A Treatise on Elitism in Defense of Zep September 26

Filed under Misc, Music by Spencer | 0 comments

Led Zep

In Aaron’s post yesterday, he called for a resurgence of The Clash, a point on which I couldn’t agree more. The Clash is easily one of the all-time greatest bands, true pioneers that never stopped trying (and usually succeeding) in advancing music to places it hadn’t been before. However I, and the countless millions of Led Zeppelin fans, also tell Aaron to shove his condescending hipster bullshit up his ass. Liking Led Zeppelin doesn’t mean you haven’t musically evolved.

Here are some concepts that may seem strange to Aaron and scores of other you other hipster indie-rock-elitist jerks:

  1. People are allowed to like other kinds of music.
  2. People can like more than one type of music; you can’t define and/or label people based on just one band that they like. (For example, while I own every Led Zeppelin album, I also own a lot of obscure jazz albums and John Coltrane is my all-time favorite musician).
  3. It’s okay to like bands that people have actually heard of or that actually get played on the radio.
  4. You’re not a better or smarter music fan for listening to bands that no one has ever heard of.

This may seem like a strong response for such a harmless comment. However, it’s not really the comment so much as it is the sentiment behind it. Living in DC, the hipster thing can get old sometimes. Please don’t get me wrong; I like a lot of indie rock and I think the DC music scene is wonderful for its diversity and focus on actually interesting music. As a transplant to the area, I am very impressed with it. However, there is this sort of indie hipster elitism that comes as a part of that. I think I may be more sensitive to it, having not grown up here (whereas Aaron and Charles, having grown up here, definitely have some of that attitude). But it’s still annoying to those of us who just fans of the music that moves us, regardless of what “scene” it comes from, who made it, or how other people label it.

* Side note: I love being in a band that is man enough to have these fights publicly. Bring it on Aaron!

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