10 of the most overrated bands, IMHO.

I have spent a lot of time listening to music. Probably too much time. I would like to consider myself as having an open mind when it comes to music that is foreign to me and I try hard to appreciate new music by researching and digging deeper than the surface to find new information to deepen my appreciation of what I'm listening to. However, there are still a few acts that I just cannot stomach. I guess you really cannot like everything, but not without justification, or so i think! Here's a handful of bands and artists that I just don't get.

1. U2

Heaps of people love this band. I'm not one of them. Well, in fact the last record of theirs I really liked was "Rattle and Hum" in 1988. The records before that were quite good too. From "Achtung Baby" forwards I have found them to be boring, bland and overplayed.

2. Coldplay

This is a band that I have just never gotten into. I always thought they were "Radiohead-lite". "A Rush of Blood To The Head" is not a bad record, but too much of a good thing ceases to be a good thing. I really haven't liked much of their work since. Hearing the whiny vocal on "Fix You" from the X&Y Lp makes me want to punch something.

3. Jet

Normally I hate ragging on Australian bands, but when they're as bland, derivative and unoriginal as Jet, I wish to be excused.

4. Bon Iver

Ok so his girlfriend left him, he retreats to a wooden hut for a few months to make his debut record. Heartache can make a great muse, so I get where he is coming from in that regard. The record is a triumph of studio craft in terms of overdubbing and other recording tricks, considering he recorded it mostly on his own. It's too bad his voice is hard to stomach, like a whiny 5 year old who can't have another cookie. That's the first barrier to his music. His second LP is stylistically all over the place like a mad woman's shit, but that's another story...

5. Kanye West

I've never really liked rap. Ok I can take Run DMC and Public Enemy, but that's about where the love ends. I especially don't like gangsta rap. I've never gotten the love for Kanye. I heard "My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy" from beginning to end. I listened with fresh ears. I tried hard, I really did. I didn't fail to appreciate it the record - it just sucked.

6. The Strokes

Saviours of rock and roll? Hardly. How strumming a C5 chord on every crotchet and singing in a voice that was compressed and had all the frequencies EQ'ed out of it except for the mid-range (making it sound like it was phoned in from a mobile/cell phone) equates to saving rock music is beyond me. I've heard 9th graders write better songs. (see here for proof)

7. Florence & The Machine

I just can't get her voice, or the neo-psychedelic dream pop they create.

8. Fleet Foxes

I just can't see what's so great about this band! Somebody tell me please! Surely I'm missing something, but I just can't see anything but blandness in this music!

9. Spiritualized

"Taking drugs to make music to take drugs to" is guitarist Jason Pearce's motto...

...I don't do drugs. Maybe that's why Spiritualized and I don't get along. Dense, meandering boredom is what I felt as I waded through all 70+ minutes of their supposed masterpiece "Ladies and Gentlemen we are now floating in space"...

10. Evanescence

Thank heavens we haven't heard much from this band for a while. Such a confusing image they put forward, and then their ubiquity on radio and TV killed them for me. Hearing "My Immortal" makes me ever so glad that I own a copy of "Trout Mask Replica" - a record that is difficult and uncomfortable to listen to, but soooo much more rewarding than stomaching 4 minutes of drivel from this band.

I'm sure this post will attract a whole host of derogatory comments, so bring them on. These are purely my view on things.