If she was classically trained in piano, she shouldn't need to reduce herself to droning beats, repetitive lines in songs, and shock-rock tactics.
That being said, I love droning beats (Techno, anyone?) and shock-rock tactics.
At least she can write her own music. Let's talk about Kesh@ or however she spells it. How can someone possibly claim that this is good music, or that she has any talent whatsoever?
It's simply a matter of how she chooses to convey her message/talents. First of all, she does do both, as there are numerous videos on the internet of her playing piano and singing normally; i.e., her acoustic version of Poker Face. This allows her to appeal to the pop crowd as well as the - and I use this term lightly - more 'musical' crowd.
As for Ke$ha...well, my opinions aside, she is purely an entertainer. She knows it, and her fans know it, and that's why they like her. Truly she is not doing ANYTHING musically unique in her songs, and she probably couldn't even if she tried.
Good lord, I think I'd actually get a less harsh reaction if I posted a video of myself burning a Koran on a Muslim message board. And this is exactly what I'm talking about. It's as if Lady Gaga is Christ to you people. I'd be hard pressed to believe that you guys would still be so adamant to defend her a year or two from now when the media has told you to discard her and move on to the next generic piece of crap.
There's nothing wrong with being a fan, I've said that time and time again on here. It's just the way you people clearly deify her that just seems a little over the top. So she can play piano, lots of people can play well. I can certainly respect her talent in that area, but aside from that her music still sounds to me like the same generic crap that's been squirted out for the passed few years. For christ's sakes guys, she's not the next John Lennon.
I mean, check out these lil nuggets of Lady Gaga Wisdom.
"Only value the opinion of those that you respect; and anyone that you don’t respect, pay no mind to their opinion about you or anything else." - Lady Gaga
Is that not basically the very definition of close minded ignorance? Although, with all due respect, it does seem like many people here are indeed abiding by this mentality.
If what she meant was something like "Gurl, don't let them hatas get 2 you!" She certainly could have done a better job of wording it.
"Self love is the most powerful thing that you can offer from your own life." - Lady Gaga
Not kindness, not generosity, not knowledge or insight. "Self Love". That's the single most important thing anyone can offer society? I mean, I certainly understand it's important not hate yourself and to half enough self respect to be able to carry on through the day, but that's still a pretty friggin selfish statement.
We're clearly not dealing with friggin Ghandi here. I assure you this is just another dime a dozen pop star and you people won't give a crap about her by 2012.
@SilveryCord: No offense, but I'm going to have to either assume you're from a country that doesn't have teen magazines, or you've never once set foot in the magazine section of any given store in the passed 2 years. Lady Gaga has been on the cover of: J14, Tiger Beat, M, Seventeen, and Cosmogirl. And those are just the ones I could think of off the top of my head. It might actually be harder to name a teen magazine she HASN'T been on.
[...]
All that being said, let's realize this is the internet. When in the history of EVER has anyone had a debate on the internet and actually had it end in "Oh, good point, that certainly changes the way I feel about the subject". We could go back and forth on this forever. I said my part, and you're free to disagree with it.
I apologize if I came off as harsh or overly-defensive in my post. I'm simply clarifying a few things about her to everyone, not just you. I'd just like to clarify the fact that you seem to think we idolize her. While that may be what many people do, I don't; I'm just defending my opinion of her music. There are plenty of songs/artists on the radio that I listen to solely for entertainment - i.e. Taio Cruz, Black Eyed Peas, Akon, and any overly-popular rapper to a certain degree - and those that I listen to for personally musical purposes - i.e. Usher because he can sing very well, Bruno Mars for the same reason as Usher, and Lady Gaga because she's one of the very, very, very few artists on pop radio that has any musical credibility to back her up.
As well, I'd like to personally distinguish myself - so as not to be marginalized any further - as a true fan of Lady Gaga. I don't listen to her because she's trendy (as stated above) but because I legitimately enjoy her music. As well, I'd be willing to bet I'll still be defending this position two years from now, and even ten years from now, because she's worth defending for me. (As well, I'm even trying to see her in concert when she comes to Atlanta in April. Whether or not I can afford the tickets by then is another story...)
Why do people like crap? Well, the PG rated answer is because some people have a certain liking towards certain secretions of the body that other people tend to stay away from. If you need any further information on this, ask someone who actually, well, "likes" said crap...no, but seriously.
But I think most country music is crap. Hell, let me be frank and say that I think most music is crap. I like music to have a purpose that can be applied to life or its understanding, not mindless garbage about sex and drugs and being overwhelmingly narcissistic.
Most music is crap, huh? You know, music can be written for the sake of being music, or for the very base purpose of enjoyment. In fact, the Classical era of music (1750-1825) is when people capitalized on the fact that their music was meant to entertain, and not always have a deep, moral or intellectual structure to it. It just so happened that the writers and masters of it at the time that are most remembered conveyed such messages.
Certainly, though, Mozart's violin sonatas can't hardly be applied to ANYONE's life-long understandings.
I disagree. I think that the problem with popular music isn't that it's simple, it's that it's devoid of any real meaning. Pop artists don't work hard to make great music, they shovel out a formula that appeals to people who don't think very deep about their music.
This couldn't be farther from the truth! Just because it's much easier to write music nowadays doesn't mean that there isn't a lot of thought and hard work that goes into them. See, that's where the "producers" come in.
Quincy Jones, while on the Colbert Report some time ago promoting his new book, gave an interesting quote: "If anything goes wrong on the song when it's sent to the masses, it's the producer's fault." Effectively, this means that your blaming the producers for how bad some songs are on today's radio. Producers go to great lengths, and the recording processes sometimes take months to perfect before sending to the masses.
And another thing, about "shoveling out a formula": there may be a certain structure that many songs follow nowadays, but that doesn't make them generic. Throughout music history, there have been periods like the Classical era where Sonata Form was written all the time. Likewise, in the Baroque era, it was all about Binary Form. They weren't looked down upon for being generic, that's just what was popular to write, and people loved it like they like the forms nowadays. If you hear something that goes in a Chorus-verse 1-chorus-verse 2-chorus-sweet sounding bridge-chorus, it's just the typical form of pop songs.
Can a person legitimately claim that Bethoven or Bach are objectively better musicians than William Hung? On what grounds?
Personally, I think not.
...Wow............um, ok. I will go into great lengths right now to prove that this is ENTIRELY possible and legitimate. To save space, though, I'll put it in a spoiler tag. You may read it if you please:
J.S. Bach wrote over 1000 pieces in his lifetime, the likes of which are all on record, so as not to say a fake number. He was an avid performer, allegedly the greatest organ player who ever lived. He was hired in three different cities throughout his life time where the majority of his composing and playing occurred: Weimar, Kothen, and Leipzig respectively. He pioneered writing music for organ that had never been written before, and provided pieces that are considered the most challenging in the repertoire even to this day for the cello, violin, viola da gamba, solo voice, flute, bassoon, piano, harpsichord, et. al. His influence spreads as far as every single composer who lived after him, and even some metal bands take his writings as inspiration for their own music.
Ludwig van Beethoven was a great player from the age of nine, and would become an established composer from his first works at the age of eleven. His influences were the likes of Mozart and Haydn, and he imitated their styles and techniques in many of his early compositions. However, in his later years, his symphonies and operas reflected great musical maturity, in that they expanded themselves from smaller orchestras to those that were more grand scale. These encompassed a whirlwind of emotion in every single one of his works given the extreme crises he faced in his lifetime, including many dear family members dying, and even his own slip towards alcoholism and deafness. Much like Bach, his influence reached nearly every composer after his lifetime, and still continue to influence many people today. Ever heard of neo-classical? Yeah, his works still show great influence in aspiring writers to this day. He, much like Bach, was seen as a period marker. His writings completely changed the world of music forever, again much like Bach.
William Hung is talentless, and that is the basis of his career. He makes money off of being completely terrible even though he seems to be trying his hardest. He has no influence and no credible factors to back up anything he does. In his famous American Idol audition, he claimed himself that he'd never had any musical training. Honestly, to say any more about him would give him more musical credit than he deserves.
So what have we learned? The fact of the matter is that Bach and Beethoven are infinitely better "musicians" than William Hung, because William Hung isn't a musician; he's an "entertainer". I understand the idea of opinions and objectivism, but there has to be a line drawn; and that line is drawn when you're saying that a talentless entertainer - which, again, is the basis of his fame in the first place - is a better musician than two musicians who, with their influence, changed the course of music forever.
Besides, I'd be willing to bet that even someone who is a die-hard William Hung fan would not dare say that he's a better "musician" than Beethoven or Bach. Even if they're not fans of the Classical or Baroque genres, they're not stupid.
And by the way, if anyone claims this whole argument is a moot point because it's a comparison of apples to oranges, then this whole thread is a moot point, so the joke's on you too!! (basically, no it's not...)
I don't know who I dislike more. Music elitists who act like their opinion is so great or people who get all in arms when their favorite mediocre artist is insulted.
Can they not be one in the same sometimes? Again, this is all objective if that's the central argument/defense in this thread. So basically, as has been stated before, this is a "one man's trash is another man's treasure" case. People may love someone who you think is a mediocre artist, and vice versa. If you insult their artist, they'll get in arms, believing their opinion is so great. Why do they think that? Simple: IT'S THEIR OPINION!!! Everyone thinks their opinions are so great; and if they don't, they're probably not very solid in their opinions in the first place.
Lady Gaga is crap. Thats not debateable. She is a carbon copy of all the alice cooper shock rockers that have come before her. Yes I look down on you for liking her. She is not original in the least.
Want good music? Listen to Pucchini. Listen to the blues of Otis Talor. Listen to some bluegrass (but god, whatever you do, don't listen to modern country).
The level of ignorance in this statement alone has moved me to say something that I feel needs to be said:
ATTENTION EVERYONE READING THIS THREAD!!! There seem to be many misconceptions about Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta. For those of you who don't know, she is actually a classically trained pianist, having been enrolled at the age of 17 at the Tisch School of the Arts at NYU. She withdrew from school during her sophomore to further pursue a career in popular music. Since then, she has achieved critical and fanatic acclaim, having released one album (with a promotional rerelease later on) which has already received awards as the best album of 2008/2010. Her fan base numbers in the tens of millions, and her album sales number around 12 million. Her music and compositions push modern music in a more avante-garde direction, pioneering intriguing visuals mixed with surprisingly lyrical music, despite the music of her piers seemingly being greatly inferior musically. Her bizarre public image has raised quite the controversy, as well as many people who dislike her. Let it be known that if you are someone who would rather belittle her success by claiming that what she does is not really music, than there is a definition for someone like you: hater.
As a devout Boros player since the deck idea surfaced so long ago, I'm glad to see it making it's steady comeback to the top. It may not've made the top 8, but hopefully some of these results will help it get in a more serious light again.
As for UB control, it is pretty much THE control deck now. I'll still play Boros for now, but I would love to play UB control if I could. I simply can't sell my soul for 4 jaces right now, so Boros it is.
I told ya...it's not dead yet! It will be most interesting to see anything that is given to us in Scars, and what will happen to the deck once Ranger rotates.
For now, though, I certainly don't mind this resurgence at all. Maybe people will take it more seriously now.
I totally understand. Nothing but high 90's here in Georgia. The pools aren't even cool anymore (by the sun alone, they can get as hot as 85-90), so they're not refreshing to get in! There's no place to go except an indoor air-conditioned place, which is where I've been as long as I can be most of the time.
First and foremost, I need to ask a few questions that I don't think have been answered.
- How old are you?
- Likewise, how old is she?
- What is your current environment? (high school, college, out of college, etc)
- Is she a friend of yours or just someone you know?
The advice I'd be willing to give would completely change depending on the answers to these questions. If you're in early high school and so is she, you don't have to worry necessarily about falling in love and committing yourself to converting her just yet. A few trial weeks/months are in order.
As a general bit of advice, though, as a christian with a wonderful girlfriend (a little more than 2 years now), I believe it's important for both of you to at least share christianity in common. Not entirely agreeing on every bit of Christianity together isn't a big problem at all. That's how my GF and I are. The foundation does need to be there, though. If you truly wish to keep growing in your faith, you need the person who may become your future spouse to be growing with you, and not bringing you down or preventing you from growing.
The problem is just as you said, though: many tournaments offer "vintage side-events". People always play Standard because it's the best for new-comers, and is the most common in terms of big-name tournaments. Because of this, Standard has a constantly growing and rarely diminishing demographic. For as many that say they're fed up with Standard and will never play it anymore, there are just as many people who start playing, if not more relatively speaking.
Though after playing the last decade or so of Standard tournaments, I can safely say that with the money I've spent, I could've bought that Vintage deck by now. I have one in the works, to save up for it someday, but for now, I'm mostly playing Standard. There's no reason you can't play both; it all just depends where your priorities fall. I'd much rather invest in cards that are with a current format that will get me to a lot of tournaments, rather than a few novelty cards that I can only use once in a blue moon.
I do agree, though. People should just take a year off from Standard, and use the money they save to buy a full-fledged Vintage deck. Hell, they could probably buy 2 for the prices SOME people pay.
It certainly wouldn't be a bad idea for responses to Day of Judgment or spot removal. The problem is as you said, though: we couldn't play it for the trap cost all that often. At 6 mana, the only spell you're thinking about is Mass Polymorph.
I'd say it's SB material at best.
Edit: upon reading the "non-creature" part, I realized why it's not played. Save it for when land-destruction becomes more viable. In other-words, never.
I don't know, it seems like a lost cause really. You do still have acidic slime and mold shambler, but they are even more expensive for their full cost. For win cons, you would definitely need something like Inferno Titan or Terastodon, which would aid in the land destruction. It would just end up like Jund Ramp with land destruction.
Don't get me wrong. I love LD just as much as the next guy. However, it's clear that Wizards just doesn't like LD players anymore. The cheapest we've gotten in years is Tectonic Edge, which only hits non-basics. That might help with all the man-lands, but we really need just good old 3cc land destruction back for it to work.
It really depends on how much you "hate" coffee. Obviously the taste must bug you, but does the smell also bug you? If that's the case, you could tell people you're allergic to coffee or coffee beans, and suggest going somewhere else. (A bar, perhaps, if you're of age)
Otherwise, pretty much the above statements. Going to Starbucks to get tea is far from out of the ordinary. Also, they do have pretty good hot chocolate, smoothies, and the like. Personally, though, I'd say you could get away with drinking something from Starbucks, because their drinks hardly constitute as coffee.
It's simply a matter of how she chooses to convey her message/talents. First of all, she does do both, as there are numerous videos on the internet of her playing piano and singing normally; i.e., her acoustic version of Poker Face. This allows her to appeal to the pop crowd as well as the - and I use this term lightly - more 'musical' crowd.
As for Ke$ha...well, my opinions aside, she is purely an entertainer. She knows it, and her fans know it, and that's why they like her. Truly she is not doing ANYTHING musically unique in her songs, and she probably couldn't even if she tried.
I apologize if I came off as harsh or overly-defensive in my post. I'm simply clarifying a few things about her to everyone, not just you. I'd just like to clarify the fact that you seem to think we idolize her. While that may be what many people do, I don't; I'm just defending my opinion of her music. There are plenty of songs/artists on the radio that I listen to solely for entertainment - i.e. Taio Cruz, Black Eyed Peas, Akon, and any overly-popular rapper to a certain degree - and those that I listen to for personally musical purposes - i.e. Usher because he can sing very well, Bruno Mars for the same reason as Usher, and Lady Gaga because she's one of the very, very, very few artists on pop radio that has any musical credibility to back her up.
As well, I'd like to personally distinguish myself - so as not to be marginalized any further - as a true fan of Lady Gaga. I don't listen to her because she's trendy (as stated above) but because I legitimately enjoy her music. As well, I'd be willing to bet I'll still be defending this position two years from now, and even ten years from now, because she's worth defending for me. (As well, I'm even trying to see her in concert when she comes to Atlanta in April. Whether or not I can afford the tickets by then is another story...)
Most music is crap, huh? You know, music can be written for the sake of being music, or for the very base purpose of enjoyment. In fact, the Classical era of music (1750-1825) is when people capitalized on the fact that their music was meant to entertain, and not always have a deep, moral or intellectual structure to it. It just so happened that the writers and masters of it at the time that are most remembered conveyed such messages.
Certainly, though, Mozart's violin sonatas can't hardly be applied to ANYONE's life-long understandings.
I lol'ed.
This couldn't be farther from the truth! Just because it's much easier to write music nowadays doesn't mean that there isn't a lot of thought and hard work that goes into them. See, that's where the "producers" come in.
Quincy Jones, while on the Colbert Report some time ago promoting his new book, gave an interesting quote: "If anything goes wrong on the song when it's sent to the masses, it's the producer's fault." Effectively, this means that your blaming the producers for how bad some songs are on today's radio. Producers go to great lengths, and the recording processes sometimes take months to perfect before sending to the masses.
And another thing, about "shoveling out a formula": there may be a certain structure that many songs follow nowadays, but that doesn't make them generic. Throughout music history, there have been periods like the Classical era where Sonata Form was written all the time. Likewise, in the Baroque era, it was all about Binary Form. They weren't looked down upon for being generic, that's just what was popular to write, and people loved it like they like the forms nowadays. If you hear something that goes in a Chorus-verse 1-chorus-verse 2-chorus-sweet sounding bridge-chorus, it's just the typical form of pop songs.
...Wow............um, ok. I will go into great lengths right now to prove that this is ENTIRELY possible and legitimate. To save space, though, I'll put it in a spoiler tag. You may read it if you please:
J.S. Bach wrote over 1000 pieces in his lifetime, the likes of which are all on record, so as not to say a fake number. He was an avid performer, allegedly the greatest organ player who ever lived. He was hired in three different cities throughout his life time where the majority of his composing and playing occurred: Weimar, Kothen, and Leipzig respectively. He pioneered writing music for organ that had never been written before, and provided pieces that are considered the most challenging in the repertoire even to this day for the cello, violin, viola da gamba, solo voice, flute, bassoon, piano, harpsichord, et. al. His influence spreads as far as every single composer who lived after him, and even some metal bands take his writings as inspiration for their own music.
Ludwig van Beethoven was a great player from the age of nine, and would become an established composer from his first works at the age of eleven. His influences were the likes of Mozart and Haydn, and he imitated their styles and techniques in many of his early compositions. However, in his later years, his symphonies and operas reflected great musical maturity, in that they expanded themselves from smaller orchestras to those that were more grand scale. These encompassed a whirlwind of emotion in every single one of his works given the extreme crises he faced in his lifetime, including many dear family members dying, and even his own slip towards alcoholism and deafness. Much like Bach, his influence reached nearly every composer after his lifetime, and still continue to influence many people today. Ever heard of neo-classical? Yeah, his works still show great influence in aspiring writers to this day. He, much like Bach, was seen as a period marker. His writings completely changed the world of music forever, again much like Bach.
William Hung is talentless, and that is the basis of his career. He makes money off of being completely terrible even though he seems to be trying his hardest. He has no influence and no credible factors to back up anything he does. In his famous American Idol audition, he claimed himself that he'd never had any musical training. Honestly, to say any more about him would give him more musical credit than he deserves.
So what have we learned? The fact of the matter is that Bach and Beethoven are infinitely better "musicians" than William Hung, because William Hung isn't a musician; he's an "entertainer". I understand the idea of opinions and objectivism, but there has to be a line drawn; and that line is drawn when you're saying that a talentless entertainer - which, again, is the basis of his fame in the first place - is a better musician than two musicians who, with their influence, changed the course of music forever.
Besides, I'd be willing to bet that even someone who is a die-hard William Hung fan would not dare say that he's a better "musician" than Beethoven or Bach. Even if they're not fans of the Classical or Baroque genres, they're not stupid.
And by the way, if anyone claims this whole argument is a moot point because it's a comparison of apples to oranges, then this whole thread is a moot point, so the joke's on you too!! (basically, no it's not...)
Can they not be one in the same sometimes? Again, this is all objective if that's the central argument/defense in this thread. So basically, as has been stated before, this is a "one man's trash is another man's treasure" case. People may love someone who you think is a mediocre artist, and vice versa. If you insult their artist, they'll get in arms, believing their opinion is so great. Why do they think that? Simple: IT'S THEIR OPINION!!! Everyone thinks their opinions are so great; and if they don't, they're probably not very solid in their opinions in the first place.
The level of ignorance in this statement alone has moved me to say something that I feel needs to be said:
ATTENTION EVERYONE READING THIS THREAD!!! There seem to be many misconceptions about Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta. For those of you who don't know, she is actually a classically trained pianist, having been enrolled at the age of 17 at the Tisch School of the Arts at NYU. She withdrew from school during her sophomore to further pursue a career in popular music. Since then, she has achieved critical and fanatic acclaim, having released one album (with a promotional rerelease later on) which has already received awards as the best album of 2008/2010. Her fan base numbers in the tens of millions, and her album sales number around 12 million. Her music and compositions push modern music in a more avante-garde direction, pioneering intriguing visuals mixed with surprisingly lyrical music, despite the music of her piers seemingly being greatly inferior musically. Her bizarre public image has raised quite the controversy, as well as many people who dislike her. Let it be known that if you are someone who would rather belittle her success by claiming that what she does is not really music, than there is a definition for someone like you: hater.
Needless to say, my inner Timmy was super happy. Not surprisingly, I don't have it anymore, and I know it wasn't necessarily a huge loss.
As for UB control, it is pretty much THE control deck now. I'll still play Boros for now, but I would love to play UB control if I could. I simply can't sell my soul for 4 jaces right now, so Boros it is.
As I've said multiple times, though, Aleksi Briclot, you are still my favorite!
For now, though, I certainly don't mind this resurgence at all. Maybe people will take it more seriously now.
- How old are you?
- Likewise, how old is she?
- What is your current environment? (high school, college, out of college, etc)
- Is she a friend of yours or just someone you know?
The advice I'd be willing to give would completely change depending on the answers to these questions. If you're in early high school and so is she, you don't have to worry necessarily about falling in love and committing yourself to converting her just yet. A few trial weeks/months are in order.
As a general bit of advice, though, as a christian with a wonderful girlfriend (a little more than 2 years now), I believe it's important for both of you to at least share christianity in common. Not entirely agreeing on every bit of Christianity together isn't a big problem at all. That's how my GF and I are. The foundation does need to be there, though. If you truly wish to keep growing in your faith, you need the person who may become your future spouse to be growing with you, and not bringing you down or preventing you from growing.
But I also love just about anything by Aleksi Briclot. He's just amazing.
Oh, and then there's foil M10 Ponder and foil M11 Mana Leak.
Though after playing the last decade or so of Standard tournaments, I can safely say that with the money I've spent, I could've bought that Vintage deck by now. I have one in the works, to save up for it someday, but for now, I'm mostly playing Standard. There's no reason you can't play both; it all just depends where your priorities fall. I'd much rather invest in cards that are with a current format that will get me to a lot of tournaments, rather than a few novelty cards that I can only use once in a blue moon.
I do agree, though. People should just take a year off from Standard, and use the money they save to buy a full-fledged Vintage deck. Hell, they could probably buy 2 for the prices SOME people pay.
It certainly wouldn't be a bad idea for responses to Day of Judgment or spot removal. The problem is as you said, though: we couldn't play it for the trap cost all that often. At 6 mana, the only spell you're thinking about is Mass Polymorph.
I'd say it's SB material at best.
Edit: upon reading the "non-creature" part, I realized why it's not played. Save it for when land-destruction becomes more viable. In other-words, never.
I'd wait for about a dozen more good standings. Then, we can talk a new competitive deck.
I don't know, it seems like a lost cause really. You do still have acidic slime and mold shambler, but they are even more expensive for their full cost. For win cons, you would definitely need something like Inferno Titan or Terastodon, which would aid in the land destruction. It would just end up like Jund Ramp with land destruction.
Don't get me wrong. I love LD just as much as the next guy. However, it's clear that Wizards just doesn't like LD players anymore. The cheapest we've gotten in years is Tectonic Edge, which only hits non-basics. That might help with all the man-lands, but we really need just good old 3cc land destruction back for it to work.
Otherwise, pretty much the above statements. Going to Starbucks to get tea is far from out of the ordinary. Also, they do have pretty good hot chocolate, smoothies, and the like. Personally, though, I'd say you could get away with drinking something from Starbucks, because their drinks hardly constitute as coffee.