What makes for a good music critic in 2010 ?

[i]idk, publishing a diatribe against someone is as definitively bridge-burning as you get[i]

Those confounded bridges. I'm good at burning them. Finding or building them, less so.

Ha, Clemenza and I have been burning each others' bridges for years (his diatribe against me is definitive), and we're still friends!

what diatribe? can i read it? is clemenza jo jo dancer?

Pretty sure it's findable at rockcritics.com somewhere, Scott. (And nah, Jo Jo Dancer was pretty easy on me, in comparison!)

I have often been tempted to definitively eviscerate my own critical writing under a pseudonym, but then I re-read my own reviews and I'm like "wow this stuff eviscerates itself WITHOUT ANYONE HAVING TO LIFT A FINGER."

I just remember Clemenza (on the Rock Hall Of Fame clusterfuck poll thread) saying 'if I told you my name you probably wouldn't recognize it anyway'...

As above, but without the qualifier. Anyway, I'm glad xhuck still counts me as a friend--we're doing better than Kael and Sarris.

John Lennon knows your name, and I've seen him.

ROCK!

sorry, t rex moment for the day.

http://rockcriticsarchives.com/features/phildellio/accidentaltheorist.html

Nice CIUT shirt. I have fond memories of "Introspective Guy Town". And in regards to the firing of TP mentioned upthread, about freakin' time.

http://rockcriticsarchives.com/features/phildellio/accidentaltheorist.html

― jaymc

Posts very much in character. :)

ρεμπετις (hope I didn't mispronounce that): Wow--don't know who you are, but I'm flabbergasted and thrilled beyond words that someone remembers "Introspective Guy Town." I'm starting to feel self-conscious, like I've accidentally hijacked this thread, but I'll just say quickly that I'm on CKLN these days. Now back to word-counts and Chief Justices and the aristrocratic style, please.

now i remember that thing. highly entertaining. and long. and kinda crazy! in a good way. i think.

i thought of one of these today: just being brutally honest about how good something is/how much pleasure it evokes upon listening. i really appreciate critics/people who separate the wheat from seas of chaff and maintain a high standard of quality, even if that means passing up loads of worthwhile bands. i've picked up albums that were all "four stars rilly good cool band ye," but there's only one or two great songs on it. like obviously we listened to the same album, you could've just told the truth in the first place and saved me being dissapointed.

*even if that means passing up loads of semi-worthwhile bands

Yet another reminder: concentrate your efforts wisely. Trying to become some sort of idiot savant when it comes to recognizing every single track from every single band that ever was is something record store clerks and DJs do (absolutely nothing wrong w/ that, but professionally it's much more useful to them; for a music critic it's nice but often not really essential).

It's a good idea to focus on music itself instead of the flippant music scene du jour or the social context where a specific genre was born-- both can turn into distractions that can make you lose your edge and cave in to cronyism, charity criticism etc etc.

So basically you should beware of the dilettante zone and aim for a kind of "new criticism" ethos applied to music: listen closely and often to the kind of music that is meaningful to you and translate that experience into words. One of the problems with music criticism these days is succumbing to the sheer weight of information and the endless search for the latest track/remix/album/band etc. Avoid both information overload and superficial value judgement; read Northop Frye's "Polemical Introoduction" on the "Anatomy of Criticism".

Can we read Althusser too?

It's a good idea to focus on music itself instead of the flippant music scene du jour or the social context where a specific genre was born-- both can turn into distractions

Agreed but with the same qualification I'd add to my thing about not generalizing about audiences, which was maybe too hasty: The history of popular music is a history of audiences, and audiences define genres, which are nothing other than social context--we're all just record-store clerks seeing who walks in and to which section to buy what, and doing guesswork accordingly. (And don't take that metaphor literally: People at shows and in stores and online for the same artist are often entirely different crowds, each more diverse and complex than we usually admit.)

Audiences shape the music too, especially in scenes. And a band's live show is just more context to draw on. So I guess I'd just recommend caution and actually talking with people at shows, and developing a way of thinking about music where there's some diversity of experience behind your shorthand. I.e.: You don't know, you better ask somebody.

And I'd say listening closely and often to what moves you includes learning about that context out in the world--I'm saying this after hanging out with a Parisian staying in Minneapolis for a few months who's been going to North Side hip-hop shows and interviewing rappers for a paper.

I went to see Factory Floor and Fuck Buttons two nights ago at a London gig venue and it was weird being in an audience of ATP beards/indie types all stood stock still, stroking beards real and metaphorical - looking at me like it was somehow gauche to be dancing. Saw FF two weeks earlier at an arts venue but everyone there (motley collection of industrial fans, acid house guys, metallers, goths and patrons of the arts all getting down - but in totally different styles. I guess it's interesting seeing in practice how seemingly functional music gets used in completely different ways.

But the hipster thing is just a red herring. I wish there was a ban on mentioning 'them'.

I grew up dancing at shows. I tend to think of it as a small-town thing, but it could just be my town/era. It's a critical mass thing.

Can we read Althusser too?
― Kevin John Bozelka, Friday, 23 April 2010 09:44 (Yesterday) Bookmark

You could, but be sure to read his critics too, and for the love of God do not take anything whatsoever from his writing style and research methods if you ever want to land a job.

The history of popular music is a history of audiences, and audiences define genres, which are nothing other than social context- Pete Scholtes

I'd say that the popular history of popular music is a history of audiences if that's the angle you choose, and that doesn't even apply exclusively to music or culture: you can get a demographic profile out of any consumer product from lawnmowers to yoghurt.

At this day and age, I'd rather focus on the historically recent facts that people 1)often isolate and create personal spaces for themselves through music(ipods, home theaters etc), and 2) somewhat paradoxically, are also more willing to listen to certain genres and artists outside of their natural social settings (like metalheads who like Stravinsky or housewives who listen to Lady Gaga). If you want to communicate with as many intelligent readers as possible, think twice before writing with a specific audience in mind; do not alienate anyone.

Finally, music like all art is created from an individualistic, solipsistic (and ocasionally misanthropic) POV. I'd rather try to assess the motivations and talent of the artist as an individual or a specific group of individuals because this is how you honour their craft and efforts, and this kind of commitment at the same time turns you into an author and thinker with a distinguishable and therefore more marketable voice.

Will.i.am has some wisdom for this thread in the cover story of the latest Rolling Stone. This is in response to the question of whether The Black Eyed Peas make songs or jingles:

"Since the 1960's, it's been a taboo for bands to fuck with brands, like they should only sell music. But music was never the product. When you played in a bar, music drew people in to sell a ticket and drinks. The first music industry was publishing, because they sold sheet music." Beethoven? Verdi? "They were selling aggregation, the ability to bring people to a concert hall."

Very interesting thread. Thanks, people.

Consumers of mass-produced products can often find an identity based around buying that product, but I trust you're not saying these identities all operate the same way, or exert the same amount of influence over their product. And is thinking about the history of popular music as a history of audiences (including individuals making space for themselves out of category) really all that popular? Books like The Sound of the City and England's Dreaming and Triksta: Life and Death and New Orleans Rap strike me as the exception rather than the rule.

yeah frankly the popular histories are usually ones obsessed w/ the auteur, not the other way around