rghammo

Enjoyed that so much that I think I'll listen to it again. From what I'd heard, I was expecting some weird freak-folk thing but this is much prettier than that. I've listened to Samson at least 4 times this morning.

And how did you feel the last time you watched the MTV music awards? Popular music is pretty bad, on the whole. That is true for all genres. I'm not sure if it was always true though. When I think about what music I listen to from the '60s and '70s, most of it was popular then (e.g. Beatles, Led Zeppelin, Rolling Stones). (There are obvious exceptions: Big Star). But, I'm too young to say that back in the good ol' days the rule was that good music made it to the radio while now it is the exception for good music to make it to the radio. I don't really know if there has been a decline

Regina Spektor - Begin to Hope

New music recommendations are great! Any album you'd suggest me to start with?

Centro-Matic - Love You Just The Same Where has this band been all my life?

Josh Rouse - Dressed Up Like Nebraska

Try Opera.

Trace took a while to grow on me way back then but now it is a favorite. Haven't listened to it in a while either but certainly more recently than 7 years. Such good songwriting. Damien Rice - 9

The Shins - Wincing I think this is going to top Chutes for me but not Inverted. I enjoyed Chutes but it was just too poppy, too catchy (if that makes any sense). Inverted is still an all-time favorite for me though.

There are going to be counter-examples to anything but in general, there is some point when it became the norm for rock musicians (certain sub-genres excluded) to write their own stuff. The question to me is why and why didn't it happen in country music.

Jon Brion - Meaningless Never listened to this before but am trying out cause of all the talk he gets round here. Good so far.

Thanks for the info. Paul Simon got the delete button so NP: Editors - The Back Room

What's this? It shown up several times lately but I don't think anyone has said what album it is. NP: Paul Simon - Surprise

If I had to credit one band/artist, it would be the Beatles. Dylan was coming from a different tradition, one where singing your own songs was more common than in the mainstream music at the time. The Beatles on the other hand started out as a typical mainstream product and evolved into something entirely different. I feel like they raised the bar (in many ways other than this as well) and forced other bands in the mainstream to start writing (e.g. The Rolling Stones) and forced new bands that would come along after them to write. This is obviously an oversimplification and it didn't occur

I don't think I like it better than the first but Save Room is my favorite song off either album.

I don't think it has anything to do with "quality" however you define that. I was cross-checking the Billboard 200 with AMG to see if the claim seemed true using the most popular stuff right now (seems so) and the rock albums that are popular are just as crappy (with some exceptions) as the country (as are the rap/hip-hop). I really think it has something to do with traditions (as markosis mentioned) and rock music evolving along a different path than country music. If you look at the two genres 50 years ago, I think you would find a similar (and small) likelihood of a song being written b

John Legend - Once Again This guy has put out two great albums in a row.

Comparing rock artists/bands (loosely classified) to country artists/bands, I think you would find that rock artists are much more likely to have written their own songs. Why is this?

Wire - Chairs Missing

What bands had long delays between their first and second albums? The Stone Roses are the first example that comes to my mind of a band having a "hit" with the first album ('89) and then taking forever to release the second ('94). I guess a better example would be Vashti Bunyan ('70 to '05) but I really have in mind bands/artists where the first album had some measure of success.

PJ Harvey - The Peel Sessions 1991 - 2004 Simply amazing.

The Shins - Wincing

Rhett Miller - The Believer This isn't as bad as I've heard. Not great but not awful.

The Rentals - Return Of The Rentals

The Dresden Dolls - Yes Virginia