Have any of you under forty even heard of them? Do you know who Brian Eno is? Roxy Music preceded The Talking Heads and influenced them. They were pioneers of electronic music. And the only reason I've heard of them is because my mom listened to them in college.
The Talking Heads are easily in the top 3 new wave acts of all time according to anyone who knows what they're talking about with multiple charting hits, becoming a classic rock radio staple. Roxy Music fizzled out relative to the Heads with one US hit but influenced rock music beyond their recognition in the public memory, much more if you include solo and producer Eno whose indifference to the band killed it.
That's what it means to be underrated. To be remembered mainly by obsessive nerds who post on the internet about forgotten bands at 12:30AM despite a tangible influence on your field.
I went through a big New/Cold/Dark/No Wave phase a few years ago. Talking Heads and Roxy were the banal touchstones for what a band that put out one 45 out of Iceland in the early 80's might have been influenced by. If Roxy and the Head's are obscure you are swimming in a shallow pond. Here is obscure New Wave, and really it was on Numa records so not all that obscure I suppose.
That's what it means to be underrated. To be remembered mainly by obsessive nerds who post on the internet about forgotten bands at 12:30AM despite a tangible influence on your field.
Strictly speaking New Wave meant British bands becoming popular in the US in the late seventies but a lot of bands like the Talking Head and Blondie get lumped in there for simplicity. Roxy Music and The Talking Heads are more art rock but it's not a big genre so New Wave it is I suppose. I knew it wasn't that accurate but the genres are used for them and this isn't biological taxonomy. Full disclosure: I'm not much of a fan of Roxy Music. I just really hate it when people throw around the word underrated. For example, I love Neko Case, she's gifted and principled. She's not a household name but that hardly makes her underrated.
Roxy Music had hits. That's not underrated. Roxy Music gave us Brian Ferry and BRIAN mofo ENO. Eno invented ambient music to improve the airport experience -- in other words, he invented an entire GENRE of music that is still active as a solution to a simple problem. You want underrated from that era, maybe a touch later? MX-80 Sound. Let's talk about how much Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti is a Snakefinger tribute band. Heck, let's give a big shout-out to the Blasters -- without the Alvin Brothers, there never would've been a rockabilly revival in 1983 and again in 1994.
I had at least 3 giggles before I went to bed. Clap clap.