Pitchfork's Top Fifty Shoegaze List

I like that they didn't take the obvious 1986-1996 approach to this and I'm really glad to see that Asobi Seksu album in there.

Dream-pop list next please, would make a good triangle point with the ambient list and this.

This knowldgeable french guy (not me) has a top150 and he says it's better and I'm inclined to believe him.
http://www.senscritique.com/top/Les_meilleurs_albums_du_shoegaze/951994

i've got a list of 500 but it's shit
500: alexei sayle "ullo john gotta new motor?
499: dexy's midnight runners searching for the young soul rebels
498: mortopsy brown light at the end of th etunnel
497: SSQ - synthecide
496: a theme tune ( news? / nationwide? tomrrow's world? can't remember how it goes)
495: brown girl in the ring
497: tijuana taxi
498: the carpenters close to you
499: clive dunn - grnadadddad
500: batman -batman theme (prince)

That French list is good with some cool inclusions like Levitation, Th' Faith Healers and Coaltar of the Deepers. Omits Ulrich Schnauss presumably on the grounds of anti-electro snobbery

no tom heasley either presumably due to an irrational hatred of tuba players

fifty consecutive shoegaze reviews, sure yeah i'll read this

No Moose is mainly weird because the term shoegazing was, I believe, coined in a review of one of their gigs. You'd think they'd get at least a passing mention! This is Wikipedia levels of research here.

Literally no one - even Ned - needs this many shoegaze albums.

i don't really need any swervedriver albums. i tried back in the day but the vocals kinda kill it for me. like a mix of kevin shields and seattle.

Ned's Nineties was like 50% shoegaze haha (any plans to do a sixteen-years-on reboot? with even more shoegaze?)

It definitely was gaze heavy. I have absolutely no plans for a reboot or for any similar effort, ever.

I would have tried very hard to get Emma Ruth Rundle included in this if I'd been involved. Also Venera 4.

how else will a generation of young web nerds discover Experimental Audio Research now ;_;

web nerds need neds words

Very glad that one made the cut. Still remember that blowing my mind across the room upon original release.

― Ned Raggett, Monday, October 24, 2016 6:01 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I looked at Allmusic for the first time in a long time and just noticed you wrote the blurbs for both Bloweyelashwish and Xuvetyn :) Like a lot of good shoegaze stuff I noticed it works when listened to both very quiet and very loud, but in a totally different way for each.

yeah venera 4 is a good call. and locals pale sun cause i like the album that much.

did a ctrl + f for Fleeting Joys and didn't find anything. Despondent Transponder is a pretty perfect extension of Loveless era MBV. as is the case with all of these sorts of lists, I'd like to see more of what was pushed but didn't make the cut.

Ned's words are awesome, I love them. Thanks Ned. If that makes me a web nerd I'm down with that.

Too kind!

This list goes a long way toward relieving my fear that no one cares about Catherine Wheel anymore.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E5Q7CcINC8M

CW didn't even peak with the albums in this list!

You like Be Here Now

is this how it's gonna be

ahahahah

http://66.media.tumblr.com/6a4139b9b5af4ef27f242a77b560f585/tumblr_mw08upqgEV1rijwyno7_1280.jpg

Good on that guy for including Alison's Halo and Sianspheric. I'd include Polar/Con Dolore albums which is definitely dreampop but maybe not quite gazey enough. I'd definitely put on the first Teenage Filmstars album, the next two albums have amazing tracks but tend to go downhill in the second half.

Pluramon's "Dreams Top Rock" is sort of a shoegaze/glitched out electronic hybrid (with Julee Cruise on vocals). Love that one.

That was sort of my only real problem with the list, that shoegaze crosses so many wires with dreampop and honestly, in the case of Catherine Wheel, straight on hard rock without the codpiece and goat horns starter kit.

If nothing else, the list led me to this fantastic Morr Slowdive tribute thing, so it was all worth it. Thanks, Bateau!

Oh hell yes! :D That is awesome.

i am on deck to do ILM's Shoegaze album and EP's and think i will do this next summer if someone doesn't take from me now.

spoiler alert: my number one is Nowhere with, i think, Whirlpool coming in second. some omissions besides Moose are Revolver's Cold Water Flat, Ladies and Gentleman... and have always felt Gish should qualify for shoegaze?

The absence of Smashing Orange (unless I missed it) is insane, as they were actually of the time, played in England (though from America), had great UK reviews, and were great. The correct Swirlies album was chosen.

I would have put Underground Lovers' Leaves Me Blind above at least half of the listed albums. I feel HEALTH should be there too.

Wow, the French guy's list has not one but three shoegazing bands from Texas

The first Pitchfork list where I own 60% of the titles.

Notable omissions:

A.R.Kane - Lolita EP (1987) practically invented the genre
Medicine - Shot Forth Self Living (1992) or Buried Life (1993) arriving at 'gaze from psych
Closedown - Nearfield (1994) an early Slowdive inspired US band
Third Eye Foundation - Semtex (1996) if one wants to play up how 'gaze flows like viscous lava into other genres, in TEF's case claustrophobic drum n'bass
Pluramon - Dreams Top Rock (2003) Mentioned above. Loveless itself was composed on a sampler. Get over yourselves, technophobes.
Fleeting Joys - Despondant Transponder (2006) and Ringo Deathstarr - Colour Trip (2011) not ageless art, but closer to their mark than In the Presence of MBV
No Joy - Wait to Pleasure (2013)
Pinkshinyultrablast - Everything Elses Matters (2015) the last two genre bands I've really dug.

Shot Forth Self Living is number 29 on the Pitchfork list.
Good call on Ringo Deathstarr.

What AltJ albums made the list?

Ah, French guy does have Nightblooms. That's another pretty major omission. I didn't notice if he had Texas Shoegazers Experimental Aircraft on his list, but their "Love For The Last Time" is also probably better than a few things on the Pitchfork list.

Secret Shine's Untouched is a pretty big omission as well.

Speaking of Texans, both Pitchfork and the French dude left off Should's (née Shift) A Folding Sieve, which is amazing.

*coughs* Folks, I love you all. HOWEVER:

This wasn't an infinite list. This was a specific list of 50. That means there was a thing called a 'cutoff,' meaning that Many Different Albums could be and were nominated, but after the votes were tallied, did not in fact make it into the top fifty.

They weren't "left off," they weren't "notable omissions," they *did not win enough votes.*

Clear? Not hard to understand? Very good. I thank you all.

we're just trying to flash our shoegaze cred, it's not about the list

lol at "the french dude"

You'd be surprised given some of the other reactions I've seen!

keeping waiting for some kind of Catherine Wheel reissues, really want Ferment and Chrome on vinyl

Really disappointing to not see Wait To Pleasure in there. One of my favourite albums of this decade so far.

xp they have so many bsides, i hope they do eventually do deluxe versions

Ned, an internet list does not exist until everything left off of it has been listed.