[quote="sheerheartattack"]Of course, finally, the holy trinity of pillows albums (LB, RH, HB) features some of the pillows most simplistic material of their entire career.[/quote]

Uh, no. Most memebers of this board would argue the holy trinity of pillows albums are Living Field, Please Mr. Lostman, and Little Busters.

I think a better title for this topic would have been "Sawao's Songwriting Ability" since as some have pointed out, they aren't really "creative" in the sense of innovation most of the time. Like most other bands, their songs usually do follow a pretty predictable pattern, but this doesn't really affect whether or not it's a good song.

[quote="kininku buster"]I'm at lost here Sheer.... Could you please elaborate on what would be one of their more sopshisticated works? I'm not all for the technicalities when it comes to listening to music, whatever sounds good to me will win me over. Having overly complex songs doesn't mean that it'll be good imo.[/quote]

I just searched through everything "the pillows" in iTunes (268 tracks), trying to find a song that may be considered fairly complex for a pillows song. I don't think I found one. That's not a bad thing though.

You know what when we talk about a new song, or when a new single comes out and everyone's analyzing it? We say things like: "Well, I didn't like the verse, but the chorus really sounded great. The solo was alright too." We always talk about the verse, chorus, and solo. Isn't that what all pillows songs have pretty much ALWAYS been composed of in the past 18 years? Manabe's always got a solo, and it's always about the same length and at about the same spot in the song (3/4 of the duration in). The first verse will almost lead into a another verse, which leads into the chorus, back to the verse, then the chorus, then the solo, then a bridge or chorus. By that time, the song's pretty much done.
Everything is very distinguishable.

Then take a band like Zazen Boys. One of my favorite songs by them (which I've listened to a lot), "Usodarake". If you asked me to hum the chorus to that song, I'd have no idea where to begin. Mukai Shutoku (of Zazen Boys) has a hugely different style than Sawao -- he is more free-form in his songwriting, while Sawao is generally more...say..."traditional?"

Of course, the pillows' simplicity doesn't pose a problem as to how much I enjoy their music. It's just that the structure of 99% of their songs is very very predictable.

Oh, I thought of one of the pillows' more sophisticated songs. Well, I actually wouldn't call it sophisticated. more like...unconventional. Smile. The song's got a lot of room to breathe, Manabe's filling in some nice lead all over the place. Then there's the faster-tempo "wtf?!" zone in the middle, followed by a bridgey-lead thing after it.

Does it make a bit more sense now?

[quote="ThinlineTele"][quote="sheerheartattack"]Of course, finally, the holy trinity of pillows albums (LB, RH, HB) features some of the pillows most simplistic material of their entire career.[/quote]

Uh, no. Most memebers of this board would argue the holy trinity of pillows albums are Living Field, Please Mr. Lostman, and Little Busters.
[/quote]

Who are these "most members"? Are they "Thinliine?"

The LB-HB era marks the pillows' most memorable and successful works, along with a distinct change in style indicative of the actualization of the identity that the pillows would carry for the rest of their career. Essentially, in this era, the pillows "discovered" their identity.

Now, aside from "I like them," why exactly did you pick those albums? Yeah, that was rhetorical. There's hardly any consistency between LF-LB to even group them together.

Besides the point is the fact that you're arguing perhaps the least significant sentence in my entire string of posts.

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[quote="sheerheartattack"]The LB-HB era marks the pillows' most memorable and successful works, along with a distinct change in style indicative of the actualization of the identity that the pillows would carry for the rest of their career. Essentially, in this era, the pillows "discovered" their identity.

Now, aside from "I like them," why exactly did you pick those albums? Yeah, that was rhetorical. There's hardly any consistency between LF-LB to even group them together.[/quote]

I agree with this. I'm pretty sure the general consensus on IM is that Little Busters, Runners High, and Happy Bivouac are what is known as the holy trinity of the pillows.

The other stuff in your post isn't conducive to healthy discussion, sheer. So I omitted that from the quote. Carry on!

I also agree with Sheer's post, that LB-HB would be considered the "holy trinity" of the pillows' work. The only thing I'd change is that the pillows really found their identity on PML. There's a few songs on LB which could easily fit onto PML, i.e. That House.

The way I look at it, the period of PML-TYMT was where Sawao's most memorable songs came from, and the majority of those songs being from the "holy trinity". From the beginning of the pillows' career through LF, they went through many different styilistic changes, with songs on a single album ranging from reggae influences, to straight up rock, and back to jazzy music.

After TYMT though, Sawao seemed to start writing more "poppy" sounding music. This is just how I've personally always generalized the pillows' works.

I remember that Little Busters, Runner's High, and Happy Bivouac have been called the Holy Trinity of the pillows since the Planet Pillows days.

The new album has no originality, I think.

[quote="All of IM, except Marekenshin"]The new album has no originality, I think.

[/quote]

Is it just me or have we gone over this thread at LEAST three times in other topics?

Seriously, we went over their so-called "musical complexity" before, with Smile being mentioned specifically as standing out and being unconventional for the pillows.

We've talked about Lady Bird Girl And Hello -> WU3 -> Scarecrow (much lesser extent) -> MY FOOT and how they're all the end of the world (the pillows for this lot...)

I think one thing we all really should pay attention to is what Sawao's said in the past. He doesn't write music to depress people and stuff, he mostly views it as something fun that he enjoys doing. I suppose it could all be summed up by saying in the 90's, he was into that crazy English rock, and then into kinda jazzy-blues sorta stuff (nfc how to define WI and LF, help plz) to alternative rock like PML and the holy trinity.

Currently it seems that Sawao is getting into the pop music scene (let us blame Yuuka and her influence over Sawao since it's apparent we need a scapegoat) and [b]he enjoys making pop music [u]for now[/u][/b]. If it's really such a big deal, wait another two and a half albums and he'll probably be into something different.

I'm not for it being a "holy trinity", but the FLCL connection is an important segment of their career for American fans. As far as them getting their signature sound in those three albums, I think it's moreso just LB alone, with all albums afterwards just kinda changing in little increments. Runners High is not a record I think of too highly, and I only love about half of HB, with the rest being either good, but not terribly memorable, to OLAP super-mega-fail. Advice is pretty dumb to finish with, too.

Oh Blank, don't forget me, I wuvvles WU3 as well... <3

If anyone wants to call the new pillows songs mediocre, I really don't care. I have my own opinions, and don't rely on others' to form mine or influence them.

But I'd like to see anyone here who hates them to pump out "mediocre" songs as often as they do. Sure their older songs are good, but to say they have no creativity is just absurd. It TAKES creativity to write songs.

[quote="Kaze no Mirai"]But I'd like to see anyone here who hates them to pump out "mediocre" songs as often as they do.[/quote]

What it really is is that we're all spoiled. Seriously. On ANY given pillows album, there are always at LEAST two songs that are really great, and even though the style is different and their "lesser than great" songs are becoming mediocre, a lot of people are getting pissy.

[quote="sheerheartattack"]the holy trinity of pillows albums (LB, RH, HB) features some of the pillows most simplistic material of their entire career.[/quote]

I know this is quite an old post in the thread, but I definitely disagree with this statement.

I didn't realize that Hello, Welcome to Bubbletown's Happy Zoo was in 11/4 (for the most part, everything but the chorus really) until a couple months after I'd had the album. It's little touches like that, the feedback during the bridge before squealing back into the verse in Rush, the big jump as the wall of fuzz kicks in on Paper Triangle, that make these albums so great. I can listen to them repeatedly and pick out parts cutting through the blazing guitars, or find a drum part I hadn't caught on first listen, or simply admire the production quality and excellent sound mixing put together on these three albums (although I would extend the era from LF - Smile) and be simply content in letting myself be surrounded in it all.

However, I put in WUx3 or Good Dreams and listen to the same bass tone throughout the whole album, the drumming is oft reduced to simple rock beats, and it all just sounds too clean and repetitive. It's certainly pop, a word I would not even try to associate with the group of albums being referred to earlier. The Sawao-leftchannel Manabe-rghtchannel thing bugs me too, and as I listen to the whole thing it just comes across as uninspired to me.

Don't get me wrong, I can honestly say I like most of what the pillows put out, including the new stuff. But there is certainly a level of awesome posessed by the group of albums in mention that the newer stuff just fails to attain.

And I'm not trying to downplay sheer's post at all, I agree with 'personal preference =/= creativity'. But as for LB-HB being formulaic and simplistic, I disagree.

I will admit that the complexity of LB-HB is up to debate. However, feedback and fuzz =/= musical complexity. Also, 11/4 is a rather simple time signature. It's pretty much a 4/4 with a 3/4 thrown in the middle.

I know that feedback and fuzz as techniques alone can't be classified as complexity, but say for example One Life, the way that the rhythm and lead guitar merge to form a giant wall of noise and yet the lead's lines are able to permeate through (esp. during the verse directly leading into the chorus) is impressive sound design and definitely is noteworthy; whether it can be defined as 'musical complexity' I don't know, but it is by no means formula-based. All the albums in question have this great meshwork of seeming simplicity but it's somewhat akin to a Pixies record in that something new or unnoticed can be heard in every listen-through.

And yes, 11/4 is rather simple as far as polymeters go, but compared to My Foot when every single song is in straight 4/4 it certainly adds to depth. It also isn't blatantly shoved into the forefront with exaggerated accents to try and point out "hey, we're not in four", it's very seamless.

Funny how you should mention My Foot, whose title track is, in my opinion, among the most musically complex pieces the pillows have ever done. In this track, the pillows deviated from their typical "lead over rhythm" design and explored a more polyphonic, contrapuntal method. Overall, one of their most impressive efforts to date.

Anyway, this "wall of noise" that you speak of is a common production technique, and is hardly noteworthy. I'm not trying to pick on you, but yeah.