How to List Influences?

[Autarkhos]

Creatively, I'm a writer first and then a musician, but in either respect I've always had trouble listing my influences. On one hand, incorporating a group like, say, the Beatles obviously shows good taste, I've always considered it a bit pretentious. I know, I'm putting them on a pedestal, obviously, but it's difficult not to. On the other hand, however, if you list some esoteric group or artist - maybe someone you only heard once but changed your life - you're hardly explaining yourself and it can come off pretentious anyway.

Of course it's always dangerous to put yourself out there like that, but I want to know what you guys and girls do and whether I'm just overthinking this way too much?

[TroySanders]

Emotions. Think about that.

[Autarkhos]

I mean, emotions are obviously a huge factor in deciding your influences. But talking about your influences is different than just playing what you feel and what inspires you.

If I'm trying to describe my music to someone, and I just say it's like Josef K meets Wilderness in Manitoba, it's hardly descriptive because of the relative obscurity of these bands. But if I said, it sounds a bit like the Gang of Four meets Fleet Foxes (even if that doesn't really capture what it sounds like.)

[TroySanders]

Yeah. Fuck that influence listing bullshit. Gay as fuck. Sounds like whatever the fuck it is. Not fuckin Nirvana meets Boyz II Men. Fuck.

[Bassus Sanguinis]

Either do it properly in thoroughly academic manner with full names and exact dates with primary and secondary reference material list and stuff... or just throw in any shit You feel like.

Beatles And the Boys Experience lost tapes 1972-1981 from the E.A.Presley private collection; cheers! to Jimi, JIm, Cliff, Sid, Janis, Kurt & co., see You back soon.

[fiddelerselbow]

Pick four artists and throw them out there. If the person your speaking to is actually interested they'll push you for more details. I really hate when people list 20 or so bands when i ask them that question, sounds bloody ridiculous.

[jfrey]

If you don't want to say a group because you feel like it sounds pretentious, you can always substitute in the genre and time period or "musical era".

So you could say "The Beatles" or you could say "60's British Pop Rock".

I like to write "musical equations" which I'm not sure make sense to most people but have in the past to the people that see them so I don't know. Things like:

Gigan = Gorguts + Origin

or

Martyr = Death + Atheist

Maybe that's kind of vague because sometimes I mean that it is a combination of the styles, other times I mean it is halfway between.

[bigchiefbc]

What if i like a bunch of bands but have no idea what the music i play actually is other than me fucking around with loud amps and fuzz in an unskilled and out of practice manner ?

Then you describe it as experimental or avant-garde. See, it's all in how you market it!

[dubkitty]

i just pick out the ones i think are most accurate. for example, when i talk about the songs i'm writing nowadays i describe them as "kind of a mix between Neil Young and Crazy Horse and My Bloody Valentine," at which point people usually say "oh, i don't know about that..."

if i'm talking about my playing, i pick out the ones that i think you can hear...after all, what i'm doing is trying to give a word description of what the person's going to hear that's going to be relatively accurate. the whole point is to give them some idea of what to expect. i don't really see the point of vague genre descriptions unless you're just making conversation, or unless that's enough to get you booked in a really laissez-faire venue ("we're a [insert genre here] band"..."hey, cool, we like [genre] here!")

but i don't have what i think of as incredibly arcane influences...though i may have to reconsider that if i have to explain who Neu! were a couple more times.

[theavondon]

Just pick an arbitrary band that isn't anything like your band, and say you're a cover band of that band. That's what my friend's Innards did (they chose Mudvayne).

[Gearmond]

i just make a list based on:
-what i was going for when making this
-who else worked with the same ideas
-where i got the inspiration for these ideas from (if applicable to a band)
-who i hear in my own music when listening to it.

for example, i wouldn't list Frank Zappa as an influence for any of my guitar music despite how much i like him

[Bellyheart]

That's dumb, who cares? Dig what you dig and whatever people read between the lines is on them.

[unownunown]

i think you're caring way too much about how people interpret you as an artist instead of how people interpret your art. so yeah, mega overthinking.

although i think it'd be kinda funny to list like, books or movies when people ask your influences.

[bigchiefbc]

I don't think it's dumb. Like it or not, you need to be able to sell what you do to people before they have a chance to hear it. Bar/club owners want to know what you're gonna sound like before they book you. When someone wants me to listen to music, I want some sort of description first. If I don't get some sort of description or sense of what to expect, then I generally don't ever get around to listening to it. You have to make me WANT to hear it.

[Zounds Perspex]

The only interesting way to list influences is to lie your ass off. "A lot like Skynyrd" is a favorite.

Also find a way to work in a sexual reference. "We sound like John Lee Hooker giving the meat to Joan Jett in the Burger King drive-thru" - that's a band I would go see, accuracy be damned. Everybody likes bonin'.