August Spies

Ray K says: I personally disagree with this. If we make sure to not define greatness in some kind of cirular way I think we can find plenty of GREAT bands that were not commerically successful or were underground.

In the last 30 years every important musical genre to emerge came out of the underground. Punk, hardcore, metal, indierock, hip hop, grunge, techno etc....Thanks to punk's influence, most of these genres have independent or underground labels and scenes. All of these genres "altered the mainstream," but this does not mean the original bands were successful.

If you look at a rock critic or rock fans list of the most important bands of the late 70's/ early 80s there is a good chance that some of these bands would make the list: Wire, Television, N.Y. Dolls, Minutemen, Black Flag etc... Yet none of these bands were commercially succesful.

Secondly, many modern bands shun commerical success and stick to independent labels. Let's face it, there probably hasn't even been a band on MTV that wasn't on a major label. Does this mean there were no great bands on indie labels?
Company Flow is arguably one of the most influential rap groups of the 90's, but their motto was "independent as fuck" and they refused to join the mainstream.

Lastly, most new innovative genres of music are not commerically viable. This seems obvious, music genres start out on the fringes and slowly grow in popularity. So possibly grindcore or noise or emo violence will be on MTV tomorrow, but the bands forging these genres today will never get commercial success from it. Does this mean none of them can ever be great?

King Rat

Compare the pre-Green albums to the post-Green albums from R.E.M. Commerciality is synonymous with homogenous, it is nearly impossible to be successful and original.

August Spies

hmm actually to liven up any potential argument I will even argue the opposite.

In the modern age (last 20+ years) of rock, most great bands are underground or independent. It is only the rare mainstream band with commercial success that is truly great.

Take hip hop right now for an example. Virtually every single innovative and great emcee is underground or middle ground. The only great emcees in the mainstream (that are still great) are Jay Z and Eminem. And even then Eminem's underground stuff is generally considered to be much better... (by those that heard it at least)

August Spies

yep. Most bands fall pretty quickly once they hit the mainstream (Metallica, Offspring, Eminem, R.E.M. etc...)

RevDahlia

Commercial success equates to greatness? Excuse me while I wipe the coffee off my screen.

Um, the Pixies anyone? They did attain some commercial success, but nothing like what they deserved for their talent and innovation. They are truly one of the greatest rock and roll bands ever. (I put them up with the Beatles and Stones and Velvets and Zep, myself.) Cobain even came out and admitted, more than once, that Nirvana was basically a Pixies cover band. And by Ray K's rationale -- with commercial success being the measure of greatness -- Christina Aguilera is a greater artist than Black Francis et al. I ask you.

Equal_Mark

How is "Greatness" defined here? Seems pretty subjective.

August Spies

well the way he was arguing it in the other thread it seemed pretty circular. Velvet Underground weren't great because they didn't have commercial success.

Jimmy Higgins

Well, there is another issue as well, some bands just run out of ideas. They have only so much material, used it all, and then they are left struggling, for instance, Def Leppard had a couple great albums. The rest is trash. Aerosmith ran out of ideas once they became sober.

Then you have The Backstreet Boys and The Spice Girls and the like which is purely manufactured music. Its almost like they had a program design it and market it. It is highly successful money wise, but hardly worthy of calling any sort of art. Those professional musicians are as fake as professional wrestlers.

mikester

as soon as i read the title of this thread, i immediately thought of 'The Roots'.

i dunno, just me i guess.

August Spies

The Roots as a band that is great but doesn't have commercial success?

Personally I think of The Pixies, Television and Velvet Underground. Three of the most influential bands ever, but not much commercial success at all.