Btw, I think goole is OTM about them being upper-middle-class looking at old wealth, and I think that's why Ezra being Jewish (and I guess the other guy being Persian) is important. There's a whole history of Jewish wealth contending with old WASP money, and I believe that's definitely running through what's going on here, even if it's not explicit. They're also one of the first generations of wealthy Jews (or their parents are, most likely) who don't seriously have to deal with things like restricted country clubs, quotas at Ivy's, etc.
― Mordy, Friday, 29 January 2010 22:25 (fourteen years ago) link
philip roth is better than VW tho imo
― max, Friday, 29 January 2010 22:29 (fourteen years ago) link
http://twitter.com/matsoR/status/8184054742
shamelessly trying to curry favor with whiney
― zvookster, Friday, January 29, 2010 10:01 PM (26 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink
and geir!
ON a HARD COLDPLAY KICK 11:20 AM Jan 25th from web
― i get mines the fast way, the balaclava way (M@tt He1ges0n), Friday, 29 January 2010 22:30 (fourteen years ago) link
Philip Roth definitely better than VW, but also writing about a different period of time. I can't see VW relating to American Pastoral or even Plot Against America. They're kinda the (grand)children of Philip Roth.
― Mordy, Friday, 29 January 2010 22:32 (fourteen years ago) link
yeah and Philip Roth's grandchildren probably don't understand him or read his books, either
― that sex version of "blue thunder." (Mr. Que), Friday, 29 January 2010 22:35 (fourteen years ago) link
philip roth had persian friends
― max, Friday, 29 January 2010 22:37 (fourteen years ago) link
portnoy's complaint is definitely news that stays news
― zvookster, Friday, 29 January 2010 22:38 (fourteen years ago) link
FWIW, I wrote an article running next week that explicitly calls Vampire Weekend (esp Ezra) a Jewish band, or at least a band that has something to say about being Jewish. It's more in the context of African influences in music, but I think it's important to identify Ezra as Jewish (as he self-identifies that way) because although whiteness and Jewishness have become hard to disentangle in American contemporary culture, it's still a real issue for a lot of Jewish Americans and in other countries it's an even bigger issue (especially in the countries where Vampire Weekend is drawing on to influence their music). Which is to say that JH's critique of the band isn't just - as nabisco points out - very privileged and white in-of-itself - but super America-centric. As though opinions on whiteness in America (and really: in New York City/Chicago/LA, so not even America) should constitute what it means to be white everywhere.
― Mordy, Friday, 29 January 2010 22:41 (fourteen years ago) link
my gf is trying to get me to have kids and i'm seriously thinking my official stance should be "the world doesn't need any more white people"
― ben bernankles (Whiney G. Weingarten), Friday, 29 January 2010 22:46 (fourteen years ago) link
Btw, I think nabisco's two things on the JH piece are really tremendous -- if I could say, even OTM.
― Mordy, Friday, 29 January 2010 22:46 (fourteen years ago) link
― ben bernankles (Whiney G. Weingarten), Friday, January 29, 2010 5:46 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink
u should read nabiscos tumblr pieces
― max, Friday, 29 January 2010 22:48 (fourteen years ago) link
tumblrs white people like
― velko, Friday, 29 January 2010 22:49 (fourteen years ago) link
this isn't really the place for it, but that first salinger piece is a lovely, lovely piece of writing
― that sex version of "blue thunder." (Mr. Que), Friday, 29 January 2010 22:49 (fourteen years ago) link
salinger wrote a piece about VW?
― Mordy, Friday, 29 January 2010 22:50 (fourteen years ago) link
if salinger were a young man today he'd be fronting a breezy ethno-pop ensemble
― velko, Friday, 29 January 2010 22:51 (fourteen years ago) link
There's a whole history of Jewish wealth contending with old WASP money, and I believe that's definitely running through what's going on here, even if it's not explicit
Wish the VW guys would underline this so the debate would be whether thinkpieces about "Jew Wave" were offensive
― da croupier, Friday, 29 January 2010 22:54 (fourteen years ago) link
I'd actually love to mention (and this seems like as good a place as any) that a number of times I've said that I'm Jewish, as opposed to being White, in a conversation or discussion and gotten called out as being disingenuous. I've actually been told that I'm splitting hairs, or that Jews are White -- which sometimes leads into a discussion of the history of Jewish Whiteness in America (which Karen Brodkin brilliantly imo traces back to the end of WW2 in "How Jews Became White Folks: And What That Says About Race in America"). So I'm kinda loving nabisco's piece because I never contextualized those conversational moments that way -- I always just felt kinda put-out and maybe a little confused -- like why do I *have* to identify as White? I speak Hebrew + Yiddish, I write for the Forward, I learn Chassidic texts with my father over the phone, etc. So the blog posts about the topic are kinda illuminating.
― Mordy, Friday, 29 January 2010 22:57 (fourteen years ago) link
ties in zeitgeist-wise with chris matthews' "i forgot obama was black" rumination
― da croupier, Friday, 29 January 2010 23:01 (fourteen years ago) link
thoughts on "Oxford Comma" and class:
"we always tell the truth":Northrop Frye observes that, in Shakespeare's plays, when the noblemen toss around the epithet 'liar', it is not as a reproach on moral or ethical grounds; the insult is aimed squarely at one's social standing. The implication is honesty is the sole domain of the wealthy and prestigious, and that the reason one would lie is because they literally cannot afford to tell the truth. The liar lies because he is in the presence of his superiors.
Perhaps you misjudge VW's easygoing self-assurance as smugness, or perhaps you misjudge VW's smugness as easygoing self-assurance.
― don't mind me: just exhuming dead horses... (Drugs A. Money), Friday, 29 January 2010 23:20 (fourteen years ago) link
I'd look GOONish in a balaclava
http://homepage1.nifty.com/double_trouble/image/plies_dor.jpg
― zvincter (The Reverend), Friday, 29 January 2010 23:32 (fourteen years ago) link
yes but isn't hip-hop's insistence on "keeping it real" heavily interrelated to its subversive program ie taking what traditionally is the dominant class's birthright by force...
― don't mind me: just exhuming dead horses... (Drugs A. Money), Friday, 29 January 2010 23:45 (fourteen years ago) link
Is there where I admit I'd find the whole debate over these last two days far more interesting if I found the band's music provoked more than a shrug and a 'pleasant enough at times'? (In that I am incredibly sympathetic to what da croupier has said above about the 'drudge siren' approach to liking/disliking VW, especially now.)
― Ned Raggett, Saturday, 30 January 2010 00:24 (fourteen years ago) link
http://twitter.com/matsoR
ruh roh
― ksh, Saturday, 30 January 2010 01:44 (fourteen years ago) link
i'm with you Ned
― that sex version of "blue thunder." (Mr. Que), Saturday, 30 January 2010 02:16 (fourteen years ago) link
Here's where I get all Oscar Wilde and say that most good criticism is as much art as the art itself.
― Blue Fucks Like Ben Nelson (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Saturday, 30 January 2010 02:20 (fourteen years ago) link
sure but most of the criticism i've read about the band is as boring as the music they make
― that sex version of "blue thunder." (Mr. Que), Saturday, 30 January 2010 02:23 (fourteen years ago) link
and yet
― Goon's Anatomy (J0rdan S.), Saturday, 30 January 2010 02:30 (fourteen years ago) link
and yet the CVB line is still 100% hilarious and accurate
― that sex version of "blue thunder." (Mr. Que), Saturday, 30 January 2010 02:42 (fourteen years ago) link
http://www.mhs.ox.ac.uk/blackboard/images/eno-l.jpg
― tramp steamer, Saturday, 30 January 2010 03:16 (fourteen years ago) link
arzE very serious question 4 amateur ethnographers: is DJ Pauly D white? 7 minutes ago from Tweetie
― Goon's Anatomy (J0rdan S.), Saturday, 30 January 2010 04:12 (fourteen years ago) link
none of this is addressing the problem of their drummer.
they should hire a better drummer. the beatles did it.
― hellzapoppa (tipsy mothra), Saturday, 30 January 2010 04:30 (fourteen years ago) link
(honestly i just went back to the first album for the first time in a while and at first i was like "you know this is kind of catchy, the guy's voice isn't that bad, i'm probably being too harsh," and then after about two and a half songs it was just ARGH can't anybody establish a groove anymore what the hell is the matter with you people...)
― hellzapoppa (tipsy mothra), Saturday, 30 January 2010 04:32 (fourteen years ago) link
and i understand that in some ways they're no more ramshackle rhythmically than a lot of postpunk bands, but a band like (say) the slits capitalized on the stiltedness of their rhythms, they did something with their awkwardness, because they understood that it was awkward and that it was a tool to work with. they turned it into something hard and interesting. vw doesn't have that inclination, which leaves them in a kind of mushy limbo.
― hellzapoppa (tipsy mothra), Saturday, 30 January 2010 04:36 (fourteen years ago) link
maybe they're just judeo-persian rhythms, whitey
― velko, Saturday, 30 January 2010 04:45 (fourteen years ago) link
Arctic Monkeys kick Vampire Weekend's ass around the block over and over again.
― nicky lo-fi, Saturday, 30 January 2010 04:51 (fourteen years ago) link
xpost:yr right i think what i really want is for them to play polkas -- the music of my forefathers.
― hellzapoppa (tipsy mothra), Saturday, 30 January 2010 04:52 (fourteen years ago) link
jesshopp
@matsoR Do you really desire to try to bash this out on Twitter? Or do you actually want to have a real discussion about it?
― velko, Saturday, 30 January 2010 04:58 (fourteen years ago) link
Oh yeah! I would love to see Rostam and Jessica go cage match over this thing.
― Johnny Fever, Saturday, 30 January 2010 05:01 (fourteen years ago) link
Having heard Vampire Weekend for the first time in my life this morning, I think that knocking them is kind of like knocking college kids for wearing madras shorts.
― rogue whizzing (Eazy), Sunday, 31 January 2010 14:19 (fourteen years ago) link
Well then:
http://twitter.com/arzE/status/8432237206
― Ned Raggett, Sunday, 31 January 2010 17:37 (fourteen years ago) link
don't think nabisco gets why people read music crit.
― free the charmless but occasionally brilliant Dom Passantino (history mayne), Sunday, 31 January 2010 17:54 (fourteen years ago) link
I didn't know he was Jewish but that fits their in-the-world-but-not-of-it attitude towards WASP culture that I mentioned earlier.
Jewish people who have to immerse themselves in certain WASP schools and places usually have to engage in such complicated role-play that they end up knowing all the social codes and shibboleths better than the kids who were raised in that environment. The other kids in the rich clubhouse have close to no self-awareness about the life they lead and don't have to spend as much time trying to fit in.
― Cunga, Sunday, 31 January 2010 18:45 (fourteen years ago) link
I get that there are a whole lot of records in the world, and sometimes it's necessary to just say "pfft whatever" to one of them. But look. A band always gets described as WASPy. One of them says, "actually, I'm Jewish, and this guy's Persian." Are you really gonna react by just saying "LOL same difference?" That's high-level print criticism? As opposed to spending like a couple minutes' critical thinking on the kind of stuff people are saying here -- that maybe there's this long history of successful east-coast Jews with a complicated love/hate deal with old-money WASP culture? (That maybe a middle-class Persian guy has a related experience?) That maybe what you've just been told might be relevant in terms of figuring out what, if anything, they're actually saying in their songs? And if you really, really don't give a shit, and for some reason you're still agreeing to review their record, then why even bring it up?
Same deal with the crack about how one song mentions a typeface ("not typical rude-boy fodder" or whatever) -- like, no inclination to think about the actual meaning of the lines with the typeface in them? Cause so far as I can tell, they're actually about Americans wearing shirts with day-glo guns on them, like making an aesthetic out of the rest of the world's political violence. (Which we all thought was kinda cool when a Sri Lankan did it.) It's not like I don't understand the value of occasionally just going "LOL typeface," but seriously, do people read criticism not to hear some kind of actual ideas about stuff? I'm sure if you asked the Reader's music editor, he would not tell you his editorial mission is "a lazy zing is always better than an actual thought about your subject matter."
― oɔsıqɐu (nabisco), Sunday, 31 January 2010 20:19 (fourteen years ago) link
re: Ned's post
http://twitter.com/arzE/status/8432255955http://twitter.com/arzE/status/8432293791
― ksh, Sunday, 31 January 2010 20:22 (fourteen years ago) link
Also:
http://twitter.com/matsoR/status/8432317629http://twitter.com/matsoR/status/8432532487
― ksh, Sunday, 31 January 2010 20:28 (fourteen years ago) link
It's kinda ironic since one of my favorite Hopper pieces is her Emo Where The Girls Aren't piece which I thought was compelling and elegant even when I disagreed with certain points she made in it. Like she made special care to show where her thesis fell down, where girls sometimes *were* (as it were), why she still loved the music even when it fell down on this account etc -- lots of room for subtlety. And here it's just blunt, obvious and totally lacking in nuance or discussion.
― Mordy, Sunday, 31 January 2010 20:31 (fourteen years ago) link
Are you really gonna react by just saying "LOL same difference?"
huh, i'm re reading Hopper's article, kind of wondering where you're getting this reduction from. she even admits that they're a difficult band to parse:
Nevertheless, Koenig insists that Vampire Weekend are not what they seem—that their lyrics are pure satire. Well, maybe the fact that so few people can tell the difference between their supposed lampooning of affluence and genuine fascination with it is a sign that they need to sharpen their game.
The music on Contra is easier to untangle than the lyrics.
― that sex version of "blue thunder." (Mr. Que), Sunday, 31 January 2010 20:33 (fourteen years ago) link
She's trying to figure out whether they're a bunch of white kids trying to satirize this kind of bourgie lifestyle or whether they're white kids participating in this bourgie lifestyle. What nabisco is pointing out, I think, is that clearly they're neither.
― Mordy, Sunday, 31 January 2010 20:48 (fourteen years ago) link
just a mostly OT note on bougie: interested in whether this is middle class or universal. open to correction but pretty sure this goes back to scorning resistance by well-off blacks to the kind of politics represented by Angela Davis, and though of course there was a lot of college activism i don't think it was ever confined to the black middle classes, much less today. yeah it codes to "acting a snob" today and predictably is often applied when a chick shoots you down, cf. Yo-Yo's mocking indignation when she gets a holla in quick & kurupt's Whatcha Wan Do "and after a couple sips of the cup you want coochie??? now that's when i start acting quote unquote bougie!". But see also the interesting experiences of being ubjected to it recounted in this piece on racialious, Bougie By Design I don't think there's really awareness of how much socialist-influenced stuff generally remains in mainstream black america, no one really talks about it but you watch something like Dave Chappelle's Block Party and half the country seems on the brink of revolution like "we be readin' marx where i'm from"
― zvookster, Sunday, 31 January 2010 20:51 (fourteen years ago) link
think VW could counter a lot of their critics by reaching out to dude
― zvookster, Sunday, 31 January 2010 20:53 (fourteen years ago) link