Best Music Writing

Luke Haines and Peter Hammill weigh in:

https://twitter.com/LukeHaines_News/status/515127513212026880

They only have to be functional for the player to understand the controls. A game like Minecraft doesn't really explain anything to you and has no clear objective, for one.

xposts

Yeah I don't agree with Kojima of course, but I only play ADOM and I only eat Chipotle

pompous drivel shock!

ha fuck that guy

well this is Luke Haines we're talking about

i remember that guy from the 90's. he was debonair.

He's widened a bit

thank god peter hammill is here to save us from pomposity

i mean i love the guy but that's a bit rich

LOL (xp)

the guy from VDGG calling out pompous things is so many levels...

Maybe he's gone all Chas + Dave in his old age

Fuck yeah! Finally someone speaking up about this music ‘journalism’ bullshit.

can we please replace the awful "my god it's made of girls" ILM board description with this

...got my beer on the mellotron here, let mother sort it out if he comes round here...

*flute solo*

I mean, I didn't actually realize that the Baker's Dozen thing was supposed to be an "all time" list, tbh, I assumed it was meant to be fun and subjective, just like Quietus usually is

It isn't. We tell people to interpret it however they want and we also offer them the choice of doing themed lists - no matter how weird or obscure.

crüt otm

XP: See The Haxan Cloak's recent favourite teenage metal albums list as an example.

oh man i want to do a weird obscure list! i'm not famous though...or in deerhoof or whatever.

i have my list-y moments.

I'm working on one at the moment... my 13 favourite screen drunks. We may blast the idea into smithereens after Xmas.

I've picked up some amazing LPs via Bakers Dozen and that was maybe the secondary or tertiary reason for me starting the series originally but after a while it did feel like I wasn't reading enough interesting choices after a while. So it feels like just giving people the option isn't maybe enough, like we have to actually pro-actively say to people, 'Will you choose your 13 favourite Turkish psych records' or 'Will you choose your 13 favourite horror sound tracks?' just to get it back to more of a potential buyer's guide or listening recommendation device.

I would do: 13 Records that Dr*w Dan*el Would LOVE to Pieces!

I loved doing mine w Luke but was disappointed that I didn't actually go deep with the how's and why's of Total Freedom's music saving my life

:///////

*squares hero-worship of hammill w/ all this, can't, weeps*

i suppose his thing was always to stray the slightly wrong side of emotional largesse & get away with it on the strength of the music, plus he's fairly seasoned now, not that this is an excuse

I like A Plague of Lighthouse Keepers as much as the next man but that was a major own goal right there.

Personal taste in music is transferable. Because if somebody- anybody, really, doesn't have to be someone I know or care about- is sufficiently enthusiastic about a record, I am going to listen to it in a different way, and after I am done there are two likely outcomes: I will love the record, or I will hate that person. There are plenty of bands I simply didn't like until I read a recommendation from someone who was really enthusiastic about that band in a compelling and persuasive way.

This looks wonderful (and organised by an ur-ilxor, too). The list of contributors is v.strong.

http://marksinker.co.uk/birkbeck_under_over.html
http://www.bbk.ac.uk/events-calendar/underground-overground-the-changing-politics-of-uk-music-writing-1968-85
http://therockwriteproject.tumblr.com/

UNDERGROUND / OVERGROUND
The Changing Politics of UK Music Writing: 1968-85

This will be a two-day symposium at London’s Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities, consisting of panel discussions and Q&As. Run by Mark Sinker, former editor of The Wire, it will bring together writers, editors and readers of the underground and trade music presses of the 1970s and 80s with academics and other media commentators, to discuss the emergence and evolution of the countercultural voice in the UK, as inflected through the rock papers between these dates. The plan is for proceedings to be recorded and transcribed, to form the core of a subsequent published collection, alongside additional memoirs and essays from participants (especially those unable to attend).

so mad i won't be able to fly to london for this.

That does look like a great May event:

Simon Frith , Paul Gilroy, Barney Hoskyns, Cynthia Rose, Charles Shaar Murray ,Bob Stanley Richard Williams and more

ILX's Michaelangelo Matos has the best Christgau interview from his book tour up on Red Bull Music Academy. Fantastic piece:
http://www.redbullmusicacademy.com/magazine/robert-christgau-interview

Another good post from Damon http://pitchfork.com/features/oped/9667-drop-the-bass-a-case-against-subwoofers/ - apparently he's writing a book. Good news.

On a different note: I'm going to see the Patti Smith Horses tour in a month, and I was thinking I should read up beforehand and then I looked up the 33 1/3 book on Horses, but judging from the user reviews it deals mainly with post-structuralist thought / academia stuff, and so I figured nah I'll just reread Just Kids. Made me think about what I like in music writing, which is not really clever analysis, more like narrative and poetry.

I read that Horses book when it came out and I don't remember it being that academic-y. What I found strange about it was the amount of space the author devoted to Smith's life and career leading up to the album, only giving the album itself an inordinately brief song-by-song analysis. I think any fan of the record will find entertaining, if not particularly revelatory, but I can't really argue with the decision to reread Just Kids again instead.

A double dose of Taylors - love both of these.
Jia Tolentino reviews Taylor Swift in Washington DC for Jezebel: http://themuse.jezebel.com/taylor-swift-is-definitely-in-her-zone-1718196417
Taylor Parkes interviews Sleaford Mods for The Quietus: http://thequietus.com/articles/18327-sleaford-mods-interview-2

Not sure if this is the canonical Best Music Writing thread, but anyhow I'm greatly enjoying (most of) the writing on this site, as well as the tournament they're running and the 90s nostalgia it is inducing: http://www.marchfadness.com/

(also rooting for "Groove is in the Heart" to take the title)

who is voting on it? some pretty shameful results there so far

but i did just read some of the essays and i will agree there is good writing to be found

Anybody can vote! Look in the "current games" page. I think lots people are voting for the more faddish songs rather than the best songs, hence the embarrassing results.

the writing is good but scanning the list of writers I do not see many people known for writing about music, and do see rick moody, which is a trend that (selfishly, obviously) worries me

Anybody can vote! Look in the "current games" page. I think lots people are voting for the more faddish songs rather than the best songs, hence the embarrassing results.

*of

I wasn't familiar with Rick Moody but I will brace myself because I guess he'll be writing the Final Four analysis this year again.

Anyway, vote for Deee-Lite everyone!

If everyone could go and vote against "Torn" today, I'd be much obliged: http://www.marchfadness.com/#/championship/

http://www.npr.org/sections/therecord/2017/03/15/520133445/culture-wars-trap-innovation-atlanta-hip-hop

thought this was kinda worthy (mumble rap thread participants may disagree. I dunno)

what would be their objections?

Too superficial maybe. Others might say "well of course the city is not supporting 'trap' culture"

Damn, Quincy Jones has some stories: https://www.gq.com/story/quincy-jones-has-a-story