Down with the happy collectives!
Over 14 people on stage? Pseudo-hippie love? All about the drugs and booze? The bigger, the better, right?
I don’t know about you, but this whole exploding bands epidemic has got me a little concerned. What happened to the days of cranky bands with dictatorship leaders, like The Cure, or The Smiths, or hell, even Oasis? It’s all a big feel good party out there these days, and maybe because I’m a hateful bastard, but I’ve been left behind on this one.
Where did this current trend of bulging bands come from? For me, I think most of the blame could be based on the Arts and Crafts collective, Broken Social Scene. I enjoy BSS, don’t get me wrong, but I wonder why sometimes. Probably because each song is so unique and textured, and the variety of it all keeps my so-called iPod attention span entertained.
Broken Social Scene are probably one of the most famous of these “collective bands” probably because they are made up of so many semi-successful members of other really great bands, like Stars, Metric, Feist, Apostle of Hustle, etc. And while I love all these other bands, none of them reach the same sort of creative climax that BSS accomplishes, maybe excluding Stars. It leads me to believe that BSS is greater than the sum of its parts, which each little guest star pushing the band further into greatness.
Would Broken Social Scene be as great if it were just stripped down to two or three members, like their Toronto peers Death From Above? Probably not.
See, that’s the thing, is Broken Social Scene can do this collective thing really well. They can take a pile of performers, put ‘em all together, and make something great. Same with Arcade Fire and Godspeed.
But I think this trend will go too far.
People hopping on this bandwagon are going to lose sense of their dynamics, because making a big sound is easy with 10 people on stage, as opposed to three. But with 10 people on stage, its harder to be quiet, which is the true key to dynamics.
I kind of liken it to those singers on those Idol shows… really great at hitting all the power notes, but in terms of actually singing a melody or sounding meaningful, these kids fail.
Once upon a time, there were these things called “big bands,” mini orchestras with over 30 instruments, the original collectives. I’m pretty sure they feel out of fashion because you make more money splitting the pot three ways instead of thirty.
But I don’t really have too much to complain about. While the whole BSS/Arts and Crafts collective is a big love-in, they are balanced out by the whole dark horse Montreal collective scene of goth-y bands like Godspeed, Arcade Fire, and The Dears, who are known as much for their depressing nature as much as anything else.
All in all, these trends are all cyclical right. This happy-lucky massive group thing will consume itself, and everyone will go back to wearing black and looking at their shoes.
Or maybe not.
This is the iPod culture after all, and maybe the cycle will just turn into a wild oscillation between one man bands and thirty people strong rock orchestras on a never-ending feedback loop.
