And apparently they had great hair, but I don’t get it 
.
Then again, I ain’t got no hair.
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Luck is absolutely a factor for being a music hit, it’s not talent or quality what makes a song reach the top os the charts, it really has a lot to do with herd mentality… people have looked at this, if you create a pool of songs on a virtual platform, say 300 songs, and give access to fairly similar groups of people, say 10 groups of 1000 people each, on each group the people can see which tracks the other people in their group have played and how many times each track has been played, you’d end up with 10 completely different popularity charts, people will gravitate to those tracks that others have played already and favor those with most plays, to the point of ignoring the unplayed tracks, you can have the same song #1 in one group and go unplayed on another for weeks…. So essentially whoever gets the first few plays is most likely to end on top… now if you give the same people the list with some tracks already showing more plays (instead of all zeros) now you’re putting the thumb on the scale (payola anyone?) and reducing luck and talent
Music knowledge has nothing to do with creativity, I don’t check an artist credentials prior to listening to them, neither I consult with a scholar to see if their level of musical theory knowledge is at a certain level, I just answer one question: do I like it? I believe this is what most people do
My kids are 13 and 11, and for some reason they listen to the Beatles, there’s something in their music that just click with lots of people 
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I often think about this and how anyone “gets a hit” anymore. And I think it’s exactly the way you laid it out. I also have an 11 & 13 year old (girls) and in general if Tik-Tok tells them to like it they do (Beatles and Stevie Wonder are the exception here). What’s really funny about Tik-Tok is the snippet videos that go viral will sometimes use samples of classic tunes, and when I play the actual tune they will run in and exclaim it’s a Tik-Tok song. They have no interest in the song other than the part they have heard over and over on Tik-Tok.
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I’ll just leave this here. It’s a work of art. That happened to work like a charm.
KLF, one of my all time favorite bands. Jimmy Cauty and Bill Drummond are hilarious geniuses.
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Justified….and ancient. LOVE them.
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The funny thing is that The Manual worked for multiple bands after they wrote it. The most notorious:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BuWrg80dXeU
Straight to #1 
but also:
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OK, now you are landing squarely in my cage dancing days…in which I broke my arm, the only time I have ever broken a bone.
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The intro (Injected with a Poison by Praga Khan) is a better song than then the Chumbawamba thing - again, cages.
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Hahaha yesss.
Jimmy Cauty of course went on to found The Orb, simultaneously becoming iconic for both techno and ambient.
Ahh, Pragha Khan. His solo work was kind of iconic techno, but nothing tops Lords of Acid. Nothing.
Edited: removed the video, just search youtube for “Lords of Acid I Sit On Acid” - but don’t do it if you’re offended by strippers talking dirty 
tl;dr: one hell of a live show
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You obviously didn’t spend enough time parachuting off farm buildings as a child 
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I LOVE Lords of Acid, Lust is on my wall.
Saw them years ago.
I still have a very awesome playlist of all that granddaddy techno stuff and just love it.
Sad thing is I had all this stuff on vinyl (even the Apotheosis stuff that got banned for copyright infringement)
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…the engineer was strong in me at an early age…sadly, so was ‘try to impress the girls at the rave club’
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Wow that’s a blast from the past. Basket Case but not Spice for Eon? 
Channel X is also Pragha Khan. Digital Orgasm might have been too? I forget…
I used to have a giant Shamen poster. Saw them with Utah Saints.
Yes, Digital Orgasm was him and also Jade4You, so essentially still Lords of Acid 
I had completely forgotten about Eon until a few months ago when an old friend asked me about a song and it took me a few days to come up with Eon Basket Case. Totally forgot Spice, adding it now - THANKS!
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Oh man Utah Saints, that song is a very particular time and place for me. Good choice!
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Any song with Kate Bush in it is for me.
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Ahh, memories.
Well arguably the fact they became so famous does mean they were good (that is why they started playing!). Besides, plenty of bands get manufactured and hyped up, but you remember Beatles / Abba / Britney and not a group like East 17
Being manufactured is just another way to start a band, not as common but shouldn’t be a negative. I mean, the Jimi Hendrix Experience and Sex Pistols were both manufactured .
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Well I didn’t know that! “Following Hendrix’s arrival in London, Chandler began recruiting members for a band designed to highlight his talents, the Jimi Hendrix Experience” (Wikipedia)
True though - although most manufactured bands do tend to suck. Maybe they’re just meant to be short-term projects - get a couple of hits and then move on?
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