Yo P&J, I'm really happy for you, Imma let you finish, but ILX had the greatest 2009 poll of all time! All time! (2009 ILX Trax Poll Results: TOP TEN TODAY)

Girls rips off Mote by SY, writes terribly bland lyrics (that you have to pay attention to because-), the music is really bland, and they're selling it because they have this perfect accessible-to-hipster-masses formula. The songs are derivative of obvious hip indie forefathers (one mentioned already), the songs are simple/basic pop which isn't hard to get over for many shallow trend followers (disclaimer: I'm not saying any specific fans of them here are that generalization, just trying to break down why they've blown up), and the guy is angsty and misunderstood (hipster: So am I!), has the heartbreaking indie-film-ready backstory (Bon Iver blew up with much help from his backstory), and the guy's voice is just alienating enough so hipsters can keep the band to themselves without worrying about the inviting pop songs attracting a casual crowd (Vampire Weekend's problem perhaps?).

― Evan, Friday, January 29, 2010 9:39 PM (1 hour ago)

I agree with pretty much every single point you make.

Thank you! Satisfied now.

Theres a formula to Girls that seems comparable to what made Juno (the movie, not the band) so blatantly forced.

even if you hate the Girls' singer's voice, i think it at least objectively makes the band stand out in spite of the obviously derivative aesthetic. and also, i hope that saying "the girls singer is worse than the phoenix singer" doesn't imply that the phoenix singer isn't balls-out terrible, b/c really, that guy cannot sing

That's a pretty good comparison (tho I fell for Juno nonetheless). xp

that's a super-assumptive & pejorative characterization of them & why they are popular

damn really??

― Goon's Anatomy (J0rdan S.), Friday, January 29, 2010 7:57 PM Bookmark

tbf, I've only heard two g-bear songs "Knife", which I can't stand in the slightest, and "Two Weeks", which doesn't do anything for me, but is fine all the same. I was thinking of the latter and not of the former when I said that.

i miscounted, actually 15 common album voters between Girls and Phoenix according to Glenn: https://pub.needlebase.com/actions/visualizer/V2Visualizer.do?domain=Pazz-Jop-2009&query=Top-10+Voter+Overlap

that chart pretty well illustrates my point, tough, even Raekwon has more overlap w/ Phoenix than Girls

tough=though

I can't believe I'm engaging in a debate now about an album I haven't been troubled enough by to be vocal about in all of the last year. It's not that Girls are terrible, it's that they're just nothing.

evan: i'm disappointed that no one called out your mote ref as worse than my thermals guitar one :( also these days i tend to just read use of "hipster" as "myself distancing myself from myself to appear more authentic", which works pretty well most of the time, otherwise it's usually meaningless to me. i think the rest of the stuff could probably code as poignant if you actually like the music.

I can't believe I'm engaging in a debate now about a band I haven't been troubled enough to hear until a quick YouTube play for LOLs a couple hours ago. Nevermind, yes I can.

I guess I'm cynical now. Conan would be so disappointed in me. :(

What a disaster for Johnny Fever.

it was worth it for the initial run of reactions

really don't understand why Girls and Phoenix are being compared and contrasted.

anyway, glad Rockin' that Shit placed, but I hope the voter split doesn't mean that's the last of The-Dream here. I considered voting for Rockin tactically as it was the single (and I do prefer the idea of voting for only singles and not album tracks), but wound up going for Right Side of My Brain just because it's miles more mindblowingly amazing. Also want to distance myself from Grizzbear.

Voted Love Story in much the same way, but it was a total 2009 track for me so I didn't feel as conflicted.

people went WTF at Girls, Jordan said hey Phoenix will be all over the poll too what's the big diff, people went um there's a pretty huge diff

grouping together girls & phoenix is no different than grouping together every band that makes up GAPDY, which we even created a nice acronym for

GAPDY just means consensus praise, but there's not much stylistic homogeny among them.

out of the loop on GAPDY

girls are in that same conversation

GAPDY poll

i think it's funny there's so much objection to the girls guy's voice, because by the standards of white indie guy singing -- which is pretty much my least favorite current vocal genre -- i sort of don't mind his. but i guess it really comes down to, i like nasally voices. when dylan and petty are two of my favorite rock singers, i'm not gonna complain too much about a dude singing through his nose.

zvookster: You really don't think that one Girls track sounds like Mote?

I know, Jordan, I'm just saying that as homogenous as the fanbases for all these bands are, you picked the 2 that, based on the chart I linked, have virtually the least fan overlap possible (and are, imo, on opposite ends of that admittedly not terribly wide aesthetic spectrum).

Morning Light is the song.

I know, Jordan, I'm just saying that as homogenous as the fanbases for all these bands are, you picked the 2 that, based on the chart I linked, have virtually the least fan overlap possible (and are, imo, on opposite ends of that admittedly not terribly wide aesthetic spectrum).

― as genuine a white mainstream talent as you are going to get (some dude), Friday, January 29, 2010 10:35 PM (29 seconds ago) Bookmark

right, okay

which is to say that if you said Animal Collective instead of Phoenix way upthread there wouldn't be any of this quibbling (xpost)

WELL IF ONLY I HAD KNOWN

but in that case, not like i think this is gonna change anyone's opinion, but people didn't react to "summertime clothes" like someone took a shit on the thread. was it just bcuz people had heard that already? or those who hadn't didn't even bother bcuz it's anco? it can't be because people like it better, considering the placement.

ppl are h8ing on that girls track bcuz theyre dead inside

I'm no AnCo stan or anything, though I think MPP is nice to hear on occasion (and is pretty much the only AnCo album I'm ever inclined to hear voluntarily), but I think there's a wide style gap between Girls and AnCo too.

lol, sure

Having heard Girls a few times I wanna say Evan is OTM. His description describes indie-landfill pretty perfectly, too.

It also reminds me of Simon Reynolds recent blogpost about indie-fill, where he memorably says "who were these faceless bands? how could they not know they're shit?"

idk what kind of music evan likes or what kind of music you like, cunga but describing the 'indie landfill' as merely replicating beloved forebears can surely be applied to uh... every genre of music

as for the "girls are famous bcuz of the dude's backstory", well i think that's pretty much BS, but we covered that ground thoroughly in the girls thread imo.

what evan said about girls & vampire weekend & pop barely scans as sensical

Blogs and bands are mutually corrosive.

There's a thread on Girls?

yes, and it's long

GIRLS - ALBUM

Jordan, I was trying to analyze why they've blown up. I feel like without the elements I went over they would be a very typical indie band many people would not have heard about or would have gotten very excited about initially.

'lust for life' is really relatable and beautiful and has a gr8 aesthetic who cares if it sounds like something else from history

also lol @ the idea that girls has 'blown up'

And I mentioned Vampire Weekend in that last example because I thought it may have something to do with their backlash in the hip/indie community.

'lust for life' is really relatable and beautiful and has a gr8 aesthetic

This is the kind of thing that makes me think people are lazy about looking for music to like.

Well you know what I mean, Lamp. They were a big deal last year.

ppl really want to listen to this guy whine over "classic pop" chord changes?

― call all destroyer, Friday, September 25, 2009 6:53 AM (4 months ago)

is it not possible that lots of people think that the song is actually good? and anyway, this is kind of rehashing territory from the p&j thread, but where is lazy in 09/10? i like girls a lot-- i found out about them because pitchfork and the fader wrote about them, i checked them out and digged their music. now, did i go seek other 60s throwback cali rock like girls this year? no i didn't, but that's cuz i was seeking out tons of other music. i don't think i was being lazy. if i sought out albums that i thought could be better versions of every album from 2009 that i like/love then i never would've left my house.

ugh, those videos make me feel so dirty for living in san francisco

― psychgawsple, Saturday, September 26, 2009 12:03 PM (4 months ago)

But why not bypass a band like Girls and be proactive about looking for better things in the same realm? Don't wait for PFM or Fader to alert you to interesting subsects of genres... that's how GAPDY gets made in the first place.

Did he sing a song about how they couldn't have pizza?

― Evan, Thursday, October 1, 2009 8:26 PM (3 months ago)

But why not bypass a band like Girls and be proactive about looking for better things in the same realm?

i think i answered this already in my post -- also, i really like girls a lot! i'm not a junkie of the type of music they make, i was fine with enjoying that album and that album only, unless something else came along. certainly everyone has genres/records on their lists that occupy this role for them. (tons of dream voters who didn't listen to all the other great r&b albums that came out this year, for instance)

lol at the rabbithole this thread's gone down