pitchfork is dumb (#34985859340293849494 in a series.)

if it’s an album I love it gets 5 stars

I can’t really parse much meaningful/interesting difference between 3 and 4 stars, let alone 100 different gradations of rating

Once every couple of years I remember Prindle exists and go look at an artist there. It’s sort of a time capsule of a more innocent Internet. The most recent one I looked up was PJ Harvey and he hated her, that was a shock - the first and third albums are almost universally praised AFAICT.

Did Buddyhead do reviews? Feel like I got them confused with Pitchfork in the early days.

Prindle was a hugely helpful resource for me when I was getting into The Fall (20+ years back). Don’t think I explored his thoughts on other artists too much… funny guy though

that guy really hated women

A year or so ago I was instructed - not asked - by a friend in a gc to stop hating on Prindle. It understandably wasn't long before the chat died, its cosiness slowly evaporated. But it makes me hate Prindle even more.

i was going to say that disliking PJ Harvey doesn't make you a woman-hater (at least for my sake i hope not, although i do have my gf's support on this) but i went to his review page and scanned through it for pages dedicated to female artists and on first pass found Joni Mitchell and Pink, both of whom he dislikes as well, so uh, does kinda seem that way, annoyingly, cos i enjoy quite a few of his reviews

on the flipside he actually really loves a whole bunch of PJ Harvey's music, and Madonna's singles, even if he expresses himself rather um unfortunately when he doesn't. dearie me

some of my best friends are PJ Harvey albums

xxxpost - milo my memory is that buddyhead has reviews for a while at least, but they were pretty short capsule punk zine style

I'd never heard of prindle before this thread, but I looked at his Tori Amos intro and Left is otm. indefensible horseshit

to be fair here Prindle himself now says he's embarrassed by most of his old reviews, finds them too needlessly edgy and confrontational, also admits he wrote a lot of them drunk. idk I think he's a good dude who went through some pretty rough times, luckily he's sober and a lot more levelheaded now. I don't think he'd defend his site more than any of us would, though I do still give it credit for introducing me to loads of good shit back in the day

Maybe he could delete the stuff he says he is embarrassed about

it's news to me that alcohol causes misogyny

like I said, I don't know anything about this guy. but if I had self-published textbook misogynistic bullshit years ago, I'd probably remove it from the public internet lest someone who doesn't know anything about me read it and logically conclude I'm a textbook misogynist. obviously on some level he wants to preserve his legacy

I liked this line in the review of the new PIL album:

End of World is hellishly inconsistent, its mid section adrift in ’80s funk-rock sheen, like INXS being harassed by an angry wasp.

no but alcohol def causes you to turn into an edgelord trying to get a rise outta people sometimes

tbh I don't know why he left that stuff up, I think at some point he wrote an explanation like "I'm embarrassed by it but don't wanna run away from who I was", most likely the reason is there are hundreds of pages on that website and he doesn't feel like crawling through them all. I mean there's all sorts of shit from 2003 internet guys who def know better now that's still up

I remember thinking Prindle was really gross even at the time, but I also happy in those early years to find anyone writing about some of the obscure artists he covered.

I like this line from that same review:

Lydon has always sung because he has to; his singular voice couples acute distress with an almost physical sense of relief.

but anyway the point of this isn't to defend Prindle's website but rather the idea that it's kind of useful to be able to follow *one* critic who writes about a bunch of albums sometimes and get a feel for how they think and what they like because I, personally, have discovered a lot of great music that way. some of those guys knew a ton about prog for instance and when they gave high marks to something in that area you knew it was good. compare to Pitchfork/Rolling Stone today, as much as I applaud their efforts to include stuff from a diverse set of genres that appeal to a diverse set of fanbases I also think this approach can lead to lists which appeal to basically no specific person

Do some of y'all not have posts on this exact website that you're not embarrassed about from 2004? Including sexist ones?

Not excusing bad behavior, but ILX's own archives show behavior as bad or worse, even from those who still post here, and nobody (besides milo) is chasing anybody around with gotcha quotes from 17 years ago.

Shit, cat.

re: ratings, I like Alfred's categories

xp
ilxors can't delete ilx posts though. idk, there's no way to genuinely respond to that Neando without sounding like a smug prick, but fwiw I do not relate to "I used to post heinous shit on the internet, it was the style at the time," and I imagine some or even many ilxors feel the same. like it's not inconceivable that some people weren't sexist in 2004, right? I'm not saying you should feel terrible about it right now and we can't account for how we grew up (I definitely said some heinous shit pre-internet when I was a kid), but I guess I'm wary of implying these things are normal or phases one naturally goes through

I suppose I'm lucky to have been fairly self-conscious & anxious for most of my internet posting life. I'd agonize over posting a blog comment or w/e, lurked for years here before posting, etc. I know there's stuff I've posted on ilx that I'd find embarrassing now, and I can recall specific posts that received deserved pushback for a variety of reasons, but nothing remotely like that Tori Amos intro (which I'm not going to post, it's gross, but maybe read it if you're finding my response too pious). I also think there's a big social dynamic difference between posting reviews and engaging in a forum discussion

maybe to get back on thread track: I think it's good pitchfork deleted their egregiously racist reviews from the early 00s

: ratings, I like Alfred's categories

― Indexed, Thursday, August 10, 2023 11:45 AM (eighteen minutes ago) bookmarkflaglinl

That's the stuff.

xpost - yeah alfred that was great, one of the better reviews i've read for a while i thought

could you re-post Alfred?

Wait -- I'm confused.

I think I'm the one confused! what are Indexed and ums talking about?

Your point was sound, solid.

oh sorry we were talking about this PIL review

https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/public-image-ltd-end-of-world/

Oh! I agree

gotcha

I think I'm the one confused! what are Indexed and ums talking about?

― rob, Thursday, August 10, 2023 11:14 AM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

Your point was sound, solid.

― the dreaded dependent claus (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, August 10, 2023 11:18 AM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

heh

I was talking about Alfred's categorical ranking system on HTV. Couldn't tell you what the difference between a 7.5 and a 7.7 rated album is, but I think having some broad categories is helpful for prioritization when you're talking about a site like Pitchfork that reviews 5 albums a day.

lol i assumed that was about a prindle review of pil

first actual prindle review of pil

No hang on that was a typo - I meant that Leonard Cohen HAS a revolting cock. It's withered and scabby with an endless stream of pus and blood oozing out all over his testicles and underpanties.

shd have spoilered that probably lol genuinely sorry

so NOW we know what inspired the Revolting Cocks

We’re polling this, right?

https://pitchfork.com/features/lists-and-guides/the-25-funniest-rappers-of-all-time/

devin the dude erasure smh

I would have added Boots Riley

Just kinda bizarre that Kool Keith isn't on there

oh he is.

But Kevin Gates? Come on.

kevin gates is very funny, more in his interviews than his rhymes tho

the only interview I've heard with him was the Combat Jack one where he got mad at the co-host for defending prison guards

I have uh a lot of opinions

share 'em, why not? no slick rick or odb seem like pretty big oversights

glad they included ghostface tho, he really is one of the funniest rappers.

I mean, the list is so flawed that it's not worth nitpicking, needs an entire overhaul