Sleater-Kinney - The Center Won't Hold - August 16th

That closing minute does feel awkwardly tacked on. Weirdly, this sounds even more like a Fridmann production than The Woods did?

It means that I am taking their new direction as a personal affront.

I was more interested in what "forced" sounded like, since I see it being applied in many instances. Intuitively speaking all music is in some way or shape could be considered "forced", but I don't think it necessarily makes it bad.

But seriously, I liked the two other new songs, but by "forced" I mean that they don't sound particularly engaged with what they're doing, and they're self-consciously playing at the surface elements of the new and old approaches (which do not, to me, come together in a "mixture," but are separate and distinct segments of the song).

this sure sounds like an opening track

their lyrics still kind of suck, why didn't they think about updating THAT approach

maybe "labored"is better? to me, truly great rock bands (which I consider SK) have a way of sounding like themselves, even if they have albums as different as Dig Me Out, The Hot Rock and The Woods

great bands also have a really distinctive way they play together musically as a unit, something I felt like SK did, and this new direction strips them of that without really adding anything interesting outside of a very staid idea of "interesting production" that doesn't feel very fresh or interesting to me

"Weirdly, this sounds even more like a Fridmann production than The Woods did"

that's one of the worst sounding albums I've ever heard. This at least sounds better than that.

that was rough. i hate how affected some of the singing is on these tracks.

what a horrible development for a band so well known for singing without affectation

maybe "labored"is better? to me, truly great rock bands (which I consider SK) have a way of sounding like themselves, even if they have albums as different as Dig Me Out, The Hot Rock and The Woods

great bands also have a really distinctive way they play together musically as a unit, something I felt like SK did, and this new direction strips them of that without really adding anything interesting outside of a very staid idea of "interesting production" that doesn't feel very fresh or interesting to me

― Blues Guitar Solo Heatmap (Free Download) (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Wednesday, July 17, 2019 12:36 PM (forty-five minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

This is otm.

Carrie sez:

What am I supposed to say? She left. We asked her to stay. We tried. It’s hard and sad. Most people would ask me, “hey are you ok?” That’s the human response. She’s left us with a job to do, a job we also expected and wanted her to be a part of. Her playing on this record is amazing and she’s raved about this album to us and to Annie. But we have to keep looking to the future. Things change, even when those changes are hard and unexpected. Four amazing women worked on this record and we are going to honor that work. So, what’s up? The usual….Women picking up the pieces when someone quits, because we have to and want to. We’re going to keep going because we believe in ourselves and it’s a privilege to get to play music for people. It’s a new chapter. And all artistic entities have many chapters, if they’re lucky. Either the music will resonate or it won’t.

http://www.brooklynvegan.com/carrie-brownstein-on-janet-weiss-what-am-i-supposed-to-say-she-left-we-asked-her-to-stay-we-tried/

The back half of "Center Won't Hold" sounds almost metal!

i dig this new track and have come around to liking "hurry on home," at least

also this dry one liner shouldn't go unnoticed

I don't get wet because I am tall and thin and I am afraid of people (Eliza D.) at 12:18 17 Jul 19

what a horrible development for a band so well known for singing without affectation

i mean like....their singing is much, much more affected now that it was on dig me out or the hot rock or all hands. it's not really a welcome development for me.

Can't wait for their back to basics album in '21

Carrie sounds about as affected as ever in the first two minutes, she's always been a distant second to Corin in singing anyway IMO.

carrie used to just kind of talk-sing and now she's doing......something

https://media.giphy.com/media/1LiryotCCtd7y/giphy.gif

can we all finally admit Quasi >

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LYvlcw8pLso

If only Sam whatshisface didn't sing, perhaps.

irl lol Grisso

If you're talking about Carrie's nasally singing, she started that at least as far back as One Beat ("Oxygen" comes to mind), and I probably the beginnings of it on "The Size of Our Love."

Finally listened to the single, it's fucking fantastic, I love that bizarre trad rock reprisal at the end. this shit sounds so cool, thank u st. vincent

woof

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/31/arts/music/sleater-kinney-st-vincent.html?fbclid=IwAR2EDvvyAEvUXImRok8abBR78Ii6HBnI2xNvVPCYiy7kNWTT6N5iseaav0k

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sic does that every time he catches someone sharing a link from facebook. I'm giving him some good-natured shit about it.

I hear Carrie kept sharing links that way, and that's why Janet left the band.

Thought that one was less revealing than the Guardian piece from a week before with their difference places in life, etc..

I've been listening to All Hands and One Beat for the last week and the difference that's striking me most is the vocal mix, especially the latest song released where Carrie's singing just seems to be on top of everything else.

i'm a little surprised to hear how hands on Annie Clark was actually in that interview so I can see how that may have been kind of an unpleasant Yoko situation for Janet.

huh I thought it was incredibly revealing, unintentionally so

clark sounded like a member of the band

yeah, both in the piece and in the music

greil m. weighs in:

I hear a person who New York Times critics and herself have sold as the coolest person on earth. What I hear on the new material is: Wouldn’t you like to be like me?—not mentioning that she’s been an image from the start.
I have been an absolute fan of the band since they formed and I heard their first tracks (including their cover of “More than a Feeling”) and stood next to the stage when they first played San Francisco. I never liked everything they did: being a fan is knowing that to embrace poor work is to betray the band, not to mention oneself. What I hear so far is a producer stealing the voice of people better than she is so that she’ll still be appearing In the fashion pages when they’re no longer competition. I hope I’m completely wrong. I am prejudiced for the west over the east. But I’ve always thought St. Vincent was a fraud and I’m not hearing differently.

Greil like to call a lot of female musicians frauds

the NYT piece winking at materialism and fashion labels feels weird with this all-female group, idk

I don't care about this band (or St. Vincent) at all but that is an incredibly bad take. It second-guesses the relationship between Brownstein and Clark in a gross, presumptive way, rather than engaging with the work itself. And calling a band a "fraud", what does that even mean? That she didn't actually produce the record, or she doesn't make her own music or have her own ideas? lol

xp

not to mention recycling hoary (and incorrect) tropes priveleging "authenticity" (she's an "image", OH NO!) and ad hominem attacks ("oh the NYT critics like her and she obviously thinks she's SO smart! I better cut her down to size")

blech

the NYT piece winking at materialism and fashion labels feels weird with this all-female group, idk

https://66.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lqqvbnG6NT1ql2u8zo1_400.gif

idk why I'm reading this thread tbh, might be because I've always found ILM's collective pants-wetting over this band totally mystifying (see also: REM, Husker Du)

really like "The Center Won't Hold"

a metric source that gets thrown around here a lot, so...
monthly Spotify listeners
Sleater-Kinney: 370,000
St Vincent: about 1.5 million

I love both and I know SV is the bigger name these days, but that's a bit surprising given where SK are at in the promotion cycle.

Been avoiding the pre-release singles and most of the noise. Looking forward to hearing the album.

xp Call the Doctor and Dig Me Out were exciting to hear for the first time I thought

lol at outic acting like Sleater Kinney, REM, and Husker Du fandom is some quirk of ILM like taking Big & Rich seriously or something

xp also felt that way about Chronic Town, Murmur, Metal Circus, Zen Arcade, New Day Rising

if you go back to like 2004 era ILM i'm sure there were plenty of posts dismissive of SK in a "ew, girl bands are so lame!" kind of way

I mean, a lot of people say the job of a producer is to become a temporary band member.

tbh I was very unhappy about what happened with Janet. I did wonder if something else was going there because I read an interview with Carrie recently when she said she just wanted Janet to be well. Is Janet... unwell? I don't know.

I really didn't like The Centre Won't Hold much, but they were great live recently and I liked the new songs live. So I think I'm back on the bus

Another New Corin Song!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-hUUGdb2qoE

Going out on a limb and saying if you didn't like the prior two singles, you probably won't be into this one either.

"Small Finds" might be my favorite S-K track since "Hurry On Home".

cautiously ...... i like this album, I think.

album cover is reminiscent of böc

ok I listened to this album 2x today already and I do like it. maybe I should revisit the last one, which I never gave much attention.

this rules. tho I've really liked all the recent albums.

"cautiously" I like this album has been our MO since 2015

I have no idea how I missed Path of Wellness, I probably gave it a perfunctory listen on release but going back to it now it’s great. New one is solid so far too. Center is still their post-reunion best though I think

Wow. POW is the only innocuous, forgettable S-K album I own. I can't hum a single line.

hmm, it's very catchy

I really like this one, way more than expected.

this is way better than any other of the new ones

I don't think it's better than No Cities to Love, but better than the last two by a comfortable margin.

oh yeah but that's a janet record, sort of consider them two different bands was talking about post janet

center was also a janet record, which is easy to forget. it just isn't very good.

she played on it but had no creative input iirc

that's the one that made he quit on the whole st vincent deal

Lindsay Zoladz , NY Times critic in part on new album:

. The new LP has more oomph and darkness than the band’s self-produced 2021 LP “Path of Wellness” and more emotional resonance than its mechanical 2019 effort “The Center Won’t Hold.” But even in its wildest moments, when compared to the band’s mightiest work, “Little Rope” sounds unfortunately diminished and curiously restrained.

The Center Won’t Hold was the album I wanted after No Cities to Love: a break from their sound. I still listen to it.

i can't stand it tbh

I hear ya.

okay on to the positive - "Say It Like You Mean It" - wow what a chorus (yr contractually obligated to refer to a chorus like this as "soaring"), incredible hook and melody

I'm intrigued by this one. It's kind of a bummer how their reputation basically collapsed after JW left (I think that break was possibly even more acrimonious than she let on in her occasional interviews on the subject), but they were too great to be dismissed based on that alone and i'm always ready to give them a chance.

this one doesn't have that feeling where you're trying to talk yourself into it or "oh isn't this an interesting direction" i just like it like it

yeah the album feels more natural, they don't appear to be trying to compensate for anything or really 'trying something new', it's just got a bunch of good songs.

saw them last night in SF at the Warfield (they are playing again tonight,but it was moved to the Regency because I think these two shows undersold). I didn't have high expectations even though I do like this album, mainly because the show I saw after Center was so underwhelming. But they were really good. It's obviously not 1999 anymore and I'm no longer 28 and neither are they, but this was as good as I could have hoped for.

the crowd was fucking annoying as shit though, I seem to have stood right in the area of a bunch of entitled babies. LIke when I came in, some guy actually grabbed my arm and moved me out of the way because I guess I blocked his view. I almost punched him. Later, near the end of the show, when I cautiously took out my camera to take a quick video, some lady grabbed me and said "I can't see a fucking thing if your phone is there" Ok yeah, that's been happening to me all night. She also grabbed my son when he walked by her and said "oh no girl, uh uh" because he briefly blocked her line of sight for four seconds. wtf is wrong with everyone.

yeah ppl dont know to be at shows anymore

when i was at margo price at the fillmore this woman was fully complaining that people were moving into her spot and i’m like it’s not yours, the crowd moves, so you do too, just fucking adjust and grow the fuck up

Little Rope Deluxe Edition: https://pitchfork.com/news/sleater-kinney-announce-little-rope-deluxe-share-video-for-new-song-watch/

New Song:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWcvPJadBb0

I picked up a copy of The Center Won't Hold and gave it a good listen, cranking it up on the stereo, and was pleasantly surprised that I enjoyed it. I tried listening to it when it came out, albeit streaming on a computer, and I couldn't get into it. I just agreed with the backlash among so many fans, but since then I've come across enough positive dissenters and re-evaluations that I figured I'd give it another chance someday. Glad I did.