I like James Blunt

[Softus]

There you are - I've said it. Lock me up if you must.

I don't mean in any other way than as a musician - I just think he's alright.

He's reasonably talented, can hold a tune, can write a tune, has a sharp wit (effortlessly overshadowing James Clarkson, for example), is clean living by most people's standards, and doesn't seem to bear ill will towards anyone.

So what's there to detest about him?

Or is that the problem? Is it his middle-of-the-road-ness and absence of something to criticise that awakens some collective unintelligence in the men on the street? Are so many people so insecure that they can respect fame only if they have a reason to look down on the person riding the crest of it?

Watch any TV program in which the name James Blunt is mentioned. Never is the opportunity missed to heap scorn on already overflowing heap of scorn. People rush to join in faster than schoolboys running to watch a spontaneous and hot-blooded playground fight, before a teacher arrives to break it up. They quickly become indistinguishable from a phalange of baying apes, just in case to be seen not to ostracise him is taken as a sign of weakness or non-conformist weirdness.

As my grandmother (RIP) would have said: what is the world coming to? Tch.

 

[Spark123]

Who's James Clarkson?

 

[Softus]

Oh boll*cks. I think you know who I meant.

 

[toptec]

Whats not to like about him. In all the interviews I have seen he is personable, humerous and pretty humble. He was well liked by the blokes in his squadron.

His music is great for chilling, as background, or for a touch of seduction. One of our better Male artists in recent years.

 

[Spark123]

Jeremy Clarkson??
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=yWb0woGFBFc
Quite funny

 

[solo]

Just for Softus

We are not worthy. We are not worthy.


Personally, when I want to chill, I listen to something like this,

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xps7AM8HbjE

 

[securespark]

His music is great....for a touch of seduction.

I must confess to liking JB, but have never sh*gged while he's been crooning. Nor anyone else for that matter, apart from Jean-Michel Jarre & he don't sing...

 

[tim west]

It's been going on for years and not just in music, a few journalists think it makes them hip,cool or whatever the term is these days to pick on certain people and basically take the mick, this then permeates through the "in-crowd" who wouldn't dare be individual and admit that they actually really like someone or their music and then look uncool to their friends and so it builds up until other media people pick up on it and eventually the person becomes the object of ridicule, personally I think those that hide behind the "in-crowd" persona are the real twaats.

Also why should some Twait on TV tell me what i should listen to or like anyway? Half the time the one's they like are in my opinion not worthy of the adulation that they bestow on them and sometimes I wonder whether its a bit like product placement where the DJ or Journalist may get a backhander for plugging certain bands over others.

 

[Belle427]

im not a fan of his music but he did seem like a pretty decent bloke when he was on top gear

 

[2scoops0406]

So what's there to detest about him?

He's intensely bland, re the JC thing, he was cringeworthy. Plus he also looks like my ex manager, who was and still probably is a tosser. Still all subjective.

 

[stargazer]

I like James Blunt too.
It is the herd mentality which maligns him and tries to tell the rest of us what to think.
There are dark forces at work in this country of which we know little…

 

[Softus]

So what's there to detest about him?

He's intensely bland...

But isn't that a contradiction in terms? I mean, how can someone be both bland and capable of stirring such intensity of feeling?

And even if he is bland, and intensely so, why the derision?

JB has even served for his country, and I can't think of any other contemporary soldier who's suffered the scorn that he has.

Surely there are people more deserving of the label "bland"?

Dido, for example - far less talented, but her inertness seems to have escaped public outrage. Why?

And what about Paul Burrell? He's a figure of notable slippery oozing blandness if ever there was one. Is his get-out-of-gaol-free card the fact that he was "The Rock"?

Leaving personalities out of it, my underlying point was about human nature and how some people rush to the sanctity of 'mob opinion'. It's safe to detest JB, because he'll never fight back. It's fashionable. It's easy.

And if it's brave to be different, is it cowardly to be the same?

 

[wobs]

Its a good question, and personally I don't like his music. I've found it overplayed on the radio, and annoying. As a celeb, he's no more annoying than any of the other people we should ignore in the media. But given I'm probably not the demographic the record companies were aiming at, I shouldn't be suprised.

As for Dido, well I hate her more, as her music is more annoying, and her voice makes me want to be violent.

JB's style is bland, and therefore the mainstream (which used to be more "underground" years ago) sees him as uncool. They need an enemy.

One could argue that if someone is hated and yet gains succes at the same time, therefore generates emotion in nearly everyone, and therefore has left an impression on them, which could be considered a good thing, rather than us being indifferent to them.

Were you by any chance reading this?:
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-e...e-singer-answers-his-many-critics-797706.html

 

[Softus]

JB's style is bland, and therefore the mainstream (which used to be more "underground" years ago) sees him as uncool. They need an enemy.

I can't help but wonder where does this need come from. Do you know?

One could argue that if someone is hated and yet gains succes at the same time, therefore generates emotion in nearly everyone, and therefore has left an impression on them, which could be considered a good thing, rather than us being indifferent to them.

I like that reasoning.

Were you by any chance reading this?:
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-e...-answers-his-many-critics-797706.html[/QUOTE]
No, but at a guess the people I overheard "talking" (oh yer, I mean, innit, wha' evaaah) yesterday had read it. Correction: must have known someone who read it to them.

 

[2scoops0406]

OK, he's very bland. His songs are merely sonic wallpaper, he's served his country??? So what? and he has a whingy whiney voice, oh and he's not funny. That said, all the best to him, I'm sure he couldn't care less what I think.