What music sites have good writing?

In terms of who I actually want to *read* from a purely writing p.o.v. - I suppose the litmus test is would you read them writing about something you had zero interest in. I genuinely think Pitchfork Media have some of the best writers on the web - the odd missed metaphor or clumsy passage, and God knows they're in another galaxy from me as far as *taste* is concerned, but their writing standards are high. And yes, that includes Brent D.

Everyone who writes for Freaky Trigger I think is pretty good, obviously. There are people on mailing lists I'm on who I really wish would write long pieces for me - Kris and Otis spring to mind.

A lot of the weblogs I read I think have good writers - but they don't often sit down and write specifically about music. Tim at Sink is very good. Nanette at Amplified is good - I'd love to see longer reviews there.

The reviews at Motion are generally a very high standard. And Tangents I think is always readable: Kevin Pearce's articles are excellent.

Most of that post-Bangs punk-schtick stuff bores me silly, and there are a lot of reviewers on the web who consider it a sacred duty to mention every.....single.....track.....(in order), and there are a lot who just write really clunky sentences. But no names mentioned!

anyhow, who writes well on the net? tim finney is a good writer, his work usually is teeming with insight and is very readable. mike is a fine writer when he can be bothered. ;) josh is very intelligent (see? i love you too) and it shows in his pieces, but his taste doesn't usually match mine, so i don't read too much of his stuff (like glenn macdonald, who reminds me of patrick bateman reviewing records). robin has a genuine enthusiasm for what he writes about, but too bad he hasn't written anything in ages. ;)

with the exception of the pitchfork folks who have talent as writers though their taste is sometimes suspect, i don't read many of the other music-review based weblogs out there. not a knock on anyone's skill, really, but most i find aren't attuned to my own taste, and unless the writing's exceptional, i can't read about anything that i have no interest in. tom, you know i think you're a good writer, but i don't read much of blue lines and i think it'd be weird to read a long-ish piece by you that wasn't related to music. it's your true calling, then. ;)

personally, i wish i had more time to think things out and edit and take notes, etc., but situations being what they are, everything that appears on my blog is straight off the top of my head and, unfortunately, usually shows. like you, tom, i think that much of the writing online has it all over print-media stuff just because that love of music comes right through. that's particularly what i like to see and what i hopes is in evidence in my stuff: enthusiasm for music.

Much in agreement with what has been said already - broadly I have the most admiration for (and get the most pleasure / directions from) FT, Skykicking, Fred's and Josh's blogs etc., CAOTM plus Tangents. Alistair Fitchett's tastes sometimes are identical to mine, often overlap and frequently disappear into another world, but his writing is always, always, accurate and evocative and descriptive and makes me wish I could express my feelings as succinctly as that.

Not long ago the Nipper indicated that he had put a Paul Morley interview on it. But I can't see it. Perhaps I misunderstood him.

A year ago I wrote an article on ATP. This is not evident from the archives, neither.

Is FT still publishing new material? Is old material still available?

Now that Stylus is going away, where should we all be looking for good music writing on the web? What sites do you think are doing a good job publishing *critical* pieces and fighting off the attack from crappy mp3 blogs?

Sarcastic responses in 1, 2, . . . go.

http://www.drownedinsound.com/user/view/46684

Ahahaha, of course!

Idolator has been in overdrive these last few months, lots of great articles and guest columnists and more. Jess on Internet hype is my favorite recent example.

fluxblog is my homepage

30 September 2000 00:00 (7 years ago)

wtf happened to my 20s

that jess article was great. i had no idea there was a band called black kids. are they, uh, white?

>>having an opinion is called 'hating' these days

Hah-hah.

It's a natural thing when confronted with the ever blooming fruit of the Internet.

does jess harvell actually like any music?

i had no idea there was a band called black kids
me neither but what is the point of knowing?

when i'm hanging out with young persons and they ask "what are the hot jams right now?" i can say "oh i've been rinsing BLACK KIDS recently. i read about them... ON A BLOG".

Jess spent a bunch of time on Idolator noting/admitting that he wrote a number of the reviews on Pitchfork's best albums link (Battles and Times New Viking and others)

No.

Also see the blog thread(s) Is the best music writing being done on blogs?

http://wayneandwax.com/
http://www.zoilus.com/
http://www.negrophonic.com/
http://community.livejournal.com/poptimists/

and blissblog and dissensus

On the one hand I love the existence of Poptimists forever and ever, amen, on the other hand I don't feel the need to actually read it. (I'm sure we could all make our own substitutions for any other site in question; in my case my hopefully amiable disconnection from actively caring about the pop continuum is the explanation, though Idolator handily provides me an overview that's just about where I want it.)

As for Jess admitting things, I'm not sure why it's troubling you, I admit.

i don't think a livejournal discussion circle can really be compared with, like webzines, with, y'know, articles and stuff...

The following blogs, mostly written by critics, have quality writing on them:

Noise Into Music (Nick Southall)
http://sickmouthy.blogspot.com/

Offnotes (Marc Hogan)
http://marchogan.blogspot.com/

Sasha-Frere Jones [@ The New Yorker] (Sasha-Frere Jones)
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/sashafrerejones/

Marathonpacks (Eric Harvey)
http://www.marathonpacks.com/

Last Plane To Jakarta (John Darnielle)
http://www.lastplanetojakarta.com/

And, of course, ILX's own Ned Raggett Ponders It All:
http://nedraggett.wordpress.com/

That last one is suspect. (Also there's not all that much music writing on it, by design!)

Don't be modest now. I read a bunch of your "In Rainbows" posts, which were excellent.

The first one is more suspect.

Oh come on now guys. I guess I'll just wait for the other four to post telling me the other four links in the list are also suspect. :)

Well I've no idea who Harvey and Hogan are, for a start. That Frere-Jones guy beat me up at facebook zombies, though.

Hahaha. Eric Harvey and Marc Hogan write for Pitchfork. Both of them write reviews and Hogan also writes a lot of the blurbs for the Forkcast.

Eric Harvey = Eric H, horror movie buff extraordinaire, non?

I don't read music journalism.

Oh Louis, I'm off to see 65dos in about two and a half hours.

The following blogs, mostly written by critics, have quality writing on them:

Noise Into Music (Nick Southall)
Offnotes (Marc Hogan)
Sasha-Frere Jones [@ The New Yorker] (Sasha-Frere Jones)
Marathonpacks (Eric Harvey)
Last Plane To Jakarta (John Darnielle)
And, of course, ILX's own Ned Raggett Ponders It All:

-- three handclaps, Sunday, October 28, 2007 12:23 PM (20 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

You're right about all of these; have them all bookmarked in my Music Blogs section, and skim/read them all every day or two. As mentioned before, Idolator and Fluxblog are generally excellent; the mark of a great writer, and I'll point to Fluxblog/Matthew Perpetua in particular here, is that the writing makes you *THINK* about the music, even if the music is not to your tastes (and no music writing site/blog is gonna be 100% to your tastes, realistically).

On a side note, that's the problem with people bitching about Pitchfork (the prime example here) -- yes, it's not that great a site if you read and memorize everything they write as gospel, and tailor your music tastes to theirs; *HOWEVER* if you simply read the pieces on stuff you like, or think you'd like, instead of following their every Best New Music whim (here's looking at you, Dan Deacon, I'm From Barcelona, Black Kids, Justice...among many others), then the writing is generally high-quality, and occasionally excellent.

Other blogs worth mentioning: Blissblog (Simon Reynolds) and Shallow Rewards (Chris Ott) come immediately to mind.

Blogs by musicians that are not *always* music-related, but great to follow nonetheless: David Byrne, Radiohead/Deadairspace, Bob Mould, Robin Guthrie, John D. (already mentioned here I believe).

Worth a read for old times' sake: Robert Christgau for MSN Music (published monthly).

Also not mentioned: a generally fun way to read reviews of new music is to check Metacritic for albums you're interested in, then follow links for any reviews that sound especially interesting, based on the 1-to-2-sentence excerpts they give from each review.

I think for me if my blog had turned out to be just a music blog I would have been horrified. Quite obviously I'm well aware on what very small measure my relative 'fame' rests, and it's all the music writing I've done. But said writing will in large part appear elsewhere and I'll link to it as it appears; this leaves me free to talk about whatever I'd like to. And I'll freely admit that the blogs I most often refresh and review on a daily basis are the socio/political ones I track.

Of course, I agree; you do post on tons of different topics. I was just saying that when you do post about music, as in the case of the Radiohead-related series of posts, it's quality stuff.

I use Metacritic all the time, although sometimes I'm forced to use Google if I want to find in-depth reviews (rather than superficial ones). Yay for 65DOS.

I wanted to Asobi Seksu in Oxford but they got bumped from headlining a smaller venue for very cheap to supporting 65DOS at the Carling Academy. This ticket price has gone up accordingly and 65DOS are _awful_ so I am no longer going : (

Just thinking out loud. Sorry to derail.

I love 65dos WAY more than Asobi, who I quite like.

I just reviewed an Asobi Seksu song for our radio station. It was quite good. Arguing about 65DOS is pointless because they're extremely divisive (and it's already been done at great length), so I won't.

Still, though, if the band you want to see are playing in your town, you should go! Just leave before the main act. It's no enormous loss.

Thread has been derailed, guys.

I'm still interested in the main question: What music sites have good writing these days? Updated daily, weekly, hell, any more good blogs out there? Blogs by ILXors? Blogs by musicians?

What else does everyone read, or at least check, daily or close to daily?

i think this thread is dumb, but you're much better off reading blogs by respected dudes— like the ones meantioned upthread— than you are trolling google results for knock-off pitchfork sites. tiny mix tapes and coke machine glow are garbage.

popmatters is good.

The Electric Version, obv.

I don't look for knock-off pitchfork sites on google searches. I generally type in [band name] [album name] and hit 'Search'. Sometimes I chuck the word 'review' in as well. I then judge the outcomes fairly against one another, regardless of their Pfork-esque-ness.

Popmatters is often OK, but it has also been responsible for some of the worst reviews I've ever seen.

dude tape store vox is the worst publication to ever write about music in the history of ever.

for all you euros, it's this really shitty student mag in columbia, mo that writes blowjob-y basically press realeases about like kenny chessney and saliva and spoon that have quotes like "i love spoon. they make me wanna dance."

Jordan, what are you talking about? This is the best article on Spoon I've ever read:

http://www.voxmagazine.com/stories/2007/09/27/ten-things-you-didnt-know-about-spoon/

"3. Stephen King (the author) named “I Summon You” one of the best songs of 2005."

you're much better off reading blogs by respected dudes— like the ones meantioned upthread— than you are trolling google results for knock-off pitchfork sites. tiny mix tapes and coke machine glow are garbage.
-- J0rdan S., Sunday, October 28, 2007 2:19 PM (3 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

who says i troll for pitchfork imitators? really, pitchfork is best at the niche it caters to, and as far as tinymixtapes (and i mentioned this on the TMT thread, in fact) the stuff i've found most valuable is the looking back at old records, the DeLorean/Eureka! sections in particular, and could care less about the new reviews. Cokemachineglow i couldn't care less about.

Which is why i asked a few posts ago: hell, any more good blogs out there? Blogs by ILXors? Blogs by musicians?

What else do *YOU* read, J0rdan?

haha that sidebar is hung up on a wall in the office in the of the paper i write for in columbia in our "lol vox" shrine xpost.

7. David Cross did an interpretive dance to “The Beast and Dragon Adored” at the Bumbershoot Music & Arts Festival and bared his bottom. It’s all over YouTube.

as for the Spoon article, that ^^^ is the only thing I didn't already know (as a big fan, and an Austin TX resident, for the last decade; been following 'em since Telephono as a local band), and that's something i really didn't need to know about Spoon. thanks.

but in all seriousness v0x is honestly a nuclear holocuast of "music journalism"

think for me if my blog had turned out to be just a music blog I would have been horrified. Quite obviously I'm well aware on what very small measure my relative 'fame' rests, and it's all the music writing I've done. But said writing will in large part appear elsewhere and I'll link to it as it appears; this leaves me free to talk about whatever I'd like to. And I'll freely admit that the blogs I most often refresh and review on a daily basis are the socio/political ones I track.

Yes, otm. Then again, often I post on a whim, after hearing or reading something that struck me, and while I often start thinking it'll be brief I write more than I intend.

Sideline operations have a tendency to become, unwittingly, your life.The announcement of the end of Stylus a few months ago reminded me that I'm a book and film guy by nature.

trolling for pitchfork knock-offs was not meant as an insult, ppl (or was it just lj) said that this was something they did. sigh. for music websites that i read, pitchfork and then blogs, basically idolator (best music blog on the internet right now and its not really close), status aint hood blog on village voice and a few of the blogs you mentioned upthread.

agreed that Idolator is #1 no contest.

Alfred, where's yr blog at? not sure i've come across it before.

I like 17 Dots a lot. Yes, it's "the unofficial blog" of eMusic. No, it doesn't blindly promote anything and everything on eMusic. In fact, given it's affiliation with eMusic, I'm surprised at how independent-minded and critical it is. And the writing is straightforward and consistently top-notch. I think at least a few of the regular 17 Dots authors post (or used to post) on ILM: Yancey Strickler, Todd Burns (coincidentally, the EIC of Stylus, I think), and J. Edward Keyes, among others.

^^yes.

hey thanks!

Alfred, where's yr blog at?

This is it, right? It's good. Lots of interesting film discussion, too.

ah i have that bookmarked already. didn't know it was Alfred. yeah it's good!

x-post from way up there

As for Jess admitting things, I'm not sure why it's troubling you, I admit.

-- Ned Raggett, Sunday, October 28, 2007 4:51 PM (4 hours ago) Bookmark Link

It is not troubling me at all. It is a good thing. M (Mark ?) Coleman had posted upthread does "jess harvell actually like any music?" and I was explaining that he does and that he, in his article on hype blogs, had touched on the subject of he, himself, hyping bands he liked in his reviews for Pitchfork. I think it is too bad that Jess is not gonna write any more reviews for Pitchfork.

I think ethnomusicologist Wayne Marshall's wayne and wax site that I linked to above, along with DJ Rupture/Jace Clayton's Mudd Up?Negrophonic blog are very interesting reads. I don't always agree with Simon Reynolds but I always read his site as well.

Alfred, where's yr blog at?

This is it, right? It's good. Lots of interesting film discussion, too.

-- Daniel, Esq.,

Yup, that's it. Thanks for reading.

To add to the list of music-crit blogs I posted above:

Clap Clap
http://www.clapclap.org/

Pretty Goes with Pretty
http://prettygoeswithpretty.typepad.com/

The Good Dr. Bill's blog (Intensities in Ten Suburbs) is the one I check the most. Andrew has a brilliant mind and his writing is consistently entertaining and updated almost daily.

btw, I don't read Idolator, but judging from the overwhelming praise here, I'll definitely start reading it.

so no one reads junkmedia? i've been writing for them (at this point mainly out of habit) for five (!) years. it never seems to come up in any of these discussions, but according to the webmaster and editor, we have a fairly sizeable readership. or at least a fairly sizeable number of people who look at the site, i don't know if they actually read anything.

it's never been a site with any amazing editorial slant (we're not very organized) but it's got decent reviews/interviews ... coverage runs a bit more indie schmindie than my tastes these days, but maybe worth a look?

Eric Harvey = Eric H, horror movie buff extraordinaire, non?

Non.