Ariel Pink

i think you're overlooking some pretty terrible ideas + arguments in that article bc you dislike Ariel Pink - many of which are terrible bc they have nothing to do w/ Ariel Pink!

i wish i could find a link to hopper's where the girls aren't, which i think ran a similar thesis about emo music but wasn't terrible

also, this is for sure more offensive than anything that seattle indie band has ever made:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UAQcNo9yWbM

Depends what you mean by "dislike Ariel Pink". I haven't heard the new one but his music is mostly great. I wish he wasn't an asshole.

Besides which, you're completely failing to read my posts: the article is not "look at these guys who are following Ariel Pink in their misogyny", the article is "Ariel Pink's recent misogynist comments are representative of a nasty undercurrent in the indie scene".

I am interested in this because I AM PART OF THE INDIE SCENE AND I KNOW IT TO BE TRUE. Which is why I wish there had been a better job made of dissociating "indie" and "twee" - they're both horribly misogynist, but I feel like their operant modes are rather different.

I think it's tricky to begin with to make sweeping claims about a particular scene - but especially when it's unclear that the specifics of the scene are actually a part of said scene, or related at all. is indie just a synonym for twee? what does drinking heavily at a club have to do w/ ariel pink's psychotic home recording aesthetic? there's this beta male idea, but that crosses scenes + genres. the author could just as easily have said: ariel pink's beta male misogyny occurs throughout music including this emo band Cute is What We Aim For - and it would be equally coherent! which is to say, not really coherent at all.

xp that's kinda the problem with the article though, it points in the general direction of the misogyny found in some subcultures (which particular ones, it's not quite clear), but without unwrapping that you get the people who know it's already the case filling the gaps and agreeing and the people who don't think there's a problem not seeing where the substance is.

I don't want to go through the piece line by line, but it's not just this one complaint. There's numerous leaps in logic here and assertions that aren't born out in the piece. for instance: "In fact, it's in some ways a visual analogue to twee indie-pop's greatest musical crime, Tullycraft's 'Pop Songs Your New Boyfriend's too Stupid to Know About'"

What is the visual analogue? "chinos and deck shoes meet satchels and rusting bikes?" what do chinos have to do w/ this Tullycraft song except that maybe one of the band members wears them? are ppl who ride rusting bikes more misogynistic than ppl who don't bike at all?

There's always a moment in a thread where things begin to turn...

For the record, I agree that Ariel's comments are off-putting and offensive. Not sure about the other links in the article (I don't know about UK indie clubs), but for what it's worth indie scenes in my experience are often defined by the double-standards that this article is sketching out. Doesn't strike me as newsworthy in particular. That's why I don't hang out at those kinds of places.

article about itself in online music publication

is indie just a synonym for twee?

Try reading my posts.

what does drinking heavily at a club have to do w/ ariel pink's psychotic home recording aesthetic?

The article never said it did. It said that the beta male seduction technique is just as sexist as the boorish males of the meat market clubs.

there's this beta male idea, but that crosses scenes + genres.

Yes, it does. However, you're just throwing it in as a vague concept mentioned in passing, when "this beta male idea" is the central fucking point.

ariel pink's beta male misogyny occurs throughout music including this emo band Cute is What We Aim For - and it would be equally coherent! which is to say, not really coherent at all.

Yes, it could have said that. But it is not an emo magazine. Its audience are not predominantly emo kids. It is a call to examine privilege and pretence in its own backyard. A reference to an emo band would be pointing the finger, rather than attempting to address one's own problems.

What is the visual analogue? "chinos and deck shoes meet satchels and rusting bikes?" what do chinos have to do w/ this Tullycraft song except that maybe one of the band members wears them?

There's this thing, it's called semiotics.

I'm going to drop it. I don't think it's a particularly well written or argued article but I see that the point it is trying to make is important enough that stylistic concerns are irrelevant.

if anyone genuinely thinks chinos/deck shoes/rusting bikes somehow nails down a particular type of person or the things they are into, then that's sort of crazy.

lol

This album RULES

I thought the Mark from Peep Show reference was a good one because I've always read Pink in a similar way. But maybe I like his music so much that I'm reading things into it to try and convince myself that it's ok to listen to. I basically had to come to terms with all of this when I first heard the Doldrums and House Arrest because it's impossible to enjoy a song like West Coast Calamities or Every Night I Die at Miyagi's without dealing with the misogynistic lyrics. It seemed clear to me at the time that much of his work was devoted to exorcising the ugliest thoughts and feelings inside of him, and it's clear that it wasn't coming from somebody who feels good about himself. I mean calling him a creep seems kind of amazingly point-missing since most of his work deals with the very topic of feeling like a creep all of the time. He seems to me like a Kauffman-esque wrestling villain who sort of debases himself and makes the listener complicit in the process. I guess that's the definition of a troll, but trolls don't usually bundle their trolling along with awesome tunes.

While I'd agree that he's exploring some kind of debased persona through his music, I don't read his interviews that way. And if it's a joke, it's not a very good one.

I think a lot of that is right, and it's worth noting that his general persona had very different resonances and implications prior to being lumped into this narrative of indie PC indignation on the political credibility of whatever scene. That is, when around 2004-2006 when he was came across more explicitly as outsider music...

Thing is, Ariel is no longer an outsider, he's a feted indie star whose pronouncements are taken seriously. I do kinda resent the notion that his critics are uptight, self-righteous PC folk. Nobody is talking about banning him or saying you shouldn't listen to his music - indeed most of us are/were fans. Misogyny exists in the indie scene, let's talk about it.

Bloody hell Stew you're now on my facebook news feed, via Beta-gate.

Time for me bed

Heh, dearie me! This is what bank holiday time-wasting leads to! Tomorrow, work, no more beta-gate. I think I've said everything I can say on this really. Ariel is a douche and deserves to be called out on his bullshit, but I still like his music, at least apart from the new album, which is largely pish.

just started the article but kudos for the "lomo beck" moniker

I am a fan of ariel pink

btw I wouldn't categorize pink as a cis white male or w/e he is like almost inhuman

highland park gollum

I'm about to read this article, but my mindset going in is: "Male-dominated rock 'n' roll scene full of dudes trying to get laid SHOCKER'.

It's not like you at all to go into a debate like this having already decided what you believe, Adam.

I'm not the only person that does that!

I'm mostly going on the basis of the Flaming Lips/Erykah Badu thread and wondering what it would take for you to acknowledge the possibility that an indie musician doesn't necessarily have the most enlightened attitudes towards women.

also the point might have a bit more traction if this wasn't an article about pretty much the least male-dominated 'rock'n'roll scene' available

do yall think it is possible that ariel's sister dying in a car accident has maybe given him something of madonna complex

Yeah im not saying he's not misogynist in his views. Clearly Ariel Pink is coming right out and saying some fucked up stuff. My main issue is with him wrapping it in a hip reference (Nerds) and then people treating it like it is a new approach. Isn't it more or less a rehash of the whole 'metrosexual' thing from 10 years ago?

not with hair like that it isn't

Normally I don't pay any attention to interviews, but this was funny.

Ariel Marcus Rosenberg was a child of divorce by the age of three, and he admits to being a troubled kid growing up in Louisiana. He was also obsessed with heavy metal, diving deeply into Morbid Angel, Metallica, and Christian Death. During a rough patch in junior high, he shipped out to Mexico City to stay with his cousins, where he first heard the Smiths and the Cure. When he went to live with his father and attend Beverly Hills High School, he sold off his metal collection and rebranded himself as a goth. It also marked his last dalliance with new music: “Metal was the last current thing I kept up with. After that, my listening was totally retro. My mind was closing itself off from the rest of the planet.” When he later goes on a diatribe about the state of modern music, he berates the likes of Alanis Morrissette and Natalie Imbruglia as if it’s still 1997.

This sounds like half the kids I knew growing up.

Could someone link to the original Wire article? I guess the guy from Quietus couldn't be bothered. That feels like a real beta-journalist move, but what do I know.

Oh, it looks like it's not available for computer.

What's a good starting point for Ariel Pink? Not that I want to support him now that he's a gross miogynist or whatever, but I remember one of the members of Warpaint repping for him as something that she enjoyed.

The Doldrums is my favorite, Before Today is also good.

...he berates the likes of Alanis Morrissette and Natalie Imbruglia as if it’s still 1997.

Ha.

his next record will be even weirder

'The Doldrums' is an alltime fave. I like the newie way more than I thought I would.

Worn Copy is my fave

^

'Credit' is the one.

Big fan of Cable Access Follies

Yeah. It's like a non-corny novelty record

"the least male-dominated 'rock'n'roll scene' available"

so what women should be happy because they have a sliver of a voice instead of less than that? 'never mind that you're seen as second-class citizens, girls, wild flag and tune-yards exist'

and i like both those bands but you get my point (i hope)

I think that was in response to Adam's "male-dominated rock 'n' roll scene full of dudes trying to get laid SHOCKER!" post rather than in support of it.

yes it was

(and was referring [Britisher] tweepop rather than whatever it is WF and Tuneyards fit into)

The intro to "Credit" kills me every time. Dude should cut an album of fake consumer exchanges (cf also "Shnitzel Boogie".)