see also everyone tripping over themselves to praise frank ocean's new clothes, largely because the critical momentum is already there
― Dave Plaintive rapper with classical training (imago), Thursday, 8 December 2016 17:56 (seven years ago) link
no, my beef is with the artist--even if we limit ourselves to "indie rock" i don't think this is very good music, and that was my opinion way before year-end list time.
― call all destroyer, Thursday, 8 December 2016 17:57 (seven years ago) link
i think 'will toledo' can make whatever the hell he wants tbh, although that doesn't mean we might need or like it
― Dave Plaintive rapper with classical training (imago), Thursday, 8 December 2016 17:58 (seven years ago) link
xp Dave otm
― Wimmels, Thursday, 8 December 2016 18:01 (seven years ago) link
call me...yeah Dave's fine
― Dave Plaintive rapper with classical training (imago), Thursday, 8 December 2016 18:02 (seven years ago) link
I don't get the Parquet Courts comparison, even if I put aside the fact that I prefer Parquet Courts.
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 8 December 2016 18:20 (seven years ago) link
i don't really see much musical ambition as maybe this dude never played shows much before he wrote so he never got to see what it looked like when ppl started going to get beer or take a piss during the boring stuff?
agreed w/alfred wrt parquet courts, feels like ppl just are throwing 2 names together
― blonde redheads have more fun (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Thursday, 8 December 2016 18:22 (seven years ago) link
Dave
― Treeship, Thursday, 8 December 2016 18:23 (seven years ago) link
It's a good record... if you enjoy the genre? I'll add that it's an even better story, perhaps the hype is music journalists zeroing in the story more than the actual record? Seems to be a common trope with publications that covers indie music. I haven't read a single year end list that doesn't mention CSR's bandcamp origins. As it has been said above, the genre produced better albums this year and not receiving half of the year end coverage CSH is getting. (My Woman is my prime example).
― Van Horn Street, Thursday, 8 December 2016 18:24 (seven years ago) link
Going through as many Yankee Hotel Foxtrot reviews as I could when I got obsessed with the record in 2009, I realized most 'indie music' publications could write about is the label war that birthed the record and the music itself was pretty secondary.
― Van Horn Street, Thursday, 8 December 2016 18:28 (seven years ago) link
bandcamp artist makes good, fucking fairytale of 2016 right there. i stand with the bandcamp artists who will never make it *folds arms*
― Dave Plaintive rapper with classical training (imago), Thursday, 8 December 2016 18:34 (seven years ago) link
Neverban Dave Jagger
― blonde redheads have more fun (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Thursday, 8 December 2016 18:42 (seven years ago) link
The record is ok if forgettable (the tapes n tapes comparison is actually pretty otm). It's the hype that annoys me, like everyone is pretending this record is actually one of the best records this year when it's so average. If I read one of those reviews and listen to it I'd go "huh? THIS is the best rock album of the year!? What a shit year for rock it must've been then". I know I shouldn't care what everyone wants to listen to but I feel they're inflating the importance of this record and band. by the next record (two record tops) the same people that are so passionate about the band this year will elicit the same meh I'm getting from them. Mark my words.
― Moka, Thursday, 8 December 2016 18:50 (seven years ago) link
don't think the Angel Olsen album is the best example since it was deservingly better reviewed and is getting more EOY list placements etc.
― ufo, Thursday, 8 December 2016 19:43 (seven years ago) link
is it? I was under the impression CSH is getting way more attention, my bad.
― Van Horn Street, Thursday, 8 December 2016 19:46 (seven years ago) link
feels to me like csh is getting more run too
― call all destroyer, Thursday, 8 December 2016 20:00 (seven years ago) link
by the next record (two record tops) the same people that are so passionate about the band this year will elicit the same meh I'm getting from them. Mark my words.
― Moka, Thursday, December 8, 2016 1:50 PM (two hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
this is sadly otm but could also be said about p much 90% of the bands whose names appear in mid-sized font on any 2016 festival bill you can name
Tobias Jesso Jr, anyone?
― Wimmels, Thursday, 8 December 2016 21:08 (seven years ago) link
whom
― who is extremely unqualified to review this pop album (BradNelson), Thursday, 8 December 2016 21:17 (seven years ago) link
Angel Olsen >>> Car Seat Headrest. Is anyone questioning that? CSH is good in a different way -- they're more of a minor act
― Treeship, Thursday, 8 December 2016 22:52 (seven years ago) link
You wont hear it from me. The Angel Olsen is good... not the sort of record I play usually but I can see its replay value over the years whereas CSH will inevitably get replaced by 2017's best new indie darling.
― Moka, Thursday, 8 December 2016 23:18 (seven years ago) link
Yeah they are in totally different categories. Watching high school basketball games is fun but it's not the nba
― Treeship, Thursday, 8 December 2016 23:20 (seven years ago) link
That said the people viciously criticizing car seat headrest are heartless monsters
― Treeship, Thursday, 8 December 2016 23:22 (seven years ago) link
Tobias Jesso Jr will possibly end up as an industry songwriter - he's written stuff with Sia, Adele and John Legend already
― art baengels (monotony), Friday, 9 December 2016 00:44 (seven years ago) link
Like the Semisonic dude
― blonde redheads have more fun (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Friday, 9 December 2016 00:49 (seven years ago) link
and Desmond Child
― Wimmels, Friday, 9 December 2016 00:49 (seven years ago) link
Lucy Dacus is sort of an indie-folk PJ Harvey, which I guess is a bit more original than Car Seat's 80s and 90s retro rock, although sometimes he's more catchy than her despite being derivative
― curmudgeon, Friday, 9 December 2016 04:43 (seven years ago) link
there's no reason the intro to Vincent had to be 2 minutes
but it's the best part of the song :P
― niels, Saturday, 10 December 2016 17:36 (seven years ago) link
how is it possible no one has mentioned toledo has listened to much modern lovers way too much
― F♯ A♯ (∞), Friday, 16 December 2016 19:38 (seven years ago) link
One band not mentioned as an influence (possibly because they weren't on Matador) is Archers of Loaf, and his vocals sometimes sound like Bachman in subdued mode, as do some of the more anthemic bits of the better songs. I like a few tracks on this a lot, think he'd be better with a better band but that might be coming, and don't see any reason to dislike him for not being more than he is.
― dlp9001, Tuesday, 27 December 2016 02:11 (seven years ago) link
This squonk wishes he was half as good as Archers of Loaf
― dance cum rituals (Moka), Tuesday, 27 December 2016 05:13 (seven years ago) link
half would be generous
― blonde redheads have more fun (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Tuesday, 27 December 2016 14:30 (seven years ago) link
I love AoL, but really don't see the need to run this guy down. He's put out a pretty good throwback indie rock album in 2016. Of all the people to criticize, he seems pretty low on the list. It's a catchy album, decent band, decent recordings, and Butterglory got an awful lot of press back in the day. (And I still like them ok as well). Just seems silly for this band, of all bands, to have a backlash at all.
― dlp9001, Tuesday, 27 December 2016 18:32 (seven years ago) link
Wait ... what does Butterglory have to do with this? I'm missing something.
― alpine static, Tuesday, 27 December 2016 19:48 (seven years ago) link
can we run down people whose idea of rock is so narrow that this is the album that determines how good of a year it was for it
― a self-reinforcing downward spiral of male-centric indie (katherine), Tuesday, 27 December 2016 20:42 (seven years ago) link
like with a car?
― blonde redheads have more fun (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Tuesday, 27 December 2016 20:52 (seven years ago) link
throw car seat headrests at them
― F♯ A♯ (∞), Tuesday, 27 December 2016 21:06 (seven years ago) link
i don't think this is necessarily "more of the same" indie nonsense, it's clearly got some sense of ambition, i just think that ambition actively detracts from the songcraft, which is merely ok
― who is extremely unqualified to review this pop album (BradNelson), Thursday, December 8, 2016 5:11 PM (one year ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
this is doubly true of the twin fantasy remake that just came out
― lowercase (eric), Friday, 16 February 2018 15:38 (six years ago) link
it's so so bloated! the original was long enough at an hour and then he added another 11 minutes onto it
― ufo, Friday, 16 February 2018 15:42 (six years ago) link
Only on my first listen but I can't tell if this record is amazing or an overindulgent mess. There are great moments in it and I like its "this-record-will-save-your-teenage-self"'s level of ambition, but aahhhh I just wish he'd write a strong, simple hook - something that so many other bands can do with songs that aren't 12 minutes long. It's a good record and I understand it's appeal, but it's emotional weight doesn't always translate into greatness. Also that "I am a good person" monologue is cringeworthy as hell
― josh az (2011nostalgia), Sunday, 18 February 2018 20:25 (six years ago) link
someone should edit his stuff down and put it on Bandcamp like that one dude did with JT's 20/20 Experience
― alpine static, Sunday, 18 February 2018 21:22 (six years ago) link
i...quite like this
whyyy
― imago, Thursday, 7 June 2018 13:18 (five years ago) link
like, much more than TOD which imo wasn't very good
― imago, Thursday, 7 June 2018 13:23 (five years ago) link
super into twin fantasy, "Body's" in particular.
― campreverb, Thursday, 7 June 2018 14:40 (five years ago) link
Skimming thru this thread, I'm surprised at the reactions to "ToD"... I thought that album was absolutely terrific -- big, ambitious, funny, anthemic, audacious, self-effacing; great/quotable lyrics ("I felt like a walking piece of shit / In a stupid-looking jacket"; "The effects are so good these days / If there were gears behind those big brown eyes, I wouldn't be able to tell the difference"); hot production, super rockin', "1937 State Park" blasting at full volume; really "going for it," not afraid to be corny or "mainstream"; communicating "big ideas" through crowd-pleasing rock 'n roll in a way that very popular rock artists did in decades past but seems to have fallen out of favor recently (...I'm aware I may be setting myself up with that last one).
The fact that it sounds "like '90s indie rock" seemed incidental to how great it was -- though I admit that I love '90s indie rock, and that very well may have helped!
I also dug the "Twin Fantasy" redo, but have only listened to it a few times....
― i’m still stanning (morrisp), Thursday, 7 June 2018 16:50 (five years ago) link
That chorus on '1937 State Park' pulls off the very rare vulnerable/anthemic and blows me away every time.
― campreverb, Thursday, 7 June 2018 17:24 (five years ago) link
that's the one song i like off tod, i appreciate the inward digging his stuff aims for but that track besides it feels mostly like inward trudging
― lowercase (eric), Thursday, 7 June 2018 17:26 (five years ago) link
is there a new album
― flopson, Friday, 8 June 2018 01:36 (five years ago) link
Another lyric I love:I’ve been waiting all my lifeI’ve been waiting for some real good pornSomething with meaning, something fulfillingI’d like to make my shame count for somethingI feel like there’s something (half-)ironic, or subtly tongue-in-cheek, about the pathos on this album — a gentle, straight-faced mocking of his own drama — which elevates the proceedings, and is part of why the lyrics are so great. I guess Lou Barlow presents a rough precedent for this kind of “dry self-awareness about the singer’s own melodrama.”By contrast, the lyrics of Twin Fantasy are more straight-up emo (Will was actually a teen when he wrote them, no?) — but still very good!
― i’m still stanning (morrisp), Saturday, 9 June 2018 06:33 (five years ago) link
(One thing to add is that I’m not usually much of a “lyrics guy” — but Will Headrest’s lyrics are so good, I find myself really aware of & focusing on them.)
― i’m still stanning (morrisp), Saturday, 9 June 2018 06:39 (five years ago) link
there's an eye for detail that reminds me a lot of Courtney Barnett actually. In the 'I did not transcend, I felt like a walking piece of shit in a stupid looking jacket' the jacket lyric so perfectly captures the feeling of alienation.
― campreverb, Saturday, 9 June 2018 15:47 (five years ago) link