pitchfork is dumb (#34985859340293849494 in a series.)

One day all the pitchfork reviews that are like "perfect music for this spring/summer/winter/fall" are going to seem hopelessly dated and/or northern hemispherecentric

all the pitchfork reviews that are like "perfect music for this spring/summer/winter/fall" are going to seem hopelessly dated when the glaciers melt and President DeSantis has ordered the last of the polar bears to eat me.

in the future, there will be bear season and croc season, and pitchfork will be there to tell us which albums are best for running from each beast

Best New Mauling

I know it’s ridiculous to complain about Pitchfork in 2022 and it has been slowly developing into a wider net “culture” site for some time now, but that “here’s what the stars wore at the Met Gala” photo essay was really striking in a, “do not want” kind of way. I guess whatever gets clicks, but that felt out of step even with their current incarnation. Figure we’re about a season away from “Phoebe Bridgers are lunch at THIS east village hot spot” paparazzi shots.

They maybe were required to do this as a sister site to Vogue, as I'm pretty sure they didn't share this article on socials? Not a big deal imo!

https://pitchfork.com/news/watch-feist-harmonize-with-an-obnoxious-buzzing-sound-in-a-theaters-basement-dressing-room/

I heard An Obnoxious Buzzing Sound on WFMU and they sounded great, pretty cool to see them collaborate with Feist

update: the Obnoxious Buzzing Sound has Covid

CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated that Bobby Rhubarb, a dog, would support Jenny Lewis on her summer tour dates.

depends on your definition of support i guess

Definitely depends. I don’t know this Rhubarb dog but I can only assume that they WILL be there to support Jenny Lewis every step of the way, no matter when or where

For anyone looking for more evidence of Pitchfork's metamorphosis into Rolling Stone, the latest 3 reviews on the site right now are:
- Florence and the Machine
- The Black Keys
- Richard Thompson
(that is, if you can find the reviews section amongst all the breaking news about the new Kendrick album)

Rolling Stone only publishes 2 reviews a month now, and probably not by those artists?

pitchfork was reviewing all of those artists back in the 00s

"Major Online Music Site Remains Major Online Music Site in Absolute Shocker"

There are a lot of legitimate Pitchfork complaints, but "metamorphosis into Rolling Stone" is not one of them

Also the reviews are not exactly hidden away - they're still fairly prominent on the homepage

www.rollingstone.com

But also, it's like— they might be reviewing these record by legacy acts, they're also reviewing the latest releases by KMRU, Whatever the Weather, Oren Ambarchi, Jeanines, and any number of niche/somewhat more obscure groups. The hand-wringing over the inclusion of more mainstream stuff is weird, as much as I agree that most of the mainstream stuff is garbage.

^^

Winter term" just ended a few days ago at my university, for example

Haha definitions of "winter term" and "spring term" always lead to mild US/Canada cross-border confusion ime.

Reviewing a Richard Thompson album (ft. Henry Kaiser) is a good thing for a music site to do, IMO

I'm not a disinterested poster, but are we complaining about a Richard Thompson review?

i'm complaining about the bonnie raitt review. she's shifted over 16 million units in the united states alone! i am sick of being smothered by bonnie raitt every time i walk outside

do you raitt her

I can't make you love her.

Bonnie Prince Billy gets a raitting of 33.3333333333

I can't make you love her.

i see what you did there

at least it gave us something to talk about

Richard Thompson is good.

that's one stellar Richard Thompson reissue, deserves every review it gets

I enjoyed the Black Keys review, which was not at all dumb, but when exactly did this band ever count among its fans "wayward factions of 78-collecting blues traditionalists?" As far as I can tell they were beer commercial fodder from the jump, pretty much anathema to the crusty blues collector demographic

the first few black keys records were definitely "cool" in my memory

Yeah the first album came out on Alive Records, a small label founded in the 90s by a French dude who was in thick with the whole extended Bomp Records empire; IIRC Greg and Suzy were their distributors from the get-go. So there was a definite cachet in that vein among those of us following/interested in such things when that came out, "Oh, another thing on Alive, could be good."

And after that they were on Fat Possum and (rhetorically at least) part of the whole "rural blues is the new punk" thing. Their fourth album was all Junior Kimbrough songs.

Black Keys were cool enough for their cover of “Have Love Will Travel” to appear on the John Peel Festive Fifty in 2003, which was my introduction to them.

And I have receipts:

John Peel Festive 50

I was hoping Bonnie Raitt would get someone like Dan Auerbach to produce her next album, but I guess that would be peak irritation for some of the posters here if Pitchfork covered it.

oooh!

good Bonnie Raitt review, Alfred!

Hey, Pfork reviewed a Kelly Clarkson album

Her debut, Thankful, didn’t challenge expectations. With the exception of tracks like “Miss Independent”—a boinging R&B-pop single originally written for Christina Aguilera—it was a fairly uninspired attempt at pop-gospel.

Honestly kudos to pitchfork for having the guys to write a not entirely glowing review of the Kendrick album rather than immediately giving it a perfect score like seemingly so many other outlets did. Like I think it deserved a bnm but all the fawning around Kendrick is a bit much

*meant to say “having the guts”. Autocorrect strikes again

I was surprised too, especially after six of the seven top stories on Friday being about Kendrick

They haven't been afraid to give Kanye low scores despite him owning the news section

agreed that it's okay to not just blindly give out high score/bnm, but there is no way DAMN. is the better album.

Everyone overrated DAMN! when it came out.

I think the pitchfork score is fair. It’s definitely a flawed album.

my opinion could yet change, but i think damn. is certainly a better album. it's better than most albums, to be fair.

Haven't heard this yet but I will be astounded - astounded - if it's anywhere near as great as DAMN, from what everyone's been saying

Haven't heard the Quelle Chris either ;)