Music genres

[Black Heart]

It happened many times that with no idea about a band I've read some reviews or some articles explaining the music genre of the artist, then I went to buy the CD and it was completely different from what I was expecting. Not that this means I didn't like it, but I only want to say that musical genres are not always reliable to choose IMO. I mean, if you need guidelines, they can make you choose something that's not what you're looking for. Other times the music of an artist is a mix of various genres. In these cases, are labels like "Pop", "Post-punk", "New Wave", "Indie" or "Noise" (just to mention some genres) really useful and necessary to choose?
Do you mind labels before taking a decision?

[AudioBoxer]

No I dont I usually only buy CD's from bands I know or of at leats heard a song from! Like they have slipknot as Metal/Rap what the hell is that! Thats why you get a song from KazaA or something first!

[Rei]

Genres are for marketing purposes, not for the artists that are the ones who actually make the music. For other people like stupid popsters it's a bit different, because in their case the genre comes first and the music follows the genre, but first of all comes the look of the popster XD Geez, that's why I hate pop music so much ...

[hijakedGTR]

another good name for them is teenypoppers...

I agree with Boxer i usually get opinions from friends of new/old/ up and coming bands i just use kazaa to "sample" :D a tune

[Pu the Owl]

Genres can be used as guidelines, but are not always reliable.

[Black Heart]

Originally posted by Fortune
Genres can be used as guidelines, but are not always reliable.

Yeah, that's exactly what I was meaning in my post :right: