Plagiaristic Jollies With Supergrass and Sonic Youth
After my post a few days back about pilfering in pop a certain DC (½ of Drunk Country, the man responsible for this abomination) popped up in the comments and started slinging scurrilous accusations around… no well actually, that’s nonsense. He just mentioned some rather striking similarities between Sonic Youth’s Silver Rocket and Supergrass’s superb Richard III.
Well I’ve listened to the songs and to be honest I can’t hear it. I mean, as DC rightly points out, the similarities are obvious, but the riff in question is just not all that complicated. It’s effective, but it’s so simple that I personally find it highly plausible that they could have independently hit upon the same thing. I would certainly be surprised to hear Gaz Coombes come out and admit to having pinched it. Ultimately rock ‘n’ roll draws on enormously formulaic structures and very few combinations of notes. The variations on these things must be pretty narrow, particularly when it comes to writing a basic rock riff, so actually I would be tempted to suggest that, if anything, it’s a surprise that this doesn’t happen more often.
DC’s response to my denial was as follows: “bleh” from which I think it is safe to extrapolate some sort of disagreement, but honestly, I just don’t think there’s enough there to warrant any sort of conclusions of pilfering. Thoughts?
Supergrass – Richard III
Sonic Youth – Silver Rocket
Jesus H. C up a tree.
You make me sound like some demented refusnik.
Let me state my case:
The so-alleged simplicity of the riff in question is not the only factor involved here: both somngs are in the exact same key, the song structure is almost identical (bar some garnishing & flourishes, on both party’s part, which periodically detract from the central riff), plus (& most importantly) Sonic Youth, pioneers (euch, horrid phrase) of the un-tuned chord, created this song/chord structure from experimenting with open & de-tuned strings, effectively making up the key, tone & eventually tune – you can hear the slight off-balance if you turn it up & listen on headphones. This is common with a lot of their songs but in paerticular this period: if you grab their seminal masterpiece Daydream Nation it is a spinal part of the songwriting process throughout.
If you take that into consideration then this apparently simplistic tune/riff is slightly more involved than a coincidental couple of ocean-spaced eureka moments.
I therefore stand by my original opinion that Supergrass (who were getting into the post-grunge scene at the time) acquired rather than creatively stumbled across the thing. Whether it was consciously or subconsciously is for others to decide.
Or, we can just drop it & move on?
)
DC
Splendid. As a casual listener with no technical knowledge and the barest awareness of Sonic Youth (yes a grave indie crime indeed, I know) I need this sort of thing explaining to me, that’s why.
I have no idea what the technical components of a song are or indeed how these things are put together, so as a fan all I hear is a vaguely similar riff. That’s why it is nice of you to come on here and explain in full.
..and it’s always nice to hear Sonic Youth and Supergrass. : ))
Ed
At the risk of sounding like some demented refusnik, earlier today I was listening to “Take 5″ by Chicken Rhythms + Extras and it struck me that they were playing “Semi-Charmed Life” by Third Eye Blind… except that “Take 5″ came out in 1991 and “Semi-Charmed” life didn’t come out until 1997.
To quote Weezer, “Say it ain’t so!”
Demented refuseniks all around me! Gah!
Frank jewett -be honest: ‘take 5′ was Northside, the menswe@r of the madchester scene!
Ooh – Menswear. Now there was a quality group! I bought the album for about 3 quid on cassette and still felt ripped off.
For years I held the opinion that Supergrass had ripped Sonic Youth off somehow, though I have to admit that while not a Supergrass fan, I actually preferred “Richard III” to “Silver Rocket”. However, I decided to reappraise “Daydream Nation” recently, as it’s one of the few Sonic Youth records that’s never really done it for me, and this time around I decided that the similarities are negligible. Supergrass’s song is more aggressive and energetic to my ears, and the rhythmic focus in these songs is quite different.
So in conclusion:
same notes, yes.
same tune, no.
Alright.
Oops. You’re right, it was Northside. Not a classic, but I still get the feeling that Third Eye Blind was “borrowing” heavily from it.
And I get the feeling Ed has some distinctly dubious things in his record collection.
Just to further the agony, Copy,Right pointed me in the direction of this (www.youtube.com/watch?v=VSWzVUQjMQ4) versus this (www.youtube.com/watch?v=la6XeCSgvL0).
What say you, good man?
DC