harry potter inspires rock

July 2, 2006 11:36 PM

Harry and the Potters was the first wizard rock band but inspired other wizard rock bands such as Draco and the Malfoys, The Whomping Willows, The Dark Markers, Cousin Wizardface, The Hungarian Horntails, Bella's Love, The Prisoners Of Azkaban and Ginny and the Weasleys." also check out this, this, this, and this.
posted by alon (47 comments total)

They're coming to my fine burg in a little bit, and I thought about writing about them. Then I realized that they sucked balls.
Sorry. There's almost enough material to make an interesting News of the Weird post out of 'em, but not enough to make a "this music is good" post.
posted by klangklangston at 12:25 AM on July 3, 2006

Harry and the Potters inspires the worst post in a long long time.
posted by bigmusic at 12:27 AM on July 3, 2006

I was going make some observation to the effect that maybe people could be a little kinder given that they're obviously kids, but according to this, the older member of HatP is 26. So I have no pity. Though the fact that they say they started it as a joke may be a somewhat mitigating factor.
posted by George_Spiggott at 12:41 AM on July 3, 2006

They may be as bad as The Epsilon Rising, but they're not nearly as much fun to make fun of. Boooo.
posted by obvious at 1:01 AM on July 3, 2006

I know they're going to be playing at some local libraries here in san diego sometime soon, and I'm supposed to go see them with some friends. Since it'll be free I just might.
posted by Citizen Premier at 1:28 AM on July 3, 2006

This is a joke, right?
posted by bukharin at 1:43 AM on July 3, 2006

It would only be made better by 'shipping wars.
posted by genevieve at 2:27 AM on July 3, 2006

Rush wrote songs inspired by the novels of Ayn Rand. What's the difference?
posted by psmealey at 6:40 AM on July 3, 2006

Hipsters: even lame things that are done "ironically" are still lame.
posted by kdar at 6:48 AM on July 3, 2006

even lame things that are done "ironically" are still lame.

So true.
posted by psmealey at 6:52 AM on July 3, 2006

"Good quality music?" WTF?

And, what, you're favorite "hip-hop" group is better? You're favorite pewling "alternative" band is more sophisticated? You're favorite "post-punk" group is more original? These guys, and their followers (at least those whose links I can open) are certainly no worse than Green Day or Sleator Kinny. Why they should be singled out for oprobrium, while the Michael Stipes, the Screaming Trees, the U2s, Ushers, the Jay-Zs, and every other millionaire cliche monger beating the the dead horse of musical styles that haven't been fresh since the 1970s should get off. These Harry Potter groups are actually an interesting cultural development. There's no reason why a group inspired by Harry Potter shouldn't produce art that's as vital and arresting as art that is inspired by the racist mythology of pimps and ho's, or the commercial myth of adolescent rebellion mined by punk and metal. Not that this is especially great pop, but there's no reason why the next musical genius couldn't appear out to the world of Harry Potter pop, as any other unexpected place in the cultural spectrum.

And it's a hoary double post anyway.
posted by Faze at 6:58 AM on July 3, 2006

You're favorite pewling "alternative" band is more sophisticated?

I can't find the word "pewl" in the dictionary, but it is perfect in that sentence.
posted by marxchivist at 7:13 AM on July 3, 2006

A friend of mine (who is a music critic and has worked for WFMU) saw them last year at an NYC Public Library, and said that they weren't bad. The songs were fun, and they were OK musically. But evidently, the room was packed with screaming 11 year olds, so be prepared Citizen Premier.
posted by kimdog at 7:20 AM on July 3, 2006

I can't find the word "pewl" in the dictionary, but it is perfect in that sentence.

Ah, that's because it's spelled "puling."
posted by TonyRobots at 7:33 AM on July 3, 2006

you're favorite "hip-hop" group is better? You're favorite pewling "alternative" band is more sophisticated? You're favorite "post-punk" group is more original?

Someone really needs to set up itsyournotyoure.com, and put a big annoying Flash animation on it that says "IT'S YOUR! NOT YOU'RE!" It would be ever so useful.
posted by reklaw at 8:15 AM on July 3, 2006

Bloodhag has been doing songs about SF and fantasy for years. Here are a few lyrics from their tune about Isaac Asimov:
In '41 fandom was young, and Asimov's name was on every tongue
'Cuz in '41 Nightfall had come
Planet driven insane by an eclipse of the sun
A pair of lush sideburns & a bolo tie describes
The genius who brings us the story of I, Robot

Or Philip K. Dick:
Nothing' s ever the way it looks!
The K is for kickin' your ass with great books!
Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch
Genius! Paranoid lunatic!
Lies, Incorporated - Valis and Ubik
You got to stay the fuck back from Philip K. Dick!
Though he wrote some crap to pay the rent
Anyone could see his mind was bent
Everything is a lie. Reality is a sham.
Am I a Replicant? I don't know who the fuck I am!
posted by 445supermag at 8:21 AM on July 3, 2006

Reklaw, exactly what I was going to say.
posted by slimepuppy at 8:25 AM on July 3, 2006

Pretty sure the Sabbath or the Zep both qualify as earlier (and much better) examples of "Wizard Rock."



Led Zep has some of the nerdiest lyrics in rock'n'roll...


Oh the war is common cry,
Pick up you swords and fly.
The sky is filled with good and bad
That mortals never know.

Oh, well, the night is long
The beads of time pass slow,
Tired eyes on the sunrise,
Waiting for the eastern glow.


The pain of war cannot exceed
The woe of aftermath,
The drums will shake the castle wall,
The ringwraiths ride in black,
Ride on.

Sing as you raise your bow,
Shoot straighter than before.
No comfort has the fire at night
That lights the face so cold.


Oh dance in the dark of night,
Sing to the mornin' light.
The magic runes are writ in gold
To bring the balance back.
Bring it back.


Also, for modern bands doing nerdy sci-fi/fantasy stuff that doesn't suck - check out C Average, for one, for some good ol' fashioned nerdy Orc Rock from Olympia WA.
posted by stenseng at 8:37 AM on July 3, 2006

I thought Black Sabbath was the first wizard rock band.
posted by goatdog at 8:39 AM on July 3, 2006

Er, or Led Zeppelin.
posted by goatdog at 8:40 AM on July 3, 2006

Not that bad. Ok, well, most of them are quite bad.
The Whomping Willows stuff is amusing: emo stylings of a tree with a taste for violence. Who knew?

A few more listed on MySpace:
Harry and the Potters
Draco and the Malfoys
The Remus Lupins
The Hermione Crookshanks Experience
The Whomping Willows
Ron and the Weasleys
The Dark Markers
Advanced Potion Making
Huffle My Puffle
The Weird Sisters
Azkaban Breakout
The Parsel Mouths
The Moaning Myrtles
The Leaky Cauldrons
Two Step Potter
Dobby and the House Elves
the Giant Squidstravaganza
Number 12 Grimmauld Place
Siriusly Black
The Wands
Hollow Godric
The Prisoners of Azkaban
Gryff and the Dors
Ginny and the Weasleys
The Quidditch Pitch Incident
Dumbledork
The Sectumsempras
The Mud Bloods
The Triwizard Champions
Roonil Wazlib
Remus and the Lupins
The Avada Kedavras
The Bandon Banshees
expecto patrAWESOME!
Seeker
Hermione and the Grangers
The Lavender Brown Experience
The Order of Merlin
Weezard
DJ Lovegood
The Marauders
The Hedwig Collective
Peeves and the Poltergeists
The Golden Glitch
Snidget
The Dream
The Gryffindorks
We-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named
Grawp
Lilly Potter
The Firebolts
The Hungarian Horntails
Luna Lovegood and the Crumple Horned Snorkack
Bella's Love
The Slytherin House Pimp
The Slythendors
Ginny and the HeartBreakers

Looks to me like these people are just having fun.
posted by zennie at 9:04 AM on July 3, 2006 [1 favorite]

"These guys, and their followers (at least those whose links I can open) are certainly no worse than Green Day or Sleator Kinny."

Yes, they are. I know that in the absence of Jonmc in a music thread, you're contractually obligated to evidence your bad taste, but is this the band you really want to make your stand on? And I'll respect your dismissal of Sleater Kinney more when you can spell their name right.
posted by klangklangston at 9:15 AM on July 3, 2006

A band that frequently appears with Harry and the Potters.
posted by JanetLand at 9:23 AM on July 3, 2006

Green Day and Sleator Kinney: Flogging 30-year-old musical tropes and essaying what would have been lyrical "transgressions" in 1959, for an audience should really be forgiven, since the only other popular music being offered to their suburban generation is either chanted declaration by sub-simian illiterates, rococo melismatic rodomontade, or the thundering self-anihillation of ant-brained satan worshipers. And aren't Sleator Kinney girls?
posted by Faze at 9:32 AM on July 3, 2006

I went to see them last year. The place was so crowded we had to stand on another floor to listen. I think they're great and if I had a kid I'd definitely take them to see a show.
posted by sadie01221975 at 9:39 AM on July 3, 2006

Got it. "pewling" alternative bands: pretentious.

Posting a stew of irrelevant, misapplied and misspelled vocabulary to metafilter: authentic.
posted by George_Spiggott at 9:43 AM on July 3, 2006

Faze - Really. Don't "wax eloquent" about music just to show off this week's spate of "ten dollar words," particularly when you a: don't know what the hell you're talking about, and b: can't bother to even spell the bandnames correctly.

It just makes you sound like a turd.


It's Sleater Kinney, btw.
posted by stenseng at 9:58 AM on July 3, 2006

just a point of reference for those of y'all that didn't get it: i was being totally sarcastic when i said i believed these bands to be good. their music sucks the ass. but you can't deny the fact that some of their stuff is simply amusing, in a "hahaha, boy are they retards" kind of way.
posted by alon at 10:11 AM on July 3, 2006

I don't need a scrying mirror to surmise that these guys don't know much about the esoteric arts.
posted by BeerFilter at 10:16 AM on July 3, 2006

alona, don't try to back out now! If it had turned out that everyone on this thread had said, "Wow! The Harry Potters! They're almost as good as the Sleattur Kinnears and the Green Duhs!" You would have crowed and preened over having discovered them and taken full credit for their genius. Instead, the Slaughter Kooney crowd jumped all over the little Harry Potters, and you (by the time the cock crowed three times) cried "I don't know the band!"
posted by Faze at 10:40 AM on July 3, 2006

Anyone assessing any Potter-derived band with standards based, on, I dunno, decades of listening to Pitchforkmedia-grade esoteric stuff (you know who you are, and you know what I mean) is either dumb or has a jaded chip on their shoulder, which, now I think of it, is also dumb. Jesus, Beezus!
posted by everichon at 10:52 AM on July 3, 2006 [1 favorite]

I saw Harry & the Potters a summer or two ago playing at a local bookshop. They were pretty awesome. I got a shirt that says "Rock the Library!"
posted by 235w103 at 11:03 AM on July 3, 2006

Faze: Grandiloquence isn't the sine qua non of criticism. Got any specifics? Green Day's popera was pretty good, and SK's been a decent band for years. And how, exactly, does the charge of recycling tropes not apply to the music of H&tP?
My expectorated jimson dreams have more cogent arguments in them. Back to your idiot bunker.
posted by klangklangston at 11:33 AM on July 3, 2006

klangklangston -- I agree there is nothing musically original about the Harry Potterites, but the cultural implications are rich -- and, as I say, it's just the sort of situation where you have a circle of outsiders, scorned by the hipster elite, producing an art form that is easily denigrated, that might bring forth a strange and unexpected genius of the Bob Dylan type, that could transform society. The context -- fan-fiction music -- is fresh, and ripe to produce something big (so is fan fiction, for that matter). But the Green Days and Sweater Kinneys are from the same old cultural pile where you are all looking for your next big thing.
Something's going to pop out of that fan fiction-music crowd, mark my words. That's what my exquisitely attuned cultural antennae tell me.
posted by Faze at 11:50 AM on July 3, 2006

My totally imaginary yet incredibly awesome glam rock band based entirely on the works of Thomas Hardy is sounding better every day.
posted by thivaia at 11:51 AM on July 3, 2006

Faze, maybe you should break the Prozacs in half from now on.
posted by erskelyne at 12:31 PM on July 3, 2006

That's one of the best ideas I've ever heard, thivaia. Second only to my Jane Austen-themed grindcore band.
posted by brundlefly at 1:06 PM on July 3, 2006

also, MetaFilter: rococo melismatic rodomontade
posted by brundlefly at 1:09 PM on July 3, 2006

I prefer my fantasy based rock to be more grownup, like My Barbarian.
posted by spartacusroosevelt at 2:33 PM on July 3, 2006

Hollow Godric are actually quite good, IMO.
posted by katyggls at 2:56 PM on July 3, 2006

I'm totally starting a band called J.K. and the Cease and Desist Orders.
posted by bevedog at 8:43 PM on July 3, 2006

"rococo melismatic rodomontade"
i love this phrase so much.

what if this is just an excuse for coming up with funny theme names like Gryff and the Dors and We-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named.
posted by amethysts at 9:42 PM on July 3, 2006

the Michael Stipes

I think that it's spelled "the White Stripes", for reference.
posted by tannhauser at 1:28 AM on July 4, 2006

I think I'll stick to The Protomen for my geeky music.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 7:05 AM on July 4, 2006

Anyone assessing any Potter-derived band with standards based, on, I dunno, decades of listening to Pitchforkmedia-grade esoteric stuff (you know who you are, and you know what I mean) is either dumb

Word. In my opinion, the sheer number of these bands made this post worthwhile.
posted by Eamon at 8:17 AM on July 4, 2006

The recorded Harry and the Potters songs sound kind of lame, but you really have to see them in person to get the full effect (especially at a smaller venue).

The show is a *riot* - loads of jumping off chairs, audience participation, and between-song chatter that gets you all worked up and tapping your feet and jumping up and down. Seriously! It's one of the most feel-good punk rock shows I've seen, and inviting for all ages. Everyone in the audience was just so enthusiastic and overjoyed to be there.
posted by cadge at 1:13 PM on July 4, 2006

Was the text of this post an unattributed quote from this Wikipedia entry? Or was it the other way around?
posted by Ian A.T. at 12:07 PM on July 6, 2006