The "white guy with acoustic guitar" genre

[Pendraflare]

That genre is one that gets a fair bit of flack from a lot of music reviewers, some for being too mellow or unoriginal. But what are your thoughts? I made this thread after watching a few videos that have said that they're not fans of it.

As for myself, of the three "J"s of that genre, Jack Johnson, Jason Mraz and John Mayer, i'm not much familiar with the former, and Jason Mraz had nice stuff early on like The Remedy, Wordplay and even Butterfly, but "I'm Yours" is without a doubt one of the most tired and overdone tracks i've ever heard. I found "I Won't Give Up" a little better, but I still don't care for it. As for John Mayer, i've always liked his works, at least up until Continuum, and I have heard some of his tracks since (like "Shadow Days") but i'm not that up on what he's done otherwise.

I can understand why people don't enjoy this music, but there might be some that find it more nice. Which one are you? Discuss.

 

[maccrash]

"Have You Forgotten" ~ Red House Painters
"Needle in the Hay" ~ Elliott Smith
"Scarborough Fair/Canticle" ~ Simon & Garfunkel
"Atlantic City" ~ Bruce Springsteen
"Re: Stacks" ~ Bon Iver
"Answering Machine" ~ The Replacements
"Two-Headed Boy, Pt. 2" ~ Neutral Milk Hotel

all songs with just a guitar and some white guy singing that are actually all excellent. and intense in some cases. the three J's you listed are actually quite unrepresentative of the whole white guy with a guitar genre, which isn't even really a genre; more like a descriptor, or something. it doesn't even describe anything, the songs up there are all quite disparate as far as tone and style are concerned. also, music reviewers tend to eat stuff like this up if it's well-done, which is what's missing from the three artists you listed. they're boring and vanilla.

hopefully you enjoy these suggestions though. maybe it'll change your mind, maybe it won't.

 

[Nihilego]

White guys with acoustic guitars:

Angeles - Elliott Smith
Love Is All - The Tallest Man On Earth
Road - Nick Drake
Skinny Love - Bon Iver
Piazza, New York Catcher - Belle & Sebastian

I think you just need to branch out a bit more. What you listed is straight-up simple radio-friendly music and you can't base an entire genre off a few songs (not that "white guy with acoustic guitar" is a genre in the first place).

 

[Pendraflare]

…So this is gonna be the thread I made about rap music all over again, huh? (Although to be fair I don't expect as much heat from this one.)

One thing I want to make clear is that I never said I hated this "type" of music (if you don't call it a genre), not at all. I was just pointing out that some people find it really bland, but i'm not one of them. In one of his reviews, Todd in the Shadows said that he felt music to come from passion, which mellow music like that does not do for him. And it's not just him - one other blog I came across said that they think this genre lacks musical ideas, and energy, and that they're usually not sincere. These things may have been said, but that doesn't mean that I agree with them!

You know, one time when I was at the dentist (when I was getting a root canal in fact), there was a lot of acoustic guitar music that was playing, and afterwards I asked what that was all about and they said that dentists like to play that music to relax the nerves of the patients. But that's kinda something to like about them - that they can be very relaxing and pleasant tracks to listen to. For that matter, I didn't mind Hey There Delilah by the Plain White T's, even if that was another tired song many might have found to get old. There are quite a few acoustic versions of other songs that I actually find just as nice as the originals.

See, I don't hate this type of music, i'm just trying to see why people do and wonder if anyone else feels the same. I mentioned the Js because they're among the most successful of this group.

 

[maccrash]

…So this is gonna be the thread I made about rap music all over again, huh? (Although to be fair I don't expect as much heat from this one.)

One thing I want to make clear is that I never said I hated this "type" of music (if you don't call it a genre), not at all. I was just pointing out that some people find it really bland, but i'm not one of them. In one of his reviews, Todd in the Shadows said that he felt music to come from passion, which mellow music like that does not do for him. And it's not just him - one other blog I came across said that they think this genre lacks musical ideas, and energy, and that they're usually not sincere. These things may have been said, but that doesn't mean that I agree with them!

You know, one time when I was at the dentist (when I was getting a root canal in fact), there was a lot of acoustic guitar music that was playing, and afterwards I asked what that was all about and they said that dentists like to play that music to relax the nerves of the patients. But that's kinda something to like about them - that they can be very relaxing and pleasant tracks to listen to. For that matter, I didn't mind Hey There Delilah by the Plain White T's, even if that was another tired song many might have found to get old. There are quite a few acoustic versions of other songs that I actually find just as nice as the originals.

See, I don't hate this type of music, i'm just trying to see why people do and wonder if anyone else feels the same. I mentioned the Js because they're among the most successful of this group.

just out of curiosity, did you listen to the songs I posted? because they have very, very little in common with the three Js you listed and, while those three artists are usually relegated to mere background music because there isn't anything interesting going on, the tracks I listed are actually well interesting. (:

 

[Alice]

I love fingerstyle/percussive guitar.

Probably my favorite example of it.

In one of his reviews, Todd in the Shadows said that he felt music to come from passion, which mellow music like that does not do for him.

I actually love really mellow, simple music. I listen to a lot of metal which can be pretty overpowering at times, especially symphonic metal that can have multiple singers, guitars, bass, drums, piano, symphony orchestra, and choir... it's cool, but more isn't always better.