pitchfork is dumb (#34985859340293849494 in a series.)

I haven't heard the Janelle Monae record yet but a 7.7 seems like a good score not a bad score?

it's .4 below the threshold of actual critical success or something

I feel like scheduled publications could just do a "best new music" "check it out" and then a general reviews section with comments, maybe a little section for critical reassessment -- possibly as soon as the next issue! -- but pitchfork releasing reviews as things come out in sort-of-realtime means scores draw attention

then again, most monthly publications have done the score thing month-over-month but there's no feedback channel and limited space. I have no idea why someone hasn't done a website with that tiered idea plus a feedback boiler on the side. You could have all the sections on the front page, with them limited to the most recent contributions to each

if they were really rude there could be a "don't check it out" below the general reviews

Xxxxpost Eazy Duz It came out at the same time as SoC

One of the best things about Pfork (and I say this w/complete sincerity) is the lack of any Comments section. God I hope they never add one!

Just saw the Liz Phair set got a 10.0. This is a case where the score seems higher than the degree of enthusiasm expressed in the review (tho it’s a v appreciative review).

to clarify, I meant critical rebuttals and ongoing conversation from staff and contributors

never comments

Ah gotcha

if they really fucked up and assigned a low score to an album that's universally loved it could have an editor apologizing in an escalating manner about how they wish they could delete the original score but the database doesn't work that way

waiting for the 10.0 redress for the original review of her eponymous 2003 album.

I was just gonna ask – is Phair the only artist to have received both a 0.0 and a 10.0 from the Fork? Inquiring minds wanna know

To answer my own question – I see “Daydream Nation” was granted a retrospective 10.0 (and that article upthread says “NYC Ghosts...” got 0.0).

Flaming Lips too! Zaireeka got a 0.0 and Soft Bulletin got a 10.0.

The guy resented having to buy three more CD players, iirc.

he had no friends for borrowing, a 0.0 tragedy

0.0 friends.

Zaireeka was pretty fuckin cool, my friend had a party where he had 4 CD players, lot of work but it was a good gimmick

tbh we should have been warned at that point or before that they were always in search of gimmicks and maybe pitchfork caught that

zaireeka tour was cool, boombox army from the audience onstage

lol

aren't there albums every year that end up in P4k's top 50 that didn't receive an 8+ score or BNM? I don't think this means much, even for them

there has to be at least one act that's released an album before march before their summer tour wasn't locked-in, got jettisoned by pitchfork when their main demographic is venues who book in that vein, that never got near the year-end list because they didn't have a popular summer tour

probably just one because that's a confluence of events but

hahaha!

Zaireeka was pretty fuckin cool, my friend had a party where he had 4 CD players, lot of work but it was a good gimmick

― The Desus & Mero Chain (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Wednesday, May 2, 2018 9:39 PM (yesterday) Bookmark

i held one of these at the 40 Watt in Athens GA. we had huge PA speakers setup with the 4 cd players and opening bands and stuff. it was really awesome (tho i think most people had dipped out by the main event to get high somewhere). "Riding to Work in the Year 2525" and ""The Train Runs Over the Camel But Is Derailed by the Gnat" are as good as anything on The Soft Bulletin

Eazy Duz It came out at the same time as SoC

yeah but much of Compton is re-recordings and electro interregnum leftovers, Eazy-Duz-It is a step forward in terms of Dre producing a cohesive album, live arrangements, etc

tru
actually listened to DOC and it's still amazing but maybe not an evolutionary step so much as a sidestep, dre making an album with a more east coast feel, or merging current east coast stuff with a west coast vibe

Livin Like Hustlers probably feels the most like a step towards the Chronic now

high five: The Last Song totally sounds like a proto-Chronic jam.

i'm still waiting for the day when i can find an affordable copy of uncle sam's curse. by above the law. on vinyl OR cd. it hasn't happened yet.

the ABBA thing today is so bad, jeez

skimmed, landed on this sentence, wtf:

This is how ideology works: by presenting a convincing, sometimes disingenuous account of your culture and identity.

this piece is straight bonkers!

i took the headline "A band beyond taste" as an indication that it would be more bullshit narrative wankery that is 100% about rock criticism and 0% about music.

ABBA rules because it's songs rule, this is why they are huge. taste has nothing to do w it.

seeing "The Pitch" right under the headline = skip this article

:'(

I like the detail of the writer being this jaded/cool at age "6 or 7":

When “Dancing Queen” kicked in, my response was not active resistance but ambient distaste. Sounds like a classic, I thought, instantly forgetting it existed.

ABBA is one of those bands that I admire/respect in theory but never, ever have the urge to actually listen to

mostly listen to ABBA when I feel like dancing but also sometimes when I really wanna rock out to this jam
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nf7xZhzgF7A

my favourite ABBA atm is ‘Eagle’ which I only recently realised sounds like it could’ve been made by some obscure folk rock band like Trees or Mellow Candle or someone

When I was 6 or 7 I loved pretty much any song I was listening too.

dancing queen is the pinnacle of all pop music. it's scary, almost psychedelic

Zaireeka rules. Played it with 3 at my buddies - dove tailed into a k hole and called it a day. Deserves a 8 at least

Best ABBA is solider

“Ring Ring” or gtfo

https://pitchfork.com/thepitch/what-chelsea-manning-is-listening-to-right-now/

I’m, uh...not sure of what to make of the fact that this exists.

This was on a playlist I made in 2015 [while in prison]

🤔

http://www.dazeddigital.com/music/article/40063/1/how-reviews-affect-artists-mental-health

this piece is bad

leavebritneyalone.mp4

That is a weird article and I read nothing but weird responses to it after it was posted yesterday.

I think it's a good line of query but that article was missing all the targets, a little more focus and research would've been useful

i.e. There is a neurological reason as to why "creative" people struggle with perceptions of their selfhood, and why commentary-- not just professional reviews, but Youtube comments, random tweets, and off-hand comments from family members at Thanksgiving dinner-- tends to cause an inordinate amount of internal upheaval. It's been studied and it could have been researched and commented upon.

or, i.e. There is also a tendency in music writers to, essentially, write like toxic fans. There is less an engagement with the work, and more of a desire to exert control over the artist who created it-- or a desire to assert one's own selfhood in the criticism. Sometimes music writers transcend this?

My favourite song is when a music writer/critic finally releases their long-awaited first book and then has "an emotional moment" on Facebook because they've never had to face criticism-of-their-work before. Suddenly, these new authors realize that their prospective readers are not only interacting with their talent and viewpoint, but also responding to their appearance, their age, their id, their history of poorly-chosen words, the circumstances of their book's release, comparison to other similar books, commentary on the jacket and blurbs, remarks about the author's family history, remarks about what the critic had to eat before they read the book, or mutual friends with the author that the critic happens to know (and attendant anecdotes), and then the first-time author feels shocked and appalled that a commentator might be judging them based on criteria beyond their control. It's my favourite song! despite my love and care for these writers/authors it feels somewhat vindicating to be like "you see? you see how crazy it is to 'make work you're proud of' but then have that work be subject to 'judgement of your selfhood'?"

r, i.e. There is also a tendency in music writers to, essentially, write like toxic fans. There is less an engagement with the work, and more of a desire to exert control over the artist who created it-- or a desire to assert one's own selfhood in the criticism. Sometimes music writers transcend this?

It's a tendency that goes back further, I think. When I was younger I was enraptured with Oscar Wilde's "The Critic as Artist," in which he asserted (among many other things) that the artist exists for the critic, not the other way around.

I think the article had a lot of good points to make about all the clueless white know-nothings running amok in our improbable media bubble, but the fact that this piece somehow conflates that with a mental health problem is what makes the article v strange. I think if it was just called Music Writing Sucks Now, it would have hit its target, but (and, let's be clear, I blame an editor, not the writer) it was shoehorned into a box for MENTAL HEALTH WEEK on DAZED DIGITAL.