Explain what you hate about Ani DiFranco.

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Rats.

http://www.cincinnati.com/freetime/movies/ other/img/battlefield.jpg

― adam (adam), Monday, 10 November 2003 22:13 (twenty-two years ago)

Pretend that's a really good picture of John Travolta from Battlefield Earth.

― adam (adam), Monday, 10 November 2003 22:13 (twenty-two years ago)

I have had very limited exposure to her music, but I really don't like her singing. And no matter what she might be saying, I obviously can't get into music I don't like the SOUND of.

**Incidentally, two of my best friends are a couple (lesbians) who don't like Ani DiFranco either.

― paige, Monday, 10 November 2003 22:14 (twenty-two years ago)

"Some of my best friends are lesbians who hate Ani DiFranco"...

the world's last minority

― Ann Sterzinger (Ann Sterzinger), Monday, 10 November 2003 22:49 (twenty-two years ago)

unbearable hot singers are, for some mysterious reason, WAAAAAY more annoying than unbearable ugly ones. It's the old fuck?/kick down stairs? dilemma.

Ann, you misogynist!

― Kenan Hebert (kenan), Monday, 10 November 2003 23:55 (twenty-two years ago)

I for one dislike her guitar playing a lot more than I do her singing; it's every bit as forced, as showy, draws as much attention to itself.

― M Matos (M Matos), Tuesday, 11 November 2003 00:21 (twenty-two years ago)

but isn't it, how you say, "glitchy"?

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Tuesday, 11 November 2003 00:26 (twenty-two years ago)

― M Matos (M Matos), Tuesday, 11 November 2003 00:28 (twenty-two years ago)

She's pretty much abandoned that trademark flamenco-punk style recently though.

I made a compilation of Ani's best jazzy/balladic stuff for my boyfriend - who was suspicious because of the uncritical love by lesbians - and I surprised myself at how totally unlike the public idea of Ani it was.

― Tim Finney (Tim Finney), Tuesday, 11 November 2003 00:45 (twenty-two years ago)

Butt Ugly? I think she looks beautiful!

― Agent Uranium [GPC], Tuesday, 11 November 2003 01:30 (twenty-two years ago)

"Ann, you misogynist!

-- Kenan Hebert (edito...), November 10th, 2003."

Oh, c'mon, I want to kick Darren Spooner down the stairs after her...

― Ann Sterzinger (Ann Sterzinger), Tuesday, 11 November 2003 01:32 (twenty-two years ago)

I hope to christ no one takes that seriously and sends him after me...

― Ann Sterzinger (Ann Sterzinger), Tuesday, 11 November 2003 02:05 (twenty-two years ago)

of course we're going to take it seriously. this is ILM, where we take EVERYTHING EVERYONE SAYS seriously.

― M Matos (M Matos), Tuesday, 11 November 2003 02:06 (twenty-two years ago)

I'd send Ani after you first, to give you the cunnilingus of a lifetime.

― Kenan Hebert (kenan), Tuesday, 11 November 2003 02:07 (twenty-two years ago)

Ani is in a special category of people whose music I do not enjoy but I am nevertheless glad that she exists.

I am bothered by:
*her weird vocal affect
*her guitar tone (thuddy, jarring)
*her general aversion to melody

I am much more bothered by:
*listening to people trying to imitate her weird vocal affect at open-mic nights
*listening to sound engineers at my college tweak the EQ on any acoustic guitar to make any acoustic guitar to make it sound like hers
*her popularity among my ex-boyfriends

― Kevin Erickson, Tuesday, 11 November 2003 13:03 (twenty-two years ago)

"I am much more bothered by:
*listening to people trying to imitate her weird vocal affect at open-mic nights"
ditto, ani imitators are even worse than Dave Matthews imitators

― Felcher (Felcher), Tuesday, 11 November 2003 19:39 (twenty-two years ago)

I was fairly obsessed with her for about half of 2002 - I heard her for the first time then, started religiously listening to anything I could find, and then kinda burnt out by the end of the year. I haven't paid her a lot of attention since then, surveying a lot of her recent material made me feel slightly embarassed at how pretentious (for lack of a better word, I guess) she'd gotten. Also didn't help when a friend pointed out how much her voice sounds like Dave Matthews'. The guitar playing is still really captivating though, and I'm glad I got to see her live at least once. The stuff about her that aggravates people is generally the stuff that appealed to me the most - the vocal affectations, the jumpy guitar-playing, the whimsy seemingly being set at 11 all the time. The songwriting is where she's really fallen off for me, she retains a really excellent talent for storytelling and setting a mood, but she just seems stuck on herself too much?

― Adrian (Adrian Langston), Wednesday, 12 November 2003 09:40 (twenty-two years ago)

four months pass...

all i can say is i LOVE ani difrancos music and have done for many years but i met her last yr at a live show in brisbane and her and her friends were so rude to me it crushed me... so my experience with meeting her was very bad.....!!!!

― Lauren S, Tuesday, 30 March 2004 06:23 (twenty-two years ago)

kevin - i agree. now that dave matthews is in the mix, i realize that my problem is the same with both of them. I admire their skill on guitar, but i just can't listen to it for very long. and i find her voice grating - and I love dylan and neil young and stipe and general weirdness of voice. dont know why hers is so piercing to me. but it is...

― AaronK (AaronK), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 12:00 (twenty-two years ago)

one month passes...

see: THE ANTI DIFRANCOS

― Matt Smut, Tuesday, 11 May 2004 15:55 (twenty-two years ago)

on my posts declaring my love for her i forgot to mention that i will hate her by default until she starts charging less for ticket prices. she's great and all, but she's not worth 35 bucks. i could get a cheapo distortion pedal off ebay for less than that (and i love cheapo distortion pedals)

― Felonious Drunk (Felcher), Tuesday, 11 May 2004 16:15 (twenty-two years ago)

I discovered an odd thing today: she is playing Clear Channel venues on her tour. You'd think that she of all people would be opposing that shit.

― nickalicious (nickalicious), Tuesday, 11 May 2004 16:17 (twenty-two years ago)

exactly!

― Felonious Drunk (Felcher), Tuesday, 11 May 2004 16:18 (twenty-two years ago)

Re: November 9, 2003 entry -

"Folky Drivel" would be a great name for a record label. Better than "Righteous Babe", at any rate.

Now where did I put that "A Mighty Wind" DVD?

― kjoerup, Wednesday, 12 May 2004 04:24 (twenty-two years ago)

OK so can someone sum all of this in one sentence so when all these hot collegiate chicks ask me why I don't like Ani I can tell them w/out offending them?

― djdee2005, Wednesday, 12 May 2004 04:27 (twenty-two years ago)

"she has a pottymouth"

― mookieproof (mookieproof), Wednesday, 12 May 2004 04:33 (twenty-two years ago)

I once compared a musician friend's SPEAKING VOICE to Ani DiFranco's and she went into an raging tirade. When someone can inspire that kind of vitriol it's just kind of funny.

― Al (sitcom), Wednesday, 12 May 2004 05:56 (twenty-two years ago)

What is her IQ really? She should've said.

― dave q, Wednesday, 12 May 2004 13:55 (twenty-two years ago)

I can't keep up with the output. I'd get a subscription, if I could, but otherwise her output is too much to keep track of.

― subgenius (subgenius), Wednesday, 12 May 2004 15:12 (twenty-two years ago)

Whinging feminist bitch with an annoying voice and bad songs.

Although maybe she's hot. Is she?

― Sasha (sgh), Thursday, 13 May 2004 04:26 (twenty-two years ago)

The most recent posts on this and the PJ Harvey thread really depress me.

― Tim Finney (Tim Finney), Thursday, 13 May 2004 12:27 (twenty-two years ago)

The most recent posts actually make me go back to Ani's latest two albums, which had drifted to the bottom of the CD pile, because I'm convinced that she must still be doing something right.

― The Lex (The Lex), Thursday, 13 May 2004 13:10 (twenty-two years ago)

Don't worry Lex, Evolve is mediocre and Educated Guess sounded distinctly unappetising over HMV headphones. I'm more and more beginning to think that Revelling/Reckoning was some weird fluke reversal in the midst of a gradual decline.

Incidentally, the irony of Sasha's complaint is that Ani's old (and not especially numerous) feminist rants were always funnier and more involving than the more generalised Mike Moore style anti-military/industrial complex stuff that she does now (though in her defence "Your Next Bold Move" - which I disliked initially for the aforementioned reasons - utilises its inter-connected metaphoric imagery superbly)

― Tim Finney (Tim Finney), Thursday, 13 May 2004 22:33 (twenty-two years ago)

I hate her logo and packaging as well.

― Sasha (sgh), Thursday, 13 May 2004 23:04 (twenty-two years ago)

she has a logo?!

― the 'surface' 'noise' (electricsound), Thursday, 13 May 2004 23:06 (twenty-two years ago)

Righteous Babe Records logo x 3 =

http://www.righteousbaberecords.com/images/m_chunkmagnets.jpg

― martin m. (mushrush), Thursday, 13 May 2004 23:10 (twenty-two years ago)

Don't worry Lex, Evolve is mediocre and Educated Guess sounded distinctly unappetising over HMV headphones. I'm more and more beginning to think that Revelling/Reckoning was some weird fluke reversal in the midst of a gradual decline.

Haha Revelling/Reckoning was my introduction to Ani! And it's ironic given what's generally considered to be her biggest flaw (self-editing) that her double album is the only consistently brilliant LP I've heard of hers. Dilate comes close, but nothing else.

― The Lex (The Lex), Friday, 14 May 2004 01:58 (twenty-two years ago)

Have you got Not A Pretty Girl? Imperfectly?

Yeah what's also weird is that all the Ani fans seem to rate To The Teeth and Evolve - neither of which really struck a chord w/ me bar a few fantastic songs on the former - and dislike Revelling/Reckoning.

Here's what I wrote on R/R when I got into it.

― Tim Finney (Tim Finney), Friday, 14 May 2004 02:15 (twenty-two years ago)

No, and no... I have Up Up Up Up Up Up and have heard but do not possess Little Plastic Castle... what I've heard has made me interested enough to keep up with what she's doing, but not to delve too deeply into the most massive back catalogue ever (esp. as Ani albums seem to be mega-expensive in the UK). Great stuff on Revelling/Reckoning - the reason why I'm still giving the last two Ani albums a chance is because R/R took so long to grow on me; as you said, "Okay, so if you're gonna spend a week listening to just me, I better give you a week's worth of music to listen to." It actually seems like she put a lot of work into all the hooks and textures of R/R, whereas at other times it can sound like she wandered into the studio, ad-libbed tunelessly and aimlessly for seven minutes, then wandered off again.

"So What" might be one of my favourite Ani songs... lyrically amazing, and I love the distant jazz clarinet circling her.

― The Lex (The Lex), Friday, 14 May 2004 10:45 (twenty-two years ago)

Please Alex switch your preferences! Buy the two albums I mentioned (and Little Plastic Castles actually - but particularly Not A Pretty Girl) but don't buy more recent stuff! R/R took a while to grow on me too but the other recent albums reach a certain threshold and then hang there lifelessly.

"So What" *is* great - the 3 drinks/2 drinks bit in the chorus, or "but nothing comes at first/and little comes at all/and when inspiration finally hits you/it barely even breaks your fall". Likewise I love the line in "Rock Paper Scissors": "Desire drags me right out of myself/like a gas-soaked rope tied to a piece of coal/i'm getting pretty good at looking on the bright side/while the flames rip along the sand and swallow me whole." Or the extended riff in "Marrow" on "a taste of your own medicine". Great stuff! Some of my favourite lyrics ever.

― Tim Finney (Tim Finney), Saturday, 15 May 2004 12:37 (twenty-two years ago)

I thought R/R was pretty terrible (a nice song or two that wear off), and am not much interested to check out what she's doing today, but everything from Little Plastic Castle on back is worth your time. Living in Clip might be the best first purchase and might be all you need.

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Saturday, 15 May 2004 13:55 (twenty-two years ago)

My preferences are definitely not towards the later stuff - just that it's easier to check out (promo copies etc) than the back catalogue. I actually dug Educated Guess out yesterday and it's very dull indeed - I don't believe there's a single decent hook on it. I'll look out for the albums you mentioned though.

The 3 beers/2 beers line - yes! Also, the munificence of metaphors on "School Night", and the "you were the make-me-mad guy... now I am the bad guy" couplet on "Sick Of Me". R/R is a perfect summer album, actually - the ballads are all languid and warm, and the more upbeat ones are totally sun-kissed. "OK" in particular needs some love!

― The Lex (The Lex), Saturday, 15 May 2004 14:58 (twenty-two years ago)

for me it's the vocal affectations, with the timbre of her guitar a close second.

now i have to find out what alex in nyc looks like.

― mike bott, Saturday, 15 May 2004 15:14 (twenty-two years ago)

She's probably *the master* of the extended metaphor.

*cough*FranklinBruno*cough*.

― Casuistry (Chris P), Saturday, 15 May 2004 15:45 (twenty-two years ago)

now i have to find out what alex in nyc looks like.

Disapointment awaits ye

― Alex in NYC (vassifer), Saturday, 15 May 2004 17:25 (twenty-two years ago)

The 3 beers/2 beers line - yes! Also, the munificence of metaphors on "School Night", and the "you were the make-me-mad guy... now I am the bad guy" couplet on "Sick Of Me". R/R is a perfect summer album, actually - the ballads are all languid and warm, and the more upbeat ones are totally sun-kissed. "OK" in particular needs some love! "

Yeah the whole house burning down metaphor thing in "School Night" is amazing. It's almost as if she realised at some point that formulating extended metaphors was her special skill like a strong backhand or something and just spent months and months stretching it and stretching it. Love "OK" too!

― Tim Finney (Tim Finney), Sunday, 16 May 2004 04:16 (twenty-two years ago)

SHE SUX FAT COX

― 24 hours with the King of Snake. (SNAKE!) (ex machina), Sunday, 16 May 2004 04:27 (twenty-two years ago)

this is not explaining why you hate ani difranco!

― christhamrin (christhamrin), Sunday, 16 May 2004 04:27 (twenty-two years ago)

well ok that last bit sort of was. i do find her attractive somehow though. because i am a perv.

― christhamrin (christhamrin), Sunday, 16 May 2004 04:28 (twenty-two years ago)

I'D HIT IT

― 24 hours with the King of Snake. (SNAKE!) (ex machina), Sunday, 16 May 2004 04:31 (twenty-two years ago)

Skipping 44 messages at this point... Click here if you want to load them all.

"shrinking violet" is achingly perfect. it's like "if i believe you" (the 1975) mixed with "tolerate it" (taylor swift)

OTM but also lol at this Beatlejuice-like attempt to manifest Brad in this thread.

― Tim F, Friday, 26 March 2021 22:28 (five years ago)

two years pass...

I realized that I hated my roommate 26 years ago when he asked me if I liked Annie. Me thinking Annie Lennox replied, “Oh my God I totally love her!” and then he started playing Ani Difranco… 🤢

Ani Difranco has no redeeming qualities to my ears. Sorry to those who like her but fingers on a chalkboard are more appealing than her incessant whining and dreadful stream of consciousness word vomit.

― Mbaby, Saturday, 15 April 2023 21:04 (three years ago)

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