Pazz & Jop 2008

I made two lists this year, one metal and one not. Last year, when there were two polls, I filed one list in each poll, but this year I had to combine parts of both into one ballot. So here's a shout out to the other things I didn't get to vote for, and how they fared without me:

Trinacria - Travel Now Journey Infinitely (0 votes)
Cynic - Traced in Air (1 vote)
Gyongyver - Vilagok Viraga (0 votes)
In Flames - A Sense of Purpose (2 votes)
M83 - Saturdays=Youth (28 votes! would have been my most popular pick!)
Katy Perry - One of the Boys (0 votes! I smell some critical cowardice...)
Delays - Everything's the Rush (0 votes)
Ida - Lovers Prayers (2 votes)
Bob Mould - District Line (3 votes)
Shearwater - Rook (8 votes)
Asian Kung-Fu Generation - World World World (0 votes)

Comments on these, as well as on the ones I did vote for, at http://www.furia.com/page.cgi?type=twas&id=twas0510 .

Yeah, I was initially pretty tepid about The Recession except for the most obviously awesome songs, but I've mostly come around to it.

well if jeezy follows the normal course of these things, his next album will be overrated by people who slept on this one. so you can look forward to bitching about that in a year or two.

― paper plans (tipsy mothra), Saturday, January 24, 2009 6:16 AM Bookmark

Probably otm, but this didn't happen with The Inspiration.

q-tip album was cool

― xhuxk d (deej), Saturday, January 24, 2009 1:07 AM Bookmark

i mean if yr mad at the shitty placement of rap music i dont know that its helpful to shit on one of the few decent rap records that made it

― xhuxk d (deej), Saturday, January 24, 2009 1:07 AM Bookmark

Really dude? Production was pretty boring and as of this point in time, Q-Tip CAN. NOT. RAP. AT. ALL.

I'll give the Roots voters more of a pass, because they are P&J perenials (whereas nothing Tip did has placed since Midnight Marauders) and the album does contain one genuinely amazing song, although WTF at "75 Bars" only getting one vote?

Are there really that many p&j voters who are so stuck on old rap paradigms that they think "Black President" is better than "My President Is Black"?

Fwiw, "My President" actually got one more vote than "Black President" did.

And I'm not saying that hip-hip probably isn't under-represented in the poll like always, but five albums in the Top 40, six if Badu counts (albiet two just squeezing in at the bottom of the list) is at least way better than metal (two albums at #s 31 and 37), country (none unless Drive By Truckers and Alejandro Escovedo count, which they shouldn't), or chart-pop (none unless Santogold or Coldplay count) did this year. Not to mention African, reggae, or Latin, all of which used to do way better. (Metal used to do even worse.) I actually think five hip-hop albums is about par for the course, over the years; definitely better than some years. Bottom line is, every genre that isn't indie-pop is getting the shaft in Pazz & Jop these days. Even the old farts have slipped some (well, they've also gotten older -- this year I guess there's Randy Newman, R.E.M., Byrne/Eno, Nick Cave though he's still really more indie, and that Dylan reissue.) (Not sure what would count as electronic/dance -- Portishead, Cut Copy, Hot Chip, Hercules & Love Affair? So that's maybe back on the upswing, but again, all four of those acts have just as much to do with indie rock.)

I also agree with Glenn that it's messed up that Katy Perry didn't get at least one album vote (especially when she placed two singles in the Top 40.) Also was really surprised Ne-Yo wound up way down at 51 -- thought he'd be Top 40 for sure, though it was partially my own fault for not voting for the guy, I guess. (Badu and Saadiq took the only r&b spots, with Al Green also coming close at #47. Outside of Green and Jeezy, 41-50 is all indie too, assuming the category still includes Death Cab and Beck and Elbow, and I don't know why it shouldn't.)

Actually, Escovedo's an old fart too obv (and I guarantee he pulled in the old-fart-critic vote; I'd wager that his average-voter-age skews higher than anybody else in the Top 40, Newman and Dylan and Byrne/Eno included. Album isn't bad, by the way.)

Yeah, if you'll notice, I was complaining about quality of hip-hop albums, rather than quantity. As you say, five is about par for the course.

all four of those acts have just as much to do with indie rock.

And I'll disagree with this, I'm not sure what Hercules have to do with indie rock other than being on/produced-by DFA (who have been releasing a lot more dance than rock lately anyway).

In good news, "Happy House" placed and all of it's voters are excused from any other P&J related sins.

although WTF at "75 Bars" only getting one vote?

wasn't really a single IMHO. The singles were shitty "Birthday Girl" and shity stupid sad b-girl Wale song.

I think it kinda had "street single" status or something like that. At any rate, they made a video for it and promoted it, good enough for me.

q tip can still rap fine

I'm not sure what Hercules have to do with indie rock

Antony, for one thing. And Nomi had connections to CocoRosie, right? And I'm guessing their audience (at least in the States) is more indie than dance/ electronica; seems to me they arrived through indie-rock distribution and promotion channels, even if they don't sound indie rock. (Which depends on whether you think of Arthur Russell more as an art guy or a dancefloor guy, maybe.) I could be wrong, though (I haven't done any audience surveys) and I'm probably splitting hairs, either way. Just saying no "pure" techno acts (whatever that is) scored on the Pazz & Jop chart, as far as I can see.

Oh yeah, forgot about the obvious Antony thing.

Guess Girl Talk could count as dance/electronic, too (but he's got an indie element as well, obviously.) And I might have missed one or two others, who knows. (No idea what Frightened Rabbit sound like.)

I do tend to call these things more by "what do they sound like?" than by "who is listening to this?" because that just leads to any number of rabbitholes. Also, if indie-electro acts like Hot Chip and Cut Copy get to count, then surely indie-electro acts like M83 & MGMT do.

But yeah, splitting hairs, etc.

You're right about M83 and MGMT. So that makes (at least) seven P&J Top 40 electronic acts, all with indie-rock fan bases (which might just mean that critics who like indie rock have accepted synths and samplers in recent years, not exactly news.)

And I've been known to classify music by what it sounds like, too, now and then. (People find it upsetting sometimes.)

how dare you??? (btw, Rev, when's your metal album book coming out?)

xp And duh, Santogold probably counts as dance/ electronic indie too. (She's also the closest thing to any kind of "world music" in the Top 40, unless Byrne/Eno -- which I haven't heard -- is. Or, uh, Vampire Weekend. Though at least Escovedo has a Latin surname.)

strange how badly the Taylor Swift album did.
you didn't vote for it, did you, Chuck?

The better half the TVotR album is all afro-popped out, too.

it's an indie-pop world, guys. we just live in fear of it.

strange how badly the Taylor Swift album did.

She really needs to work on her release schedule -- Pazz and Jop isn't the Oscars! I'm starting to click with Fearless (I don't think I'd have put it in my top ten anyway), but the same thing happened with her first album: heard it in Dec. '06, liked it most in '07 but didn't consider it an '07 album. Although Taylor did very well in Nashville Scene poll, I think.

Pazz and Jop isn't the Oscars!

ah, if only: "and now, the moment you've all been waiting for. drumroll please... and the Xgau for album of the year goes to...TVOTR!!!"

xp Nah, I didn't like Fearless nearly as much as Taylor's debut LP. Too Lillith, not enough obvious hooks for impatient dumbies like me. Put it at #39 on the year-end list I did for Rhapsody.

the thing about metal doing worse than rap on this chart is that rap has been selling gajillions more units than metal for the last decade so one would expect it to probably being doing a bit better, but as per usual the consensus celebrates a couple albums while completely ignoring the overall rap world as a whole. nothing new i know, just sayin

yeah, but rap has always been better represented on the single's list p&j-wise, no?

Glenn posted stats that 5ive, who finished 8th in the ILX Metal Poll, didn't even get 1 vote in P&J.

Rap and Metal are always the losers in general lists. (though yes you can add plenty of other genres in there too as Chuck said)

I ran the metal poll as stuff does get missed out and it deserves more.
For the same reason a hoy hoy is thinking of running a rap poll btw Give him some encouragement Here
I'm sure he will appreciate it. And it will help the non-autogoon cru to check out good stuff that has slipped under the radar.

xp And hip-hop hasn't always sold gajillions more units than chart-pop (which is at least represented on the singles list more nowadays than it used to be.) (Sometimes country's sales can rival hip-hop's, too. And country only placed one single in the Top 40 -- By Hayes Carll, an alt- guy who gets no commercial radio play outside of possible Triple A stations.) (And if sales are the issue, then the real people who should be complaining are Nickelback and Daughtry and Josh Groban fans.) (Also, fwiw, AC/DC had a really kick-ass opening week. And they finished 140th, one spot lower than the Cool Kids.)

(By "chart-pop" I mean "teen-pop-like-stuff," or whatever. Obviously songs from the pop charts have always placed on the P&J singles, back to "Pop Muzik". But it actually seemed kind of unprecedented when "Mmmbop" won in whatever year that was -- no Debbie Gibson or New Kids on the Block single had ever come close. Then the floodgates opened for Britney, Christina, Backstreet, NSync, etc. Not sure who'd fall in that category this year -- both Katy Perry singles? Or maybe not. Pink and Britney seem pretty old by now. And I don't see any equivalents of Britney or Justin on the album chart this year.)

Also remember thinking it was really cool when "Missing You" by John Waite tied with "Jam On It" for the #25 single on a 25-song list in 1984. Journey, Foreigner, AC/DC, Def Leppard, Lynyrd Fucking Skynyrd -- none of those bands ever did anything in Pazz & Jop. So while I empathize and agree with people who point out every year that hip-hop should have done better, I also think it's horseshit to pretend that hip-hop is the main genre being shut out, when it's not being shut out at all.

Once again, I never said that. I said better hip-hop should have placed.

Better everything should have placed!

Well, yeah.

...and, scene.

the only people irl who like girl talk are indie ppl

Frightened Rabbit (my #1 vote!) are not electronic, to put it mildly. They're indie, put broadly, but not coy enough to place higher.

It's hard for me to not conclude that the main emotion driving whatever "consensus" the P&J represents is fear. It certainly never looks like joy.

Also, "Missing You" is a great song.

yah but xhuxk there already exists a rap music canon and substantive rap music discourse whereas that sort of thing w/r/t teenpop/chartpop has been pretty negligible until recently. this is not a judgment about the worth of this music or anything at all but you realize that most teenpop fans arent interested in the canonization of their favorite stars whereas rap & critrock have always had that type of discussion going on (or have for a long long time). the idea of even having those discussions is pretty new and limited to the ilm teenpop threads (RIP) and those livejournal discussion groups right?? whereas there are kids in every town in america who were arguing about whether jay beat nas back in 01 for ex.

rap didn't do well in the P&J in the 90s?

im not saying that in an idealized world everything isnt represented im just pointing out that the continued marginalization of rap music is particularly weird. part of the problem is rap writers themselves ... dudes like caramanica voting for 2 rap albums is wtf

the metal writers (from ilx anyway) didn't exclusively vote for metal either. Do some writers just vote for what they think might get enough votes from others so it places high?

which btw is weird & self defeating. we'll never elect a black president so im not voting for obama in the primary.

i think some ppl do put shit in at the end if they think it will give it a boost as opposed to something that's gonna get 2 or 3 votes

rap writers are just more open minded than indie pop fans ^__^

Maybe (too be naive and uncynical for a moment -- though actually I suspect this is the case) writers (like Caramanica, for instance) just vote for what they like best?* (I mean, I assumed, when Glenn suggested that critics who only put one metal album on their P&J list lacked "courage", he was joking. Now I'm kind of getting the idea he maybe wasn't. But, you know, some of us might just have thought only one metal album -- in my case, one that might not even count as "troo" metal, as if anybody over the age of 12 should give a fuck -- was good enough.) (Also, deej, I do understand your point about chart-pop, though how that applies to the shut-out classic rock bands I also mentioned is sort of beyond me. And country has had a canon for longer than rap has, though I'm not sure whether fans argue about whether Toby could beat up Kenny or not.)

* - I assume Caramanica does, anyway. Why wouldn't he? And why second-guess his motives? He's not just a rap critic, hasn't been for several years.

I do, though, assume a lot of writers much hackier than Jon just follow the bandwagon, for expediency or out of sheer laziness, maybe -- copying down what other writers put on their Top 10s in December, and thinking, "yeah, I kinda liked that, too." So I guess that's what Glenn means about P&J voters lacking fortitude, which may well be the case. (And yeah, I wonder who gutlessly left off Katy Perry.)

Glenn was joking.

there are kids in every town in america who were arguing about whether jay beat nas

I have a feeling there were kids in every town arguing about whether NSync was better than Backstreet, and Christina better than Britney (and Debbie better than Tiffany, and the Monkees better than the Beatles), too. So let's ammend what I just wrote to say I sort of get your point.

yeah but no one is arguing if torche is better than made out of babies

Did anyone say people were?

re carmancia deej is right. ppl obv like tons of stuff but the most high profile p&j voters who are rap critics (fennessey, breihan for instance) voted for tons of non-rap shit, whereas you don't see any david fricke or rob sheffield or david marchese voting for 6 rap albums even tho they work for rock mags