Griff, you might well be a musical expert but many of us aren't and I don't think we should be denied the privilege of using the words 'technique' and 'technical' just because we aren't part of the 'musical elite'.

You don't have to be part of the musical "elite". But if you're going to describe something as technically good, whether it's a song or a washing machine, then you ought to be able to explain yourself in more technical terms than "yeah I really like it, it's great". Otherwise you're just using the word as a smokescreen.

Zooter- lol! It looks exactly like that! Scary.

how about :~
kind of forked tongue

Griff - oh dear, I shall never be able to describe the washing machine as technically shit ever again.

I used that term as it technically pisses water all over the kitchen floor and my clothes come out smelling of drain.

Actually, you might be on to something. Perhaps I should buy a manual...


Zooter - I love that forked tongue one.

I think it's allowable to describe something as "technically shit" when you are very cross with it.

But if I was daft enough to go to see a ballet and then opine in the interval that "the dancers were technically brilliant" then I'd surely be implying I knew something about ballet technique and would be able to impart this wisdom to my eager listeners ?

I think it's allowable to describe something as "technically shit" when you are very cross with it.

Thank heavens. Fecking thing.

Davy, here's what seems to me to be a fairly accurate bass tab to Pretty Vacant (which I've played live a few times on guitar by the way, although punk rock guitar is about as far away from my normal comfort zone as you could get, having been primarily a jazz-and-blues pianist). No world-rocking "major chords" being played on the bass there, just a straightforward single-note-melody accompaniment that any competent learner with a year or so's playing experience could (and would) come up with.

By the way, I think the Sex Pistols were great. But nobody who knows the first thing about writing or performing music would try to accuse them of technical brilliance. (Least of all themselves, I would imagine.)

So I'm declaring war on the word "technical" as a meaningless badge of approval. Because you know, Girls Aloud are technically brilliant, really , they are, they are technically excellent technical musicians, all the technical people say so. And Steps ? Technically they are all technical geniuses. Did you know that they were actually, technically, fantastic, even though most people don't know it. Technically brilliant, musically. Well, people say that Gareth Gates is no good, but did you know, that technically, he's actually technically brilliant ? Etc.

Wow, this place has become, like, the New Lounge, 'cept we talk about important writing issues instead of kicking lumps out of each other over meaningless stuff like religion, politics and food.

When I joined WW I had written a full-length novel without ever having heard of 'rules'. It was, however, fairly poor.

Before that I had spent 15 years writing for a living in journalism and PR where there are lots of rules - the key one my first chief reporter drilled into me being "keep you first para under 21 words, put the whole story in the first para so that it will still make sense if the subs cut the rest away, never use the word 'that', and, write everything as if it were a front page story, even if it's about the local jumble sale".

Then he went on to re-write one of my stories with what he described as “a classic drop intro” – i.e. the first para is the set-up, but the real angle is in the second para.

He broke his own rules, but the point is you can only really do that if you know what the rules are in the first place – unless of course you are a complete genius.

Rules? Maybe, like Keira Knightley says on The Pirates of the Caribbean when talking about the pirate law of Parlay, “they’re more like guidelines”?

Now I am learning about the ‘rules’ of writing, it is helping me structure my work better. It is quite liberating to be honest to understand better about POV, tone of voice and so on. It’s like having ingredients I can play with to create different recipes – and as with food experiments, some of it is good, some of it is awful.

The downside is that you end up looking at other writers’ work based on these rules. I can’t read a newspaper as simply a newspaper any more because I always see: intro para (how many words?), where’s the angle?, quote, supporting source, does this come from a press release, and so on.

The vast majority of readers are not (would-be) writers, so they are not as tough on what they read, particularly when it comes to big best sellers. This doesn’t mean they don’t like or dislike stuff and cannot be critical of books, it’s just they won’t analyse in the same way we do.

So really this is not winnable debate because there is no right or wrong – I still think it’s an interesting debate, mind.

And unless Dan Brown joins WW and admits that he broke all the rules when writing DVC, or that he believes it’s great/awful, or…heaven forbid, he posts the first couple of chapters on the next adventures of Tom Hanks (woteva) on here for us all to take the piss out of/critique constructively/crawly bum-lick to get an invitation to his ranch in Arizona, we won’t know what the DB finks about it all.

Personally I think that getting a better understanding about what makes writing work or not, which encompasses rules, technical ability and even commercial pressures is useful if you want to move your writing forward, even if it is just for the simple pleasure of enjoying it more – which is what I am current discovering.

I reckon all of those things apply to Dan Brown, Girls Aloud, Dave Beckham as much as they do (insert serious writer here), Arcade Fire and, er, Tiger Woods. But ultimately how they value those factors will differ, which will inform their work and how their audience perceives and enjoys their work – i.e. taste.

And sometime you might end up with The Sex Pistols who were completely against the rules, but were also a textbook rock group by playing three-minute pop songs as loudly as possible to making kids dance. Simple, but it did change the pop world.

I'm kinda regretting mentioning The Sex Pistols now, but it's been a fun thread. I only mentioned them to make a point of why people bought into the punk genre. Perhaps I would have been better mentioning Crass or Discharge. Anyway, Beadle pretty much summed up my own feelings on rules and guidelines and managed, beyond all hope, to bring the thread back to it's main theme.

Okay Griff, as you've been so utterly patronising, I guess I should respond. I have been playing bass for the past 16 years, and I promise you Steve Jones played chords on the bass when they recorded Never Mind The Bollocks. If you don't belive me, write to Chris Thomas. If you know so much about music as you said, you'd know how much of the technical expertise involved in recording is down to the producer and engineer. Chris Thomas and Bill Price both support my argument, even if you are SO determined to disprove it, for whatever reason.

For instance, as Thomas says:

"...Anarchy has something like a dozen guitars on it; I sort of orchestrated it, double-tracking some bits and separating the parts and adding them, et cetera ...It was quite labored. The vocals were labored, as well."

Which implies it was a technical job. And considering his work with Pink Floyd, I'd say he was technically adept.

Anyway, so I know how to play bass, and that is why the sound that Jones got was unique, because he played it as if he was playing the major bar chords, then dampened the D and G strings. I know about the technical side of recording, after all I was in a band that released a single in 2005, so spent many hours in the studio. And he didn't play just root notes, and there is hardly a fifth, seventh, or any scale on the entire album, that's my f**kin point.

Anyway Griff, you can argue until you are blue in the face, but your attempts to belittle me on this thread, and your insistence on being such a great musician, and trying to show me up as some charlatan, have really got my goat, I must say. The fact you put so much into belittling me has quite upset me, but not to fear, mate, I will get over it.

Anyway, you have your technical prowess, I'll keep the Pistols up there ahead of the Beatles, Stones, Pink Floyd or whoever, yeah that's an opinion, but anybody who knows anything about the modern music scene, will know how technically great that album was, and how well produced it was, and how well engineered it was, and well written it was, and how well played it was, in fact it was technically great, which is why, Griff, it hasn't been bettered by anyone since.

I'm not saying Girl's Aloud are technically brilliant, and definietly not Steps, so don't patronise me okay? I'm saying Never Mind The Bollocks was, so what are you on about?

The words to Liar take on more meaning if you add "This is for Harold Wilson" like Rotten did on occasion, and could be used today. Write out the lyrics to Holiday in the Sun and "yeah right" them. Or Bodies.

Zooter - I have no idea why you are so catty with me. I wasn't born when the album was released, my love for the Pistols started in 1991 when they showed loads of stuff for 15th anniversary, when I first got into music and they changed my life then as they had done to many before, so I think I know enough to know that the album sounded f**kin great in 1976, okay? Is it? Is that okay wioth you?

Then I know that because there is a mountain of evidence, including the entire punk scene, the mod scene that followed, New Romantic scene, the accounts of countless musicians that formed a band from 76 until the 80's, including John Squire, Ian Brown, Ian McCulloch, Bernard Sumner, Guns N Roses, Paul Weller, Mick Hucknall (tho I hate him), Shaun Ryder, Iron Maiden, Leftfield, U2, Oasis, the list is endless, have cited that album as a main influence. And the small fact that the Pistols changed the entire face of the music scene forever. Everyone knows that, who knows anything about modern music.

But you go ahead and have a go, after all I did slag off Dan Brown so I must be stupid.

And you know, mate, if you want to read your crappy Dan Brown book, I ain't stopping you.
I never had a go AT you, but you seem keen to have a go at me, but I'm not bothered thanks, so why don't you just go read the DVC?

This thread has left a rather nasty taste in my mouth.

Anyway this is a writing site, not a musicians one. We all have our tastes, but snobbery about these things is laughable really, like arguning over whether Gary Barlow or Robbie Williams is the better songwriter. Dav, just ignore it mate.

Griff, I am still looking forward to the day when you actually upload some writing to WW. I'd love to take a look at it. You seem so immensely knowledgable about so many things, that I'm curious to see how this translates to your writing.

JB

Davy

I'm sorry for the wind-ups, shoulda put some smileys after them.

Got the mood wrong in here I guess...

Robbie

Just a note on "Holidays in the Sun", I was immensely impressed when Simon Bates went against the grain (for Radio 1) and mid afternoon, on the day the Berlin Wall came down, he played it.

A brilliant song, not just because of the lyrics, but for their delivery.

My favourite Pistols track will always be "Satellite", the B side to "Holidays in the Sun" - and I haven't got a damn clue what that's about!

Just a note on "Holidays in the Sun", I was immensely impressed when Simon Bates went against the grain (for Radio 1) and mid afternoon, on the day the Berlin Wall came down, he played it.

A brilliant song, not just because of the lyrics, but for their delivery.

My favourite Pistols track will always be "Satellite", the B side to "Holidays in the Sun" - and I haven't got a damn clue what that's about!



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oops - double clicked. Soz