OK, is this the worst piece of music writing ever?

you can't link to a book

like, besides some throwaway sentence ends ("hip-hop’s dominance of the pop charts that continues to this day" is the exact opposite of what is happening on the pop charts today), most of it -- the disco backlash being tinged with if not rooted in racism and misogyny, grunge being celebrated by critics for removing bubblegum pop from the zeitgeist, the Beatles' trajectory from proto-boy band to established canonical group -- seems as if it would be recognized for the generally accepted critical consensus that it is if people weren't conditioned to have a negative response to the byline and URL

she completely left out racism re: disco

which confused me more than anything

<i>Look at disco, for instance. Disco is classic girl music — or, more accurately, music for girls and gay men. Those things, <b>along with some barely concealed racial resentment,</b> were among the biggest reasons that disco was so demonized and despised by so many straight white men of the 1970s.</i>

it kind of reads as if she independently discovered that critical consensus but didn't quite have all the pieces, despite music journalism churning out similar articles for decades?

fuck

follow the markup yourself

oh duh, sorry

maybe it just felt weird as an aside?

I seem to remember critics celebrating grunge spelling the commercial end of hair metal rather than for slaying Duran Duran.

well the generally accepted critical consensus is often wrong. or at best reductive, oversimplified. since I'm almost 60 yo most of this isn't history. no question the disco backlash was racist AND misogynist. but as a practicing critic in the early 90s I recall grunge being celebrated as a return of rock rather than a vanquishing of "bubblegum pop" (small but significant distinction) while the Beatles didn't become an established canonical group they established the canon! there's a difference. that said, as a card-carrying baby boomer (though not an AARP card) I could care less about Sgt Pepper, remixed or whatever.

fwiw I've never encountered this writer or URL before.

like, besides some throwaway sentence ends ("hip-hop’s dominance of the pop charts that continues to this day" is the exact opposite of what is happening on the pop charts today), most of it -- the disco backlash being tinged with if not rooted in racism and misogyny, grunge being celebrated by critics for removing bubblegum pop from the zeitgeist, the Beatles' trajectory from proto-boy band to established canonical group -- seems as if it would be recognized for the generally accepted critical consensus that it is if people weren't conditioned to have a negative response to the byline and URL

― sick, fucking funny, and well tasty (katherine), Tuesday, May 30, 2017 1:46 PM (five minutes ago)

yes, it is possible for a piece of written work to draw broadly from widely-accepted theory and still make its points lazily. this pretty much describes any marcotte essay i've ever read (and i've hate-read a lot of them)

hair metal = bubbliest of gum

katherine, there are so many factually inaccurate and insulting things in here that it goes well beyond "ho-hum just another day where a politically blogger rehashes the critical consensus"

xpost

yeah exactly. bubblegum kinda disappeared until the Spice Girls kicked off the new new pop millennium iirc

yes, it is possible for a piece of written work to draw broadly from widely-accepted theory and still make its points lazily. this pretty much describes any marcotte essay i've ever read (and i've hate-read a lot of them)

Exactly. Marcotte is a bad and lazy thinker no matter what subject she's attempting to tackle.

Like, for starters, Highway 61 Revisited released in 1965 and the entire rock-critical discourse of Marcus et al; or that the whole whimsical psychedelia thing came up in a scene dominated by women like Grace Slick and Janis Joplin; or that house music isn't "girlish," it was made for and by gay black men; and that women are actually the thought leaders in "pretentious" art and avant-garde music right now and reducing women listeners to yepper yepper carly rae jepper stereotypes is ugly

Oh no, am i doing a sexism? actually actually not all men

the whole article is dumb. i don't care who wrote it. and this is the dumbest: "Disco is classic girl music — or, more accurately, music for girls and gay men."

people who say or write stuff like that shouldn't be taken seriously. probably a trump voter.

The soundtracks to both “Guardians of the Galaxy” movies, made up of pop classics by artists like Fleetwood Mac and the Jackson 5, are darlings not just of audiences but critics as well.

bernie would have beatles 1

amanda marcotte writes troll thinkpieces for salon, she once criticized bernie sanders for supporting the sandinistas over the contras and it was p clear from the context she had just found out about both of those things

I wasn't aware of Rob Sheffield's book, but judging from the excerpt on Rolling Stone it seems to fit squarely in the books for RS readers who live for lists of greatest rock bands and yet more books and articles about said bands?

AM's piece seems kind of a drive-by challops take, this "what's hot in the news I can have a take on" school of blogging

there's a difference in targeting between writers who can probably describe what hairstyle each of the beatles had at any given time versus a salon blog giving a lukewarm take that's semi-topical

its no big deal that its a dumb article. finding something good to read on the internet is hard enough. finding something good to read about the friggin' beatles? could take you years.

imo just reading wikipedia and then coming up with some ideas is a good way to blog

hoo boy I just read AM's wiki entry. somebody should do her a favor and edit in some good stuff

"women listen to records like THIS" is a generalization that needs to be stated with a lot more care than this piece did.

I'm just personally going to reserve my outrage for things like the 100th "poptimism is bad and ruining music, writing and everything" piece by an established, secure writer than for mostly unremarkable pieces like this

also, calling a feminist writer a Trump voter is pretty ...

that was a joke. i don't know who the writer is. will never read them again if i can help it. i only read stuff like that when people here are talking about it.

re-reading my post I'm probably (unintentionally) guilty of mansplaining...

i just meant that it was dumb like trump. that's all. but perfect for the trump era, i suppose....stereotypes, generalizations, poorly thought out arguments...

Maybe I'm reading too much into this, but my takeaway is that 'girls' who don't prefer 'girly' music implicitly suffer from some form of Stockholm syndrome. Totally inoffensive and 'unremarkable.'

iirc amanda marcotte was one of the ppl who thought democrats should root for trump b/c he'd be easier to beat in november

fwiw I loved "Rio" inordinately then, and I love it inordinately now

every day is Rio day

the central thesis of *people ruin everything* is, as always, on the money though.

Amanda Marcotte‏ @AmandaMarcotte Feb 16
The notion that there’s any meaningful difference between Perez and Ellison was created by drama addicts stoking their martyr complexes.

Amanda Marcotte‏ @AmandaMarcotte Feb 16
It's honestly dumber than people who used to make New Order v. Joy Division a thing. THEY ARE THE SAME BAND GET OVER YOURSELVES.

C+ trolling

Amanda Marcotte‏ @AmandaMarcotte Feb 16
It's honestly dumber than people who used to make New Order v. Joy Division a thing. THEY ARE THE SAME BAND GET OVER YOURSELVES.

― salthigh, Tuesday, May 30, 2017 2:54 PM (five minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

true tbh

Curti Bros

xpost

Alfred I'm shocked, SHOCKED

lukewarm takes, delivered regularly, to your door

also, calling a feminist writer a Trump voter is pretty ...

― sick, fucking funny, and well tasty (katherine), Tuesday, May 30, 2017 2:25 PM (fifty-nine minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

iirc amanda marcotte was one of the ppl who thought democrats should root for trump b/c he'd be easier to beat in november

― (The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Tuesday, May 30, 2017 2:45 PM (thirty-nine minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yes, yes she was, and then proceeded to blame not campaigning in wisconsin, having the wrong candidate for this time and virtually every other legitimate hilldog campaign problem on bernie bros

i honestly don't know if marcotte is a troll who believes in next to nothing a la amanda palmer or if she actually /is/ as milquetoast a liberal as one could possibly be, but it hardly matters because she sounds like a fucking idiot

why are there so many public trolls named amanda ;_;

take my hand, I'll make you understand

confirmation bias imo

2 is too many

I WANNA DO A LITTLE STRUT
AS YOU WIGGLE YOUR FIRM BUTT

AMANDA

Sorry, wrong thread.