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Thoughts on Big Star

I've read a little about Big Star after getting two of their songs on a southern music CD sampler. I really like "For You" and "Stroke it Noel". After sampling some of their other stuff I found that I also like "September Gurls".

I really like those three songs but I'm having a hard time finding other stuff of theirs that I like.

Just wondering if anyone else is into them, which albums you might like best, which songs you like best, best approach to getting into them, which recordings/format you prefer? 

They seem to have been one of those 'influential' bands with critical acclaim and with a strong but small following. Sometimes I find that I just don't see the magic in some 'cult' bands of that sort but liking the three songs mentioned above I feel like they might be worth getting to know. My only streaming is low end iTunes....for now.
n80
bdp24's avatar
bdp24
9,788 posts
 

@reubent, I didn't want to be a negasaurus, so didn't say anything. But upon finally learning of Big Star in the late 70's via Greg Shaw's fantastic Bomp! magazine, I fully expected to love them. Try as I might, I just don't hear it. "September Gurls" deserves to be considered a Pop classic, but other than that, much ado about nothing. Okay songs, okay singing, okay musicianship, nothing really great. But then I feel that way about quite a few cult bands and artists I'm "suppose" to like more than I do. The Velvet Underground, for instance. One man's ceiling is another man's floor.

On the other hand, I like quite a few bands and solo artists who never achieved widespread notoriety, such as The Skeletons/Morells out of Springfield, Missouri. Other fans of theirs include Dave Edmunds, Nick Lowe, and Elvis Costello. Great band!

loomisjohnson
1,941 posts
 
i'm a little surprised at the polarized reactions--to my ears big star (unlike most "cult" artists) is all about melody and  should have very broad appeal, like the beatles or the hollies. at the end of the day, though, either you dig it or you don't.
n80 OP
2,116 posts
 
Generally agree with your premise, but there are plenty of albums that had to grow on me over time. Some of them are among my favorites. I think about Astral Weeks this way. Working on Veedon Fleece right now. Both of these can be polarizing among Morrison fans. Neither appealed to me at first listen.

For me, Big Star seems worth working on even though right now I'm still ambivalent. I really like For You and Stroke It Noel a lot. September Gurls, Thirteen, O Dana (sp) also appeal to me. Just trying to get it to all fit together.
reubent
6,979 posts
 
@loomisjohnson and @bdp24 - Please understand, I don't dislike "Radio City" at all. I just don't yet get the gushing praise. I also didn't get it about Rockpile when I first heard them. But Rockpile did grow on me and I appreciate them for who, and what, they are. The same may happen with Big Star.
waltersalas's avatar
waltersalas
952 posts
 

One thing I have learned over the decades is that there is just no way to predict or account for personal taste in music. You either get it or you don't--or somewhere in between. That can even vary among albums by the same artist. For instance, I adore the Grateful Dead's "American Beauty," but I cannot make it all the way through a single one of their 10,000 concert albums to save my life, nor do I care about a great many of their other studio albums. But "American Beauty" has been ringing my bell for thirty years or more.

My wife loves Dave Matthews, but to me he's as boring as a bowl of warm milk. I love Ornette Coleman, but his music sends her screaming out of the room. And so it goes.

I love Big Star with all of my heart, but their music is, well, stranger than most of the Beatles catalog, and Alex Chilton has that tremulous voice that does not exactly translate easily to pop the way John Lennon's or Paul McCartney's do. In that sense, maybe they are an acquired taste for some. It knocked me right out from the start, but I get that they may not be for everyone.

Radio City will always be a deserted island album for me, and the other two are not far behind.


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