Bands You Think Deserve more Attention...
 

theres a lotta good ass bands out there who's influence, creativity, or just plain awesome-ness is criminally downplayed. what are some of your favorite bands who you feel need to get some more love?

me:

crom-tech
ova!
cul de sac
experimental dental school
labradford
oxbow (they goot some recognition last year, but shit, these guys have been around for 15 plus years and theyre still making creative, boundary pushing, extreme , and ultimately relevant music, theres only one band i can think of with that reselience, *cough sonic youth *cough)
us maple (this band is fucking amazing, yet rarely discussed)
various death metal/black metal bands (other than devout metal heads, very few seem to acknowlede how amazing it is that a lot of these bands are able to make such extreme music, but always reman musical)
noxagt
forcefield
the weirdos (the most underrated of the 77 punk bands ive always thought)
one be lo (amazing mc that isnt takin off like he should be)
cherubs
secret chiefs 3
dropdead

theres definitley a lot more but thats all i felt like gettin into right now

Wipers.

the wipers??

theyre one of my all time favorite bands, but theyre pretty well known and loved and discussed.

one thing that is underrated about them though is greg sage's guitar playing. best guitar player out of all the protopunk bands and 77 punk bands

I could list a whole host of bands, but...

Sonic Youth. I was musing this over Sister today...

how the fuck does sonic youth not get enough attention? theyre on a major label, theyre listed by literally hundreds of bands as an influence, and theyve had consistent press since the fucking beginning of the 80's, they definitley get enough recognition, i mean as great as they are.

Its probably different because I live in the UK, and anything which isn't Radiohead is the enemy here. Outside of Thurston's gig and festivals, do you know how many Sonic Youth fans I've met? Zero.

thats pretty ridiculous, i mean, theyre not even remotely underground anymore.

Yes I'm not calling them underground, I realise they're a well known act, and on a major label, but none of that can account for the fact I never meet any bugger who listens to them!

no i know its nothin against u, its just odd to me

slant 6

I had the same reaction as you when I saw him list The Wipers, but then I thought about it, and they do deserve more attention. They should be considered a classic rock band along the lines of CCR and an American punk band rivaling Black Flag and the Ramones in importance. They don't get those kind of accolades, and they will probably never be in the Rock 'n Roll Hall of Fame or even get the retrospective credit from the likes of Rolling Stone that plenty of other bands they ignored the first time around get.

But my list does lean (for the most part) towards the more obscure:

Giant Sand (awesome group doing remarkable stuff from the '80s until today with little recognition despite the obvious influence on Will Oldham and that whole roots indie movement.)
Peter Jefferies (man's a fucking songwriter genius and my favorite album by him I bought in a cut out bin at Phantom City in Olympia where people are supposedly hip to this stuff.)
The For Carnation
The Beat Nigs (Michael Franti's best group by far, they should have been legends, but are largely forgotten because their mix of industrial post-punk and hip hop influenced poetics was too hard for the world to digest.)
Rocket from the Tombs (yeah, we read all the time how important they are, and of course any band that spawned the Dead Boys and Pere Ubu should get that kind of credit, but when I saw them live, there were literally under 50 people in the room and tickets were like ten bucks.)
The Sonics and the Wailers (seeing as how they inspired the Who, the Kinks, the first generation of punk rock, and the best garage bands from the '80s on, these two Tacoma WA bands ought to be as familiar as their progeny, but they really aren't)
Noggin (this guitar/electric violin noise duo is vastly influential and bridged the generational worlds of post-punk noise and free jazz improv. Full disclosure: Eric is a good friend of mine, and Michael was too. We sadly lost him last month.)
Vexed (Seattle band from the '80s and '90s who were on the apex of goth, grunge, and prog without being cheesy the way all three of those genres usually are. Heard of them? Of course you haven't, but they played on bills with Soundgarden and other people who got rich and famous before all that shit hit the fan.)
Blowhole (absolutely amazing Seattle noise/improv band who I sorely miss)
Amy Denio (whether in the Tone Dogs, the Billy Tipton Memorial Saxophone Quartet, one of her other infinite number of groups, or totally solo, Amy just fucking rules. Experimental while never failing to have brilliant pop sensibilities and a perfect grasp of our quirky world. Full disclosure: another good friend, but I was sure a fan first.)
Cabaret Voltaire (they basically invented the whole techno dance thing years before it became all kids listened to, and they did it with a punky political panache that made it always interesting unlike many of their progeny.)
The Screamers (one of the first American punk bands and they used all synths to devastating effect. They have a certain amount of hind sight critical acclaim, but not at all on the level of the Germs, who they completely rivaled in intensity and even importance.)
Zoviet France (ambient musique concrete genius.)
Crank Sturgeon (easily one of the very most entertaining performers I have ever seen. Full disclosure: we're good friends, though it came from me worshiping his insanely good and insane live set.)
Christian Marclay (you know who he is, but most of the world sadly doesn't.)
Black Dice (they range from angry noise to beautiful atmospheric wall of sound, and they are mildly popular, but I think they should be huge.)
Tape Beatles (I love Negativland and all, but these poor guys never got sued and so didn't get a 1/100th as famous.)

-Demons
-Aaron Dilloway

There was a whole heap of hype and discussion about Wolf Eyes at one stage, none of which was passed onto Demons or Dilloway. Frozen Fog and Dilloway's collaboration with Yeh where two of my favourites from last year. I guess most people would write them off as another lo-fi bedroom projects featuring members of Wolf Eyes...

-Geto Boys (in the early 90's)
I've only got "We Can't Be Stopped" but I reckon it's on par, if not better than all the celebrated hardcore/gangster rap groups of the early 90's.

-The Replacements
In the grand scheme of things not all that overlooked but in my circle of friends everybody knows Husker Du, yet few people have heard the Replacements (unless I've showed it to them). One of my favourite 5 bands ever.

-Adverts
One of the best 77 punk bands in my opinion.

-Anthony Braxton
I'm not an expert of free/avant jazz but I think this dude deserves more attention. Don't think I've ever heard anyone talk about 'For Alto'....

define "more attention".

in reality, all artists deserve more attention always, if they have something original to present; the whole world should at least know them and then decide if they like them or not (of course, this is all in theory); even artists that get somehow overexposure, they get that for a limited time in the end, there's a period before or after where one could argue that they deserve more attention.

and, in the grand scheme of things, most artists don't get enough attention, among the people i know, i'd say more people should listen to, say, lasse marhaug or kemialliset ystävät, but then i could also make an argument over people i know who love nirvana but don't have the faintest idea who sonic youth or dinosaur jr are (or like last weekend, when my friend told me how nobody knows who was in soundgarden except for chris cornell). so it's all relative.

so yeah, ever artist who tries to do something of quality deserves more recognition.

the kills

climax golden twins

Everything I've ever recorded deserves more attention.

But I never allow it.

good call on dilloway and braxton.

i was gonna say kevinn drumm but then i realized he gets tons of press i just love his music.

snakefinger is a good one, hes been on all the residents best ablums and his solo stuff is all amazing, yet NO ONE talks about him.

the replacements on the other hand always kinda bored me.

Are we talking more attention between people of our ilk or more attention from mainstream audiences?