Daniel Tosh just because you can be more disgusting than anyone else does not mean you are talented or funny
What, like Leonard Bernstein?
Personally I can’t stand Bruckner symphonies OR Mahler’s, and I have a limited tolerance for Richard Strauss. There’s something about that period of symphonic music that grates on me. Brahms is fine and once we get to Shostakovich, I’m good again.
And I’ll second Rothko - I get why other people get him but it just doesn’t do it for me.
I liked The Beatles, but I just don’t get any of John Lennon’s solo stuff.
I know he’s inspired a lot of present musicians, but I just can’t relate to him as much as I can with Paul McCartney.
I think it’s an age thing tbh, I am only 23. Maybe when I’m in my 40s, I’ll see what all the fuss is about.
Martin Scorsese and Woody Allen, I don’t get. Not offended by either’s oeuvre, just don’t get it.
This kind of reminded me, Frank Zappa is another one I can’t get into. I respect him musically, but the music just sounds too weird for weirdness’ sake to me. It may not actually be that way, but that’s how it sounds to me.
For writers, it would have to be Tolkien. I could get through The Hobbit fine, but for all the times I tried getting through Lord of the Rings, I could only get through about 1/6 before being utterly bored to death. The guy was smart, I like, in theory, his mythology and his created languages, but, lord oh lord I have no idea how anybody can get through that tome.
Another vote for Tracey Emin and Damien Hirst. It’s not that I hate what they do; I just completely don’t get it.
There are other ‘greats’, like DH Lawrence and Nathaniel Hawthorne, whose stuff I loathe, but I can more or less see why other people would be into it. Emin and Hirst…I just don’t get why anyone would care. I’m a good bit younger than them, but all their stuff makes me want to give them a pat on the head and go, ‘Yes, sweetie, of course I’m terribly shocked and challenged, no really I am. Now shoo.’
I’ve seen the Rolling Stones in concert, and I still do not get them.
And don’t get me started on Woody Allen.
Tolkein.
Never got Captain Beefheart either and I’m a huger progressive rock fan.
I consider myself a jazz fan, but I can’t stomach Mingus, Monk, or (especially) Dizzy Gillespie. In fact, I think Dizzy Gillespie is to jazz as Kurt Cobain is to hard rock; both tried really hard to breathe new life into their genres, both wound up almost killing them.
There are some fantastic singles by Lennon, but for the most part, I’m right there with you. and I hate how many Lennon enthusiasts have to bring down McCartney to prop up Lennon. And you know how the internet is. I could make up five “Terribly wise-sounding things”, paste the same ones over a pic of Lennon and a pic of McCartney, and the reactions would be completely different.
As for the OP…“Pet Sounds”. This is supposed to be the best album by an American group evah? It’s fine and all, but man…
Try reading The Silmarillion. Tolkien’s genius is in his world building and language creation, not his prose. I think even his biggest fans admit that.
I feel the same way. It took Frodo & Sam five pages to move three feet, while every blade of grass was being described in exacting detail, punctuated by pages-long poems in Elvish.
The movies are ten millions times better.
Zappa goes without saying, although “watch out where the Huskies go and don’t you eat that yellow snow” is comedic genius compared to his buddy Cptn Beef.
I’ll disagree. His prose is a heck of a lot better than some fantasy writers (I’m talking about you JK Rowling and Terry Brooks!). The Silmarillion is not intended as a novel, but rather epic legendarium. It succeeds on that level amazingly well and creates an indelible impression beyond what LOTR does. And yes, I know that can be interpreted both ways. I liked it.
Jim Cary. I find him creepy in a sort of uncanny valley sort of way. It really worked when he played Andy Kauffman, but when he is going for just funny instead of disturbing, or disturbingly funny he loses me. I don’t know if it is eyes, or a symmetrical face, or what. I am sure I couldn’t sleep if he was staying in the same hotel.
John Malkovich. Everybody raves about him but I just don’t get it.
I don’t think Jim Carrey is funny, and Will Farrell isn’t either. Amy Poehler creeps me out too.
Here’s another “great” artist I’ve never quite figured out: the Beastie Boys. When “Fight For Your Right to Party” came out, I just figured they were a one-hit wonder and that was that.
Modern Literature: Cormac McCarthy. That the Wikipedia entry for The Road spends effort lauding the Oprah Book Club significance of its literary merit damns it with fainter praise than I could.
Art: Banksy. A master of self-promotion relying on hooking key celebrity scenesters for the textbook “Fame - Phase 1”, now in the deliberate artificial scarcity and seclusion of “Fame - Phase 2”. Look forward to the upcoming Ron Howard directed Oscar-bait movie, with a cross-dressing Halle Berry as Banksy in the most challenging role of her career, as “Fame - Phase 3”.
Guitar Gods: Jeff Beck. He just fails to hook me with any of his playing, it has always seemed pure paint-by-numbers.
Acting: Denzel Washington. His method of “drama by shouting” is obvious and unvaried. At least Pacino can shout in multiple entertaining ways.