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The thing is, Xgau is a critic whose tastes really seem to parallel
my own. He loves Sleater-Kinney, old Stones, Tricky, PJ Harvey..I
love S-K, old Stones, Tricky, PJ Harvey. He likes the same Madonna
records that I do. With the exception of the African-world-fetish-
thing and his Sonic Youth obsession, then, our inclinations converge,
and I know that I can trust him, generally, his ridiculously
hilarious, unilateral bashing of Radiohead notwithstanding...
And that may be the other reason I prefer him to someone like sacred
cow Marcus, whom I'll admit I haven't read much. His sense of
humor... and openness to much more varied forms of music moving away
from trad r 'n'r structures doesn't hurt either. Xgau is pretentious,
but doesn't just pretend to love hip-hp. Hell, he's probably prefer
if we all listen to some gonzo african tribal album, the sort that
always makes # 1 on his end-of-the-year lists. So ransom, but also
more comprehensive than any other reviewer out there. The writing in
those P&J essays thogh sometimes winds up sounding too
insular...really, half the time what the fuck is he talking about?
Yet that's the fun. So, its Christgau over Marcus for me
― Vic, Friday, 16 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
Marcus all the way, since he's my favorite rock writer. As someone
else said, he's better when writing at length (Lipstick Traces,
Invisible Republic, the "Presliad" section of Mystery Train) than in
his shorter columns, which are pretty hard to fathom unless you've
read everything else he's ever written first. His obsessions pop up
incessantly in his work, which a lot of people probably find
annoying, but I think he looks for the same qualities in music that I
do, and he's never been particularly trend-influenced. He's still
turned me on to a hell of a lot of music (Sex Pistols, early Elvis,
Mekons, Raincoats, X-Ray Spex, mid-eighties Elvis Costello, Sleater-
Kinney and Sly Stone) I wouldn't have paid much attention to
otherwise.
Christgau, on the other hand, is excellent in his shorter reviews and
practically unreadable in his essays.
And I don't get Richard Meltzer at all. He's one of the worst writers
I've ever read. Self-indulgent, grating, and completely clueless
about most of what he writes about. He's also another one of
those "Rock died some time before 1980" people - how I hate that.
― Justyn Dillingham, Friday, 16 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-two years ago) link
Rock died in 1969, or earlier, acc. to Meltzer. Stillborn, rilly. I like that notion.
― Sterling Clover, Friday, 16 November 2001 01:00 (twenty-two years ago) link