OK, is this the worst piece of music writing ever?

Slate's new challops column.

: /

My new Slate column: "Received Contrarianism"

Is the rest of Slate any good? I rarely read it.

Varies wildly from writer to writer, but I'd say overall it's gotten worse over the years.

holy shit, that city paper story takes the fucking cake - easily the worst thing I've read this year

Craziest thing about the CP story is that it's not by some dumb young kid:

http://www.nathanielturner.com/baltimoreoratorbarrymichaelcooper.htm

:O

Totally thought that was written by a college kid.

Every single one of this guy's article titles outdoes most of the #slatepitches responses.

http://twitter.com/#search?q=%23slatepitches

Yeah, you can't out-Slate Slate...

from city pages in mpls, steely dan concert review:

http://blogs.citypages.com/gimmenoise/2009/11/steely_dan_at_t.php

I imagined myself in a wood-paneled basement rec room party with Chicago and the Pat Metheny Group.
would go to that party.

City Pages, RIP.

I don't think that's a badly written piece at all

lol i thought of a slatepitch this morning... what was it

ugh, that Dan piece. being a middle aged loner with no taste and a clear disdain for people more successful than you is NAGL. it would help if she at least learned to write a serviceable punchline

i just hate that smug failure to try to even engage with something, just recycling lazy "zings" about something you clearly don't even really understand

yup

oh I don't agree with her at all and think her succession of lazy zings are very revealing about her own very funny and fairly arbitrary insecurities but I don't think its badly written per se. its kinda funny.

she would make a perfect subject for a Becker/Fagan song lolz

not really--how fucking old are these jokes at this point? cocaine! wine coolers! parents are old! lol!

there are (perhaps unintentional?) lolz at the fact that she stresses how HER parents wouldn't be here, just YOUR parents. whoah, judgmental much...

also hey who has issues about being 30yo and unmarried and clinging to juvenile aesthetic positions derived from received wisdom

but mostly she just hates nerds!

http://www.city-data.com/forum/members/bs13690-83559-albums-random-pics-pic43266-nerds-ogre.jpg

having a downtown condo and drinking chardonnay sounds tite imo

Starbucks wasn't hiring, huh?

the best thing about the steely dan thing was when i clicked to the second page and there were pictures of john d. and donald fagen both singing with their heads held high. wanna hear that duet!

oh wait its on the first page too.

pwned

matos, come home.

oh I don't agree with her at all and think her succession of lazy zings are very revealing about her own very funny and fairly arbitrary insecurities but I don't think its badly written per se. its kinda funny.

― I forgot my mantra (Shakey Mo Collier), Monday, November 9, 2009 4:13 PM (50 minutes ago)

ok but the entire glue of her piece is supposed to be this wit she brings - if we agree she can't write a punchline and goes for only the laziest of zings, what's of value? was there any insight you gained?

so tempted to RAMPAGE THOSE COMMENTS, but, why

City Pages, RIP.

― uninspired girls rejoice!!! (Hoot Smalley), Monday, November 9, 2009 2:35 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark

^^ this ain't no shit btw

goole do you even do stuff for them anymore?

the insight i gained is she needs an editor: "I have to say it's a pretty brilliant concept to feature entire album on tour." if you're gonna do a disreview your writing should at least be clean, especially at your zing-a-sentence ending there

Sorry, but my mom tells better jokes and has more insight than this critic.

was there any insight you gained?

main insight is that the writer is neurotic. I def. didn't learn anything about the music haha

What is the ridiculous strawman that Steely Dan fans think that Dan music is somehow the apotheosis of jazz fused with rock?

I will say that while I thought her writing was horrible, the gig she described sounded great!

I see wine coolers at the Publix every visit and always wonder who the hell buys them in 2009.

lol @ shakey's halfhearted backhanded defense of this awful piece

jk i havent even read the piece

oh, right: Becker-Fagen groupies buy wine coolers.

is this piece online only? i know the alt weekly in my city is under huge pressure to just churn out content constantly for the web these days, so "editing" is kinda a thing of the past. Gotta get those click throughs y'all!
also, i don't think I've ever had a wine cooler. are they tasty? are they like the steely dan of beverages?

It's not that the piece is really AWFUL as much as it's just really, really stupid; you get a sense that the author is WAY more of a douchebag poser twit than the people she's criticizing for SHOCK HORROR having fun at a Steely Dan concert

Wine coolers are awesome until you turn 19

Like life.

:'(

goole do you even do stuff for them anymore?

― The looming shadow of the big baller/shot caller (M@tt He1ges0n), Monday, November 9, 2009 4:12 PM (5 minutes ago) Bookmark

naw my relationship was entirely w/ s4r4h 4sk4ri. they canned her for reasons that are probably unrelated to running the kind of shit i wrote, heh. the new crowd there is, from what i know, wholly imported from reveille, but i don't really pay any attention anymore.

y'all are sadly OTM re wine coolers and life