P2K: The Top 200 Albums of the 2000s: 20-1

i dont think hes accusing you of being contemptuous, dan--just of disliking those three.

It's a by-proxy thing; sticking my name on there implicitly ties me to that mindset. Also, as I said, I don't actually dislike 2 of the 3!

Yeah I agree with you Dan - the mindset he's describing exists elsewhere.

Following these links led me to this AMAZING short discussion on internet snark that Tom blogged:

http://tomewing.tumblr.com/post/212276849/why-snark-works

oh wow that is fantastic

the snark argument is wrong wrong wrong for many reasons, some kinda obvious.

if all the critical voices i know who disliked taylor swift justified their dislike in as clear and sensible terms as dan, i'd have no problem with them disliking her. as it is i assume that 75% of taylor dismissers are basically assuming that a blonde teenage american girl cannot be a great songwriter and not bothering to listen to her songs.

^ nah

the definitive taylor swift song was recorded 18 years ago tbh
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lb2K6TsMmgo

BTW Lex maybe you didn't see my question for you a little bit upthread w/r/t Fall Out Boy et. al.

the snark argument is wrong wrong wrong for many reasons, some kinda obvious.

Expand?

Read that Kogan piece a few days ago. Was bothered by the implication that I'm failing to perceive the value judgments contained in our expressions of artistic taste. My argument is more that, where deep taste* is concerned, such value judgments are often little more than an intellectual smokescreen used to rationalize and universalize an atavistic response. Obvious caveat that deep taste isn't clearly distinct from any other sort (see Rudipherous' point above), so it's hard to draw a clean line between what this applies to and what it doesn't.

FWIW, I regret introducing the destabilizing comparison of musical taste to sexual taste/orientation into this discussion. Should have known that things would go pear-shaped from there on out, no matter how well-intentioned my argument. I intended only to draw a connection between a form of "taste" that we regard as beyond criticism, and one that we don't -- and to question the mechanisms involved. But I could and should have picked a less inflammatory example.

I agree with Kogan that the critical arguments we use to communicate our value judgments can and should be subject to criticism, analysis, etc. But I see such critical arguments as separate from (though necessarily related to) our underlying tastes, which, it seems to me, are never right or wrong. That's why I'm hesitant to draw conclusions regarding the political implications of even collective expressions of taste -- Pitchfork list, etc.

* "Deep taste" being the sort that seizes us from within and leaves little room for intellectual/aesthetic equivocation: "I LOVE THIS SONG!!!"

"Deep taste" being the sort that seizes us from within and leaves little room for intellectual/aesthetic equivocation: "I LOVE THIS SONG!!!"

This isn't an actual category though. There's always room for intellectual/aesthetic equivocation. It's just that we don't always need to - our taste in the music and our value judgment that the music is deserving of enjoyment simply overlap so well that the issue doesn't arise.

But the "taste" part isn't necessarily more "deep" than the value judgment part. In fact, in many instances people's tastes appear to change quite rapidly while the underlying value judgments remain constant; indeed, the value judgments determine - or, rather, constrain and delimit - the tastes.

See where yr coming from, Tim, but respectfully disagree - to some extent. I believe that value judgments and the intellectual devices that support them are very flexible, or at least can be, depending on the person involved, but that what I'm calling "deep taste" (a phrase for which I feel I must apologize) is very difficult for any of us to consciously alter. That's a presumptive and unjustifiable argument, I admit, but it reflects my personal experience and at least seems to be true of the people I've known.

That said, I'd never deny that value judgments never influence taste, or that taste in general isn't extremely flexible.

"...I'd never deny argue that value judgments never influence taste, or that..."

Something I haven't said and that maybe isn't clear from what I have said: I feel that intellectual equivocation regarding deep taste is a form of lying, or worse, self-delusion, and that this kind of lying/delusion is very common among people who pride themselves on having "good taste". I.e., it's not so much that you can't think your way around your fundamental tastes, but rather that you shouldn't.

Tim, I'm not ready to argue the point (especially with you), but I haven't observed in myself or others that value judgments about music appear to be more constant than taste in music.

I tend to be sympathetic with what I think contenderizer is saying that reasoned accounts in defense of value judgments are frequently ad hoc attempts driven by taste. I don't see some underlying value judgments as driving taste.

I also agree with contenderizer's view that taste is not particularly easy to alter (certainly not through submitting to other people's arguments about music*). I can think of times when I've tried to nudge myself in the direction of a certain genre or artist, and it's "taken," but I can also thinking of plenty of times when it hasn't.

*I don't think the many years I've spent reading ILM have changed my taste much.

I'm not saying that value judgments take priority over tastes - if anything, I'd say they're so intertwined that working out where one stops and the other starts verges on impossible (ha, like nature and nurture). If, for example, I say that I like my dance music cheesy, is this taste or a value judgment?

Exactly! It's impossible to say for certain. If you make some argument concerning why cheesy dance music is the best, I might take issue, but yr fundamental taste-and-or-judgment is beyond reproach, IMO -- no matter how much my own taste/judgment might differ. Not sure you're saying any different...

"I might take issue, but yr fundamental taste-and-or-judgment is beyond reproach"

Why?

All human conduct is a difficult-to-untangle mixture of impulse, learned behaviour and will. That doesn't make it beyond reproach.

As I said upthread, there are other reasons we may choose not to interrogate the musical tastes of others, but it's not because of some fundamental right.

Yeah, I suppose that that's the part on which we do disagree. I can't see any good that might come of the temptation to fault basic taste, and I can't see any sound grounds on which to fault it in the first place -- given the inseparability of deep taste and our more superficial ideas about it (nature vs. nurture, etc.). I think it's great to suggest that people might find this or that thing interesting, perhaps more interesting and compelling than they seem to imagine, but that's as far as I'll go.

For what it's worth, this is a matter of something approaching personal ethics for me. I feel strongly about it, but don't insist that I'm right or that others need to see things my way.

The ground gets shaky real damn fast, though. Taste can certainly reflect values that we reject, and it's often useful to call into question the values reflected in taste. In such cases, however, I prefer to observe an arbitrary line drawn between sacrosanct personal taste and fair-game cultural/demographic/collective taste.

You know, like the Pitchfork list...

Well in practice I agree, I don't go around personally criticising people's tastes as a rule - as you note it's more the reasoning people use which tends to be risible.

I just don't wish to transform a contingent social practice into an immutable metaphysical law.

Why fault basic taste? We're all embarked on the task of constructing our selves, and basic taste is just another layer of construction. What you're calling "basic" is just lower down in the strata that have accumulated in this construction: earlier stages in the construction of self. Why should those earlier stages be privileged? I think our construction of self is dialogical, in that we carry out self-definition in dialogue with others. But that's why I think "basic taste" shouldn't be privileged: because those dialogues mean something, and if basic taste isn't negotiable, then those dialogues ultimately don't mean something. They're the equivalent of "well, I see where you're coming from, but I disagree". Otherwise, why talk with others about music? Are you just using them as a source of news, e.g. of songs or bands presently unknown to you? I talk with others about music in the hopes of learning new ways of experiencing music, and of understanding music.

Now you might say: people have their starting positions in dialogues, and that's what I mean by basic taste. But again, the point of dialogue is to adjust starting positions. So I don't see any bedrock here.

^^^ 100% OTM

21-40 poll should be crazy, right

guys

x-post

I think it's mostly hot air, especially the less of your taste you share in common with the person you are dialoguing with.

You might as well seriously try to convince someone to give the texture of a dried coconut another chance by talking about the way its firmness combines with a trace of its previously moist state.

Music: more complicated, but you soon run into similarly simple simples.

My experience is that discourse around music rarely comes anywhere close in changing my perception of music to: seeing how people (who are part of the musical sub-culture) move to it, learning how to dance to it (where things are formalized enough that that makes sense), drugs, and maybe heightened states of emotion, or simply being in an unusual context (staying up all night on a long ride home from somewhere).

I don't mean to say that it can't be somewhat interesting to find out how other people experience music, but I find those accounts have minimal persuasive force.

All of this may be less true of discussions of lyrical content, but lyrical content doesn't figure too significantly in my experience of music. (Maybe that's because I am otherwise attracted to so much foreign language music).

My experience is that discourse around music rarely comes anywhere close in changing my perception of music to: seeing how people (who are part of the musical sub-culture) move to it, learning how to dance to it (where things are formalized enough that that makes sense), drugs, and maybe heightened states of emotion, or simply being in an unusual context (staying up all night on a long ride home from somewhere).

I've said this before, but dancing is discourse. All you're saying here is that writing hasn't changed your perception of it much.

Part of my problem with the handwringing surrounding this thread is that suspending critical integrity and dismissing things you haven't really listened to based on contempt for the general aesthetic is FUN and nearly everyone does it including some of the people railing most vociferously against it on this thread (eg The Lex and the Arctic Monkeys).

I mean, if I ever stop having lazy gratuitous pops at mimsy tweepop bands with cardigans and recorders and xylophones then just kill me then and there. And I would say people with infinitely more critical clout than me doing it at, say, up and coming indie bands (or MCs, or singers, or whoever) is much more damaging to the artists than a perceived lack of critical respect for multi-million selling globally famous pop stars like Taylor or Mariah.

I mean, what this comes down to more often than not is a filtering of those aesthetics you consider worthy of lazy dismissal and those whose lazy dismissal you are outraged by. And the outrage is totally 100% OTM and justified in the case of say Lady Stush or some band playing a currently unfashionable strand of guitar pop but I can't think of anyone who is likely to be less affected or bothered by a lack of respect from the indiecentric internet critical sphere than Mariah Carey.

(God I think in a roundabout way I've just defended Pipecock - I'm going to go and hang myself now)

And yes I do realise that there's a world of difference between indulging lazy dismissal on a message board and doing so from a position of power and/or influence but the conversation seems to have moved away from Pitchfork and onto more general internet attitudes so I'm trolling a bit. But it doesn't really matter in the case of Mariah Carey who is so ridiculously successful without the critic's help.

Personally speaking I don't really want to give Mariah any time because a)there's so much else to listen to and b) she comes across as such an unbelievably unpleasant person and I can't see how I could possibly identify with her music on any level.

My experience is that discourse around music rarely comes anywhere close in changing my perception of music to: seeing how people (who are part of the musical sub-culture) move to it, learning how to dance to it (where things are formalized enough that that makes sense), drugs, and maybe heightened states of emotion, or simply being in an unusual context (staying up all night on a long ride home from somewhere).

I don't mean to say that it can't be somewhat interesting to find out how other people experience music

I am very confused by this line of reasoning! Aren't all the things you list "how other people experience music"?

I just banished the image of Mariah Carey excitedly photocopying the Sasha Frere-Jones New Yorker review of The Emancipation of Mimi

... in a pair of tiny hotpants with 'Animal Collective' written on them.

This is not a pleasant vision to wake up to.

Good morning, Ned!

Uhhhh . . . an image of Mariah Carey in a pair of tiny hotpants (with "Animal Collective" -- or anything else, for that matter -- written on them) is a very pleasant image!

She's your type of chick.

LOL

Yes. Crazy girls try harder.

Must be a Miami thing.

In reading over this last batch of posts I was thinking a bit about where I stand with it all, and I was able to put into words something more of the shift in the way I consider (and argue and write about) music in the past few years, or perhaps the decade as a whole. Some of which I'm going to save for my piece in the upcoming Stylus one-off, but more generally now:

The indirect exchange between Frank and Dan above helped me crystallize an idea that I seem to unconsciously, if not always consciously, steer away from 'anchor figures' to talk/think about music, at least in the sense of the performer or public face and, where applicable, voice. I kinda identify this as part of a larger withdrawal from the concept of the celebrity, partially due to the evolving change with which I dealt with music and media over the decade. In a strange way (and this sounds grotesque, so I will apologize for it in advance), one of the more profound personal impacts of 9/11 was a decision to stop switching on the TV and channel-browsing, as I didn't want a slew of voices and images in my head any more than necessary, even by chance. In combination with the fact that I long ago gave up on regular commercial radio listening (must have been around '92 or so), much of the decade has been a 'silent' decade on many fronts, the more obvious contexts in which popular music is consumed somewhat willfully shut off in favor of other, often unexpected ones which I find much more intriguing. (Going out and about somewhere, hearing something clearly well known but totally unfamiliar to myself is often a good shock to the system.)

Of course, it's not like I don't just call up everything and anything these days on the Net regardless, which has been plenty helpful over time (as have pop-conscious blogs like Idolator, a classic example of a gatekeeper function at work!). It's all there if I want or need it. But I don't always *need* it, and often the knowledge it is there is enough. Rightly or wrongly I have reached the point where given the sheer volume of music out there that I can and do have an interest in -- in combination with everything else in life I find of particular value, all of which is time spent, human capital -- means that I choose often to pick my battles precisely so I can let myself be surprised otherwise. And this doesn't mean a full retreat into the well-worn either -- in ways I've been doing that a little more lately due to the ongoing digitization of my library, but the majority of my listening remains new releases, newer artists, as part of a product of my reviewing for the AMG in particular.

Turning back again to Frank and Dan's points, said 'anchor figures' in pop for me have held much less of a sense of fascination than past ones have, and I rarely think about them in those kind of terms anymore. (Thinking not just music here but talk about actors in film and TV would need several posts on its own.) I was trying to think who for me had any sort of impact on that front recently that I used to feel for people like Michael Jackson, Madonna, Prince -- the usual suspects of my early adolescence -- plus the later more generally subcultural ones. About the only figure who comes close in recent years is *kinda* Kanye but more from a sense of appreciation at his series of balancing acts and impulses, not always successful. Similarly overarching figures of constant annoyance, focuses of ire, a reverse but equally strong fascination are much thinner on the ground for me now. Someone like Asher Roth's a dipshit, but I was never on the warpath against him like I was, say, Rage Against the Machine back in 1993 (and after). And yet the *sound* of the charts as randomly encountered away from the computer, unstable then unstable, constantly recombining into new monoliths -- same as it ever was but crazily accelerated -- is often relentlessly fascinating to me, a constant life-pulse that I lock onto much more than the people who are the brand-name for it, or the debates over them. I made a joke the other day, based on the upcoming Shakira/Lil Wayne/Timbaland single, that the charts seem to have turned into a rolling collaborative mixtape, and on that front the figures of pop seem to bob in and out of a larger pool, something that often feels -- again, in the way I tend to hear things now -- far less constructed of discrete parts than my earlier sense of what pop 'was,' when I was eight, fourteen, nineteen.

None of this is to somehow settle the debate or provide a grand unified theory or anything, it's just a sketch and outline. For all I know it's a position that nobody has any sort of connection to!

Age is something more than a number. It's possible that no one will ever Mean more to you than Prince, Madonna, and MJ did during your adolescence, Ned. The liberating effects of maturity released you from the influence of totems, leading you to a more catholic approach, say.

Doubtless, and J0hn D.'s spoken at length about studies where music heard (and heard again) in adolescence hardwires the brain in some fashion that can never be set aside, which of course makes perfect sense. But if one can't escape the past one can still find ways to engage with the present on different levels (which I'm sure we can all agree on).

Matt DC wrote: "[D]ismissing things you haven't really listened to based on contempt for the general aesthetic is FUN"

I can't get with this, though it's partly situational. In my world the music that is sneeringly dismissed without engagement is generally hip hop, contemporary r&b, female singer-songwriters, and country music. That is, what you're calling "FUN" in my world is the domain of racists, sexists, and classists; and I find those repugnant.

In addition it seems assholish to dismiss without engagement. If you don't want to engage (and I can understand this, time is limited as Ned says), why not just pass over it in silence and attend to what's worth your time?

but dancing is discourse

Not on some pretty commonly used definitions of "discourse."

Yes, I was talking about written and spoken discourse exclusively.

Sure, but you're admitting that experiencing how music is enjoyed by other people has changed how you experience it - whether it's writing or dancing, you're still letting some third thing mediate your relationship with the music.