pitchfork is dumb (#34985859340293849494 in a series.)

I am 48, so totally middle-aged, but whenever I go to some legacy boomer band show, I still feel like one of the younger ones, lol

OTM

(Whoops… that was meant for the post that revived this thread. The others hadn’t loaded yet)

But in North America, The Masterplan was a crucial act of fan service. In the ’90s, the stateside singles market had been all but snuffed out by a music industry that had conditioned consumers to pay $23.99 for a full album to get the one or two songs they liked.

This is from the recent Oasis review and the $24 statement is confusing me.

Think I figured that one out. The writer appears to be Canadian. The exchange rate in 1998 was about 1 USD = 1.50 CAD. So $24 was probably the price in Canada for a $16 CD in the US. He writes "stateside" but forgets that the price he remembers was not the price in the States.

lol yes I have had some bewildering conversations in Canada about CD prices (e.g., a friend, with surprising vehemence: "CDs are a scam!"). It took me a while to figure out that in addition to the exchange rate, CDs were simply noticeably more expensive up here than in the US

the provinceside singles market

Even as a Canadian, I don't remember CDs being that expensive in 1998. I remember them being at least 3 dollars cheaper. And that was without getting them on sale or buying them from some place like Zellers or Wal-Mart.

I wasted so much money at Music World before finding better stores.

At a certain point CDs within the time period of "I like the singles so I'm getting the album" hit $17.99 maybe $18.99 price points iirc. But maybe the writer was thinking of a deluxe edition!

working in music retail for many years in a us city of about 250,0000, the absolute highest price that i remember for a single disc new release was $21.39 after tax.

and that was in the early 2000s.

i, too, am wondering where this person was buying cds in 1997. i hope they got in on that class action lawsuit that repaid people who got ripped off by cd prices.

$17.99 maybe $18.99 price points iirc

The popular new releases lining the front of the store, yeah. Back in the racks at Music World most albums were like $23.98 + tax.

19% sales tax for me lol

Did Pitchfork accidentally publish that Hotline TNT review and Best New Music a few days early? Because it's no longer there now.

it's still up at the direct link: https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/hotline-tnt-cartwheel/

It's mentioned here, but it's not in the Reviews section or the band's own aggregate page.

huh, I still see it on the main page when I checked now

Oh wait sorry it is there

Dude, it wasn't on the homepage or the Reviews page a minute ago, I swear

(Oasis was the big/featured review)

I just checked not long ago and it was gone

You’re not imagining things

What's with the weird score format though:

Rating: 8.4/10 (info link that goes nowhere)

Lol Pitchfork just because I thought it was confusing doesn’t mean the review should be taken down. https://t.co/YDzqypEXpk

— Travis Shosa (@tsdenizen) November 3, 2023

The Oasis review has that same new score format (but not the others on the homepage)

I dunno, I still see the Hotline TNT review there myself as the featured review. Does have that weird score format though.

However, I still see the "old" score format for Oasis. Weird.

I can't handle this rollercoaster of emotion

FFS, they just put up the "Vote Now for Your Favorite Albums and Songs of 2023" poll... I hate how anything released after Nov. 15 will have to be shunted to the 2024 poll (and likely forgotten by Nov. 2024).

("Feel like I complain about this earlier every year," lol)

Literally the day after Halloween now, it's ridiculous! My family still believes in waiting until after Thanksgiving

Gave me son a stern talking to at dinner about this very thing. I don't want to even hear about your favorite albums of the year until after we clean the plates on Thanksgiving.

"You guys weren't here for Beyonce in 2013, or Black Messiah in 2014. They gave album of the year to Run the Jewels! It was a catastrophe!"

What new score format is this? Nothing seems out of the ordinary looking at either Oasis or TNT

Both seem to have reverted back now...

If you weren't there on Friday, November 3, 2023 btw 9:42 and 9:46 AM, you'll never know what it was like, man...

These are always some of the most whogivesashit.jpg obsessions this thread has

mod autoreplace

Don't get me started on the aesthetics of this graphic!

https://media.pitchfork.com/photos/654263e8e2e78963b84a3694/2:1/w_1920,c_limit/Readers%20Poll-08.png

These are always some of the most whogivesashit.jpg obsessions this thread has

― The SoyBoy West Coast (Whiney G. Weingarten), Friday, November 3, 2023

whiney otm

It's not like there's anything else going on in the world.

Where’s the “Under the Silver Lake” for website formatting hijinx, I ask

my workplace’s year end review process meant I had to have my documentation in by today!

there are the music outlets who do the same thing where they want to have it all tidied up and ready to publish before the winter holidays and those who roll
the dice with just publishing in late january. I don’t love the former but I get it as long as nothing good falls through the cracks

Most tedious P4k thread conversations:

7. "Why are they posting about [thing that isn't music]? When did they start doing this?"
6. "Actually, the way they come up with the scores is..."
5. [Alfred Soto full-throatedly defending a piece of writing that everyone sees is clearly bad]
4. "Ah, 8.2 no BNM means..."
3. "This thing was off the website/improperly formatted/improperly scored for five minutes."
2. "Well after Condé bought them [idiotic opinion]"
1. "I wish they posted the individual writer's ballots"

almost as tedious as constantly policing threads

You're forgetting "Inconsistent scores/opinions on artist's albums by two different writers"

Or nit-picking the rules about the Sunday Review

That's a good one, yes, that's like no. 2

the pitchfork is dumb thread is dumb (#4376437323)

some people are just really into the fork and that’s okay