I think the 2010's will be dominated musically by...

If it were *just* Pitchfork, I'd just roll my eyes and go "corny indie fuX0rs, I don't even read P4k" - but it was about 3 or 4 "canonical lists of the 00s" in a row - Uncut, Pitchfork, RateYourMusic and something else - might have been that All Songs Considered but I don't think it was.

I reached saturation point, OK?

When it gets to the point where Uncut - UNCUT freaking magazine - ends up having the most women on a list, you start to get frustrated with lists and who makes them.

This was all stuff brought up on the other thread, FWIW. But I'm gonna actually put myself on a temp leech ban from ILX for the rest of the day because I'm becoming compulsive about these threads, and that's not good for me, or for debate.

or if you're me you start to stop caring about lists and who makes them xpost

as i said above it's completely unsurprising that we do this over and over because lists are not written for ILM users--they are written for college freshmen with large external hds

also, i think the pop scene will move away from repetitious electronic-beats-based jams in one key and get all complex and chord-changey again. maybe even with harmonies. and rap will go through this thing where it SOUNDS almost indistinguishable from samples-based 90's jams, with the same drum sounds and swing settings, but actually the music will be performed by hired musicians.

who sound like they're on a record from the 60's, but arent.

big, multi-instrumented groups of players with chops, doing complex, well thought out arrangements into high quality microphones picking up every nuance of a well played, even virtuoso performance... but with all the idiosyncatic, not-quite-exactly-on-the-upbeat, not-necessarily-perfectly-in-tune parts of the best take being purposefully left in on the recording (or even raised in the mix, just so you know it's actually music played live, by real people in the same room with each other and stuff)

not gonna happen since home recording technology is going to get even cheaper and more ubiquitous, and it makes more and more sense to piece together stuff at home rather than pay for a bunch of studio time in a big, nice room.

really i think music is going to get even more cross-pollinated and omnivorous, ie it'll be more expected and less novel to mix genres, recording techniques, and cultures.

one word. Hongrotronica. Highly melodic and catchy Beatles-esque electronic dance music. lots of mellotron samples.

Music needs more mellotron samples.

The Beatles bit not so much. It'd sound like that horrible "remix" album thing from the other year.

I hope A-Frames turn out to be influential.

what's the best prog disco album of the year? i'd buy it. as long as it doesn't sound anything like Justice. something new and electronic that might have a psychic affinity with an old ELO or Necktar album.

you want the Mungolian Jet Set collection

not gonna happen since home recording technology is going to get even cheaper and more ubiquitous, and it makes more and more sense to piece together stuff at home rather than pay for a bunch of studio time in a big, nice room.

i dunno, maybe there's one guy in the band with a big, nice sounding living room in an a-frame in the woods, one guy with a couple of really nice akg microphones, and one guy with a laptop and a avalon vt737 converter or something? granted that stuff costs money, but not beyond the bounds of reason/possibility.

anyway i agree about very decent home multitrack digital recording being a HUGE influence on the genres of the teens though (teens as in '13, '14 '15 etc)

too many people in this conversation come off as boring scolds who can only talk about something in reference/relation to this hegemony in which critics they don't like write for a readership they don't like or care about. like, start your own discourse about things you're interested in among ppl you like talking with. no one is under obligation to read/respond or not read/respond to anything!

You and Contenderizer and this please only think happy thoughts pov. Is that what you want, everyone agreeing with every indie-rock dominating list that comes out? Kate and others have demonstrated problems with numerous sources, its not just a few critics. And yes, I post on threads (Latin, African, Chitlin Circuit soul) and write for publications about stuff that interests me.

no! i don't "agree" with the pitchfork list, in that it's not a reflection of my taste to any great degree. my point is that time spent railing against pitchfork's habits in list-making (or pitchfork and a couple other publications, whatever), would be better spent doing other things.

the reason for this is that "agreeing" with a list is more or less a false concept. lists are rough guides for people who don't know that much about music. people like kate, or really anyone on ilm, have prob moved beyond the point of needing them for anything.

i agree that the lack of certain voices in the list-making process is symptomatic of a larger issue that has been effectively raised. but the content of the list? really?

btw don't lump me in with contenderizer who i like fine but i don't agree with his "taste" argument at all.

I have problems with the fact that music criticism is a boy's club, and that critics seem to respect male artists more than their female peers. This is true not just of Pitchfork indie, but of many other genres as well -- it's perhaps true in a pervasive sense that transcends genre, and it fucking sucks.

On a completely unrelated note, I get annoyed when people bitch about other people liking the wrong shit, or liking it the wrong way. So, the Pitchfork list is indie-dominated. So fucking what? If you don't like the source, read something else. And if think other musics deserve more attention, write about them. Cough up the funding for a magazine. Run a label, organize a club night. Whatever. Do anything but bitch about it.

And in spite of his protestations against the association, CAD OTMx1000.

;)

oh man this discussion is going on 2 threads at the same time now!!

the reason for this is that "agreeing" with a list is more or less a false concept. lists are rough guides for people who don't know that much about music. people like kate, or really anyone on ilm, have prob moved beyond the point of needing them for anything

I do not agree. There is so much music out there and people have such busy lives that lists can serve as filters that help reduce the amount of individual research one has to do(for example, I know a Gucci Mane song or 2, but do not have the time to sample each and every mixtape he and every other rapper put out, so a Deej list of his fave mixtapes could be valuable) and they can demonstrate aesthetic consensus(look--all these people who like such and such seem to agree that this Arthur Russell reissue is special).

And dude, I do read stuff other than Pitchfork and I do write about stuff I am interested in. And you, are you on their payroll?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/essex/content/images/2005/09/05/warm_up_470_470x352.jpg

xp so uh it seems to me that per the criteria you laid out the pitchfork list comes as advertised.

and endless lols @ "am i on their payroll"

http://www.abc.net.au/reslib/200901/r330719_1490839.jpg

So you don't look at Pazz & Jop or other year-end polls?

http://www.rockbrookcamp.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2007/08/girl-campfire.jpg

i skim p&j and pitchfork year end for stuff i missed but if something makes one of those things i probably didn't miss it.

ilm's rolling metal thread was about a million times more useful at the end of last year in terms of highlighting areas that aren't well-covered.

guys i know it's hilarious that ppl actually sit around and talk about music criticism but could u stop?

Disregard everything I said upthread for a moment (shouldn't be too hard).

"i agree that the lack of certain voices in the list-making process is symptomatic of a larger issue that has been effectively raised. but the content of the list? really?"

CAD what you are saying makes sense but I think the reason people are frustrated with the content as much or more than the makers of it is that those makers DO listen to a lot of different things. As soon as it is time for them to write the list, that is when the catholicism of their tastes seems to go away and in a seemingly predictable manner.

I promise this is it.

(the funny thing is is that I actually do need a good list - most of this decade i listened to Japan)

Bands that sound like Daisy Chainsaw, Dinosaur Jr, Lawnmower Death, Senseless Things, Senser, early Cypress Hill, Bleach-era Nirvana. I'm hearing a lot of this kind of thing in the Dead Weathers' recent album.

umm this reminds me. why are the racks of my local Fopp full of new albums, and old re-released cds by Senser !?

anyone else wanna actually make stupid statements of what might happen MUSICALLY, not critically?

Tinchy Stryder has a #1 US album.

Ariel Pink will be the Kurt Cobain of the 10's.

yeah i mean i guess, list-making is such a reductive surprise that it should be no surprise that this happens, esp. when there is the matter of an editorial voice that is kind of unifying things. this is probably why we always say "writer's individual lists are so much more interesting."

the list needs to not be treated as some sanctified object but as an occasionally useful and occasionally entertaining exercise. for any publication, it's regular reviews, articles, whatever taken as a whole are that publications real work.

Yeah, I have to mention here that you kinda do get the canon you want. If you believe the numbers in VIBE's press kit, their issues topped out at a paid circulation of around 875k. That's putting down money for something in print. Now I don't know how many people read Pitchfork every month. Pitchfork has the advantage of being online and free. But I am willing to bet that the number of regular readers across this decade did not dwarf VIBE's to such a massive extent that what Pitchfork said assumed a totalitarian grip on the canon against which the VIBEs of the world were just whispering into the storm.

But across the decade people on ILM have loved to interrogate the taste of things like Pitchfork as some kind of important canonical arbiter. Pitchfork, the New Yorker, NPR, the Times Magazine, whatever. "They like indie-rock too much." "They don't pay attention to pop or r&b." "They DOMINATE THE CANON." "They have a responsibility to consider X and Y and Z." This board has seen so, so much more of that than it's seen "check out this great article in VIBE" or "let's talk about this list in The Source" or god forbid "why doesn't Murder Dog cover any punk bands." (I know, I know, it was hard to break into online discussion when you're a print mag -- but still!) If you esteem the people who talk about indie-rock as canon-setters, you will get an indie canon. If you esteem middlebrow publications as generalist arbiters of taste, you will read about middlebrow tastes. Etc.

I don't say that as some huge criticism of anyone. It's perfectly reasonable to be inclined enough toward the style or presentation or level of discourse of a publication that you care about what they cover and want it to be better. It's perfectly reasonable to locate the canon in THIS place and want that canon to be the best you think it can be. I just don't think anyone can pretend they're not at all complicit in that, that a "canon" is being unfairly imposed on them by some all-powerful arbiter. To some extent you get the canon you choose to pay attention to.

I think possibly part of what I'm trying to say there is that if you care passionately about (e.g.) Pitchfork's canon being "correct," on some level you are saying that Pitchfork's background/canon are generally enough in line with your own that it's the one you want to perfect. It's the suit you've bought and want to tailor. That is completely sensible and natural. But don't act too much like it's not your suit, and if it's that bad then don't pretend like there aren't others.

me tbh

I'll get me suit

They should bring back Benzino to do the source decade list, just for the wtf lols.

I think Anthony Burgess got it right. All tomorrow's droogs will be listening to classical music and Heaven 17.

what nabisco said

On a completely unrelated note, I get annoyed when people bitch about other people liking the wrong shit, or liking it the wrong way. So, the Pitchfork list is indie-dominated. So fucking what? If you don't like the source, read something else. And if think other musics deserve more attention, write about them. Cough up the funding for a magazine. Run a label, organize a club night. Whatever. Do anything but bitch about it.

Do you think I HAVEN'T?!?!?

FWIW, I've spent the past 25 years - yeah, longer than most P4k readers have been alive - doing all these things and more.

I've not just played in bands and done session work as a musician. I've promoted gigs, run club nights, planned tours and festivals highlighting female artists. I've written for everything from fanzines to national magazines to international websites.

I am nearly 40 fucking years old at this point - I have a mortgage and a dayjob, and I no longer have the energy or the time to do all of the above, yet I still try to stay engaged - I DJ, I participate in forums because those are the things that I'm able to fit around the life I have now.

I am frustrated as fucking hell that after 25 years of doing this, it actually seems to me like gender mixed and female artists got MORE respect in the early 90s than they do now. Like things, especially in the indie world, have actually gone *backwards* in the past 15 years.

I'm tired, so forgive me, if, after 25 years of trying to change things from inside and outside, I occasionally resort to a bout of "bitching" when it all gets too fucking much.

you get the canon you choose to pay attention to

― oɔsıqɐu (nabisco), Thursday, October 22, 2009 1:11 PM (12 minutes ago) Bookmark

for emphasis

RIGHT. From here on in, the Canon is as follows:

1) The Ronettes
2) The Supremes
3) The Crystals
4) Martha Reeves and the Vandellas
5) Electrik Red
6) The Chiffons
7) The Shirelles
8) Destiny's Child
9) The Shangri-Las
10) oh shit, wait, this list is 100% female so far and 90% black so I'll throw in as a token... erm, Robbie Williams. Yeah, that'll keep you lads from feeling left out, right?

So glad we've sorted all that out.

And you need to step back, Kate. Cuz I'm with you on the gender imbalance thing, okay? I'm in yr fucking corner, and I've said so a thousand times, a thousand ways. God, said so in the post you teed off on, and the fact that you failed to notice suggests to me either that A) you're drunk & irritable, or B) you don't care to think about what you read and just wanna fight. Neither of which exactly invites further discussion...

I don't understand. AFAIK, all (or virtually all) of those acts are in the Canon. Maybe more the "pop" Canon, but the Canon nonetheless.

Well, 5 of 10, at least.

I'm not drunk or anything else like that. I'm frustrated in a way I don't think you can even begin to imagine.

Anyway, I'm giving myself a yellow card over this.

Boyd Rice St. Clair

Kate is like 100% OTM wrt the underlying concern of her whole argument, but she seems ready to take all of us on as if we are the ones writing these canons.