I was thinking about my mini-rant about Wynton Marsalis in my previous post, and I realized that I'm a bit of a hypocrite in that area. I dislike Wynton Marsalis because he's done what I consider to be pointless retreads of sounds that were perfected decades ago. And yet I'm willing to indulge and even love people who do the same exact thing with pop music.

Now, granted, pop music, as far as I'm concerned, is still evolving, and at a much faster pace than jazz has in quite a long time. But I'm talking here of the pop traditionalists. People who deliberately recreate the sounds of bands and artists that preceded them by decades. People like Dr. Dog, the Wondermints, latter-day XTC (which is my favorite XTC), and even the new generation of folkies like Devendra Banhart, Feathers, and Espers (who might be moving away from the old sound, as I'll explain in a forthcoming post). They're not doing anything new, and in fact, are doing things that are very old, but they all get free passes from me.

Why is it ok for them and not for Wynton Marsalis? First of all, there's a line to be drawn between being influenced by somebody and completely ripping them off. Marsalis worshipped at the altar of Miles Davis, to the point where he even put together a backing band that sounded like Tony Williams, Wayne Shorter (his brother Branford being that doppelganger, incidentally), Ron Carter, and Herbie Hancock. This is also why I can only like the Wondermints so much before they make me cringe. Let's just say there's a reason why they're currently Brian Wilson's backing band (and let's be fair, I'd jump at that opportunity too).

Second, pop music is my pet genre. It's probably fair to say that I listen to a wider range of music than most people, but first and foremost, a well-written pop song can move me in a way that most other genres have yet to do. That's why I worship at Brian Wilson's altar, and why I don't really care if a song was written by the Zombies in 1967 or by XTC in 1992. I'm sure there are people who feel the same way about Wynton Marsalis, but I'm not one of them. It's a hypocrisy I'm willing to acknowledge and willing to live with.

Final caveat: I realize that the term "pop music" encompasses a ridiculously huge range of music, but for this purpose I mean Beatles/Beach Boys/Zombies style pop. It's for the lack of a better word, really.