Modern AOR needs to learn from the first Giant record. The unashamed look at melodic rock.

It has a grit to it thta a lot of the modern bands seem to miss. Am I wrong?

Well, I've never considered Giant to be AOR. To me, they've always been a hard rock band. I know the lines between the two can be easily blurred, but I've always felt that most AOR bands distinctly lack grit almost as a rule.

Guess i'm so right nobody cares.   I know what you mean but i've seen Giant on the AOR lists.

Dark Horseman wrote:

Guess i'm so right nobody cares.   I know what you mean but i've seen Giant on the AOR lists.

I've never listened to Giant or that much AOR to form an educated opinion, but if it makes you feel better, I'll agree with you anyway, mmmmmkay.

A lot of modern AOR does lack grit. Almost pop..

AOR not gritty enough, hmm,you understand that is in itself a contradiction.

Thats like saying "you know whats lacking in death metal?..there is not enough songs about bunnies"

Ha! Yeah.

Giant would be more "Melodic Hard Rock"....AOR choruses w/ more guitar and guts. LOVE Giant, by the way...

AOR is one of my favorite genres...guilty pleasure,kind of like Manowar,on the other end of the spectrum. I would never crank Manowar in the presence of a female but I sure as hell would whip out some Def Leppard, John Waite or Billy Squier. Never heard Giant but every time I see the name I get them confused with the band Gun from Glasgow,don't ask me why.

Shawn Of Fire wrote:

Giant would be more "Melodic Hard Rock"....AOR choruses w/ more guitar and guts. LOVE Giant, by the way...

I know there is a difference, however, so many bands straddle the line between the two that I just find it easier to lump them together (melodic hard rock/AOR). Love both equally though.

Trying to define AOR feels like the most hopeless of semantics.

I've seen people refer to Springsteen, Boston and Kansas as AOR. And then people will do Def Leppard, Bon Jovi, and Journey. I don't really see those artists being all that similar.

And then the actual term "album-oriented rock"...that's just vague as hell to me.

Like others have said, I prefer the lumped term "melodic rock/AOR".

And then to confuse matters even more, there's west coast AOR. Which, as far as my ears have been able to discern, has barely anything to do with rock, but is more light pop. And crap.

And then what the hell does "pomp" refer to exactly?

I consider pomp to be even more surgurey than AOR. Even slightly glam AOR.

The only pomp I know for sure would be Angel and Magnum. Like crue said, more sugary then AOR.

Dark Horseman wrote:

The only pomp I know for sure would be Angel and Magnum. Like crue said, more sugary then AOR.

Angel the 70s glam band?

That Angel was pretty heavy stuff.

A band like White Sister is the epitome of pomp. Giuffria, maybe to a certain extent.

ZombieHavoc wrote:

And then the actual term "album-oriented rock"...that's just vague as hell to me.

It's even more confusing because the term has completely changed meanings over the years.

The term "Album Oriented Rock" was used to describe music that was not based on "singles" but was more geared toward focusing on complete albums. In the early 70s the term AOR meant everything from bands like Led Zeppelin that didn't release singles, to bands like YES whose songs were much longer than the usual 3:30. AM radio stations were still focused on short, pop tunes but FM radio was starting to experiment, unafraid to play long songs or sometimes complete album sides.

In that context AOR makes perfect sense.

Now, how the hell that changed to describe post-Journey/Foreigner corporate rock (especially since those bands were primarily singles groups) makes absolutely no sense to me.

S.D. wrote:

ZombieHavoc wrote:

And then the actual term "album-oriented rock"...that's just vague as hell to me.

It's even more confusing because the term has completely changed meanings over the years.  

The term "Album Oriented Rock" was used to describe music that was not based on "singles" but was more geared toward focusing on complete albums.  In the early 70s the term AOR meant everything from bands like Led Zeppelin that didn't release singles, to bands like YES whose songs were much longer than the usual 3:30.  AM radio stations were still focused on short, pop tunes but FM radio was starting to experiment, unafraid to play long songs or sometimes complete album sides.  

In that context AOR makes perfect sense.  

Now, how the hell that changed to describe post-Journey/Foreigner corporate rock (especially since those bands were primarily singles groups) makes absolutely no sense to me.  

Spot on but your typing is so brickwalled, Shawn.  

cruedevil71 wrote:

A band like White Sister is the epitome of pomp. Giuffria, maybe to a certain extent.

But then it gets all murky because the first White Sister album sounds way different (and heavier) than the second.

I could see the second lining up with Giuffria though.

Giuffria. Forgot about them.

So true within the melodic rock/AOR/pomp genres, often times they will often mix them up or have whole albums dedicated to one of the three depending roughly on the years between 78' and '88 (not counting the huge resurgence in this genre triangle)

Edit to add while I'm thinking of it. The second King Kobra "Thrill of a Lifetime". UGH, I had such high hopes for their release. Biggest let down from a band in this general discussion zone. I actually smashed the cassette the next day and returned it cause my record store dude was also my 7th grade teacher. True story.

Dark Horseman wrote:

Giuffria. Forgot about them.

I won't. Great,great band along with Angel.

cruedevil71 wrote:

So true within the melodic rock/AOR/pomp genres, often times they will often mix them up or have whole albums dedicated to one of the three depending roughly on the years between 78' and '88 (not counting the huge resurgence in this genre triangle)

Edit to add while I'm thinking of it. The second King Kobra "Thrill of a Lifetime". UGH, I had such high hopes for their release. Biggest let down from a band in this general discussion zone. I actually smashed the cassette the next day and returned it cause my record store dude was also my 7th grade teacher. True story.

I remember being VERY STONED the first time I heard that album. It didn't help it none. And then straight. I never listened to that album...again. You're right in the biggest let down department. 

S.D. wrote:

ZombieHavoc wrote:

And then the actual term "album-oriented rock"...that's just vague as hell to me.

It's even more confusing because the term has completely changed meanings over the years.  

The term "Album Oriented Rock" was used to describe music that was not based on "singles" but was more geared toward focusing on complete albums.  In the early 70s the term AOR meant everything from bands like Led Zeppelin that didn't release singles, to bands like YES whose songs were much longer than the usual 3:30.  AM radio stations were still focused on short, pop tunes but FM radio was starting to experiment, unafraid to play long songs or sometimes complete album sides.  

In that context AOR makes perfect sense.  

Now, how the hell that changed to describe post-Journey/Foreigner corporate rock (especially since those bands were primarily singles groups) makes absolutely no sense to me.  

As a kid I thought it meant Adult Oriented Rock because, well, old people dug Foreigner and Journey and Toto because of how poppy or mellow or accessible or sentimental it was. Then I found out the 'A' was for album and it stumped me. Then we have AOR magazine which is basically written around these pop bands.

Anyway, a lot of it had to do with the shift in trends with radio. As stations became more compartmentalized and DJ ownership decreased, AOR stations began spinning the popular formats and going Top 40. Weirdly enough, they never lost the AOR tag, and the meaning was lost.

I guess no-one really knows what AOR is. I've always understood the term to mean Adult Orientated Rock. I think the problem is that AOR is related to a lot of genres. You have the lighter end of the scale that borders on pop music and at the other you have stuff with a lot of hard rock/glam metal influence. What I will say is that if you're trying to define AOR as a genre, it has absolutely nothing to do with radio.