"House of Jealous Lovers" is the worst piece of garbage of the last ten years of indie rock

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I mean, try to defend it. It makes me want to perform acts of unusual cruelty.

― roger adultery, Monday, 15 December 2003 06:50 (twenty-two years ago)

Dude, Bright Eyes exists. No way this song can be the worst.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Monday, 15 December 2003 06:51 (twenty-two years ago)

do you really want a list of EVERY INDIE SONG from the last ten years that's worse?

― fiddo centington (dubplatestyle), Monday, 15 December 2003 06:51 (twenty-two years ago)

cuz that's like maybe all of them, except 20 or so.

― fiddo centington (dubplatestyle), Monday, 15 December 2003 06:52 (twenty-two years ago)

I thought indie was dead.

― Gear! (Gear!), Monday, 15 December 2003 06:52 (twenty-two years ago)

Dude, I am NO fan of Oberst, but Fevers and Mirrors is fucking Exile on Main Street compared to this song.

― roger adultery, Monday, 15 December 2003 06:53 (twenty-two years ago)

this song is great! i'm gonna go listen to it right now!

it's even better live

― geeta (geeta), Monday, 15 December 2003 06:54 (twenty-two years ago)

ok its shit...but how is it indie again?

― gaz (gaz), Monday, 15 December 2003 06:54 (twenty-two years ago)

I saw them live before I heard the record, and whenever I listen to it, I keep wanting more sax!

― jaymc (jaymc), Monday, 15 December 2003 06:55 (twenty-two years ago)

you don't even like the 'shakedown!' part?

― geeta (geeta), Monday, 15 December 2003 06:56 (twenty-two years ago)

I like it. It has a good beat and you can dance to it. Not big on much of their latest lp, though. I especially dislike the one that sounds just like Big Star.

― dylan (dylan), Monday, 15 December 2003 06:59 (twenty-two years ago)

I love it! It's about time people who couldn't sing started singing again. I've been waqiting for this sea change since about 1979.

― the music mole (colin s barrow), Monday, 15 December 2003 06:59 (twenty-two years ago)

i dislike it. most annoying x-month old track on aussie radio. i like other stuff on the album though.

― gaz (gaz), Monday, 15 December 2003 07:02 (twenty-two years ago)

once again the "roger adultery hates it" revelation proves not unlike a great big shining Seal of Greatness

― nate detritus (natedetritus), Monday, 15 December 2003 07:15 (twenty-two years ago)

surely "hey ya" is the worst piece of garbage of the last ten years of indie rock

― fiddo centington (dubplatestyle), Monday, 15 December 2003 07:17 (twenty-two years ago)

this thread is baffling

― the surface noise (electricsound), Monday, 15 December 2003 07:18 (twenty-two years ago)

Yeah, that song where he tries to be John Lydon's a lot worse

― Andrew Thames (Andrew Thames), Monday, 15 December 2003 07:28 (twenty-two years ago)

it's like britpop never existed (and i wish it hadn't)

― the surface noise (electricsound), Monday, 15 December 2003 07:29 (twenty-two years ago)

so fiddo, why the change of heart?

― Sterling Clover (s_clover), Monday, 15 December 2003 07:40 (twenty-two years ago)

omnipresence.

― fiddo centington (dubplatestyle), Monday, 15 December 2003 07:46 (twenty-two years ago)

Um, wasn't this thread already done and over with like 19 months ago ?

― Vic (Vic), Monday, 15 December 2003 07:51 (twenty-two years ago)

― cinniblount (James Blount), Monday, 15 December 2003 08:01 (twenty-two years ago)

"ONE STEP BEYOND"

― mark grout (mark grout), Monday, 15 December 2003 11:26 (twenty-two years ago)

I think it's pretty damn good, actually.

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Monday, 15 December 2003 13:00 (twenty-two years ago)

i like it but there are better tracks on 'Echoes' imo

― stevem (blueski), Monday, 15 December 2003 13:03 (twenty-two years ago)

i agree stevem - much as i love HOJL there are better things on the album. i cant belive i'm even contributing to this ridiculous thread though.

― jed (jed_e_3), Monday, 15 December 2003 13:06 (twenty-two years ago)

"I love it! It's about time people who couldn't sing started singing again. I've been waqiting for this sea change since about 1979."

??????

have you heard of a band called belle and sebastian?

― ambrose (ambrose), Monday, 15 December 2003 13:09 (twenty-two years ago)

i like it but there are better tracks on 'Echoes' imo

Very true.

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Monday, 15 December 2003 13:14 (twenty-two years ago)

do go see them live if you can as they are hella fun

― stevem (blueski), Monday, 15 December 2003 13:17 (twenty-two years ago)

It's probably the lesser part of the DFA launch triumviurate that also includes 'Losing My Edge' and 'Beat Connection', but it does kick like a goddamn sucker.

― Barima (Barima), Monday, 15 December 2003 17:20 (twenty-two years ago)

best part: the tiny little overdub on the screamed "down" part of "shake-Dooooooooooooooooowwwwwwwwwwwnnnnnnnnnnnn"

― gff, Monday, 15 December 2003 17:44 (twenty-two years ago)

Jess:

You keep listing Ted Leo on your top ten yet criticize those who swear by the indie-rock canon. He's indie rock isn't he? Or is he on your list of 20 that you exempt from criticism? Ted may be better than Conor Bright Eyes but I don't see why his wannabe Paul Weller Joe Jackson pop-rock manages to largely escape criticism here.

I agree with you and others though that there are countless worse songs than "House of Jealous Lovers," which, despite the shrieking vocals, I kinda like. Now, Rapture's knock-off of PIl's "Careering" sure is lacking though.

― Steve Kiviat (Steve K), Monday, 15 December 2003 17:46 (twenty-two years ago)

I've never heard this song and I'm not even quite sure who does it.

― nickalicious (nickalicious), Monday, 15 December 2003 17:58 (twenty-two years ago)

steve:

about 20 or 30 songs > "house of jealous lovers" > every other indie song from the last 10 years.

it's a continuum not a hirearchy.

― fiddo centington (dubplatestyle), Monday, 15 December 2003 18:01 (twenty-two years ago)

I prefer the knockoff to "Careering"

― M Matos (M Matos), Monday, 15 December 2003 18:09 (twenty-two years ago)

just like I prefer "HOJL" to all but like one or two Gang of Four songs

― M Matos (M Matos), Monday, 15 December 2003 18:09 (twenty-two years ago)

You're kidding aren't you.

― Steve Kiviat (Steve K), Monday, 15 December 2003 18:13 (twenty-two years ago)

Gang of Four songs that are better than HOJL:

damaged goods
at home he's a tourist
i found that essence rare
paralysed
what we all want
call me up

i'm sure there are many more but i'm tired of typing. and i absolutely love HOJL.

― fact checking cuz (fcc), Monday, 15 December 2003 18:17 (twenty-two years ago)

Oh wait I heard this song at Cprek's house. It's pretty a'ight.

― nickalicious (nickalicious), Monday, 15 December 2003 18:20 (twenty-two years ago)

I think at this point HOJL is a lot less boring than a lot of Gang of Four's output. But Gang of Four didn't really have THAT many good songs anyway, did they?

'Echoes' Careering knockoff is alright, and the fact that he shouts 'WHUUUUT?!' in a silly voice at the end of each line improves it a lot.

― Fug (Ferg), Monday, 15 December 2003 18:27 (twenty-two years ago)

I prefer the knockoff to "Careering"
-- M Matos (michaelangelomato...), December 15th, 2003.

You are dead to me.

― Dean Gulberry (deangulberry), Monday, 15 December 2003 18:37 (twenty-two years ago)

why would I kid? and ooh fucking boy, I'm dead to Dean Gulberry! shit! I'm in for it now! < /mock horror>

― M Matos (M Matos), Monday, 15 December 2003 18:45 (twenty-two years ago)

I really like it, but I can't help but think it would be better if it were polished to a higher sheen and had a better singer.

― Spencer Chow (spencermfi), Monday, 15 December 2003 18:48 (twenty-two years ago)

4RLZ.

I vote that Matos is the worst piece of garbage in the last ten years of garbage.

― Dean Gulberry (deangulberry), Monday, 15 December 2003 18:49 (twenty-two years ago)

They've been around that long? Shirley Manson still looks great.

― nickalicious (nickalicious), Monday, 15 December 2003 18:50 (twenty-two years ago)

oh no! my cred's washed up! OH NO!

― M Matos (M Matos), Monday, 15 December 2003 18:50 (twenty-two years ago)

Chk-chk-chk at the way this thread's going.

Entertainment didn't knock me sideways when I finally heard it this year.

― Barima (Barima), Monday, 15 December 2003 18:53 (twenty-two years ago)

HOJL does something entirely different to most/all gang of 4 songs why is it surprising that someone would prefer what it does to what they do. ?

― pete b. (pete b.), Monday, 15 December 2003 18:55 (twenty-two years ago)

because we have to HONOR THE TRADITION

― M Matos (M Matos), Monday, 15 December 2003 18:56 (twenty-two years ago)

someone doing something the first time ALWAYS = doing it BETTER

― M Matos (M Matos), Monday, 15 December 2003 18:57 (twenty-two years ago)

Skipping 80 messages at this point... Click here if you want to load them all.

Hmmm, I think I bought the Young Marble Giants CD last year at Rocks in Your Head ... I finally broke down and bought the import, unaware that a domestic version would be released not five months later. Ha. Seemed like a pretty good store, yeah.

― jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 05:19 (twenty-two years ago)

Am I the only person who thinks The Rapture really sound very very little like Gang of Four?
It was my impression upon listening to "Echoes" that The Pop Group were at least as important an influence as Gang of Four. The Pop Group at its most conventional, that is (parts of "For How Much Longer do We Tolerate Mass Murder"). But Mark Stewart's vocals were such an important part of TPG's sound that it might not occur to many... I like HOJL very much.
It would be interesting to do a track-by-track breakdown of "Echoes" listing the quotes e.g. Careering and less blatant references to "classic" postpunk/new wave/etc.

― kdjfe, Tuesday, 16 December 2003 08:04 (twenty-two years ago)

Yes HOJL > Go4.

Do we really need a post-punk canon? etc.

― Tico Tico (Tico Tico), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 11:24 (twenty-two years ago)

Entertainment > Echoes though.

― Tico Tico (Tico Tico), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 11:25 (twenty-two years ago)

I only like Go4 ironically. I do not 'respect' old music. Or new music. PHEAR ME!

― alext (alext), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 12:25 (twenty-two years ago)

This thread is compleet wankpants.

― Nick Southall (Nick Southall), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 12:30 (twenty-two years ago)

Not a typo. Try pronouncing it.

― Nick Southall (Nick Southall), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 12:30 (twenty-two years ago)

you all took ten minutes of my life and i want it back.

Oh I SO can't stand it when Jess says something that genuinely makes me laugh out loud.

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 15:24 (twenty-two years ago)

at times the Rapture have also sounded like the Cure, Suicide, Big Star, Frankie Knuckles many other influences. I think it's to their credit that they rip off many people, not just one, and personally see it the way Stereolab did/does it, i.e., you can't listen to Jenny Ondioline and not think, "they're doing Neu!" but they put it in a different context for a different audience...

― Dan Selzer (Dan Selzer), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 16:59 (twenty-two years ago)

stereolab is better than neu.

― keith m (keithmcl), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 22:06 (twenty-two years ago)

neu had balls, though this does not necessarily make the above false

― the surface noise (electricsound), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 22:08 (twenty-two years ago)

I really like it, but I can't help but think it would be better if it were polished to a higher sheen and had a better singer.

I love HOJL but I'd love it so much more if it were sung by Martha Wash.

― bad jode (Jody Beth Rosen), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 22:28 (twenty-two years ago)

It needs a female.

― bad jode (Jody Beth Rosen), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 22:29 (twenty-two years ago)

i say that every night

― cinniblount (James Blount), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 22:29 (twenty-two years ago)

aww

― bad jode (Jody Beth Rosen), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 22:34 (twenty-two years ago)

blount is such a horndog.

― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 22:35 (twenty-two years ago)

Jode OTM re: Martha Wash!

― Spencer Chow (spencermfi), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 22:36 (twenty-two years ago)

blount that's awful.

― fiddo centington (dubplatestyle), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 22:38 (twenty-two years ago)

have you considered the monastery?

― fiddo centington (dubplatestyle), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 22:38 (twenty-two years ago)

i'm looking into german cannibalism

― cinniblount (James Blount), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 22:40 (twenty-two years ago)

also. matt. I'd bet a million bucks Fugazi were big Gang of Four kids in their younger years

I'm sure you're right, too....it's funny I didn't hear Gang of 4 until years after I was a Fugazi fan and was really, really shocked....like "Oh my God, someone did this before Fugazi!"

If you came out of being sort of uninformed, small town punk fan like myself, Fugazi seemed like they sort of fell out of the sky...

― Matt Helgeson (Matt Helgeson), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 22:40 (twenty-two years ago)

matt otm

― fiddo centington (dubplatestyle), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 22:41 (twenty-two years ago)

esp if you were trying to somehow link them to minor threat

― fiddo centington (dubplatestyle), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 22:41 (twenty-two years ago)

things i heard about for the first time reading fugazi interviews/reviews: go-go, dub, electric miles.

― fiddo centington (dubplatestyle), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 22:42 (twenty-two years ago)

oh, and post-punk obv

― fiddo centington (dubplatestyle), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 22:42 (twenty-two years ago)

yeah...until them it was like my conception of music was A) the heavy metal I'd grown up on B) Run-DMC and Beastie Boys and C) standard punk kid stuff like Dead Kennedys, Ramones, Misfits, Minor Threat.....Fugazi was always really cool about talking about different kinds of music and their influences....

― Matt Helgeson (Matt Helgeson), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 22:53 (twenty-two years ago)

three months pass...

yeah, okay guys. i like this song. it's a good song to drive to. i wouldn't really consider it indie though. oh yeah, and i love bright eyes.

― chanelle mays, Thursday, 8 April 2004 01:02 (twenty-two years ago)

bedtime for you

― roger adultery (roger adultery), Thursday, 8 April 2004 02:02 (twenty-two years ago)

This song's ill, but only in its original 12" incarnation. I don't dig the album or CD single versions. Where's the groovy bass at the beginning??? It's... GONE!!

― Mr. Snrub (Mr. Snrub), Thursday, 8 April 2004 04:29 (twenty-two years ago)

I really don't like it....its so thin. So unfunky and uncool and unfun.

Don't get me started on that saxophone wankery.

― djdee2005, Thursday, 8 April 2004 04:35 (twenty-two years ago)

wankery

I am tired of all this incessant anti-masturbation slander

― Nate in ST.P (natedetritus), Thursday, 8 April 2004 05:16 (twenty-two years ago)

three years pass...

great song ('hojl'). rough and dirty sounding, catchy as the plague, totally danceable

― Charlie Howard, Sunday, 5 August 2007 13:34 (eighteen years ago)

I actually prefer "Whoo... Alright, Uh-Huh" (or whatever it's called) off of the last album to this. Still a good song though.

― the next grozart, Sunday, 5 August 2007 13:38 (eighteen years ago)

Ban Manalishi.

― Colonel Poo, Sunday, 5 August 2007 13:39 (eighteen years ago)

[seething, definitive putdown of HOJL here]
not even worth wasting intellectual energy.

― blunt, Sunday, 5 August 2007 14:46 (eighteen years ago)

WAYUH is soooo much better than House of Jealous Lover

― Mr. Snrub, Sunday, 5 August 2007 16:42 (eighteen years ago)

Lovers, even

― Mr. Snrub, Sunday, 5 August 2007 16:42 (eighteen years ago)

this song is really bad. whenever i hear it out i go to the bathroom. djdee is otm re unfunky

― elan, Sunday, 5 August 2007 17:13 (eighteen years ago)

Yeah I never understood the appeal of this song. I never thought it was bad, just boring and unremarkable.

― filthy dylan, Sunday, 5 August 2007 20:12 (eighteen years ago)

Hate, have hated, and will continue to hate this song.

― wanko ergo sum, Sunday, 5 August 2007 20:15 (eighteen years ago)

"House of Jealous Lovers" rules. U R all ghey.

― The Reverend, Sunday, 5 August 2007 20:28 (eighteen years ago)

no, you just like shit

― elan, Sunday, 5 August 2007 21:01 (eighteen years ago)

One of the best songs to dance to in this fuckin' century.

― zeus, Sunday, 5 August 2007 21:04 (eighteen years ago)

whatever happened to this band?

― scott seward, Sunday, 5 August 2007 21:06 (eighteen years ago)

They released a good-to-excellent album last year.

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Sunday, 5 August 2007 21:09 (eighteen years ago)

Uh, more towards the "good" end of that particular continuum.

― The Reverend, Sunday, 5 August 2007 23:24 (eighteen years ago)

i never heard it. and barely remember that it came out. i missed that last yeah yeah yeahs album entirely too. and the strokes album. not that i was LOOKING for them or anything. but they didn't hit my dim-bulb radar at all. i saw the shins and the arcade fire on t.v. though. and spoon. making me an expert on those bands.

― scott seward, Sunday, 5 August 2007 23:28 (eighteen years ago)

out of the rapture and the other bands scott listed, the only bands that still register for me in terms of their new content are spoon and the rapture. through with caring about yeah yeah yeahs (if i ever did in the first place), the arcade fire, and the strokes (though strangely enough i really like the first two records if i'm pushed to say it)

― Charlie Howard, Monday, 6 August 2007 04:35 (eighteen years ago)

Really bad management of the HOJL lovers - how long did it take their label to release the album, a full year?

― milo z, Monday, 6 August 2007 04:48 (eighteen years ago)

HOJL buzz, not lovers. I don't know where that came from.

― milo z, Monday, 6 August 2007 04:49 (eighteen years ago)

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