In a comment on his Morrissey review earlier this week, fellow Idolatorian Mike Barthel mentioned that his antipathy toward Animal Collective was so strong, he couldn’t even understand why other people liked them:
Why do I hate AC? I’ve gotten into it elsewhere, and yeah, like Maura said, there hasn’t really been a proper platform to air any writer’s grievances at length. I just really, really don’t like them, to the point that I don’t even really understand why other people like them. I actually spent about an hour today talking to a former AC-hata who was trying to talk me into liking the new album, and I gave it an honest, serious try, and it made me want to stab knitting needles in my eyes.
That’s some serious hate there, but I completely understand. There are some bands that I loathe so much that it clouds my reason. The rational centers of my brain are so opposed to them that I can’t understand why any thinking bidepal creature would ever deign to listen to such garbage.
There’s a definite divide between the bands that give me the Hate Shakes™ and bands that I just don’t like. For example, I get why high school kids dig the Doors (I know I did), and, heck, I can even see why kids got into the horrid nu-metal of the late ’90s/early ’00s. Sure, the thought of a Limp Bizkit song’s existence makes my kidneys want to jump out through my eyeballs, but I sort of understand the band’s underlying appeal.
But then we have a band like Kings of Leon. I know what you are thinking. They’re harmless and mediocre, right? Yeah, I know, but context has to be part of this kind of intense hatred. The Kings of Leon garner so much acclaim for their hook-free, watered-down faux-Southern rock garbage when more deserving bands (like everyone else in the world making music) don’t get covered with the same fervor, and it fills me with loathing. Adding fuel to this fire is that most of their fans seem to agree that the band is getting worse, yet the coverage is almost always praiseworthy. (This happens a lot when artists become “feature” bands that garner features over reviews. Features are generally fawning puff pieces meant to sell mags or generate clicks, so who cares if some Grumpy Gus in the back thinks the band sounds like putrified dog squeeze?) God, just talking about this band gives me the Hate Shakes™. You see? I’m so blinded by hate that I can’t even elucidate a tenable position on this. I just shake and hate and shake some more. Blergh!
How about you? Whom do you hate so much that you can’t even fathom why someone would ever listen to them? Who gives you the Hate Shakes™?
Also, Nine Inch Nails sucks! Haha. Kidding. I just wanted to feed the beast.
@Marth: Yes! Anything East Coast here in Canada just kills me.
Great Big Sea. That goddamn Spirit of the West song.
Death Cab for Cutie. I’m even having trouble articulating why, I’ve got the hate shakes so bad. I find them to be insincere for a start. They remind me of a certain kind of “sensitive dude” who seems nice at first but will then stalk you and write songs about you and generally creep you the hell out. Also, whiny. Grrr.
@Nunya B: Oh, I hadn’t noticed! Do they? I didn’t get the impression that she takes herself too seriously!
This is a weird one, because people always assume I will like: Captain Beefheart. UGH.
@Jon Can Dance: I’d mention Radiohead, but I assumed that would be understood, really.
@walkmasterflex:
I think The Hold Steady question all comes down to whether or not you use “bar rock” as a compliment or an invective.
I spend most of my music-listening life kinda cocooned within a few specific genres, so it’s tough for a band to earn my hatred these days, mostly because I just won’t encounter a lot of what’s under discussion in the larger world. That being said, all the piano-girls VH1 plays in the mornings drive me insane. I thought Fiona Apple had some damn good songs, but all these singer-songwriter girls who’ve come along in her wake have been without exception horrible.
Also, jam bands. The Disco Biscuits are the worst band on Earth. Phish are right up (down) there. The Dave Matthews Band? I’d rather jam flaming chopsticks in my ears.
@Lucas Jensen: Aha Hate Heartbreak
mostly Led Zep for me, they’re an immediate channel change, kneejerk, no matter the song, but that’s a purely musical response, no taking into account ‘hype’ or ‘cred’ or any of those things that make ppl hate, say, the Strokes.
Funny I was trying to ’splain AnmlColl to a friend just today (let the backlash begin) and I was all “you know maybe that break in Tomorrow Never Knows, or that real ambient floaty thing on Pet Sounds? Yeah Animal Collective turned that snippet into not just a song or an album, but a career!” thing is, I like that pulsating harmonic arythmic 60 second break on those tracks so I like AC.
@walkmasterflex: I loved The Hold Steady until they sold out.
@miryam: I hated Death Cab for Cutie until they sold out.
@boozyj: Hell yes. I hate her so much.
Ray LaMontagne…and his indiefied cousin Bon Iver. The latter, mostly due to the baffling consensus of love around his only-OK album.
@the rich girls are weeping: Google for some interviews with her and hopefully you’ll come to the conclusion that she should be shot on sight like I have.
@Lucas Jensen: I will give you Kravitz’s early, early, early stuff, but yeah, it’s mostly his hot-shit, designer-tailored, style-over-substance attitude in the face of his crushingly mediocre music that does it.
@Nunya B: Nooo, don’t shatter my illusions. I want to like that pablum without feeling guilty about it!
“In a comment on his Morrissey review earlier this week…”
BAM. Hate Shakes right there. He’s why rave needed to happen.
Vampire Weekend.
The Shins.
The Grateful Dead.
Katy Perry, of course, but hating her doesn’t strike me as irrational at all. There are plenty of sensible reasons to despise her.
@Ned Raggett: Gene! Damn, that opens old wounds. And since we’re at it, let’s ad Vertical Horizon, Train and Third Eye Blind to the list…
@natepatrin: I was just thinking the same thing. Completely insufferable!
@BawstonSean: Haha. A few comments back I was like ooooh, Vertical Horizon! TRAVIS.
@Ted Striker: I dunno; I suspect there are Hold Steady fans who used to sneer at Springsteen and bar rock.
I hate them, BTW.
I think this topic also brings up an interesting flip side to the Hate Shakes, which would be those bands that you love, and for which other people harbor (to your mind) irrational hatred. The band that stands out for me immediately is Pink Floyd, since where I see borderline genius in much of their music, I’ve known and heard from a large number of people who have an almost visceral negative reaction to them. When I listen to the instrumental intro to “Shine on You Crazy Diamond,” I have a really hard time seeing how someone could feel so strongly against it, and no difficulty understanding why someone could be amazed by it. I’m not an obsessive fan by any means, but just don’t get the idea of really HATING their music as a whole.
As for the Hate Shakes… The Offspring.
@Mike P.: Amen, brother! Whenever someone starts going on about the HS, I usually counter with an offer of “The Wild, The Innocent and the E Street Shuffle.” And I’m not even mad at the HS, but come on.
how fitting that animal collective would begin the piece: i swear on anything, whatever makes their music appealing to some people must be recorded in tones that only straight people can hear.
as a counterpoint, rufus wainwright need sing only four bars before all-consuming lasers of hate come shooting from my eyes. for the love of god, if one absolutely MUST become a singer, would it kill one to maybe attend a few speech therapy classes?
also, i hate everything neil young has ever touched. with a passion. and leonard cohen. so, basically, i despise male canadian singer-songwriters.
and animal collective.
@walkmasterflex: I’m right there with you on Antony and the Johnsons. That voice; those songs. Absolute crap.
I also hate, hate, hate Keane. The whole we-don’t-have-a-guitar thing pisses me off. (Its not that I care that they don’t have a guitar; hell a lot of my favorite early 80s music is guitarless. Its just that they seem so douchey about it.) Except, of course, whenever I hear a Keane song on the radio, I think to myself “this song is pretty good” and then when I figure out the artist, I feel ashamed and pissed off at myself for liking a Keane song. Fuck you Keane (shakes fist in the air).
The Eagles.
God. They suck SO bad.
But, I don’t understand getting the Hate Shakes from say, Fleet Foxes or Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, or even to some extent AC- but I guess their cult is particularly annoying. But these mostly seem like casual distates. I fucking hate the Eagles.
@eyeball_kid: good point!
I will always ride for the late/great hip-hop producer Jay Dilla. I literally had to leave a party when someone insisted that he was “overrated” and then had the audacity to add, “It’s not like he was Timbaland or anything.” I’ve never wanted to hit someone so badly in my life.
The La’s. One of the first threads on ILM was called “WHY IN THE NAME OF ALL THAT IS HOLY DOES ANYONE LIKE THE LA’S” and of course a big fan turned up and was all reasonable and hurt and I thought oh no, I have been an asshole, but then I thought BUT IT’S THE LA’S. Magic 60s dust. That one about the ship. Fucking “Doledrum”. “It was a hit and nobody realised it’s about heroin”. Playing the same wretched songs at every gig for 12 years. Endless endless albums of demos of those same songs. It seems to be dying down a bit now in the UK probably because we had a few bands idiotic enough to try and sound like the La’s and everyone realised what a bad idea it was. But I remain vigilant.
@superineficaz: I’m so crushing hard on you right now.
@How do I say this … THROWDINI!:Right with you on Keane.
How could I forget Death Cab for Cutie? And Sara Bareilles, whose Love Song makes me tremble with Hate Tremors.
@Freakytrigger: Bless you, sir.
Frank Zappa. Guy was smart, funny, and politically astute, but MAN do I find his music awful.
Steve Miller Band.
Animal Collective (I was pissed they got a headline slot at Pitchfork over Jarvis. I mean it was JARVIS).
Dave Matthews
Neal Young
Sheryl Crow
Sufjan, et al…
I actually understand that they have redeeming value but I just can’t hack it.
Most music they play at Lincoln Park trixie bars. I remember spending a night out with co-workers (on their turf) and muttering to myself ‘I am in hell, I am in hell’ everytime people started singing along to the classic rock and bad pop. I love music and it was just too much to listen to that crap and drink overpriced bad beer. They finally threw on ‘The Whitest Boy Alive’ at the end of the night and cut it off halfway through to turn the lights on. 1 good song the whole night and it cuts off and the bar tried to blind me.
/rant
@eyeball_kid: @T’Challa: Double hi-5s! I’d have a hell of a lot more to say in a Bands You Defend thread than this one.
(PS: I liked Springsteen before I liked the Hold Steady. I also liked Lifter Puller before I liked the Hold Steady.)
For me right now it’s Fall Out Boy. I really tried to give them a chance again a few days ago when that video was posted but right from the start I thought the song totally blew, then I started getting worked up about that stupid band name, and Pete Wentz and his stupid hair and his stupid wife, and the stupid shit he says in interviews, and how he’s on the cover of every goddamn tabloid all the time, and shit I’m shaking now just thinking about them. Fall Out Boy. The name of the goddamn band is Fall Out Boy. AAAAAGGGGHHHH!
@natepatrin: Lifter Puller! Minneapolis represent!!
K.T. Tunstall
Van Morrison
I’m on the hating Fall Out Boy train, too.
Katy Perry and all of the people that like her.
I had to DJ a big old party on NYE and after a while I made myself a sign that said “DJ reserves to right to not play your song if she thinks it sucks”. I didn’t play a LOT of songs that night.
When their new album came out I was sort of surprised to find that I have the Hate Shakes for TV on the Radio. I loathed Cookie Mountain enough to continue loathing Dear Science without hearing more than a couple songs. Now just the sound of TVotR sets my teeth gnashing. And don’t get me started on Bon Iver, either.
If I spent more time with ‘em, I’d probably develop the Hate Shakes for the Hold Steady, but I think I saw right off that the band just wasn’t for me so I just don’t pay attention.
I recognize that these examples have not a little to do with hating a band’s hype in tandem with hating a band’s music, which is such an indie douche thing to do. So to balance that out, I’ll also say I’ve hated the Eagles since I was a lad, as well as “American Pie” (though I like “Vincent”). And the utter betrayal that was Metallica’s black album still stings to this day.
During lunch, I thought about how there are usually a few bands I read about every now and then in the OC Weekly(I live in Orange County) that seriously make me go off on rants for the entire day. Nothing worse than a local magazine choosing to cover only the crappiest bands they can find to rep the county.
There was a time when I could’ve filled this thread with 80 comments all by myself, but those days are gone. I don’t think there’s any band I hate rationally or irrationally anymore. If the time comes that good bands have to step out of the way and stop making music just so all the bad bands have room to do it, I might revert to my old positions. But right now, I’m in a live and let live music world.
God, I sound like a hippie.
Social Distortion
@eyeball_kid: Oooh that’s a great idea for a post too. I have tons of bands that I like and can’t for the life of me justify why. Kaiser Chiefs are one of them. I understand that their music is pedestrian, and all their songs are exactly the same (lacking any sort of nuance or experimentation and way overdoing the “wooooooaaaaaaahhhhhhhs”) but I just feel happy seeing Ricky Wilson jumping around on stage.
As far as music I hate beyond reason? Probably Pink Floyd (post Syd), Flogging Molly, AC, My Morning Jacket, and Of Montreal.
Nickelback.
What’s up with all of the Neil Young hate around here?
Phish
The Eagles
Fall Out Boy
…I should stop or I’ll be here all night.
@MayhemintheHood: Hey, I’m open to suggestions of who to pitch a story about!
I think a lot of hatred comes more from what the bands represent or the makeup of their fanbase than anything intrinsically musical. Some bands just suck, sure, (i.e. Creed and Nickelback) but there’s either a common “uncoolness” (i.e. Phish, The Eagles) or a common “too coolness” (i.e. The Strokes) to a lot of the bands people mention. And hipsters hate musical hegemony, so any large, rabid fanbase generates a lot of backlash.
A lot of people loathe the Eagles, but I love their hits, for the most part. The vocal harmonies on “Seven Bridges Road” alone are worth liking them for. Bring it on.
Oh, so many crappy bands so little time: off the top of my head I’m gonna say Animal Collective, Kiss, Modest Mouse, The Moldy Peaches, and Vampire Weekend. But to be honest, with the exception of Kiss, I have more of a problem with the people that like these bands and defend them; who wear their fandom as a badge of coolness or something. Like walking around proud of having taken a dump in your pants.
The Steve Miller Band.
Ever since the last album I absolutely hate of Montreal. I think that Kevin Barnes is trying WAAAAY too hard to shock people (which makes him strikingly similar to Marilyn Manson, whom I also hate with a passion), and that leads to OM’s fans being incredibly douchey about how weird they think they are. It’s all “Oh, look at me, I like this guy who rides a horse on stage and gets naked.” Hissing Fauna was actually shocking in that he was dealing with his life with such disturbing lyrics, but Lamping is just pathetic. And the music isn’t nearly as good.
@T’Challa: @natepatrin: It’s LFTR PLLR y’all!
@Ned Raggett: Ones that come to mind that made me get the Hate Shakes real bad are Millionaires, Paris Hilton mofos(or whatever they’re called) and The Shark That Ate My Friend. Those types of groups are seriously so bereft of talent that it’s infuriating to see any attention paid to them. From memory, I don’t think you were involved with any of those pieces. OC Weekly does do some great coverage every now and then, though. A couple months back you guys wrote about one of my favorite OC bands, Baby Champ, which was cool(even though they were breaking up that same week).