pitchfork is dumb (#34985859340293849494 in a series.)

king crimson

I don't think they sound at all like King Crimson, not even a little bit, but yeah, a good exercise trying to think of a good comparison.

the simplest complex alt-rock-approaching-prog-metal you can think of. a kind of helmet-y spartan and grooving quality to the riffs, just extended way more indefinitely and swerving around different time signature shifts provided by a p incredible rhythm section. their earlier stuff is hookier, shorter, and more immediate, self-serious but with bad jokes as a tonic, they were kinda the ultimate ozzfest band imo. then on their third record they broke through into the proggier dimension they've inhabited since. not a lot happens and yet there's enough movement that it never gets boring or feels as long as it is. it's kind of a remarkable, meditative thing they've touched on that only they do

There is something to be said about the interplay (or lack there of) of perma-solo drums and relatively static Helmet-y (good enough comparison) riffs.

Opeth is more metal, but they do some similar stuff. Thinking of this (especially how it ends):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rggQNCS8UjM

LOL I don't know exactly who Tool sounds like, but this band sure sounds like Tool!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6y6NvbtLiRU

I know “Sober” and that’s it, I’ve never listened to Tool. Such a good band name! It sounds like a band Fred Frith would be in. Except for the dick-wrench merch they were peddling, kind of ruined it for me, works better as an austere mechanical band name than a dick joke

Hmm, I wouldn't put dick-wrench art past John Zorn (inc. cohort Frith and/or Mike Patton).

lol i remember the first tool song i ever heard was "hooker with a penis," you could not pay me to listen to a song with that title in 2019

The first two tool albums are lyrically the worst but musically my faves. Very frustrating.

i kinda think maynard in dick joke mode and maynard in new age bullshit mode are both very bad lyricists. i also think "prison sex" is a p incredible lyric about child abuse that is for some reason called "prison sex"

His lyrics relative to the songs are often very "Lick My Love Pump."

I will say I hadn't noticed the lyrics cited in the Pfork review and in context they do creep me out

it's pretty much only that "caligula would grin" lyric though, right? everything else keenan sings is nonsensical mush like "free fall through our own midnight"

Yeah just that, but it's enough

The lyrics to "Culling Voices" could hypothetically be about being #metoo'd but they also could have been written 10 years ago

Judge, condemn, and banish any and everyone
Without evidence
Only the whispers from within

oh yeah lol that one is definitely... yep

that’s a long-winded way of saying #fakenews

Heyyyyyy maaaaaan / #faaaaaake newwwws

Oh nvm that’s Filter

Tool are pretty terrible to me so that review was fun to read

I had listened to that new tool album yesterday and found it boring, but Brad's description upthread makes me feel like I need to go back and try again at double the volume.

it's what worked for me

hooker with a penis
I know, I know, it’s serious

lmao goddammit

was a huge pretentious stan for them when i was 17, as is the way of things. been relistening to them for the first time in 15-20 years, and will echo what others have said that:

a) Maynard is by far the weak link
b) the records actually stand up far better than they should *
c) they still need to edit

* except Opiate, thats nearly all awful.

like i was expecting to laugh at how bad these albums were, but its mostly that I was an awful teenager and took them way too seriously. now i can look past that, and hey, these doods are pretty rockin if you block out the lyrics.

Wow, the rare 1st person/autobiographical perspective in a contemporary pfork review
https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/boy-scouts-free-company/

I thought the Tool review covered all the angles well btw, and I like the record (against my own expectations!).

now i can look past that, and hey, these doods are pretty rockin if you block out the lyrics.

No, you mustn't ignore lyrics! Lyrics are incredibly important, probably the most important thing of all, and any critic who chooses to look past them is failing themselves and the reader!

well maynard is no joni mitchell

"hooker with a penis" is a great bait and switch - you expect its lyrics are probably going to be centred around some gross transphobic joke, but instead its terrible in a completely different way by just being an embarrassing ramble responding to claims of selling out

https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/boy-scouts-free-company/

another review that gives you zero idea what the album sounds like

hazy and dreamlike, calling to mind tour mate Jay Som,

there ya go

No, you mustn't ignore lyrics! Lyrics are incredibly important, probably the most important thing of all, and any critic who chooses to look past them is failing themselves and the reader!

― shared unit of analysis (unperson), Friday, September 6, 2019 10:09 AM (twenty-six minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

im of the opinion that lyrics are much less important than the music unless they're extremely good or extremely bad. you can guess which category tool falls under.

That Tropical Fuck Storm is maybe my favorite album of the year so far, which lines up with Pitchfork giving it a 6. They seem to do that with most of my favorites.

There should be more (& longer) twitter apology threads for all of Pitchfork's terrible takes. It would be a massive undertaking but it would be helpful (for them).

1/ I tremendously enjoyed this interview with @PhizLair, which has given me cause to reflect on the condescending and cringey 0.0 review I wrote way back when. https://t.co/NsraIm6TTR

— Matt LeMay (@mattlemay) September 5, 2019

that interview was indeed terrific and is making me really excited about her book

I like that Boy Scouts review and I like Matt LeMay’s tweet

Screw revisionist history, that Liz Phair album fucking sucked.

good ol' Snrub

I interviewed her around that time, and she told me in the end she just wanted to record an album that had a chance of getting played at the gym when she worked out.

Hah, my college roommate would see her at their gym during this timeframe (Manhattan Beach 24 Hour Fitness).

Every time I try to think of something off of that Liz Phair album in general, the song that leaps into mind is Jewel's "Intuition"

(I forget how many indie luminaries went to Oberlin. Phair, Seam/Bitch Magnet guys, incl. John McEntire, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Songs:Ohia folks, Jon Theodore ...)

I suppose that album with “Bollywood” and “U Hate It” is also a 10.0 all-time classic?

i once put a track from that liz phair album on a mixtape for someone and they were still annoyed at me about it years later

(I forget how many indie luminaries went to Oberlin. Phair, Seam/Bitch Magnet guys, incl. John McEntire, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Songs:Ohia folks, Jon Theodore ...)

― Josh in Chicago, Friday, September 6, 2019 10:40 AM (two hours ago)

Greg Saunier of deerhoof...

Guess it's cool for that writer to learn that he dissed Liz Phair for the wrong reasons, but it's still a bad album.

If memory serves, part of the reaction stemmed from her specific choice of the Matrix as writing partner. At the time they were best known for working with Avril Lavigne, who of course was dogged by calls of inauthenticity. The silly "sell out" call hit Phair before the self titled album, but the self titled album felt pretty desperate and cynical, like she gave up trying to be successful the other way and instead tried to buy her way in. Again, this is from memory.

Yeah, I mean, I personally was a big Liz Phair fan who also loved the Avril album, so I was psyched for the S/T — and it turned out to be such a disappointing letdown.

dont like the album but I always thought it was cool how she owned it, just being like "i've got a kid, I'm trying to make some money, idgaf."