Flanderization/Music

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Examples of Flanderization in Music include:

• One of the main things that annoyed The Beatles about their 'Fab Four' image was how it reduced all four of them to a quick-caption stereotype which lingered -- John was the 'funny' one, Paul the 'handsome' one, George the 'quiet' one and Ringo the 'normal' (i.e. less talented and klutzy) one.
  • In modern times, the Lennon/McCartney writing partnership tends to be oversimplified as 'Lennon wrote all the angsty, complex, rebellious and therefore 'good' songs, whereas McCartney wrote all the Silly Love Songs and fluffy album filler.' Which not only tends to unfairly deny McCartney the credit in several cases and do a disservice to several of the songs, but collapses entirely when you remember that Lennon wrote "Mean Mr. Mustard", "Norwegian Wood ", "This Boy" and "Dear Prudence" and McCartney wrote "Eleanor Rigby", "Helter Skelter", "Carry That Weight " and "Yesterday". Furthermore, half of the Lennon/McCartney songs were genuine 50:50 collaborations.Lennon did tend more towards Creator Breakdown than McCartney in later years, however.
  • George is thought of usually as either 'quiet' 'mystic' or 'grouchy', but people forget that George Harrison wrote "Something", "Savoy Truffle" and "Here Comes the Sun".
    • George was also characterized in works like A Hard Day's Night and Yellow Submarine as being a somber and serious mystic (especially in the latter). His son Dhani complained about this once, as his dad actually had a pretty good sense of humor. The man personally financed Monty Python's Life of Brian just because he wanted to see it and the last letter he ever wrote was to Mike Myers about how much he loved Austin Powers.
    • In A Hard Day's Night George is more "deadpan" than "serious", not only because it was part of his personality but also because he lacked the natural talent for comedic acting of John and Ringo. But he gets two of the funniest bits of the movie: the "what would you call your hairstyle?" joke and the scene where he's mistaken for a fashion model (both of which work well with a Deadpan Snarker).
    • Overlaps a bit with Truth in Television: when asked what would they do with the money they made in A Hard Day's Night, George simply asked the reporter "What money?".
• Elvis Presley has been shamelessly flanderized after his death by Elvis impersonators. In his youth Elvis actually was slim with boyish good looks and a pleasant smooth tenor voice with only a little shaking in it. If he was anything like most of his impersonators he would not be nearly as popular as he was in the late 1950s.
• In the 70s 80s and early 90s when the name Michael Jackson was mentioned people thought of his great voice and wild dancing; and while in the late 80s and early 90s there was some talk about his cosmetic surgery and alleged child molestation those were decidedly not his main defining traits. By the end of the 90s however, his child molestation allegations and plastic surgery problems had become by far his most defining characteristics.
  • Has become somewhat averted after his death, when there was a surge of remembrance for his music again, probably in part due to being mere weeks away from starting his big comeback tour, of which footage was used to create a documentary tribute to him. Time will decide which one, if not both, will settle in the forefront of the historical record.
• N.W.A., on the album Straight Outta Compton, mostly stuck to an aggressive Gangsta Rap style they called "reality rap", and used quite a few songs to explicitly criticise the conditions and harrassment endured by the black population of Los Angeles. Then Ice Cube bailed, and they became ridiculously over-the-top, violence-celebrating Horrorcore with Efil4zaggin.
• Oh God, Weezer. When they burst into the music scene back in 1994, they were just naturally geeky. Instead of trying to have some kind of bombastic or showy image, they were completely themselves. However, around the time the Green Album was released, their geekiness was heavilly flanderized. They all began dressing deliberately in geeky/outdated fashions, frontman Rivers Cuomo began wearing thick-rimmed glasses, etc. Plus, even though he's now well over 40, Rivers STILL obsessively sings about topics like snagging the sexy cheerleader goddess!
• Pantera. When they hit the mainstream with Cowboys From Hell in 1990, they had a then-unique "street tough" attitude but had no problem getting into some pretty emotional/sensitive topics with their music. Starting around Far Beyond Driven, however, their "toughness" was heavilly Flanderized with many songs revolving around Phil's over-inflated ego, and (with a couple exceptions) the band shed all traces of angst and sensitivity.
• Alice in Chains is a good example of fan-Flanderization. Many (arguably most) of the band's songs have nothing to do with drugs. However, Layne Staley's well-publicized heroin addiction, coupled with persistent rumors of Dirt being a concept album about his struggles, led many to assume that all their songs have drug-themed lyrics.
• Queen is another example of fan-Flanderization. Due to the publicity surrounding Freddie Mercury's bout with AIDS, many now assume their classic songs are about his illness and/or bout with homosexuality. Freddie was actually bi-sexual, and he wasn't diagnosed with AIDS until after the release of A Kind Of Magic (the band's third-to-last official album before his death!).

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