would have seen me at the shows of a reigning Bollywood singer, western classical recitals, jazz, metal, even Shakti (McLaughlin's collaboration with Zakir Hussain and others).  If I like the music, genre is no bar for me. I don't insist that everybody should be equally or more adventurous in exploring music just as long as they don't give their opinions about MY preferences in music. 

The irony of this is some of the most influential prog rock bands did in fact scale way up the album charts and when they bothered to produce radio edits, did well on the singles charts too.  Even today, great music does break through the charts.  Everything Everything have had two top five albums in the UK charts and they are by no means typical.  Radiohead's Moon Shaped Pool made the Billboard top five and have similarly charted well in the past too.  It's just difficult to cut through the clutter of overexposed cookie cutter pop.  And I do not think calling something by its name is snobbery.  I am sure that at least in private, the songwriters regularly called on to deliver hits for popstars would admit to adhering to a formula if for no reason than that they can't afford to miss as the stakes are too high.  

That's the safest answer, to just say you don't know and don't have an opinion. 

I respect all kinds of music (including much that ends up in the charts) and fans of every musical genre. However I do believe there are many around who don't listen properly and whose music preferences are driven by criteria that I'd consider non-musical, consciously or subconsciously. And there's music around that was made to cater for these in the first place, or to just satisfy certain expectations, rather than for conveying a "musical message". I don't enjoy discussing music with these people and I'm not interested in that kind of material. If that makes me a snob, so be it.

(Also, which may not exactly be the same thing, I'm on a "private" forum discussing all kinds of things where there's a musicbox thread in which people post all kinds of stuff that they love - and occasionally I'm really stunned how samey and unoriginal the vast majority of that stuff is.)