pitchfork

it's a damn good list, but i'm wondering what the big deal is. seems pitchfork-ish, though slightly more tilted towards dance/pop/rap/r&b inclusiveness than one might expect. but not enough to seem like a radical about-face in terms of editorial taste or anything.

what's the big deal about anything really

I never noticed before but they're right: 'Autumn Sweater' is an amazing makeout song.

do tell

The real gem for me in the whole Smashing Pumpkings catalogue is 1979's b-side 'set the ray to jerry'.

deej, the one guest rapper on rakim's last album was.......maino :-/

picking Check the Rhime = :DDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD

wish they included emusic/insound links for these songs (or at least identify the album on which each song appears). tracking down the correct album can be a chore.

deej, the one guest rapper on rakim's last album was.......maino :-/

― bernard goony (The Reverend), Thursday, September 2, 2010 2:48 AM (4 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

thats not that bad really, i mean, at least no one is celebrating that dude for saving rap.

"Car" really changed the world forever, didn't it. "Kicked it in the Sun" #1?

Yeah, "1979" is definitely the Pumpkins song that non-Pumpkins fans like. I owned Siamese Dream like most white Midwestern 14-year-olds at the time, but I'd probably go with "1979," too, for the same reason I'd go with "Lost in the Supermarket" over anything else on London Calling.

Agree; "1979" is definitely Corgan's finest hour personally/creatively/commercially/blablabla. You can't really put you know "Apathy's Last Kiss" on there per Moka's post. Though it's my personal fave. "Glynis" is a nice haunter too; almost proto witch haus, right Scott? Pfft.

Well unless I accidentally included some artists who have already been on the list, I think I figured out who will be filling up 16 out of the 20 remaining slots on the list:

Notorious BIG
Wu Tang Clan
Nirvana
Pavement
My Bloody Valentine
Aphex Twin
Weezer
Radiohead
Neutral Milk Hotel
Dj Shadow
Daft Punk
Bjork
Beck
Talk Talk
Dr Dre
Belle And Sebastian

holy shit they picked Stardust

I love this list

and "Setting Sun"!!!!!!

wish "Unfinished Sympathy" was higher

jeez, when did Pitchfork turn into... me

In the spirit of overanalysis...

Joys:

"Everlong" -- as perfect a rock song as was released in the '90s.
The Pharcyde at #41 -- didn't think they might place!
"TROY" at #35 -- *eats shoe*

Disappointments:

No mention of PJ Harvey's post-Rid of Me material (her best).
"Unfinished Sympathy" at #44 -- there had better be some good shit ahead of this! I'd say it's top 20 material.
"The Private Psychedelic Reel" a notch below "Setting Sun" -- really?
"1979" being the Pumpkins' representative track -- LOL NOSTALGIA

Surprises:

GBV at #36 -- I thought these guys were going top ten!!
The Flaming Lips at #30 -- again, I thought they were "Pfork Canon" material and would place much higher. Wasn't The Soft Bulletin #3 on Pfork's previous '90s albums list? I think it was... oh well.
Spiritualized "Ladies and Gentlemen"... ELVIS VERSION!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!

They can't possibly chart Talk Talk that high on an individual song basis. I don't think you'll DJ Shadow on there either but maybe "Mutual Slump"?

i think they could chart 'after the flood' or 'new grass' but yeah i don't think it'd fit the spirit of the list so much

i would expect dj shadow though, building steam maybe

'midnight in a perfect world' seems like the obvi one

"Midnight" to me deviates from his personal style too much, I never liked it. It feels cribbed. I don't know, being picky.

they'll probably go 'in flux'

Before "Girls & Boys", Blur were seen as just another Britpop band, maybe a couple notches above Dodgy.

yeah, no.

God that's horrid. I think it's better to refrain from posting excerpts and stick to placement...

I think if they are going to include a Talk Talk song, it'll be "Ascension Day" and for DJ Shadow it'll be "Midnight in a Perfect World". This is because they were included in their Pitchfork 500 list from 2007: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pitchfork_500 , which I think has been a pretty good indicator as to what songs would put into this list since I don't think the general attitudes to the 90s and the staff at Pitchfork has changed a lot in the past 2 or 3 years.

xp: I don't know that that's an unfair reading of Blur's profile in the US.

"Midnight" to me deviates from his personal style too much

This is pretty much what propelled "1979" to the list, though. I'd expect "Midnight" to place.

could still be a track from Violator to come, right? that was 1990?

also slowdive - alison

i don't get this list at all tbh

it's fine to be eclectic (i guess) but this just feels like two groups of people in mutual incomprehension, basically indietards + rap/dance heads

"Enjoy the Silence" in the top 20 would be mind-boggling to me (and Depeche Mode is one of my favorite bands)

"Enjoy the Silence" has to be in there, song was extramassive.

In re: Blur/US, nobody in the US knew what "Britpop" was, so, they couldn't well be seen as "just another Britpop band". Statement is a mess.

Yep. I don't think I've seen Depeche Mode on the list, so I'm pretty sure they will be in there.

Alison was already mentioned in the See Also for Spiritualized's "Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space (Elvis Version)" at 23.

oh rats

it's probably my favorite rock song that hadn't placed yet

And mayne I said about the same [on hipinion], it's a disconnected series of impulses. Received wisdom V personal tastes V editorial bent V ret-conning the past such that it fits with/informs the present...

"Enjoy the Silence" in the top 20 would be mind-boggling to me (and Depeche Mode is one of my favorite bands)

WTF u talkin' bout, Depeche Mode has always been a lock for the top 20.

"it's a disconnected series of impulses"

this is sometimes also called life.

In re: Blur/US, nobody in the US knew what "Britpop" was, so, they couldn't well be seen as "just another Britpop band". Statement is a mess.

― cee-oh-tee-tee, Thursday, 2 September 2010 14:01 (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

The term hadn't even been coined yet - statement is a double mess

(if they'd said that it was the song w/ which Blur changed their game up without being vaguely snarky about bands the writer probably barely ever heard, that would have been legit I think)

That's awesome strongo. Happy 90210.

you used to be better at this.

not sure how many "rap/dance heads" there are

you dont really have to be a rap head to know & love a lot of the rap songs on this list but dance existed in sort of a different context during this time period, like you could listen to 2pac and green day on the radio but you probably wouldn't hear the orb

is guided by voices' 1995 track 'game of pricks' really the 36th best song of the 1990s?

like a whole s.tonne of picks, it's a completely unremarkable indie record

even the dude who did the blurb hasn't done his research. "The whole thing's just over a minute and a half long" -- yes, it's three quarters of a minute over a minute and a half long.

if it was in my toilet i wouldn't bother to flush [via 90s zings]

GBV at #36 -- I thought these guys were going top ten!!

for a different song or

Yup. See above re: "Car". Also really tired of "T.R.O.Y." as the go-to "I have a friend who's black!" hip-hop "awareness" herald.

And mayne I said about the same [on hipinion], it's a disconnected series of impulses. Received wisdom V personal tastes V editorial bent V ret-conning the past such that it fits with/informs the present...

― cee-oh-tee-tee, Thursday, September 2, 2010 10:05 AM (9 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

how come we're getting these diplomatic ott posts and hipinion gets awesome hardman stuff like

The thing that kills me is Tim, like Ewing and the other ILMers, hate Pitchfork. They hate Ryan. But their desire to be read, to communicate, and try to drive dialog, is stronger, so they're functionally hostages of Pitchfork's success. There's a whole class there that pissed on Pitchfork from 2000-2006 but then waddled through the door with their USB cables between their legs, rationalizing it by pretending ScottPL's presence makes it OK. Nate Patrin in particular shocked me, that he sunk to that; I called him out for it on ILM, he was just rabidly anti-P4K for years. Breihan surprised me as well. I mean...I understand the sensation that's driven them to make this and other compromises, but I don't understand how, after going through the process for long enough to realize there is no material gain on the other side of it, you don't make the decision to write for satisfaction, and separate it from making a living. Because you can't make a living that way, and the compromises you have to make in trying devalue the whole process. How can you delude yourself for this long?

Because you haven't earned my trust.

this list is reminding me to buy Pharcyde

xpost we knew you first u_u

lol

how can we possibly hate pitchfork in the same way as we did circa '99 to '04 when a good 75 percent of the writers' roster has turned over?

Because of the 25% that hasn't, obviously. And let's not pretend the recent crop is exactly storming the gates of literary or critical canonization.

Yup. See above re: "Car". Also really tired of "T.R.O.Y." as the go-to "I have a friend who's black!" hip-hop "awareness" herald.

― cee-oh-tee-tee, Thursday, 2 September 2010 14:18 (1 minute ago) Permalink

this song rules d00d.