RÓISÍN MURPHY

In a 2010 list on jokey 90s lists. The bottom of the list now reads: "CORRECTION: A previous version of this article contained language that was offensive. It has been removed."

― you can see me from westbury white horse

yeah in 2010 that kind of language was what i'd describe as "pervasive and all-encompassing". for about the first 40 years of my life my experience was that there was this kind of self-perpetuating hegemonic state of enforced ignorance regarding transness. that said i only speak for me, there are probably trans people out there who found that list offensive and have not, and never will, give p4k a pass on that one, and i support them completely in that. for me personally, though? not a blip.

i'm just tired of the Discourse. every day it's something else, and right now this niche artist who most people have never heard of stands a very real chance of blowing up because she said some bigoted shit and that made a lot of people unhappy. probably the new york times or somebody will do a sympathetic profile on her soon enough, it sounds like something they'd do, and if that happens, it'll matter more than this. in the meantime, though, i feel like not reviewing the new record by someone who said bigoted shit, a record the label has chosen not to promote because of the artist's open bigotry... i don't know. to me that seems like kind of a no-brainer. i guess p4k sees it differently, got someone - and is it a cis person? it wouldn't make it ok if it was a trans person, i mean, we're all different, i'm still gonna be pissed about it, but if on top of that they got some fucking cis person to review it... like i said. to me, that's a pretty major fuck-up.

i mean i try not to make a big deal out of it. i was kind of losing my shit over it earlier this year, but nowadays, i try not to make a big deal out of it. i'm aware of it, though, i'm aware that there's a very real chance that people like me could all wind up dead. and whether or not that happens isn't up to me. it's up to cis people. how much they support us. how much they stand behind us.

i don't feel like pitchfork did a really good job supporting trans people in this case.

she's gonna blow up the same way Ariel Pink did after 1/6

dumpy's roisin nuts

― NickB, Wednesday, 13 September 2023 20:01 (twenty-nine minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

LOL

tbf frogbs Murphy is UK-based and being a trabsphobe is considerably more of a popular position amongst the UK liberal press than right wing insurrection is amongst the US equivalent.

Still think that not reviewing it at all would've been a better move.

― jaymc, Wednesday, September 13, 2023 9:57 AM (five hours ago)

there's so few outlets left consistently reviewing albums that i'd rather publications err on the side of writing about music made by problematic artists than just pretending the music doesn't exist. honestly, being able to approach & critique music made by people who do/say bad things should be a tool in the bag of any modern music critic, because the problematic artists -- in all genres/spaces -- don't appear to be going away. i guess i look at it as like, actually the function of the music critic is in these exact moments, to synthesize discussion happening culturally around an album, provide further context to the reader, and ultimately put forth an informed and hopefully engaging argument regarding the music and its relationship to the bad person who made it. i think snapes did this most effectively but i personally don't want to see any lesser critical engagement, in general, w/ big records than we get now. i actually don't think the press has the ability to like boost artists careers anymore, so it's more about the critic's relationship to conversations happening on social media and other forums... i like the idea of conversation funneling up towards critics even in, or especially in, the case of a problematic artist.

w/ pitchfork it's a bit messier bcuz their scores function as a big institutional stamp of approval or disapproval in a way that isn't inherent to other publications, but anytime a big album comes out nowadays there's like maybe like 2 worthwhile things to read about it. i was really curious what people had to say about this record. idk i like reading criticism

idk if the conversation in this case is that interesting to synthesize but i don’t have much of a perspective on it beyond “it ruins her music” and “it’s depressing that terfs are falling over themselves to praise her bravery and music.” all i got. would be finer with this form of engagement if at least a rating weren’t applied every single time

i mean, i’m wrong, it’s interesting, yeah, artist with ravenous queer following completely betrays them on the eve of a big album with dj koze would probably be an interesting story to me if i weren’t like… directly affected by it lol

she's gonna blow up the same way Ariel Pink did after 1/6

― frogbs

i mean transphobia is pretty mainstream, there's a lot of pretty open bigotry against trans people that's accepted. who was doing the "both sides" thing on the 1/6 thing? because there are plenty of people today, including papers like the new york times, who are doing "both sides" on trans rights.

i mean, i’m wrong, it’s interesting, yeah, artist with ravenous queer following completely betrays them on the eve of a big album with dj koze would probably be an interesting story to me if i weren’t like… directly affected by it lol

― ivy.

right, otm, the issue here, and i feel like maybe j0rdan isn't getting this, is that trans people in the us are in serious danger, at serious risk, and these things that are being done against trans people, to hurt trans people, they're not only being seriously challenged but the bigotry is escalating and becoming more and more severe. trans people are under concerted, direct attack, and it is _entirely possible_ that this attack will succeed.

if that weren't the case, i mean, i'm with ivy, this would all be _extremely interesting_, you could probably make an award-winning documentary about it.

they're not only being seriously challenged

not only _not_ being seriously challenged, sorry

i’m sure j0rd gets that. i’m really sympathetic to his position bc i don’t want less criticism

but, i guess i’m making an obvious point here, there’s not just one kind of problematic artist. there are artists i write about still who absolutely documentedly sucked ass and i guess even though i hate it it doesn’t fundamentally alter my image of them and their relationship to their art. here an artist revealed that something i took for granted as layer of her music was actually false and thus the whole thing collapsed. five stars

“gone fishing,” that song means nothing now!!!!

tbf frogbs Murphy is UK-based and being a trabsphobe is considerably more of a popular position amongst the UK liberal press than right wing insurrection is amongst the US equivalent.

― Daniel_Rf, Wednesday, September 13, 2023 3:44 PM (thirty-five minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

sure but in general the new "fans" you get when you do shit like this are pretty fickle. they'll check out her stuff, probably think it's interesting or neat, and then forget about it in 2 weeks. Ariel Pink got a ton of streams the week he went on Tucker and then dropped off a cliff. JK Rowling's bullshit maybe brought a few people into the Harry Potter fandom but it caused way way more to leave. Dilbert got dropped from every newspaper and is now a subscription webcomic that probably pulls in about $50 a month. and Dilbert doesn't even say "fuck" in it. I guess what's I'm saying is lets see where she is the next time an album rolls around

tbc I don't think she'll have a huge influx of new loyal fans - I just think the media treatment of her will be sympathetic enough for her to basically maintain her previous status, which I don't think you'dbe able to say about Ariel Pink

Shocked that Ariel Pink is currently at 680K monthly listeners on Spotify. Was he ever substantially higher than that? Maybe I'm underestimating his previous popularity, but he never sold a ton of records at our stores, even at the height of his "popularity".

in conclusion, róisín murphy is the cm punk of music

it would have been so easy not to choose to make the world a bit worse by covering this album but p4k's relationship with queer artistry / audiences is a lot like RM's when you get down to it

wait, sorry if this is an inappropriate question to ask, what did cm punk do? i don't really follow him very closely but i always understood him to be one of the few wrestlers to be generally fighting the good fight.

the cm stands for "child molester"

re:ariel pink maybe it’s from his songs appearing on curated playlists and such rather than people actively choosing to listen to him

lol sorry he is not someone who’s done anything morally wrong (unless threatening your boss’ life is morally wrong and i think we all know the answer there is “depends”) but his last run in aew confirmed to me he’s a huge phony who presents himself as a certain thing he is not

xp re: cm punk

his last run in aew confirmed to me he’s a huge phony who presents himself as a certain thing he is not

A professional wrestler? No!!!!!

thanks ivy, was curious. hadn't followed him much in recent years, just remembered that he seemed to piss off some wresting fans with his vocal trans rights support (which i'm gathering was about as legit as RM's)

it would have been so easy not to choose to make the world a bit worse by covering this album but p4k's relationship with queer artistry / audiences is a lot like RM's when you get down to it

― your original display name is still visible (Left), Wednesday, September 13, 2023 5:39 PM (two minutes ago)

isn't there a difference between criticism and coverage though? they aren't actually "covering" the album -- they've posted a single news story about roisin in the last month and it's after she released her statement regarding the controversy. they've declined to cover even any further fallout. so is the act of good faith critical engagement w/ a piece of art in of itself contributing to a worse version of the world? i think i disagree w/ that assertion in most cases. this case would be one of them, for me. "this personally/culturally meaningful artist has suddenly changed our perception of him/her because of offensive speech/actions and it's harming my ability to listen to/enjoy this music" is a real & relevant emotion and i don't agree that working thru that dynamic via criticism is contributing to a worse or more violent world

i knew someone would do that and my very earnest reply is that wrestling is as rooted in reality as any other art

xp

i also don't think the assertion that ariel pink's fanbase has grown since the capitol incident would hold up to scrutiny

whatever

No one was saying that! He was being used as an example of a career that patently did not benefit from his heel turn.

"this personally/culturally meaningful artist has suddenly changed our perception of him/her because of offensive speech/actions and it's harming my ability to listen to/enjoy this music" is a real & relevant emotion and i don't agree that working thru that dynamic via criticism is contributing to a worse or more violent world

Dunno about a worse or more violent world but I do think it's an experience that has been written about plenty, sometimes feels like the only thing music criticism has expressed in the past couple decades, and while ofc a transcendentally great writer might still wring something out of it it mostly feels like that well's pretty dry now, regardless of new examples popping up.

eh. seems like the snapes review struck a chord with people

i think i'm less convinced of good faith criticism w/ art that is intentionally harmful. like movies coming out of the dimes square indie film scene funded by peter thiel for the express purpose of destabilizing society... i'm not sure the world would be served by too much good faith engagement w/ that art. and i think there's instances where like... the art itself has no frisson to begin with. for instance, dababy had been spinning his wheels artistically long enough by the time he got cancelled for his anti-gay rants that i wasn't really dying to read any reviews of his subsequent albums. but in this case where you have an album that was being feted as a possible career peek by a beloved & inventive artist... i think there's as much discussion to be had there that would contribute to a better world as opposed to a worse one

so is the act of good faith critical engagement w/ a piece of art in of itself contributing to a worse version of the world? i think i disagree w/ that assertion in most cases. this case would be one of them, for me. "this personally/culturally meaningful artist has suddenly changed our perception of him/her because of offensive speech/actions and it's harming my ability to listen to/enjoy this music" is a real & relevant emotion and i don't agree that working thru that dynamic via criticism is contributing to a worse or more violent world

This is kinda what I was grappling with in my newsletter this week, talking about Charles Gayle, a free jazz saxophonist who died last week who would periodically interrupt his live shows to deliver ranty monologues rooted in his hard-line Christianity, which included being strongly anti-abortion and condemning homosexuality (though TBF he was one of those Christians who believed that pretty much all human behavior was sinful in some way). But his music was entirely instrumental, so unless you were subjected to one of his rants at a show (and he didn't do it every night — I saw him three times and he never said a word onstage) it was very possible IMO to separate his work from his beliefs. Now some people — on ILX and elsewhere — have said, in effect, "I can't support this person's art because I know he believes things I don't believe, even if they do not manifest in the art," which I think is a step too far. I mean, we're talking about someone who was voluntarily homeless for two decades because he was on some kind of ascetic spiritual/artistic quest, trying to remove his art from the commercial realm as much as possible. Does a dude like that fit into conventional political binaries? I don't think so.

like movies coming out of the dimes square indie film scene funded by peter thiel for the express purpose of destabilizing society

is this a thing?

(i honestly don't know, quick googling leads me to things about RedScare and frankly, this is an aspect of culture I have politely decided to ignore)

i think i'm less convinced of good faith criticism w/ art that is intentionally harmful. like movies coming out of the dimes square indie film scene funded by peter thiel for the express purpose of destabilizing society... i'm not sure the world would be served by too much good faith engagement w/ that art. and i think there's instances where like... the art itself has no frisson to begin with. for instance, dababy had been spinning his wheels artistically long enough by the time he got cancelled for his anti-gay rants that i wasn't really dying to read any reviews of his subsequent albums. but in this case where you have an album that was being feted as a possible career peek by a beloved & inventive artist... i think there's as much discussion to be had there that would contribute to a better world as opposed to a worse one

― J0rdan S.

see, if anything i'm the opposite... i look at things from a systemic level, and i personally view harm done _without_ malicious intent as being _more_ dangerous than work that's intentionally harmful. i mean, if we're gonna talk about ariel pink, to me, there's no similarity between pink and murphy. pink is an asshole who won't ever fucking shut up. he's not ever going to be a martyr people rally around as a victim of the heinous Gender Ideology. murphy? she said something once, she didn't apologize, she just stopped saying it. that, to me, that's someone who's a _really_ sympathetic figure. it's _really_ easy to portray someone like that as a victim of cancel culture gone mad. i don't think that's an honest framing, but it's a pretty persuasive one, all told.

the unasked question here, the implicit question here, is who's more important here? who should this "debate" be centered around? should it be centered around trans people who are, right now, being materially hurt by institutional transphobia in all sorts of places, or should it be roisin murphy and her art? centering murphy's art doesn't say anything explicit about trans people. in implicit terms, however, in _practical_ terms, it makes our experiences, our rights, less important than murphy's. i think that niko stratis article a couple of weeks ago makes a really good point - there's this whole conversation and trans voices just aren't present in it. that's why i asked if the album was reviewed by a cis person. it's a question of whether or not pitchfork is giving us a voice in the whole thing.

Does a dude like that fit into conventional political binaries? I don't think so.

― read-only (unperson)

does it matter whether charles gayle fits into conventional political binaries? i mean, is this really about charles gayle at all? forget separating the art from the artist - is the reporter separable from the story?

who reads your newsletter? what influence is it going to have? who's going to be hurt by your promoting charles gayle? are there people you care about who are going to trust you less, who are going to feel let down and betrayed by your promotion of him? and that gets balanced against, you know, how much do you love his music, how much has it inspired you, how much do you believe in it, how much do you want other people to experience it? to me, that's the calculus of such things.

i'm not interested in the murphy review for what it says about murphy, but for what it says about p4k.

who reads your newsletter?

About 2500 people, about 50 of whom actually pay for it.

what influence is it going to have?

Very little, I think. I hope it'll help me sell my book this time next year, though...

who's going to be hurt by your promoting charles gayle? are there people you care about who are going to trust you less, who are going to feel let down and betrayed by your promotion of him?

I couldn't possibly say, but I hope they'd let me know. I do know of at least one trans person (because they commented) who is going to explore his catalog after reading my piece.

and that gets balanced against, you know, how much do you love his music, how much has it inspired you, how much do you believe in it, how much do you want other people to experience it? to me, that's the calculus of such things.

Exactly. Would I say "I can't be friends with you if you don't like Charles Gayle's music as much as I do"? Never. But I would say, and do, "I think this music is great. Maybe you'll like it. But, you know, he was kind of a religious nutcase, and that may put you off."

i'm not interested in the murphy review for what it says about murphy, but for what it says about p4k.

I agree with you on this. But here's the question I have: If they had assigned the review to a trans writer, what form would you have wanted — or expected — that review to take? Having just skimmed the review they did run, it feels like it was written before her statements became public and the third and fourth paragraphs were shoved in after the fact. What if a trans writer had done the exact same thing? Would that have been worse, in some way?

"I can't support this person's art because I know he believes things I don't believe, even if they do not manifest in the art," which I think is a step too far.

I tend to think the right thing for P4K to do would have been to issue a review, but with no score. That would have been a better move for The Guardian too, but especially for Pitchfork given their scores (annoyingly) play a public role far exceeding the reviews themselves in terms of impact - and precisely because of that role, it would have been more meaningful than, say, just docking a few points.

I would also go with publishing the review without a score, so everyone could focus on how poorly written it is

haha

haha

I can't really say what Pitchfork "should" do. Who cares. I'm pretty sure trans people will be here in 10 years, I can't guarantee the same for nu-disco, Pitchfork, music criticism, entertainment journalism as a whole, Ninja Tune, or the hipster reboot of the chick from Moloko

Jesus, Whiney

Trans people in a critical state these days esp in UK but sure I’m sure some of them will be “left”, alive albeit distressed, in 10 years, if things continue, maybe focus on thems instead of some poor corporations

I am myself annoyed at this debate especially because I’m listening to the album rn bc “is it even worth talking about?” Laura Snapes got the facts about trans people right yes but does she have cloth in her ears? This is an embarassment, DJ Koze you have done so much better

When Ariel flopped I thought “who cares? he’s always sucked” and it was “oh what a cool high horse bandwagon” and I was like ”no, his music has always fucking sucked, Round And Round fucking sucked, I’ve shit better songs than Ariel Christing Rosenberg when I’m not even thinking about it, he is and has always been lousy, I don’t care I don’t care, what’s next, a big expose on how Micah P Hinson is a Trump supporter? I listened to that yokel’s crapshit and it is crapshit, and Ariel is crapshit, and Roisin is crapshit”.

I hope it’s ok that I call Roisin English because I’m sure the Irish don’t fucking want her or Linehan any more; anyway, this woman sings and it sounds like the human manifestation of a suburb of Leeds

I got a good friend named Oisín and I’m careful to pronounce his fauny name properly. Meanwhile, Roisin rhymes with Raisin, when Murphy

xxxp who cares? they have publication power and views.

the "poor koze did good work so a review is deserved" is bullshit.

Yeah, fgti, I’m saying all the internecine details of music writing is just incredibly low stakes across the board these days.

The fight for trans rights is obv of the utmost importance.

I don’t think there’s any “right” answer in that fight that concerns determining the correct numerical score to put on a dance record

I mean, I’m listening to it right now, and it’s the worst record I’ve heard this year, and I’ve heard a lot of shit albums this year

“Free Will” actually made me stop and worry that my headphones were busted, Raisin’s voice had me so hivey, but no, headphones are fine, I checked

This album sounds like a bunch of food that was made with bad implements, eggs whipped with a hand mixer, steaks boiled, it’s all following established recipes but so faulty. I’m on “Can’t Replicate” and holy god this is so, so bad and embarrassing

I haven’t listened to Raisin’s music since she was working hard with Herbert but I don’t remember her voice sounding so ugly and awful. If we were friends, I’d offer her microphone suggestions, but it doesn’t seem like we are friends.