site banner
naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   4031 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for February 10, 2023

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

5
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

I'm not sure I see your point. Yeah, they had commercial success, but I don't see what record sales have to do with anything. At a time when they were fading into irrelevance studio execs parlayed their credibility to give them a second life, but part of the process was stripping away what had made them distinctive in the past. I really don't see how they're any different from Jefferson Starship/Starship of this period. Both had Ron Nevinson and Keith Olsen giving them the same slick sound, both had Diane Warren writing hits for them, both bore little to no resemblance, music-wise, to their earlier incarnations that gave them artistic credibility. Heart could have easily had a hit with "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now" that wouldn't have been radically different than the Starship version. This is part of what I find so frustrating about what happened to classic artists in the '80s—in a bid to stay relevant, they all succumbed to trends and abandoned what made them distinctive in the first place. It's one thing when the band reaches that point organically, like Genesis did, but it's another when a deliberate effort is made to reduce the band itself to nothing more than frontmen (or women) for the machinations of record executives. This says nothing about whether the resulting product is actually good or not, but merely why I described them as generic (and if they're not, what would be generic arena rock, exactly?). And what's your problem with Rumours?

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats