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Now, radio contemporary pop was never my music of choice, mainly I enjoy hip-hop and emo music.

But James Blunt, regardless of whether or not his voice is a little nauseating, which I can see as a reasonable enough reason to dislike him but to hate in packs, no. (Nick Drake has an annoyingly nauseating voice but because he snorted so much sheetrock it gave him mental illness he's seen as some sort of iconic hero.) Was a genuine artist.

In my opinion, Blunt was one of the most openly emotional guys on the radio song circuit. Every song he wrote he wore his figurative heart on his sleeve and left himself open for the world to see.
There was no great complexity about his music, perhaps that'd have made him acceptable in many of your minds.
Perhaps had he chucked in obscure references to 80's anime that you shamelessly jacked off to or pretentiously spent 12 and a half minutes noodling whilst remaining unsigned and smoking heroin at the back of your local bar he'd reach cult like Music Banter status.

I didn't get the impression of this try-hard nature that is personified by many of the posters on Music Banter, who hawk lounge posts attempting to earn a cheap laugh by making crude and unfunny innuendos or lame puns, in Blunt's music.
If he was sh/t, he knew he was.
He never tried to be someone else, to create an illusion he was someone else. He was genuine about who he was, he was open and comfortable with it and that's why I find it hard to direct hatred towards this guy.

Take the infamous 'You're Beautiful' for example. In that song Blunt sings about seeing a women on the subway. She's got a boyfriend, yeah she's way out of his league, her boyfriends probably a complete douchebag, one of those guys that seems to have no redeemable characteristics yet has had everything presented to him in life including his striking girlfriend.
In an ideal world, that girl would be with someone like James. He knows however this is no ideal world and that she is just another girl who can never be with a guy like him, a nobody.
The reality in this should probably resonate with a lot of you. I'm sure there was always that girl at high school you liked that you couldn't win never. Nay, you never tried to win her over, because you knew she was too good for you.
The most you could hope for was her to merely look your way. Despite the fact you in inhabit the same room, you're on different planets.
You're Beautiful may not be presented in the most technically proficient manners, nor is it put in such a way that its sheer beauty and cleverness astound the listener, but the message is simple. It's clear. It's something the majority can relate to.

Another song, 1973 it's title I believe, I remember him wailing down late night Kingdom FM, reminiscing of a time gone by when he and another would stay up late together, presumably just content with the simplicity of having each others company.
It's displayed in a format that got me thinking. It's sorrowful whilst nostalgic. Is nostalgia this warm feeling of longing for a time when things were simpler, memories of good people, good fun, events, places that evoked greater emotions within us, or is nostalgia just a grim reminder to get the f/ck over yourselves, because those times, those places, those feelings, those people are gone and are never coming back.

That's how two of James Blunts songs made me feel, now I'm no superfan, heck those songs aren't in my extensive music collection, I couldn't tell you the name of his albums let alone his star sign and blood type, but I can tell you that those songs provoked more from me than any Nick Drake song did. Than any pretentious noodling did. Than any flavour of the month hipster Pitchfork/Zane Low unsigned good for nothing so indie that no label would touch us because we're not marketable wankery did.

How can anyone hate a guy, who was so open, so genuine and so comfortable with who he is. The guy knew reality, and he knew what he could expect, he probably knew he would never achieve critical success, perhaps You're Beautiful can be a metaphor for how he'd never be accepted by apparent 'educated' music fans.
Maybe honesty was not the best policy.

It's 2012, and people still believe 9/11 was caused solely by rouge novice pilots acting on the word of the evil CIA tactician Osama Bin Laden. Give me a break.

Neapolitan

tl;dr

If you want a to share your political veiws or have a political debate, then start one up in the proper sub-forum. You can do very well defending James Blunt without inserting politcal commentary.

And if people want to express their annoyance of James Blunt... I say let them go ahead and celebrate the retierment of James Blunt from the music biz.

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someonecompletelyrandom

I don't think you'll find many people on here who only like music which is technically proficient.

This thread is tongue in cheek because the guy had a few hit songs that some of the people "celebrating" found annoying, generic, or overplayed.

I enjoyed your passionate, well written, well thought out defense of him and his music, and I must admit its actually piqued my interest into learning a bit more about him and his albums, but your assertion that MBers are aloof in regard to pop music or non technical music is way off base. You'll find plenty of members here who like commercial pop along side classical, experimental, South Pakisani Opera Polka, etc.

Engine

In that case, what a disingenuous dick he must be to have gone on as long as he did.

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Like an arrow,
I was only passing through.