Sometime in the past I may have suggested that someone create a thread with this purpose. The What's Playing Now thread is probably the most popular thread here, but I seem to remember its original intent being to present music of unusual merit. What it has become is wonderful, but I would still like to see a thread to post truly outstanding music on.
This will become whatever it becomes, but the concept I had in mind is to not misuse "great" or "genius" and to reserve this space for music that has more than nostalgia or danceability, or catchy lyrics or licks going for it. I do not expect there to be any concensus whatsoever about what qualifies, so "that sucks" commentary has no useful place here. Perhaps there is a place for music being judged by its quotient of social commentary, but it is the music itself I am thinking of, not so much the lyrics alone. Recording quality could be considered, but that is actually "Recordings of outstanding merit," not Music of Outstanding Merit if you get my drift. We don't judge Bach on how well the performance was recorded.
I will be so presumptuous as to propose an entry, Sandy Denny, No More Sad Refrains: The Anthology. This is an excellent collection of her work. She was in possession of the dual gifts of a great voice, often considered the best folk voice in English since World War II; plus she is also in the running for being the best folk songwriter in the same period. Richard Thompson considers her to rate as the best, enough said. She wrote most of the selections here, but her covers were equally inspired in execution. Her rendition of Banks Of The Nile is usually cited as the best cover of traditional material in English in quite some time, perhaps in the recorded era.
She died at the age of thirty-one after an accidental fall, but her light shone so brightly her body of work is considerable in impact. This collection presents it well. Even her last release, criminally overproduced by her husband, is worth a listen if you like this sort of music. I am not a man of means, but I parted with some treasure to own a Japanese mastering of this two disc set.
I am including the second photo because a great many Americans know her solely from being the only guest vocalist to ever record with the group she is pictured sitting with. And to quote (from the liner notes) the vocalist on her right: "My favorite singer out of all the British girls that ever were."
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and "The Iron Butterfly THEME" is like the quintessential 60's psychedelic tune. Almost defined the era in one cut.
If the trend continues, I am having a failure of imagination re: what will follow what we have at present. Since it is a seriously diminishing pool of people who even aspire to single task listening to music, I assume listeners like us are teetering on the brink of extinction. But Jazz, Blues and the concert halls have not had great music of quality all to themselves for the past fifty years. There is some brilliant music that has managed to be heard by a mass audience. To be fair, in all the history of popular Jazz 90% of it was not very good. Pop music, 99%? I refuse to judge what the actual numbers are, but the great music does tend to stand out to those who bother to hear it, doesn't it? Fairport Convention and even Fotheringay were pop music of sorts, but their listener base at the time was tiny compared to the Top of the Pops bands. In the liner notes for the Remastered 2002 release of Fairport's Unhalfbricking, band member Ashley Hutchings writes that a French language version of Dylan's If You Gotta Go, Go Now was their only Top of the Pops appearance. This is all why the Led Zeppelin mention. The LZ audience dwarfed that of Sandy's bands. So it has always been. But pop musical gold does exist. Just don't expect me to take Kanye West serious musically when I have heard John Coltrane. I do personally think a case could be made for some of Led Zeppelin's work to be outstanding music. They were special.
Originally Posted by Ducatista47
