Recommend Elok some music

[Elok]

So, I like to listen to music while I'm making my ongoing attempts to write seriously. In the past I stuck mostly to classic rock--Led Zeppelin, Rolling Stones, etc.--since I'm basically removed from almost all popular culture, barely ever watching TV and being something of a social misfit. In terms of modern bands, I listen to the Killers and the White Stripes and that's about it, because those are the two modern bands I happened to be exposed to by freak occurrences and liked. Lately, though, I've wanted something fresh on the rotation. I like what I can find of the Black Keys on YouTube (cue Al asking who the hell ever heard of the "Black Keys"), and I definitely plan to do some serious downloading once I'm back in the states and don't have to muck around with proxy servers to use Amazon. BTW, it's really frigging stupid that I have to do that, especially given the booming pirate/bootleg culture down here.

So, throw me some names to look into. I like blues/rock stuff, obviously, but generally anything uptempo and not too discordant will help me get in a writing mood. I also like some slower music, but my tastes are really weird.

[Al B. Sure!]

(cue Al asking who the hell ever heard of the "Black Keys"),

You do realize the Black Keys have rap cred, right? You do realize Dame Dash got them and a bunch of rappers together and made Blakroc which reached #7 on the Billboard Rap album chart?

You clearly are not a Black Keys fan if you think I could possibly not know about this:

[Elok]

I have just established that I only know a little of the Black Keys at this point, Al. Also, do you seriously think I follow anything that has to do with rap, or any similarly benighted genre? If they tinker with it, well, that's their bad taste. Hell, Jimmy Page let that P. Daddy bugger ruin Kashmir...

[SlowwHand]

https://www.allmusic.com

Search "Black Keys" and when you get to their pages, it will have similar artists and artists that influenced them. I have a lot of Blues. A lot.
Lightnin' Hopkins, Bobby 'Blue' Bland, Elmore James and Peter Green would be good starting places. Again, you can look at related and influenced if you like one or all.

[Al B. Sure!]

Might not be what you like but the perfect background music is probably 70's fusion jazz funk. Roy Ayers, Norman Connors, Herbie Hancock, etc.

[Al B. Sure!]

I have just established that I only know a little of the Black Keys at this point, Al. Also, do you seriously think I follow anything that has to do with rap, or any similarly benighted genre? If they tinker with it, well, that's their bad taste. Hell, Jimmy Page let that P. Daddy bugger ruin Kashmir...

This rap hate is getting ****ing annoying. Jay-Z for freaking sakes of all people can reference Plato's dialogues with Euthyphro in the context of questioning Christian morality and you keep spewing this garbage that rap is stupid. And Jay-Z of all people is hardly a deep guy. This is the guy who made Big Pimpin. Underground guys like Blu would put him to shame.

Rap is like anything else. There's good rap and bad rap. There's intellectually stimulating rap and not.

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

[Al B. Sure!]

So we're posting music here or what? Peruvian internet gets down like that?

This is what I mean about 70's fusion:

[Thorn]

Leave the drums in the jungle.

[Barnabas]

Some stuff I would recommend

All the Stevie Wonder Albums of the 70s from "Music Of My Mind" to "Songs in the Key of Life" are good

I would recommend all Radiohead albums except the first one (Pablo Honey) and the last one (The King of Limbs) which are not very good.

For Prince The hits 1 2 and bsides are a very good introduction

Bands of the 2000s which are good, the Hipster Band Arcade Fire is fine, New Pornographers were very good till around 2005.

[Barnabas]

B-52's style vocal harmonies

[Uncle Sparky]

Winnipeg's latest interesting group - Imaginary Cities -

[Al B. Sure!]

Here's some modern blues:

[Elok]

This rap hate is getting ****ing annoying. Jay-Z for freaking sakes of all people can reference Plato's dialogues with Euthyphro in the context of questioning Christian morality and you keep spewing this garbage that rap is stupid. And Jay-Z of all people is hardly a deep guy. This is the guy who made Big Pimpin. Underground guys like Blu would put him to shame.

Rap is like anything else. There's good rap and bad rap. There's intellectually stimulating rap and not.

My main objection to rap is not about stupid lyrics or bling or any of the other stuff; I mention that mostly to yank your chain. The main problem is that its core characteristics--rhythmic grunting into a microphone while bad, repetitive beats play in the background--are basically what you get from watching a porno, only without the jugs (which, to be fair, music videos generally contain, along with copious butt). Perhaps Eminem, at some point, busted mad rhymes or what-have-you about the implications of quantum mechanics. I bet it sounded just as crappy as every other rap "song" ever, so I don't care. It is an absolutely terrible genre.