AESTHETICS OF HATE: R.I.P. DIMEBAG ABBOTT, AND GOOD RIDDANCE -- Time For Conservative Imagination!

ICONOCLAST ^ | by William Grim

[Apolitical]

Part of the hard work of civilization is teaching young to be able to distinguish between the good and the bad in all aspects of life. If we teach our young children to obey the 10 Commandments and to obey the laws of the land, but don't teach them to realize that Johann Sebastian Bach is superior to Dimebag Abbott, we have failed as parents and mentors. If a person has gone through 12 or 13 years of education and has not developed an appreciation for the greatest artistic achievements of mankind, that education has been an utter failure.

While laissez-faire is the correct approach to economics it has no place in the realm of aesthetics or morality. A confidant civilization imposes its morality and aesthetics on it young people. Yes, you heard it right. We impose. The Rousseauian noble savage is a myth. Left unchecked and untutored the savage will never attain nobility......

[Delbert]

The guys at Guitar Center knew me by the name of "If You Aren't Gonna Buy That Martin 000-28EC Clapton Model, Would You Please Put it Down So Someone Else Can Play It?" <---"No Stairway to Heaven Allowed"

[Delbert]

Actually it was not a topless bar, fully nude.

[monday]

"I am saying that, objectively speaking, and on balance, the heavy metal screechy depressing crap just really doesn't make that much of a contribution to our society."

The purpose of music is to inspire people or make them happy.

You may say that "from my limited experience and point of view, heavy metal screechy depressing, ...... doesn't make a contribution" and I will agree with you.

Since music isn't an objective medium like math or science that can be measured, only a fool would claim that it doesn't make it's fans as happy as classical music makes it's fans.

[Blzbba]

"Slave to the Grind was one of the best (and most underrated) metal albums of the 1990s."


Agreed.


You can't be King of the World if you're Slave to the Grind!

[NurdlyPeon]

Well, I can't say "from my limited experience", because I don't consider my experience to be all that limited, and in any case that's a subject which could be debated ad infinitum.

And I didn't say "doesn't make a contribution", I said "doesn't make that much of a contribution"

And, I don't recall saying anything about "make it's fans as happy". I'm sure that talking about killing cops and f**king hoes makes somebody somewhere happy, but what has that got to do with making a positive contribution to the society?

[Jasper]

"Those million guitarists who followed, without the classical training,

IMHO, while 'classical training' is a definite plus; some of the best guitar players I have ever heard were self taught or had very little instruction. You either have a 'genius', and a musical sense for the guitar, or you don't.

and began playing "solos as fast as possible for no reason" however, suck. ;0)"

I agree. As an old friend and guitar instructor once told me:"It aint how many sixteenth and thirty-second notes ya slip into a measure, it's what you do with those notes. When he needs to, within his own context, he can "shred" with the best of them.

/jasper

[Delbert]

Thanks for posting that , it was very cool to see what his peers thought of him.

[Chad Fairbanks]

I agree with what you wrote - I was merely poking good-natured fun at the Yngwie-wannabes ;0)

[Tribune7]

I think it's Mr. Grimes being rather uncouth in speaking of the dead that way.

[RockinRight]

So, tell me what exactly J.S. Bach "contributed to society" anyway? Music that people enjoy and remember? Something that other future artists followed and emulated? Positive things for the community?

All these hold true for metal and guys like Dimebag as well.

[monday]

" At root, you seem to believe that all "cultures" are equal--they are not. "

No they are not. You are equating music and culture though. Are they the same? Are all metal music lovers monsters who should be shunned? Are classical music lovers all wise and intelligent? Should I base my musical tastes on what someone else tells me just because they are sanctimonious and tell me they know what is best for me?

You say; "As for Ellington, don't be patronizing, you're not smart enough."

lol...I see. In other words, "only I am smart enough to be patronizing, shut up you uncultured clod and listen to your betters."

[US admirer]

"In my book, mocking someone is synonymous with disliking them."

It appears at least that you downgraded your omniscient interpretation of my feelings from hating to dislike. so um, I guess my arguments are slowly winning you over. Come on. I know you want to say Yeeeaaaaassssss, praise the Lord.

"Calling them "hypocrites," while presenting no evidence, is cheap and tawdry."

I’m sorry. I thought that as a good Christian with so much experience in revivals and so on, you would have been familiar with the likes of Jimmy Swaggart, who I presented as an example of just such a (more) scripture quoting (harder) bible thumbing Christian. Apparently you are not as well versed in the fine art of the revivalism a I thought.

While I actually was familiar with many of the details of these charlatans leading the blind I expected you would like actual references and hence I have included them for your education.

If you go to "Google News" now, and type in "Jimmy Swaggart" here is the first thing that comes up:

http://news.independent.co.uk/people/profiles/story.jsp?story=591979

JIMMY SWAGGART: Sins of the Flesh - Dec 10 2004

“In the gaudy, intemperate world of 1980s US televangelism, no one burnt with a more self-righteous fury than the Rev Jimmy Swaggart. He was iron-hard on all the usual soft targets: gays, Hollywood, people not pledging their life savings to Jimmy Swaggart Ministries - but poured special bile on his peers, such as Jim Bakker, whose Praise The Lord network collapsed when he was revealed to have had an affair with his secretary. Swaggart went on Larry King's CNN show to say such sinners were "a cancer on the body of Christ". There was an inevitability to his exposure as a regular client of hookers at several insalubrious Louisiana truck-stops.” (hey no offense to Louisiana truck stops OK?)

Can you spell H-Y-P-O-C-R-I-T-E

Well if that one dosen't meet your definition, try this on for size and feast your Christian eyes on the third hit, which is particularly telling and representative of the whole rotten grimy “cheap and tawdry” bunch (now just calm down- I don’t hate them, I hate their sins don’t ya know!).


http://www.axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/article_14418.shtml

“Descending the podium, I had noticed but a single empty chair in the entire room. Taking it, I found myself at a table of strangely egalitarian folk. They were gentle in manner. They welcomed me expansively. They introduced themselves. To my delight, they spoke less of arcane technology than they did of their fellow man and their responsibilities toward humanity that such technology could help them fulfill. I listened, interested, noting that they all had that sort of deliberate not quite real Dixie accent that I’d learned to recognize in actors when playing Southern characters before the camera. But why here? Their names - remarkable in retrospect, but hardly noteworthy at the time - were Jimmy Swaggart, Paul Crouch, Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker, Pat Robertson, Robert Tilton, and a guy named Billy Batts. I was present, I know now, at American Televangelism’s Big Bang, or if you prefer, its Genesis. Big league Fundamentalist Christian TV Evangelism was born at that table that day...

Of the seven people at that fateful dinner table, most would be embroiled in scandals. They would stand accused or proven guilty of behavior violating their very admonitions and those of their professed god. One would be indicted for fraud, another convicted, two would be involved in extramarital affairs with prostitutes and another accused of sexual harassment by a same-sex employee.6 The preacher accused of this laying on of hands would pay that employee nearly half-a-million dollars to keep his silence. Another would enter drug rehab. One I would personally witness attempting to pass a worthless check for $2,000,000.00 of satellite equipment and services. Nice bunch. “

Need more evidence skoozy-toozy? Cause it just keeps on cummin. Unfortunately, I could sit here and post all day, and then all night and I would still have scandals to marvel at. Now I’m certain these aren't your Christian heroes... or, ah, are they?

Oh no, I know they are not representative of the real bible thumpin, scripture screamin preachers, well at least those that haven't been found out yet.

And by the way, you know one hell of a lot less about me than I know about these bums (who I don’t hate but OK, maybe do dislike, just a teenie weenie itsy bit, but don't hate, no hate) and yet you seem very uninhibited in pontificating about my knowledge and motives. Kinda makes you look like a hypocrite too skoozy-woozy, and well we wouldn’t want that, would we?

So next time, be careful before you make those leaps to judgment without the facts otherwise that leap might just put you in front of one of those big Christian metaphorical Sunday school busses and you could get hurt! And Lord knows I would't want that my little skoozy-foosy-schmoozie-poozie.

Remember keep love in your heart.

Oh, and have a nice day!

[NurdlyPeon]

Cast not your pearls before swine, buddy. These people just don't seem to be able to follow along. I'm going to call this thread a day.

[MahaMarty]

Um, Madonna is her first name by birth.

[monday]

"Well, I can't say "from my limited experience", because I don't consider my experience to be all that limited,"

Unless you enjoy or study metal music your experience listening to metal music is limited. That is not open to debate unless you listen to metal music for some other perverse reason.

Incidentally, music isn't required to make a positive contribution to society according to your standards. It is only music, entertainment.

[Chad Fairbanks]

These people just don't seem to be able to follow along. I'm going to call this thread a day.

I'm sorry. I was listening to my Quattro pezzi sacri/DamagePlan mix CD... You were saying...?

[MagnumRancid]

<<
I believe, too, that the superior man seeks the Apollonian in art rather than the Dionysian, but the relativists might take exception to this...and there certainly are exceptions to my rule.
>>
Alas, I am afraid I must abandon any and all hope of ever being a "superior man", since I don't grok Apollonian vs. Dionysian relative to music. I am going to guess that the Apollonian is more lofty or celestial/cerebral and the Dionysian is more base/physical/earthy. Am I close? I like my Bach just fine, thank you. I suppose I could drop another name or two but no point in that. I also like to "kick out the jams". Blue Oyster Cult, The Stones, or even Pantera is superior to Bach, Wagner, or Mozart for certain purposes. Fine dining is inadequate if what I want at the time is a hamburger.

[MagnumRancid]

<<
....but I don't play the piano and I understood that was the criterion for any kind of real appreciation for the racket and discords that bellow forth from these horrible exibitions of human lewdness and craziness on the stages of these idiotic and neanderthal rock concerts.
>>
Good to see you maintain an open mind on the issue.