pitchfork is dumb (#34985859340293849494 in a series.)

they want everyone to know that this album that everyone of a certain age knows about has many strong moments and is ok to listen to

but yes, i very much enjoyed reading it all the same

Let Go is a 6.6 though

Let Go is a 6.6 though

it has one of the defining pop ballads of its era ("i'm with you") plus two singles that stodgy critics were singling out as being Actually Pretty Good For An Inherently Silly Manufactured Pop Tune even then. perhaps every other song on the album is mediocre but i wouldn't know as i've not heard it in full.

first four or five tracks are all time bangers but it drops off pretty quick

Not to 6.6 level. 6.6 is a mediocre album

why am I arguing about this, lol

Anyway, some of the best songs are later — like “Things I’ll Never Say”

could you guys make it any more obvious?

I’m convinced this record wouldn’t be half as loved if Avril had lived longer

Do you mean, like, if Avril's career had lived longer...?
Or is ilx now the nexus of some Berenstein Universe-type phenomenon where all of us are denizens of different timelines with different pop histories and celebrity deaths?

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/shortcuts/2017/may/15/avril-lavigne-melissa-cloning-conspiracy-theories

"all time bangers"

ic otm, tbh

https://twitter.com/en_cohen/status/1074443467886014464

^Tweets are protected

sorry, he posted: "If there's any 2002 album named "Let Go" that Pitchfork needs to reconsider..." with a screenshot of the 3.8 they gave Nada Surf's Let Go

Not to 6.6 level. 6.6 is a mediocre album

― underqualified backing vocalist (morrisp), Sunday, December 16, 2018 6:28 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

not to be the decimal police here but a 6.6 is a basically decent album, mediocre is more like the 5 range

5 is bad! That’s 2.5 stars on the Rolling Stone scale. (Maybe I shouldn’t be “converting,” lol?)

I mean I know 5.0 is literally the middle of the scale; but I feel like anything rated less than 7.0 (or RS’s 3.5 stars) is not too worth checking out. (How many records do you own & enjoy that you would rate less than a 7.0?)

We call it "deep sixing" when a record gets a 6.0-6.9 because that's effectively the result. Below 6.0 is insulting enough to make stans protective and create backlash but a 6-range is perfectly milquetoast and is the most effective way to consign an album (or artist) to purgatory

Don't forget to carry the one.

grade inflation strikes again!

Saba – CARE FOR ME (8.7)
Car Seat Headrest – Twin Fantasy (8.6)
Mount Eerie – Now Only (8.5)
Father John Misty – God's Favorite Customer (8.5)
Tim Hecker – Konoyo (8.5)
Jean Grae / Quelle Chris – Everything's Fine (8.4)
Joey Purp – Quarterthing (8.3)
Jeff Tweedy – Warm (8.3)

yeah interesting stuff. You'd expect Mount Eerie and Tim Hecker. Can't hardly believe they gave Father John Misty a BNM anyway.

The reversed thing, would be interesting too. Like Christine & The Queens "only" got a 7.9 and a review which clearly didn't really liked the record. Yet it made the top 50. Was it the lowest rated album that got into the list? lemme check some random others.. no, tried about 10. only found an 8.3 and a 8.1.

Bill Callahan Join Twitter.

oh sick, now I can ask what poem he read before a screening of Faces in 2010

Like Christine & The Queens "only" got a 7.9 and a review which clearly didn't really liked the record.

― Ludo, Wednesday, December 19, 2018 3:48 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Chris is a portrait of an instantly memorable character making utterly gleaming pop music. ... The resulting album is an electric blend of unforgettable imagery, emotional depth, and lurid, sizzling pop-funk.

yeah sounds like he totally hated it!

there's a good point above about how Pitchfork really does crank out good writing pretty regularly...

But today there's the music of Malcolm Gladwell's life! I really need to stop visiting this site daily. Maybe we can have a "Pitchfork is great" thread just to link the good stuff!

isn’t that just intra conde synergy

it's actually a p good list

who cares he sucks

i don’t have a strong opinion on him either way

God bless em, they still have RSS feeds. Getting back on that!

Have Pitchfork discontinued their "new tracks" page? No updates on it at all since December 1.

https://pitchfork.com/reviews/tracks/

A shame if they have, I found some great tunes via that page.

Sorry, December 4 not December 1. Anyway the point stands.

Watch Ezra Koenig, Haim Members Cover “Little Drummer Boy”

i think both of the lsat few posts can be summed up with "it's december"

They should get back to their genre-specific 2018 album lists — they petered out after Rock, Rap, and Metal.

what other genres are there

they experimental & electronic lists

they had*

I wish they'd do a list like this one for every year: https://pitchfork.com/features/the-out-door/9323-genres-of-one/?page=1

But since The Out Door fizzled in 2015…

"i think both of the lsat few posts can be summed up with "it's december""

okay, but to post pretty much nothing for the entire month seems a bit extreme. I'd understand if they went silent for a week or so either side of christmas.

They used to suspend album reviews after the ROY list until Jan, but have published one or two a day in that period the past few years

EOY that is

i'd been down to see a Roy list, list of the best Roys

I really miss both The Out Door and Resonant Frequency columns. Two of Pfork's best ever.

agreed

I was checking for a review of the last Drive-By Truckers album (2016) and I see that there wasn't one. It makes sense that over time Pitchfork is going to give up on bands they used to review habitually (studio, live, solo albums, comps, etc.) Are there other cases like this--where a band that used to score 8s (or higher) loses relevance and gets left behind?

sometimes it's less a conspiracy theory and more that a band is championed by one staff writer and/or freelancer who, for whatever reason, doesn't pitch the latest album

What happens when a band loses a publicist to narrate the record, which Lost Highway did so well.

or, like, the writer gets the flu and by the time they no longer have the flu it's too late to pitch