What Is Rockism ?

If that’s his opinion of the music and playing, what more is there to say about it? (He does call one song “a fun stomper” later on.)

ah, you know, i don't mind imitation! for me a lot of it is about issues of style, taste. it's _crass_ imitation, and that irks me more than the imitation itself.

― dub pilates (rushomancy)

imitation that isn't crass isn't really imitation, it's just drawing on influences. the thing that i understand to be objectionable about this band is that they aren't doing anything interesting with their source material. they're just in love with this dessicated idea of cool—the most decadent possible attitude

If there's nothing to say about it, WHY WRITE A PIECE AT ALL?

maybe the critic thinks that kitsch is a scourge and needs to be stamped out wherever it's found

He has plenty to say about it — and entertainingly so — just not about the technical aspects of the playing or whatever you’re looking for.

(I concede that if you’ve never heard Led Zeppelin, you may be left with an imperfect impression of what this band sounds like. So it assumes that much of the reader.)

If there's nothing to say about it, WHY WRITE A PIECE AT ALL?

Like I said before, social positioning. This review is "You can't sit with us" blown out to 1000 words.

I'm not asking for musicology. I would, however, actually like to know why the reviewer doesn't like the actual music and not just the sociological aspect of it.

unperson otm

he doesn't like it because it's derivative? it makes him sad to think that people out there are in thrall to a dead aesthetic

it's not sociological. that's aesthetics

it's just not populist

the problems with the music are self evident. you really don't have to go beyond one listen to realize they are for all intents and purposes a Led Zeppelin cover band that doesn't play Led Zeppelin covers. all of the stuff outside of the music - the marketing, the licensing, the touring, the kids themselves, the embrace of aging Boomers - is all much more interesting than the music itself, which can be fairly and summarily described in less than a paragraph. Larson did his due diligence and engaged with the music as much as was necessary. GVF work well as a jumping off point to talk about all these things, hence the attention from publications that would've never covered them otherwise.

Exactly. He says very clearly that the music is undistinctive and unremarkable. You guys just aren’t satisfied with that as a reason to dismiss it, for some reason.

Also — do you think the label sent Pfork a promo copy and press kit for review, or do you think Pfork decided on their own initiative to buy the album and assign a review?

it's not sociological. that's aesthetics

What's aesthetics, the two quotes morris posted? The review is nine paragraphs.

Like I said before, social positioning. This review is "You can't sit with us" blown out to 1000 words.

― grawlix (unperson), Tuesday, October 23, 2018 9:44 PM (seven minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

please keep trying to position this as being about "the cool kids" even though everyone who reads and writes for pitchfork is old enough to have school-aged children at minimum

He says very clearly that the music is undistinctive and unremarkable. You guys just aren’t satisfied with that as a reason to dismiss it, for some reason.

He doesn't say how it's undistinctive and unremarkable. I'd be satisfied with it as a reason to criticize it if I knew why he was saying it.

Like adults don't ever do similar things!

xp

He says it this way!: No one in this band offers anything in the way of personality that doesn’t sound like your average YouTube tutorial for a Jimmy Page-type pentatonic solo or a John Bonham-type shuffle.

If you want a song-by-song description of an album, you can read a college newspaper.

i actually think kids today are less invested in cultural positioning based on taste than other generations.

You like to put words in my mouth

xp

saying that it's a dull and unremarkable blues rock album is a description of the sound, not the sociology

morris, I will listen to the album and see how I think his two statements hold up.

sometimes i forget i'm in a place where people who haven't listened to the music posted v. spirited attacks/defenses of the criticism of the music.

i definitely have never listened to this band

Thank you for answering my question, though. There are two statements.

1) nothing a bar band couldn't do
2) as much personality as a Youtube video of Jimmy Page style pentatonic solo or Bonham shuffle

I have listened to one song, fwiw, and don't think I agree with statement #1 already

Oh my god, Tim. Have you listened to the album? If its problems are not immediately obvious to you, I got nothing.

Jesus

the second one is probably hyperbole

fwiw, i listened to some of the songs after reading the review, and it sounded pretty much exactly as i thought it would

xp

they can't even *play* a bonham shuffle

I have listened to one song and experienced the zep-ness

Where is the evidence that they cannot? I will gladly listen to that song or group of songs.

the second one is probably hyperbole

You think?

if you're saying these guys are particularly good musicians we're not really going to get anywhere

that's not even the problem with them anyway

has anybody else itt actually listened to the whole album? at least once?

I listened to at least a few verses of most the songs (that was the most I could take).

Tim — lol @ at all that back-and-forth before you had even queued up the album

that's not even the problem with them anyway

― Trϵϵship, Tuesday, October 23, 2018 10:07 PM (one minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

it's more of a problem than them being target-marketed to white stripes fans.

like when the black crowes were doing a straight up stones impression for the entire 1990s at least one could argue that they could play and write a song or two.

I listened to this record. I like it. So what if it’s derivative. And it gives people something to talk about on the Internet. They’re bringing people together.

Yeah, Morris, I had heard "When the Curtain Falls." Listening again, there are a couple of things that strike me. One is that I really don't find the riffing to be hackneyed pentatonic hard rock stuff. There are a lot of notes in it and there's that one part where the bass plays the same notes. I actually feel like it's going the extra mile a little bit. I like the solo OK.

Someone mentioned sounding like Rush earlier - I hear that in the second part of the verse, too.

He sounds an awful lot like Geddy Lee.

Each song here could be written or played by any of a thousand classic rock cover bands that have standing gigs at sports bars and biker joints across America (the same venues where Greta Van Fleet cut their teeth when they were kids). So why should Greta Van Fleet be the ones signed to Republic and William Morris, because they don’t have bald spots yet? Tons of people in those cover bands play their instruments better than Greta Van Fleet, who are, currently, proficient at best.

it's funny how this is such a rockist argument, obviously a big part of why GVF are famous instead of any randomly selected bar band is because the former are boyband-cute, that seems as legitimate a reason for their success as any unless you feel obliged to judge them by their own standards

the bit about the Darkness seems like total cool-kids stuff, they're similarly derivative but cool enough to signal to the audience that they (and you) are too smart to really fall for this stuff, so they're OK to like

imo GVF is bad not because they're an unoriginal imitation per se, but because they're an unoriginal imitation of Led Zeppelin, who were rubbish, they should try imitating a good band instead, like Slade or Be Bop Deluxe - my review

Lol the Darkness was so terrible

GVF would be so much more unbearable if they were doing that kind of smirky, 'knowing' Darkness-esque thing of constant signposting that they are being ironic

the darkness wouldn't be well received by pitchfork in 2018

led zeppelin is good though by the way. they have this song that's called "when the levee breaks"

it occurred to me that the dead sara record from 5 or 6 years ago is probably the upper limit of what gvf could conceivably accomplish and no one really rode for those guys...hmm i wonder why

Earlier this year, even Robert Plant spoke out about his feelings on Great Van Fleet, saying, "They are Led Zeppelin I. Beautiful little singer, I hate him! He borrowed it from somebody I know very well!" in a sarcastic manner.

Speaking to NME, Greta Van Fleet's singer Josh Kiszka shared his thoughts on what Plant said.

"It was kind of strange to watch, but it was quite flattering. I think he likes the stuff! That's good, to kinda get that seal of approval. He's one of the most fantastic singers ever. I think what he was taking from was those black singers like Wilson Pickett and Otis Redding. It was just his interpretation, and I think I've got this separate interpretation. There are similarities, and I see it, so it was pretty amazing that he mentioned it."