Originally Posted by DriveYourCarDownToTheSea

This attitude always bugged me. It's actually a form of snobbery ("Ewww, I don't want to listen to any pop music. Make me gag!"). What's wrong with pop songs and ballads? Are you just too cool to enjoy something happy sounding?

Coolness is lame, and it isn't even really very cool. It tells me you're interested only in being dispassionate and repressing any emotion about happiness or contentment.

I don't mind the Stones, but I've noticed this streak in a lot of their fans, and have called them "Rock 'n Roll snobs" at times.

Writing songs about the full range of human emotions - the happy ones as well as the sad and mad ones - is a strength, not a weakness IMO.

Originally Posted by J.R.R. Tolkien

There is only one bright spot and that is the growing habit of disgruntled men of dynamiting factories and power-stations; I hope that, encouraged now as ‘patriotism’, may remain a habit! But it won’t do any good, if it is not universal.