Entering the lexicon
One of Zach’s favorite sub-genre descriptions – butt rock – gets some exposure in Paste, from Barry Blasengame’s review of the Midlake album, The Courage of Others:
“The disappointing thing about most Molly Hatchet albums – beside the fact that they’re horrible – is the blatant deception of their covers. During the band’s heyday, Hatchet albums featured a hulking, wide-eyed barbarian swinging a massive battleaxe as sinew and bits of bone fell about him like crimson snow. It was, in a word, badass. But when you dropped the needle, out came a sickening bilge of chuggin’ boogie blues and butt rock. The only thing hemorrhaging was your ears.”
February 5th, 2010 at 5:54 pm
here’s the site that i remember the buttrock thing coming from – mark can correct me if i’m wrong:
http://techno.org/electronic-music-guide/music.swf
buttrock (or buttrock goa) is under “trance.”
February 5th, 2010 at 7:49 pm
I agree that there’s something very appropriate about “buttrock goa” as a description for the type of music featured on the site. It seems like in addition to just being funny, the term “butt rock” carries with it connotations of tasteless, hapless stupidity and aggressive embrace of unintelligence. In that sense, I think that Motley Crue’s “Girls, Girls, Girls” is a good candidate for butt rock national anthem, as is Foghat’s “Slow Ride.”
Question: is there a difference between “cock rock” and “butt rock”?
February 6th, 2010 at 3:47 pm
what does butt rock mean???
February 6th, 2010 at 3:59 pm
ross if you listen to the sample i think it explains itself. rock from a butt.
rob, i’m pulling this out of my ass (pun unintended) but i would guess that cock rock is about extremely male meathead rock anthems, while butt rock is just really shitty rock – like a metal band that doesn’t shred (molly hatchet). i would also say that they’re not mutually exclusive categories!
February 6th, 2010 at 9:57 pm
I’ve always thought that buttrock referred specifically to techno music with heave metal guitar, based on that site. although I’m not sure how widely the term is applied. obviously buttrock is also something we say as a general pejorative
February 7th, 2010 at 12:02 pm
i’m listening to the sample, it doesn’t sound anything like rock from a butt!!
at first i thought it meant rock you’d listen to while sitting down on your butt, like a rock band that isn’t good or awesome enough for you to want to get up out of your seat.
February 7th, 2010 at 11:06 pm
I was actually surprised that “butt rock” (or buttrock) had been applied to a kind of electronic music. I assumed that it just referred to a kind of generically crappy variant of classic rock, with the stupidity of cock rock but without its arrogance or swagger (i.e. Rolling Stones = cock rock; Molly Hatchet = butt rock). But I guess that this definition is still compatible with “buttrock goa” since here “buttrock” is modifying an already existing form of music (goa trance), grafting a crappily generic rock sound onto an (already crappy) electronic music base.
Ross: what are you talking about?
Did you listen to “Stranded,” by Johann?