thread to dis hyped releases that you don't get/don't like/wanna complain about

wow, did this thread start being interesting and entertaining?

I like Charli XCX a lot but "Boys" sounds like my daughter playing Smashy Road and is dull, that is my complaint

well she was
prolly
thinkin
bout

Yeah I don't see ILM as being particularly poptimist, ogmor and boxedjoy OTM basically. None of the top four songs appeared on even a quarter of the ballots submitted (although I'm not sure how that compares to previous years' winners) and I'm not seeing loads of pop-only ballots on the stats thread. (Did anyone vote for all of them? FWIW I voted for Boys, love New Rules and am indifferent to the other two). People have varied tastes and I think the overall results bear this out.

If the list was full of the Chainsmokers and Ed Sheeran then the handwringers might have a point, otherwise I'm just assuming it's another "eww girls pop music" kneejerk reaction and leave it there.

Those aren’t pop songs, they didn’t reach the top of the poll and I think girls have cooties. QED.

Yeah, it's interesting. I never heard the Charli XCX or CRJ songs before this. Acc to Wikipedia, the latter didn't chart anywhere other than Japan and the former didn't chart at all in the US, reaching #60 in Canada and #30 in the UK. They also do sound different from the chart pop music I hear all the time. It's like a completely new kind of 'indie pop' or something. That said, "Boys" also sounds like garbage to me so pomenitul OTM if that is his point.

My suspicion is that the very occupation of engaging with music as a critic or connoisseur is ultimately incompatible with trve kvlt poptimism/populism.

Pomentiful - no offence dude but any definition of pop that excludes ED SHEERAN could probably do with being loosened a bit.

Looks like we're dealing with different definitions of pop here. Those sales are high enough and the songs themselves poppy enough to qualify as pop in my book given how cramped the charts are and how much music (and the kinds of music) they necessarily leave out (read: marginalize).

As for trve kvlt poptimism, I don't know. I feel like it's compatible with a theory-minded, discursive outlook no less than with an 'unconscious' one depending on the context. Different definitions here as well.

xp

Btw, I agree that Ed Sheeran counts as pop music. If anything, it's your definition that strikes me as overly narrow, since it assumes that only the most commercial of the commercial should have made the top of the poll for ILM to qualify as poptimist. I think of poptimism as being more flexible than that, but correct me if I'm wrong?

Yeah, I mean Charli XCX and CRJ qualify as 'pop' relative to Rez Abbasi or Barbara Hannigan. They just don't strike me as what someone would come up with if their primary interest was in celebrating what is currently most popular or fashionable; imo someone who picks those as their favourites of last year is coming from a distinct aesthetic pov, one that is somewhat at odds with the present-day mass audience's (although less so than someone who votes for Barbara Hannigan).

celebrating

Or even critiquing for that matter

xps

It's definitely a different strand, I agree, it's just… not different enough? To each their own, I suppose.

How about someone who votes for both XCX and Hannigan?

8)

These polls are never really going to mainly cater to your or my tastes. I just make a ballot to get myself to review the year and check out a couple of new things; I think of the final results as a resource and check out the odd thing that seems like it might be interesting. There are always a couple of good things in there. xp to pomenitul

That's my general attitude as well, I'm just trying to live up to this thread's promise.

Ha, good work then.

Back on topic! Colleen record is giving me horrendous foreshudders of KAS' arrival at some point on Thursday

^^^that should sell it to a few of you

This innoccuous indie-synth record seems to bother you a lot.

oh i quite liked that KAS album

the innocuousness of it is what gets me down I think! anyway if you like muzakburbling synths that convey the sea or whatever then hey go wild

plop plop

The Kid would have been alright if it hadn't been for her voice. She should stick to instrumentals.

yeah the kas thread is full of criticisms like this ^^^ and they're all wrong

I like that record just fine fwiw, somebody I played it for thought it was The Knife

Not sure Colleen and Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith have much in common...well one thing I guess.

fuck off

the records really don't have much in common

was resenting insinuations that i'm a misogynist tbh

i like muzak , what of it, punk

https://www.discogs.com/Farbror-Resande-Mac-Farbror-Resande-Mac-LP/master/1157850

both colleen and KAS lack sufficient hubris to catch LJ's ear obv

pomenitul we may have failed to win james morrison's heart but I appreciate your efforts to flesh out a substantial aesthetic theory. I considered starting a separate thread to debate context and so on but I think ilm's appetite is limited and there's a special pleasure to shitting up the shit talking thread.

I see the sort of strangeness you're talking about as a lack of familiar context (and/or the suggestion of unfamiliar contexts), which is why our sense of the strangeness of any given bit of music varies. the strangeness is relational, it doesn't make sense to me to pin it just on the object, or the observer. contexts can disrupt each other, I suppose, as your focus shifts, but you seem to be talking about something necessary rather than experiential. similarly, other than in a conceptual, logical sense separated from the experience of listening, I don't see room for a necessarily unfinished/indeterminate quality to (some? all?) music. or maybe you're just talking about how things imply their own absence/negation and thinking that any one way of hearing will necessarily be limited and finite & tinged with that lack, which I would agree with, I suppose, although it doesn't effect my enjoyment of pop one way or the other

LJ I was merely suggesting you feel prey to the common mistake of comparing two musicians who are very different perhaps bc they are women, but that doesn't mean you dislike them bc they're women, or make you misogynist. But I apologize and take it back bc now I remember you comparing Hurray for the Riff Raff to The Hold Steady and maybe your comparison game, regardless of gender, is simply mystifying to me.

I'm perpetually baffled by LJ's dislike of LAS. It sounds like music tailor-made for him.

fair, fair. sorry, didn't want to be obnoxious there :(

actually the new KAS has for maybe 3-second periods made me think 'hm' in a not entirely negative way

I would think "Rare Things Grow" from EARS would totally be your jam, although it does have repetitions.

It has some sweet sax work.

I'm a bit baffled with the KAS hyperbole. I'm prepared for it to be the fact that I haven't put the work in, but I hear the picturesque when I'm promised (given the levels of appreciation) the sublime: it's pretty enough, but there's no punctum there. That might well be the point.

all good, LJ!

ogmor, I hear you re: the 'special pleasure to shitting up the shit talking thread'.

We still don't see eye to eye when it comes to aesthetics (not that I was trying to convert you or anyone else to my idiosyncratic premises) but it seems you now have a better understanding of what I was trying to express and likewise, I think I get where you're coming from.

Lest this appear too positive, let us resume the dissing. I'm sure the album poll thread will provide plenty of fodder throughout the coming days.

do you even enjoy listening to music

i'll just get this out of the way: most of the 2017 music is bad

― brimstead, Friday, December 15, 2017 3:58 PM (one month ago)

Pomenitul is A+ on Shostakovich. xp

Can I just get the thread back on track by pointing out the latest Ulver album is a massive pile of shit.

Apart from 1969. I like that track.

you said this on the album thread too and you're still wrong