Hi

Are there any musicians who you recognise as accomplished performers, despite their music not clicking with you or their personalities/egoism getting on your nerves.

Here are my top 3:

1) Sheryl Crow - very talented and successful performer, but her songs just don't connect with me. (I may have to give her songs further listening).

2) Bono - one of the purest voiced male singers, particularly with his songs in the 1980s. Also one of the purest cocks around.

3) Calvin Harris - knows his way around the dance scene very well. Not afraid of acting like a tool on occasions.



Anyway, over to you fine KVR people: who are the musicians you think deserve plaudits, despite you being left slightly cold by them overall?


Cheers.

Im pretty 'meh' about Bowie (except for Low, which I do like)

Good call!
For me, he's done some fantastic songs - Rebel Rebel etc - and he's also been involved in many other musical and artistic adventures / fashions.
But maybe there's a reason for all those impressions...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQNAebAtNFI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4zV4pJ8MwM

The music just doesnt grab me that much. Certainly not per the reputation.

Nowadays, sans coke etc, though, when Ive seen him interviewed he seems like an affable, genuine bloke...

Clapton can move his fingers fast and play in key .

I quite like how Zappa resolutely did his own thing and stuck to his guns. Unfortunately he was a complete tosser and his music doesn't even bore me - I have a complete antithesis to it. Progrock wannabe jazz wankery of the worst kind.

And Keith Richards. I'm really not that into the Stones, but respect! How is that man even still alive? He can play guitar, although I suspect his fingers do their own thing with no help from upstairs...

Skrillex and the gangnam style dude

Springsteen. Totally respect him as a musician (3+ hour shows are quite a feat of endurance) but the radio usually gets changed if one of his hits is playing.

and a big +1000 to what kritikon said about zappa.

There's a ton of people who produce complete drivel that seem like good people or have a really good attitude to music or life in general.

Marilyn Manson seems to have a pretty good attitude to the bullshit that he's given by journalists (I think he used to be one), and talks in a pretty straightforward way. His music on the other hand is just constant rehashing of things that have been done before and I can't think of anything I've heard that just makes me think of him as a weird cover band with nothing particularly original to offer

Never really got into any of the 80s hair metal bands as metal seemed to just be all power ballads and pop metal, but Nicky Sixx seems like a really good guy. Even recently he spoke up about what a cock Dave Mustaine is a few times, which is cool.

I'ma just say ditto to that.

Dave Matthews comes to mind - very talented guy with some monster players in his band, but I just find his songs to be very lame/meh.

Bruce Springsteen: i only like his acoustic songs, but he's a beast.
Van Dyke Parks: great arranger and lyricist, but i can't listen to most of his own songs.
Bono: great voice, horrible guy.
Deadmau5: his music isn't all that special imo, but the guy has an extraordinary marketing talent.
Jean Michel Jarre: did one fantastic album, which borrowed a lot from Tangerine Dream and then used only the auto repeat button.
Eric Clapton: was great with Mayall and Cream and from then on doodledeedoo auto-pilot.
New Order: were fantastic as Joy Division and lost me then.

This will likely get me flamed but here we go anyway:

Michael Jackson.

I recognize that he was a talented guy, but I never liked anything he did musically (or otherwise, for that matter). I was a teenager when "Thriller" was released and I hated every song on it. Anybody alive during the 80s realizes that you couldn't escape having those songs shoved down your throat at every opportunity, which probably made me despise his songs even more. Then, he turned into a total creep, at which point I lost complete respect for him as both a musician and a human being. I still think he's the most overrated musician that ever lived, but I find it even more disturbing that so many people will look past what a creep he was just because they like his songs and his stupid white gloves.

There. I said it. Feels good to get that off my chest. Now, flame away.

Yeah, Clapton...

The Yardbirds stuff was good as they did sound fresh compared to other bands doing the same thing, but they got REALLY good when he left and Beck took over

Bluesbreakers was good but more of the same

Cream was mostly good, but he occasionally lapsed into his stock riffs

Blind Faith were underrated but the fact that Clapton chose to sit in the background had a lot to do with that

Derek and the Dominos was Clapton's finest hour in many ways, but I think that had a lot to do with the musicians who played on the album

After that? Boring covers with the same guitar parts played over and over.

Seems like a real piece of shit too - supports fox hunting and repatriating immigrants to the UK.

Good topic.

Rush comes to mind for me - awesome musicians, especially Peart, who deserves his rep. And by all all accounts really decent guys. Plus, their music never bores me - I always listen intently when it's on. That said - I almost never listen to them on purpose. I think that's true of a lot of the more progressive bands coming out of the 70s - something about those "grand" ideas put to music makes it hard to get emotionally connected.

Early Genesis ran with that crowd (and had no shortage of grand ideas), but something about Gabriel's voice kept them grounded. I think that's why I love RHCP and Foo Fighters so much - they combine that musicianship with music that's almost intimate. If you're gonna rock like that, there should be some real pain behind it.

Clapton again - he's an icon and marked a path, but for the most part his songwriting bores the crap out of me, (but I feel bad about it.)

Skryllex, etc. - I think dubstep is a guilty pleasure for a lot of people though they consider it a talentless endeavor, but I'm the opposite - don't listen to it but I admire the talent of these guys - kids with laptops, broken monitors, and no training, yet a lot of producers would give their right nut to be able to manipulate those subs as creatively. There are 28 well-chosen notes in the main melody to Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites - it's a good tune even on piano