Can't blame him for his popularity, any more than you can blame Mozart.

still think his music has been endowed with a 'greatness' by virtue of his cultural / political significance - it's just not great music, in my humble ...

(and I'm sure you will) but I've seen them perform live and although I'm not the biggest fan, those guys are phenomenal musicians.

I'm almost certainly in the minority here, but I like 'em. Once you've got past the hopeless singer and the ludicrous posturing, and avoided the more cliched, Flea-led funk workouts, you're left with a pretty good band. John Frusciante is a brilliant, extremely musical guitarist (certainly more gifted than anyone else I can think of in 'mainstream' rock), and they can write, you know, proper songs.

Mind you, I'm from New Zealand. It might be an Antipodean thing.

Are you kidding? You're not, clearly, so I won't try to talk you 'round, but... *The Beach Boys*!?

I agree with two, three and four, though, and would add U2 to the list - I really can't see the appeal.

When did the Cranberries ever have any credibility of any type?

Possibly (with the exception of Keane) the most derided and unlauded (rightly) band ever?

Or is that just in my house?

who's been lauding the Cranberries? My better half quite likes them but I don't think that counts as critical acclaim.

Toploader, Kula Shaker and Freddie and the Dreamers to that list?

Stick out of that list like a sore thumb. Not sure who ever rated them. I have a couple of their CD's but they haven't made it to my ipod.

Bob Marley is correctly lauded - he changed the way reggae is perceived by making it mainstream.

Beach Boys are easy to underestimate in my humble due to the advances around studio equipment in the 70's onwards. But they were ground breaking at the time (and that's the only time that they can be judged I reckon).

The Manics and Chillis are good bands who have created some good stuff and some so so stuff. They're not in the Bob Marley or Beach Boys league but they are certainly not the Cranberries.

Can't agree about Marley or Beach Boys, but I like them on a Greatest Hits level. I recall being shocked when I first learned that The Beach Boys were 'ground-breaking' - for years they were just like The Monkees to me, frothy feel-good 60s pop. And still are I s'pose.

I would add The Clash to your list. I have never understood their level of popularity or credibility. Joe Strummer, nice bloke etc, but boy what a fake. And what an ugly band.

yes, you're all right - they were the odd one out, in that they never had any cred. I just heard them on the radio the other night and really needed to purge myself by having a pop.

They will be, Jake, as round these parts, slagging the Boys off is just not on. Cripes, there are some here as partisan as the RTphiles about the Wilson brothers and extended, dontcha know. But I know you only put them there as a loss-leader,so to speak, to guarantee a good posting response to an otherwise fair list. Problem is, however, that there is some merit in each of the 4 also-rans listed, as has been mentioned.I agree with you about all 4 in part, but, but, but it depends how deep you have delved. I too think Marley is over-exposed and over-played, but the undeniable fact is that he was enabled to open the door for the mass acceptance of reggae to a wider and non specialist audience, even if others are deemed "better" and/or more authentic, whatever that means. The underlying songs are exceptional and I think it may be the "presentation" you find unacceptable. His solo version of Redemption Songs is up there in my top ten best and most moving songs ever.
Chili peppers have produced the odd maverick masterpiece, Under the Bridge being one such. Trouble is the early stuff was marred by the aforestated Flea-overfunkification, and the most recent stuff by sticking overly hard to the formula that gave a couple of CDs I am happy to own.
Manics are less easy to justify. Couple of tuneful singles probably not enough to want to not wallop the eye-lined one.
I liked the Cranberries. The first couple of CDs were fine, if not quite comfortable, image-wise, between the pastoral sounds and the would-begrunge market to be exploited. Zombie managed I feel. Dolores (there, I said it) was a relatively amusing sub for Sinead whilst she was off the boil for a while. Annoying, sure, but... All later stuff was/is crap, t'is true....

I've tried, believe me I've tried - mono and stereo mixes, stereo, headphones, MP3 player etc, but I can't even get as worked up as Poacher Jake.
It's just utterly forgetable, like Keane without the sense of dangerous animal sexuality. Sorry if thise disturbs your cosmology, but it's bland rubbish.

Can't say i agree with your inclusion of Marley, the Manics or the Chilli Peppers, but here's some I would include in a list of currently overly lauded acts

Goldfrapp
Elbow
Beck
Arcade Fire

I think people take a pop at him because he was so gob-smackingly successful. And anyone who can manage to come up with something as inspiring as this deserves to be in the glovebox of every car ever made.

Manic Sreet Preachers/Stereophonics

Surely these are the same band?

the Manics are no doubt past their best but if nothing else they were visually and lyrically lightyears ahead of the dull Sterophonies. In the early nineties MSP were a glittery mix-up of glam rock and political pop. They would NEVER have written stuff like 'Have A Nice Day' and other banalities.
Can you imagine the Stereos singing "I spat out Plath and Pinter" for a chorus?!

Can you imagine the Stereos singing "I spat out Plath and Pinter" for a chorus?!
________________________

why would anyone want to though? It's a leadenly portentous and pretentious lyric. I mean what was the scenario for this spitting? Was he recounting an argument with a lover perhaps? In which case, anyone who starts quoting poets and dramatists in the midst of a lovers' tiff (or writes songs about fictional 'I's who do) deserves a good slap I say.

In contrast: "Keats and Yeats are on your side
While Wilde is on mine" - now that's quality

Van's masterful 'Summertime In England' - IMHO his best individual track
_________________________

I think of it each time I go up to the Lakes ...

wonderful though it is, I'd put it behind a few off Veedon Fleece and St Dom's Preview which are poetry in themselves

...always great to see so much acclaim for that album's material. I bought it for the princely sum of £1.25 last year and fell in love with it; it's incredibly beautiful. Trawled through second hand stores getting hold of Van's other albums then.

Has to be The Clash for me; I can't get near appreciating this band due to the amount of fawning praise thrown their way- 'the only band that mattered' etc. The amount of their songs I really like I could probably count on one hand. See also Guns N Roses; a few songs I don't mind from the debut but can't bear anything else they've done, which isn't that much anyway considering the amount of times magazines like Classic Rock have featured them.

Not a huge Manic Street Preachers fan but I think 'Motorcycle Emptiness' is a genuinely great song. Love Bob Marley and The Beach Boys, but I'm indifferent to RHCP and The Cranberries...though are the latter 'lauded', really?

to take the sacred cows out for the afternoon and give them a good kicking around.

to take the sacred cows out for the afternoon and give them a good kicking around.
___________

precisely
___________

Top 5 Van albums:

1. Veedon Fleece
2. Astral Weeks
3. St Dominic's Preview
4. Common One
5. Into the Music

ain't bad. Marley : quite simply the most charismatic performer I've witnessed, by a long way. (Rainbow Theatre 1977, promoting 'Exodus'.) Beach Boys : a wealth of tunes whose beauty brings tears to my eyes. As for those others, though, I wouldn't piss on them if they were on fire. (Except perhaps John Frusciante, for I am a guitarist.) Especially annoying : Dolores and that - for want of a better word - voice of hers. Were she aflame I might start looking for a petrol can....

as a fully paid up member of the Word Massive but don't in the slightest.

Van Morrison
Bob Dylan
Radiohead
Eric Clapton
Jeff Beck
Randy Newman
Eagles
Pentangle

I am also truly mystified as to the general love of Elbow on these pages - even so much as I put aside my complete antipathy and gave them a try - but no, sorry!

...I thought it was crap, to be honest! Having said that, David Hepworth warned as much in his review of it, I seem to recall.

I don't think artists should be held responsible for the shortcomings of their audience - it's not Bob Marley's fault he's the only reggae artist most white people have ever heard of.

My vote for over-rated artist is Lou Reed - put aside the Velvets stuff and the Bowie collaboration (and i don't think Reed was the presiding genius in either of these situations), and what's left? A couple of so-so solo albums, a load more dreadful ones and guest slots with Simple Minds and the Killers. Certainly not enough to justify the seriousness with which he regards himself.

I don't think artists should be held responsible for the shortcomings of their audience - it's not Bob Marley's fault he's the only reggae artist most white people have ever heard of.
_______________________

ok, ok, agreed, that was slightly off the mark

I maintain though that he's not as amazing as constantly made out to be - but then I don't really like reggae, so hey, what do I know ...

It's hard to avoid hearing a number of his songs over the years but nothing really has ever particularly grabbed me. I bought a live album by him once as I felt I should own something. I must say I didn't really care for it. I found it all rather simplistic, almost childish and musically quite basic. It's not that I don't like reggae, although I prefer ska and dub, which seem more exciting. And dub has more complexity and so can stand a lot of re-listening. That's two well-loved acts I have slagged off so far today. Onwards and upwards!

If Bob's songs of freedom are indeed "a fixture in the glovebox of every middle-ranking marketive executive within a thousand miles of Swindon" we should rejoice.

Elvis?

He was certainly good, undeniably for his time, but I can't help thinking a lot of the praise is simply unwarranted. He was (and I'm fully expecting a good kicking here!) a bit of a one-trick pony, albeit an extremely good trick. He was, however, at the mercy of songwriters, and had some very variable material to cope with.

As a child I instinctively didn;t like his music that much because I picked up something profoundly sad about it (and therefore about him), and this was long before I knew about his personal life. The Beatles always seemed much more life-embracing to my twelve-year-old ears.

Final comment: at around the time he died, my mum had a double-cassette of his 40 greatest hits, spanning his whole career. Our house was broken into and the thieves stole just one of the two cassettes ...

No, not him, although I think he's over-rated, but: Madonna and Metallica. I just don't see the point of either, to be honest. Madonna's made a few decent singles but I can't see how she's sustained a career from the music. Metallica, well...

I feel obliged to refer you to my blog on this same subject on 24th August which generated a heated debate (So Why, Exactly, Is Madonna Famous?). I don't think anyone was able to put up a cast iron case for her - it has a lot to do with outfit changes, being an icon, conical bras and that sort of tripe. A few catchy singles aside - does anything she does really have lasting significance? She is a triumph of American marketing strategies. Like the charming man himself I could go on and on, but I suggest that you re-read the original blog for more in-depth knowledge.

I wonder how many people get out their Public Image stuff and give it a good old listening to! X Ray Spex then? Sham 69 even? Thought not. 'The wisdom of one age is the cack of the next' as the great poet said.

Pink Floyd, bits of The Wall are OK but the rest is self-indulgent nonsense.( A tad harsh , I admit )
David Bowie´s output in the last 15 years has eaten away at his legacy.
Ditto Eric Clapton.
The " Genius " Brian Wilson, no doubt a musical visionary with The BBs , but he strikes me as a bit lost, in every sense of the word, with his solo efforts.
The Red Hot Chilli Peppers for the unpardonable crime of "Funk-Rock"

Not so much the Beach Boys (the harmonies can be just spellbinding), but Pet Sounds particularly. Having read how it's among the greatest albums ever, I splashed out and bought the 4CD box set with stereo, mono, a capella and all sorts of versions only to discover... s'alright. Not brilliant. Just can't see what the fuss is about or why it's praised so highly.

The greatest album of all time? The Wall, of course. So there. I say it and I'm on the internet so it must be true :)

both seem hopelessly over-rated to me. At least the Beach Boys, Peppers, Cranberries, Preachers and Marley have at least 1 (and 3 of them actually quite a few) decent tunes to count as a legacy to be proud of. Brand and Ross?

Anyone who can make God Only knows or Redemption Song should be properly lauded even if everything else they did was crap which it wasn't.
Chilli Peppers are nothing special to me but Under the Bridge and a couple of others are pretty good pop records.
Cranberries i can see although Zombie is a great song.
Manic Street Preachers are also okay in their way.

Far more deserving of your vitriol are Snow Patrol, Keane, Razorlight, Queen, Coldplay, The Undertones, The Buzzcocks.

but no, cos that sort-of misses the point: the first five bands you list don't have much credibility now do they, they're widely derided despite their popularity - easy targets if you like.

What I'm talking about is bands or artists people talk about in hushed tones as visionary or seminal or groundbreaking or 'artisically deserving of their massive popularity' (as someone said 'sacred cows') .... so the Cranberries was a bit of an odd-one out, cos no one really ever said that about them.

Undertones and Buzzcocks - that's more the idea, I agree on the former but not the latter ...

are critically lauded for their whole output but rather rightly showered in affection for "Teenage Kicks" one of the greatest punk 45's and of course its connection to Peely. The Buzzcocks are another story and Pete Shelley was punk's recorder of love and all its accompanying messiness. Chalk one up for the 'cocks says I.

horribly overrated.

Also, that the shear passing of time renders an artist as 'a legend' (e.g. Shirley Bassey, Tom Jones) - that's plainly rubbish.

Personally I think Pet Sounds is fantastic but to be told that first, and then listen to it in that light - I can see the challenge, whatever the album. A reputation can kill enjoyment.

I've spent reasonable sums of time and money trying to get into Bob Dylan - like his stuff well enough, but I can't think of anything that I would take to a desert island. Just wasn't there when it happened.

Joni Mithcell. Tried. Failed. Sets off the dogs round here.