Do we have a PAZZ AND JOB 2009 thread yet?

it's the truth

poll Pitchfork's entire masthead, receive results similar to P4k's own year-end list

This whole exchange is kind of amusing to me now (pretty sure this was my second-ever post on ILM):

Hey nabisco, et al. -- how come no Pitchfork writers voted in the Pazz & Jop? Seems like writing for the site should be make you far more reputable than some of the freelancers they get lists from. Then again, I don't know what's involved in submitting a list.

Partially, I bring it up cuz I feel like PFM writers could have some sway. At least Enon, who put out such a fun record (#15 on Pitchfork's year-end), wouldn't have to languish at #733 (!!) on P&J02.

― jaymc, Wednesday, February 12, 2003 12:09 PM (6 years ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Jaymc: I have no idea how they decide that stuff, but it seems pretty print-oriented to me. I can think of a lot of other issues, too.

― nabisco (nabisco), Wednesday, February 12, 2003 2:55 PM (6 years ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Like?

― jaymc, Wednesday, February 12, 2003 3:16 PM (6 years ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Well, ILM associates seem to be one spot of non-print inclusion -- which, so far as I care, is terrific!

"Other issues" wasn't meant snarkily: I'm thinking of things like the fact that Pitchfork has quite a few writers (do you ask them all to vote?) with a more consistent aesthetic (would they turn into a voting bloc and do you want that?) that's not entirely in line with the Voice's (most of the critics included cover wider varieties of material than Pitchfork as a whole does). (Also I don't imagine Chuck being very into Pitchfork: a hunch.) These aren't giant issues, I don't think (I think several of the individual writers actually aren't a bloc and probably would cover a wide variety of stuff), but it's not as if I'd expect them to sit down and give this careful chin-scratching consideration: it's not like they use loads of people from equivalent web sites and I seriously doubt they're all that bothered about the issue.

― nabisco (nabisco), Wednesday, February 12, 2003 3:30 PM (6 years ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

I think it's less about getting certain people to vote than getting qualified people to--people who cover music regularly, basically.

― M Matos (M Matos), Wednesday, February 12, 2003 3:33 PM (6 years ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

oh man, that whole exchange: prescient.

the exact opposite of what Christgau wanted to do with the poll.

Well, the really early Pazz & Jops (pre mid '70s) just polled critics he handpicked, right? By it would be hard to go back to that, more than 30 years after opening the floodgates to everybody out there.

Who is "Viva Las Vegas"?

http://vivacide.com/about/vivalicious/

Not sure if she's still at Willamette Week in Portland or not.

wow, looks like nabisco was......OTM!

I think the "let's get more specialist writers in" position is noble but I don't think it changes "the results" - it means more (better?) records at the bottom of the list, at best a more interesting 50-100 perhaps. But it doesn't change the top 50 whatsoever.

What this list reflects is the lack of consensus around many if any great non-indie records among "boring" critics. I mean, we have to accept that if records we like get into the top 20 it's because a huge whack of critics who are otherwise consensus types put them there.

So the interesting question for me is why only a couple of non-indie records were able to beat the indie-onslaught - notably in the tracks list - and what it is about the ones that did make it that that is distinguishable. Why "Empire State Of Mind", "Bad Romance", "You Belong With Me" in the top 10 but not other stuff? All "anthems" in their respective genres, and in Taylor and Gaga's case it seems the moment when enough steam had built up to bust down genre-based resistance to the artist - lots of critics (myself included in Gaga's case) breaking down and embracing these songs after ignoring or disliking the artists previously.

Why such a marginal presence for R&B in the top 50 (Alicia and Rihanna's Jay-Z choruses, the critically distinguishable "Pretty Wings", the stylistically borderline "Best I Ever Had" and "I Gotta Feeling", then 2008 hit "Single Ladies" at 46) in particular?

Likewise with rap - Jay-Z wins, but then hardly anything else in the top 50 - though both of Jay-Z's other singles, Kid fuckin' Cudi, weirdly "Shine Blockas", Raekwon.

The R&B results look like genre-abandonment en masse. The rap results look like critics lost in a world suddenly unfamiliar and mostly looking for familiar faces to grab onto until the storm passes.

The dance results are curious: if we ignore "Day 'n' Nite" (assuming votes were for the original and the remix) then the top and only result in the top 40 is for "Hyph Mngo", a decent record but not one which deserves such spotlighting relative to other dance music released, and certainly not one which fits the "big anthemic hit by established artist that was also critically popular" mould for non-rock placements.

This suggests to me a similar story as for R&B - mainstream critics just weren't interested this year - with the proviso that "Hyph Mngo" was probably pushed that high owing to a bloc vote from dance critics, or at least dance critics bloc-promoting a track which then gets picked up by less dance-focused listeners ("Raindrops" at 46 feels more like an organic choice from mainstream voters to me). This reflects two things:

1) "Hyph Mngo" (which won Resident Advisor's poll) is the "cross the board anthem" you have when there were no cross the board anthems and no one sub-scene big and exciting enough for that not to matter - it's dance music critics looking for a record that seems best (or least worst) able to play the role of "telling the story of 2009 dance music" and pushing it as such.

2) R&B, which has no similar self-identified critic base to speak of (refer to discussion of this in the Stylus poll thread), relies on the scraps thrown by mainstream critics to get any placings whatsoever - i.e. stuff has to translate as pop-crossover (or push general crit buttons a la Maxwell) to do well at all. I think it's notable that this year the really big R&B records in ILM terms - The-Dream, Electrik Red - weren't exactly massive hits singles or albums wise.

3) Rap structurally should act more like a combination of 1 and 2, getting both scraps from maintream critics and its own bloc push, but maybe this year the mainstream were nervous while the bloc was confused and didn't really unite behind anything - I thought maybe "Shine Blockas" was the default option there but it's hard to say as it looks like almost all its votes were from indie types - was this indie types picking up on rap crit hype, or independently tracking Big Boi for lack of any other old reliable heroes to latch onto?

There were four people who listed all five of those indie albums. 18 people had at least 4 of them, 67 had 3+, 176 had 2+, 356 had at least one...

wow

Hyph Mngo's status as critical placeholder really snuck up on me, it must be said.

Congratulations Luke Hackney whoever he is for winning the prize for least original taste imaginable.

http://lukehackney.com/

"He also regularly contributes to the Village Voice's annual music critic's poll, Pazz & Jop."

Matt I reckon that prize goes to Julie Seabaugh actually. At least Luke voted for "Thao Nguyen with the Get Down Stay Down".

don't blame it on luke hackney.....blame it on his wiiiiiiiild heaaart!

Pitchfork gave "Shine Blockas" a 9.

Have to admit it's interesting that Barry Walters -- a gay man well into his 40s, I believe, from San Francisco who has been writing about dance-pop music for over a quarter century; also, a real good writer fwiw (and the first critic I know who wrote about Scooter, who I voted for this year) -- is one of those four.

tim's whole post v otm - and i LIKE "hyph mngo" a lot, but as per twitter earlier a) don't get why it, particularly, and not ikonika or joker or guido or a host of same-genre-but-betters; b) it really is a proxy for the whole genre given the total lack of anything else from the same scene

The R&B results look like genre-abandonment en masse. The rap results look like critics lost in a world suddenly unfamiliar and mostly looking for familiar faces to grab onto until the storm passes.

also this sentence, while otm, reflects so badly on critics and their so-called critical faculties in 2009

"Raindrops" at 46 feels more like an organic choice from mainstream voters to me

haha, no, to me it looks like:

critics lost in a world suddenly unfamiliar and mostly looking for familiar faces to grab onto until the storm passes

Ha ha yeah those two mean the same thing really!

Re the placement of "Hyph Mngo" relative to other "post-dubstep", I guess combo of:

1) it fits better into house/techno type sets; while
2) not actually being house/techno, hence people have an angle

An actual house/techno record couldn't do well at the moment because of the weird self-hating cul de sac dance crit has wandered into, but even stuff like "Purple City" or "Digidesign" are too closely tied to dubstep's torpidity for them to become the number one consensus people who are still operating in a house/techno framework.

Dudes his name is HACKNEY. What did you expect? (jk)

is the goal of the P&J poll to celebrate originality or to reach concensus?

It's really to celebrate consensus.

tim's whole post v otm - and i LIKE "hyph mngo" a lot, but as per twitter earlier a) don't get why it, particularly, and not ikonika or joker or guido or a host of same-genre-but-betters

Hyph Mngo has a classicism that's absent in the others (Subeena excepted), and also a hands-in-the-air dancefloor MOMENT element to it that the others lack. It's reference points are things like Pacific State, Papua New Guinea, Halcyon and even So Much Love To Give as much as they are any dubstep.

Hyph Mngo elevation is particularly annoying if like me you actually like Wet Look a bit more (maybe one of 09's best double-whammy singles along with Walter Jones I'll Keep On Loving You/Living Without Your Love)

subeena soooo overlooked, her new single is amazing

I suppose Hyph Mngo is the track that feels like it would work as well in big fields as it would in dark and grimy basements. It's appeal is pretty obvious (and I don't even like it that much).

i dunno, maybe the time for stuff like pazz and jop has passed. maybe they shouldn't do it anymore.

And it doesn't help that straight house and techno, especially of the post-minimal variety, has been somewhat short on anthems over the last year or so.

yeah I can't claim to be surprised or disappointed by the albums list, but the singles list is always more unpredictable and this year it was total shit. I've been thinking for a while about running some numbers on how much of P&J's singles list for any given year is actual Hot 100 charting hits and how much isn't -- might get motivated to do that now if I have the time.

fair enough but the #1 p&j single is also a gigantic chart hit, and it's just as shitty as the indie stuff below it.

and "1901" apparently hit the top 100, tho not by much.

It cracks me up how when I'm looking at various pages on the P&J site, my browser title bar says "New York Pazz and Jop," but when I'm on the singles list it simply says "New York," as in "LET'S HEAR IT FOR NOOOOO YAAAAWWWWWK"

well yeah, didn't mean to imply that the lack of commercial hits is the only thing wrong with the singles list.

haha i thought the same thing re: NEW YOOOOOOORK

i thought that was intention!;

I don't even consider myself an indie-blogger, but when you're sure that the consensus is going to shake out a certain way it's hard to vote for albums that you know will never place in a visible place on the list.

How’s that? All 1,934 albums are listed on the same page. It would still be nice if ballots allowed for up to 50 or even 100 albums though.

Whiney: the answer is focusing more on a smaller selection of pan-genre pop critics like Christgau, SFJ, Caramanica, Powers, Harvilla, etc who listen to tons of music that lives outside of the hype machine

Exactly! My idea was dismissed on previous threads, but I think the ballot should include an estimated number of albums the voter had listened to, and allow readers to sort the results if they choose to factor that in.

My suggestions for improvements aside, I really don’t see the point in griping about Pazz & Jop every year. I’m unconvinced by the argument that it’s “less interesting” this year than any other year.

I've been thinking for a while about running some numbers on how much of P&J's singles list for any given year is actual Hot 100 charting hits and how much isn't -- might get motivated to do that now if I have the time.

Would LOVE to see that, Al.

Figured out the decade in percentages of voters voting for #1 and #2 albums

2001: 38% 1st place, 25% 2nd place
2002: 29% 1st place, 20% 2nd place
2003: 42% 1st place, 29% 2nd place
2004: 31% 1st place, 21% 2nd place
2005: 29% 1st place, 27% 2nd place
2006*: 19% 1st place, 20% 2nd place
2007: 24% 1st place, 26% 2nd place
2008: 27% 1st place, 18% 2nd place
2009: 22% 1st place, 20% 2nd place

So 2009 actually looks like an anomaly here in terms of how few voters overall voted in the #1 album (except 2006 which had a ton of different issues). Would be interesting to see if this has happened at other points in the poll's history, will check it out. One question I have is where the extra 100 voters between last year and this year came from (696 up from 577).

The gap seems to have closed in 2005 between the #1 and #2 album -- Christgau wrote at the time that it was the closest 1-2 finish (between Kanye and MIA) in the poll's history, but it seems to have repeated itself just about every year since, except for 2008. But it's also possible that each year in which this happened after 2005 was due more the general shake-up at the Voice plus fewer voters overall than a trend.

I'm guessing that total albums listed have increased dramatically this decade.

except 2006 which had a ton of different issues

Are you just referring to the boycott of P&J by voters who defected to Jackin' Pop? Or something else, too?

where the extra 100 voters between last year and this year came from (696 up from 577).

I was actually wondering whether Glenn McDonald recruited metal voters! (Which would help explain that mysterious Mastodon/Baroness/Converge convergence between #18 and #24, which apparently nobody but me cares about. Not to mention Sun O))))))))))))))) at #42, maybe.)

^^^best thing about this year's poll results imo.

Your musical compatibility with lukehackney is Very Low

Music you have in common includes Grouper, LCD Soundsystem, Blonde Redhead, The Cardigans and The Blow.

thank fucking fuck for that, last.fm. ps who are the blow and when did i listen to them, lol

you don't remember because the blow is a band that reviews themselves

dude really likes m. ward

the(y) blow

you don't remember because the blow is a band that reviews themselves

A curious sentence.

Re the placement of "Hyph Mngo" relative to other "post-dubstep", I guess combo of:

That song was in the Pitchfork top 20, was made a big deal of on Pitchfork, etc. 30% of its voters are Pitchfork staffers.

Also, two of the seven all-metal voters are Pitchfork's primary metal writers the past few years. (The others voted 7/10 and 5/10)

And six of the nine people P&J asked to write essays have written for Pitchfork in some capacity, including the two primary editors of the whole thing.

So to blame us for just the indie stuff ignores that, again, most of our non-indie selections are also the same ones picked out here; and to blame us for crashing the gates is silly since the two top names on the masthead of pazz and jop are p4k vets.

//

hell, also:

* in general, I don't see why it's weird to anyone that nominally indie rock is at the top of this. Rock music made by 20s and 30somethings presumably *always* was pretty well at the center of this stuff. Today almost any of that stuff that gets any critical traction is under the pointless tent of 'indie', whether its yyys or lcd or spoon or hold steady or some tiny band in williamsburg - or hell even electronic (v acoustic/electric) artists like mia or hot chip or anco. The change is with rock music more than it is with critics. This is what rock music made by and for adults looks and sounds like now.

* e.g. I don't see anyone here riding for radio-ready modern rock and complaining about Kings of Leon. I don't see them plumping for Flo Rida or BEP whatever either. In fact in all the hand-wringing I see very few realistic alternatives that people "should" be making, which makes me wonder what people thought would place high on this thing instead of what actually did.

* "stuff pitchfork covers" isn't just an indie diseases here-- take any music not made by boomers, performing in any genre, and it matches up well with our publication. (e.g. a full 30 of the top 34 songs also made the pitchfork list; exceptions: BEP, Kings of Leon, Avett Bros., and a Lady Gaga song that was tossed because she already had two spots on the list)

* more examples: the four metal lps in the top 50 here are the same as the four in our top 50/hm; five of the six hip-hop lps in the top 62 here are the exact same ones on the pitchfork list as well; the two r&b lps in the top 50 are the same; The *whole thing* matches up with our sensibilities, so long as we cover that genre)

* Which is another way of me saying for the 100th time: we cover a lot more than the indie stuff, and I think we can direct people to more than that too. If anything, with our readers, it's safer to say they'd have found Phoenix regardless and what we do more than anything is expand their POV, which I've said previously as well: For all the shit we get, I think our coverage of pop over the past seven years arguably did as much for "poptimism" as anything else. certainly more than the one time the NYT published an article on it, or whatever gets credit for that. (e.g. I assume joy o and shine blockas weird placements are more due to us than, say, phoenix or yyys)

*last thing, which amazes me is almost never brought up in these handwringing threads, is everyone says "it's too bad there aren't more crits who want to write about x, y, z" and I would guess there are plenty of them-- but there aren't many readers who want to read about that stuff.

In the internet-era, when there is way less guesswork about what readers want from critics, I don't see much evidence from consumers or whomever that people want to read analytical or intelligent writing about, say, R&B or modern country, or even most metal. Maybe I'm wrong and there is some sort of place for discussion of this stuff, but I've seen us and RA and Stereogum and some other places thrive and/or get a foothold while the old VV, Blender, the thing CNET tried to start, Maura's Idolator, Stylus (which was about 5% less indie than p4k anyway) drift away and I feel like by now everyone complaining about that or missing them are people, say, posting in this thread. Don't get me wrong: And I say that regrettably, it's an awful state for music criticism to be in, but after watching this happen for five years I have a pretty realistic and less romantic view about it than I used to. This is the way it is and unless you turn the people who do want to discuss and read about music online (i.e. who many of you would call "indie fans") into R&B fans too, I don't see where the audience for this stuff comes from.

And, so, it's possible, just possible, that it was *always* like that-- and a lot of outlets were publishing a lot of words about a lot of things their readers cared zero about, and now that we have fairly direct metrics to sort out what readers do like, that is being exposed.

don't mean to sound either confrontational or triumphant, just feel a little defensive in the face of some of the finger-pointing and I think a lot of it is a matter of scapegoating us for the things one doesn't like but never giving any credit for things that you all do like about these results.

hell, I'm sure there are a lot of typos there, which is what I get for hastily tossing thoughts off the top of my head and not re-reading, anyway..

re: the first bulleted point up there, I didn't close my thought, but shit like spoon or yyys or THS is only indie these days by default; it's basically just "rock" but since there is no place in the marketplace to validate rock music that isn't utter lunkhead third gen grunge or made for pre-teens, it's all called "indie" and it appears that "indie" is growing when more to the point "rock" is contracting

Are you just referring to the boycott of P&J by voters who defected to Jackin' Pop?

The boycott (and in some cases just plain lack of interest after the firings at the Voice) was a part of it, but generally I just meant the participation drop from about 800 critics in '05 to 500 in '06, the lowest number of critics polled since at least the 90s (not sure which year participation was comparably low).