My emo theory...
 

Does anyone think that emo music, which usually expresses feelings of sadness and talks about lifes problems, is just the newer form of blues?

is that not what blues music was originally all about? all the black people singing about their problems being black and poor and other such things, eventually white people started singing the blues, although they didn't have as much to complain about. eventually the situation bettered a little for black people, slavery was gone, laws were made, so they didn't have as much reason to sing the blues.

so after a few decades, no one really needs to sing the blues, black people aren't looked down upon nearly as much, white people never had a reason for the blues...people need to find other ways to express their unhappy emotions.
suddenly Kurt Cobain started signing the blues, although not in the original true blues way, it was a new form of blues. it took rock n roll, which was a genre born out of blues, and turned it into grunge. when grunge died off, true rock music wasn't around much, there was a lot of pop music, a lot of metal but no true rock. eventually emo showed up, which had the same ideas that the old blues guys sang about, kurt cobain sang about, it was just in a new style.

so basically if you make fun of someone for "being emo", you are making fun of the blues, which is the basis for a lot of rock and roll music. and no one has the right to make fun of someone for "being rock and roll".


did that make sense to anyone cuz it kind of just happened spur of the moment.

Yeah that made sense..but blues has a jazz kind of mellow tone on it's guitar, and emo is more rock I guess you could say. I don't know where I'm getting at really but I get what you're talking about. I partially agree...
And emo people are awesome.

I think you really didn't think this through. Either that, or you know very little about the blues.

[QUOTE=thickasabrick]
did that make sense to anyone cuz it kind of just happened spur of the moment.[/QUOTE]


No. Saying "I hate emo music" has no correlation to blues music at all. General theme may be the same, but that's where the comparasions stop. A blues song can be happy, yet the style that it is played is still part of the blues. The meaning behind the song doesn't classify it's genre, it's how the song is structured. The gypsys in Europe have been writing music with these sad themes for hundreds of years, but their music hardly has anything to do with the blues.

Emo could be modern society's form of complaining. I see nothing resembling the blues at all in the emo music I have heard, and to say it is a "newer form of blues" doesn't work for me. The blues is still kicking, although you made it sound like some lost art. Your whole statement about people's reasons for the blues is asinine. Everyone is different, the most obscure people can have the most obscure reasons to feel whatever they do.

i hate emo people. they can't ever seem to have any sort of fun

emo is a post-hardcore genre.

Green River was around in the mid-80's ('85 being their first album) so I doubt emo was long before grunge. You either have to generalize them all or none of them, can't just paint it in the way you want to.

Even if emo dates as far back as '84, how can you say that the direction it's heading in is very good? I can't stand the music that's labeled "emo" or "screamo" or "hardcore". It can be interesting if the artists actually know something about music, but it seems these days that if you give someone a guitar and say to them "here, write a song" it's automatically considered planned out, knowledgeable music.

That's what I think, anyways.

[QUOTE=DFelon204409]Never heard of Green River but I'm going to take your word for it. Let's look at it from a different point of view then. When did emo hit its height? 1985ish. When did screamo hit its height? 1992ish in San Diego. That's well before grunge hit its height in around 1993 and 1994.[/QUOTE]

Green River is considered to be the first grunge band, and they formed in 1984. Two of the members are now in Pearl Jam.


I disagree fully about when each genre peaked. By you needing to tell us the history of emo, it shows it wasn't that big during the '80s. I am assuming more people know who Weezer and Pedro The Lion than the stuff put out in the '80s (I can't name any, but I'm not exactly someone who could name anything modern either). If you meant the quality of the music, then I wouldn't be able to weigh in there. I don't listen to either genre ... pretty much at all.

Emo is just people complaining about stupid ****. I've never heard the older Emo bands, but now it's a joke. I find the genre sounding more like a producer oriented genre, like disco and pop. I'm sorry to see that music has never really recovered after Nirvana. I'm glad to say this to you guys but: EMO IS GAY!!! I agree with what [B]DemBonez[/B] has said about Emo and the blues, [B]they're not the same [/B] . Now screw u guys, i have to write an essay

that an interesting theory put forward by the thread starter, i think they meant to point out both styles of music have an undercurrent of emotion and pain and that emo could be the modern day equivalent of what the blues was at that particular time, not to draw comparisons musically. not that i agree with the theory, thats just my interpretation of it.

Hahaha, no.

You really ARE thick as a brick, aren't you?

Wow, emo and blues. There is absolutely NO connection between them.

[QUOTE=thickasabrick]Does anyone think that emo music, which usually expresses feelings of sadness and talks about lifes problems, is just the newer form of blues?

is that not what blues music was originally all about? all the black people singing about their problems being black and poor and other such things, eventually white people started singing the blues, although they didn't have as much to complain about. eventually the situation bettered a little for black people, slavery was gone, laws were made, so they didn't have as much reason to sing the blues.

so after a few decades, no one really needs to sing the blues, black people aren't looked down upon nearly as much, white people never had a reason for the blues...people need to find other ways to express their unhappy emotions.
suddenly Kurt Cobain started signing the blues, although not in the original true blues way, it was a new form of blues. it took rock n roll, which was a genre born out of blues, and turned it into grunge. when grunge died off, true rock music wasn't around much, there was a lot of pop music, a lot of metal but no true rock. eventually emo showed up, which had the same ideas that the old blues guys sang about, kurt cobain sang about, it was just in a new style.

so basically if you make fun of someone for "being emo", you are making fun of the blues, which is the basis for a lot of rock and roll music. and no one has the right to make fun of someone for "being rock and roll".


did that make sense to anyone cuz it kind of just happened spur of the moment.[/QUOTE]

That's pretty da[SIZE=2]mn[/SIZE] narrow minded of you, just because white people aren't a minority doesn't mean they didn't have problems. Also, emo is too vaguely related to the blues for you to say you'd hate them both if you hated one of them. That's like saying you have to like two bands just because they were inspired by the same musician. For example, Weezer and Radiohead were both inspired by Pixies. But they're completely different and not all people who like Radiohead like Weezer and vice versa. What things are based off of doesn't say jack s[SIZE=2]hit[/SIZE]. Basically most of today's music is based off of the rock if not rock in itself, and that from blues. So if what you said is true, you can't make fun of anyone for liking any music otherwise you'd be making fun of them for disliking blues.

Another thing.

Emo= The Opposite of good
Blues=Good

P.S.- Please don't fill these forums with rants about things you don't know anything about.

[QUOTE]so basically if you make fun of someone for "being emo", you are making fun of the blues, which is the basis for a lot of rock and roll music. and no one has the right to make fun of someone for "being rock and roll".[/QUOTE]
That should win an award for the stupidest thing ever said, no really were you up all night thinking about this? The blues is a decent form of music blues musicans were telling you something, where emo kids are complaining about a girl they can't get over. I also don't like that fact that it's called emo last time I check emotions cover more than complaining and crying. Angry, Sad, Happy, Bored these are all emotions where emo doesn't even touch on all of them. I'm sure I'm going to get a lot of crap for saying that all emo is just crying little brats who can't get over a girlfriend but that's all I've heard.

I can't get over how stupid this thread is.

Wait a minute... you think that a music born from disenfranchised people lamenting their slavery is the same as a group of surburban, middle class (predominantly) whining about a girl who dumped them. Where, uh, where does this stuff come from?

i think that was pulled right out of your ***

[QUOTE=rockinbass17]i think that was pulled right out of your ***[/QUOTE]
Who's this directed to?

[QUOTE=DFelon204409]Never heard of Green River but I'm going to take your word for it. Let's look at it from a different point of view then. When did emo hit its height? 1985ish. When did screamo hit its height? 1992ish in San Diego. That's well before grunge hit its height in around 1993 and 1994.[/QUOTE]

Sorry bro, gotta correct you here:

Emo hit its height in 1991-1996.

'Screamo' hit its height in 1998-2002 (Reversal of Man, Saetia, etc.)

I don't know anything about grunge.

[QUOTE=Fireflyhigh]Wait a minute... you think that a music born from disenfranchised people lamenting their slavery is the same as a group of surburban, middle class (predominantly) whining about a girl who dumped them. Where, uh, where does this stuff come from?[/QUOTE]
Because that isn't emo. Emo is such a lost art nowadays, no one even knows what it is anymore. I know that it isn't what you said it was, that is just a cliche that everyone has in their mind, the same way people think moshers are goth-wannabe freaks with black clothes, spiey wristbands and too many bike chains on their trousers.

What you described was pop-punk, pure and simple. Nothing emo about singing about broken hearts. I'm not gonna try and say what is emo, and I'm sure as hell not gonna say how it compares with the blues (mainly because I can't), but I just wanted to clarify that.

Doom Metal is pretty emo.

[QUOTE=Kif]Because that isn't emo. Emo is such a lost art nowadays, no one even knows what it is anymore. I know that it isn't what you said it was, that is just a cliche that everyone has in their mind, the same way people think moshers are goth-wannabe freaks with black clothes, spiey wristbands and too many bike chains on their trousers.

What you described was pop-punk, pure and simple. Nothing emo about singing about broken hearts. I'm not gonna try and say what is emo, and I'm sure as hell not gonna say how it compares with the blues (mainly because I can't), but I just wanted to clarify that.[/QUOTE]
Ah fair enough then - the reason perhaps I have this sterotype of emo is that it's been chucked around on TV etc. so **** much.

Would you care to offer a few bands that you would regard as being indicative of good Emo, if you'll not say what it is?

Go have a look at the first page of the Emo/Screamo thread (in this forum), it's full of suggestions.

Thanks. Will do.

[QUOTE=Fireflyhigh]Who's this directed to?[/QUOTE]

the threadstarter

Why does everyone assume anyone that listens to emo hates life and stays inside all day crying? I listen to quite a bit of emo, and im the polar opposite of this. When are people gonna learn that emo has some of the best music being made right now, and that anything that is completely different to "emo" normally ends up sucking a'ss.

I can't wait for everyone to notice I'm back again.

I bet they'll be jumping with joy!

[QUOTE=DFelon204409]In fact most of it is extremely introspective and poetic as opposed to the straight forward, frank cynicism of the blues or the toned down Gen X values of grunge. Emo is ornate and extremely different than what you're pinning it down as.[/QUOTE]

Translation : Emo is random words thrown into a piece of paper. The less sense they make, the deeper they are according to emo kids.

Not deep: She left me and I'm sad.
Deep: Their words will cause the sweetest fracture from a stone's throw
just a scratch upon the skin, a drop of blood to welcome them (Circle Takes The Square - Non-Objective Portrait of Karma)


Not deep: My feet smell and I'm sad.
Deep: Consciousness, sometimes silence is all I need. Take all prior notions back. (Yaphet Kotto - Highly Enlightened)