Seven Ages

Sir Graball

Curious about what people thought of the recent BBC series 'Seven Ages of Rock'? It ended on Saturday last with a look at British Indie from The Smiths to The Libertines.

JLemmon

Very good, but the libertines!!!!
This band are being wrongly given a place on the pedestal
with the likes of the smiths and stone roses etc..
They achieved nothing! They were an english version of the strokes.
And since them now we've had to put up with bouncy guitar rock
like the kooks and the view.
I cannot rate this band low enough.
The Arctic Monkeys have achieved more in the area of "indie rock" in the last
2 years then the libertines ever did or will.
Great series tho, my favs were the one on REM\Nirvana and the second one about Pink Floyd\Bowie

Acid_Violet

Libertines=total ****.

I saw the last one from Suede on (Suede being possibly one of my fav bands.) Thought the metal episode was somewhat ****, metal is too broad and a lot of it underground, keeping it to metallica for fifteen minutes is simply wrong. They did the Britpop episode well imo, were brutally honest that indie went generic and **** after oasis and blur, but I thought it was absolutely abhorrent that they said 'today's music is exciting'? It's even moreso insipid and repetitive then it was come '95 onwards!

Ps. Did they have anything to do with Smashing Pumpkins on the grunge episode?

John

I think there was a short snippet of a SP video shown but with another song playing over it. Was delighted to see Black Flag get some of the air time in the grunge episode, expected them in the punk one so it was a nice surprise to see Rollins interviewed.

Jonny Arson

JLemmon wrote:

Very good, but the libertines!!!!
This band are being wrongly given a place on the pedestal
with the likes of the smiths and stone roses etc..
They achieved nothing! They were an english version of the strokes.
And since them now we've had to put up with bouncy guitar rock
like the kooks and the view.
I cannot rate this band low enough.

That is such BS it's unreal.

Like them or not, like British indie music or not, The Libertines got the ball rolling again for the British indie scene which had been in the doldrums for 3/4 years. Their place and substantial time in Saturday's programme was essential and fitting. Their importance for the British indie scene will be looked upon in a similar vein as The Smiths, Stone Roses, Oasis and Blur for years to come - that's not to say they were a better band than those four, that is open to debate, but their importance is undoubtedly parallel.

Punchbowl

The Stadium Rock one was pretty good, reaching it's zenith with Zoo TV. Also enjoyed the Glam one with Roxy Music.. Missed the indie but I'm sure I'll catch one of the 30 odd repeats this week

funktastic

The indie one didn't have anything new in it really. The same old clips dragged out with the same old stuff being said in the interviews.

JLemmon

Smashing pumpkins were mentioned in the grunge one
insofar as they appeared on the "scene" after the whole thing took off
with the likes of pearl jam and alice in chains et al., it was mentioned in a sort of hopping on the bandwagon way but that's unfair to pearl jam and pumpkins in particular as they we either caught up in the movement by coincidence or have moved on musically in different ways since and to dismiss their careers as bandwagon jumpers is wrong.
As for british indie rock in the doldrums, it still is apart from Arctics, Fujiya and Miyagi, Mogwai and a few others. The Libertines rescued indie guitar rock to bring us the likes of the kooks, the view, kasier chiefs, fratellis (aka Chas and Dave tribute act), crap NME journalism, and the rest of the bouncy guitar bohemian brigade, I for one would rather they hadn't rescued it all if this is the result.
In ten years time the libertines will be the menswear, gaydad or northern uproar of their generation or maybe Dodgy

DadaKopf

The whole series is total rubbish. Really annoying, populist tripe.

indiewindy

It was an ok series, caught the one with pink floyd, velvet underground and genesis( must be one of the worst bands in the history of music). The grunge one spent far too long covering nirvana, their story has been told so many times already, didnt go near the indie one when I saw that they were covering those jokers the libertines, noe of their songs stand the test of time, if it werent for that clown Doherty and his "drug" issues they would have been long forgotten about all they are is tabloid fodder. Bands like suede, gene etc wiped the floor with them in their heyday, the current indie scene is shockingly bad.
The series had no time for radiohead, can't see the libertines been more important than them. In 10 years the libertines will hopefully be excised from all the variousbest album lists

DerekD Goldfish

Extremly disapointing series watched all but the last one I coundt stomach a show dedicated to the libertines.

The Libertines got the ball rolling again for the British indie scene which had been in the doldrums for 3/4 years. Their place and substantial time in Saturday's programme was essential and fitting. Their importance for the British indie scene will be looked upon in a similar vein as The Smiths, Stone Roses, Oasis and Blur for years to come - that's not to say they were a better band than those four, that is open to debate, but their importance is undoubtedly parallel.

The libertines did have a big effect on english music in recent years but in the same way Hitler had a big effect on Europe in the last century. One of the most sickinly adverage boring bands of recent history.

Driver 8

I learned from this series that, despite having a number one album in the u.s., and making what is almost universally considered to be one of the all-time great albums, Radiohead merit less attention than Oasis, Blur, The Libertines, Franz Ferdinand... etc etc

That last episode felt like it was compiled by the staff at the NME, apart from the half-decent stuff on The Smiths

Sir Graball

I tend to agree with Indiewindy. I thought the whole thing was a bit of a mess. What bugged me was the assumption that the whole indie concept began with the Smiths. Don't get me wrong they were a great band but the series should have considerd the influence of the earlier Manchester indie scene with Joy Division, New Order, A Certain Ratio and bands like the Jam who influenced the 'britpop' guitar based sound . Did Paul Weller even get a mention?? Frankly I can stand Oasis ( apart from Wonderwall) and Gallagher came across as a right twat, even if he was trying to be 'ironic'.As for the Libertines well they tried bless em!:rolleyes:

Earthhorse

The focus they took on the alternative rock and grunge one was to tell the story with a heavy focus on REM and Nirvana. Basically, they told the story of these genres through both band's eyes. I actually really enjoyed this episode, but that's because of my love for both of those bands and grunge in general, though they did have "In His Hands" captioned as "Verse Chorus Verse" which was a bit annoying.

The stadium rock one was also good and again very much focused on U2. Is this how they structured all the episodes? Telling the story by tracking one band?

I caught the end of the last one but can't be objective on it due to my hatred of all things Britpop. I always thought that genre struggled to justify itself as anyway important in rock 'n' roll's history.

Sir Graball

The stadium rock one was also good and again very much focused on U2. Is this how they structured all the episodes? Telling the story by tracking one band?

Basically they tried to. It worked well in the first episode by showing how British based electric blues and American protest songs influenced Jimmy Hendrix and provided him with an audience. But after that it turned into an NME who's who. Unfortunately in doing that it ommitted considering in depth some serious artists like Neil Young, Lou Reed, Frank Zappa, Captain Beefheart and Nick Cave to name but a few.Pity!

Acid_Violet

NME has to be the worst magazine ev0r, would rather read Hello or OK or some **** like that, plus the editor barely looks likes he's reached puberty.

mike65

I enjoyed the series though skipped the american indy/atl/grunge prog as I have zero interest in REM, Nivarna etc.

It was never going to please everyone by its nature, twas a thumbnail sketch of the last 40 years of popular rock music. Nothing more.

Mike.

JLemmon

I agree that the omission of Radiohead was an unforgiveable travesty
but aren't or weren't they on Parlophone??? Not Independant, "indie"
Smiths on Rough trade, Stones Roses on Silvertone
I don't know if any of you remember but Kylie Minogue was "indie" then, i.e.
on an independant label thus giving her frequent access to the indie charts!!!
Having said that Blur are on Parlophone\Food and Oasis on Sony\Brother so
****e to that idea.
Good series would like to see one on independant music
since the 60's covering all genres therein or on jamacia or world music or dance\electronica. I think the punk stories have been played out abit now we all know about the Ramones and the Sex Pistols. Yeah the grunge one brushed over alot of important bands very quickly, like the 60's one they sort of brushed the beach boys, captain beefheart, Zappa, beatles and the rest out of the way.

Morgans

Yeah, no mention of Radiohead, and if I am not mistaken, no Joy Division, but The Liberthines and Suede were seen as revolutionary. Funny editing.

bottlerocket

Morgans wrote:

Yeah, no mention of Radiohead, and if I am not mistaken, no Joy Division, but The Liberthines and Suede were seen as revolutionary. Funny editing.

The lack of Radiohead and Joy Division was unforgivable but in fairness, I don't think they argued that The Libertines or Suede were revolutionary, more that they gave British guitar music a kick up the arse when it was badly needed. They opened the door for others and even though what followed the Libertines hasn't been anything exciting, that's not their fault as others seem to have suggested above. Both bands had the potential to be great, imo, but personalities prevented them from realising that potential. Dogmanstar was and remains a fantastic album and Suede really tried to push themselves and do something different. I've always thought it was an awful shame Bernard left, would've been really interesting to see where they went next.

As for The Smiths, yes Joy Division, A Certain Ratio etc came earlier but The Smiths were far and away the most important and influential band to come out of the whole early 80's UK scene. To give the likes of ACR the same level or billing on the show would've been ridiculous.

All in all I thought it was fairly good, a thumbnail sketch as someone else said. The 70's one was probably the best of the lot, looked like a really interesting time to have been into music, but then again, most times are provided you look hard enough.