IS ROCK CRITICISM DEAD?

why can't listeners -- or critics -- be responding to music when they like a pop song?

lolz are you kidding - music is a lifestyle accessory for the vast VAST majority of listeners

― Kitchen Paper Towel (Shakey Mo Collier), Wednesday, June 17, 2009 4:09 PM (10 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

real talk you are a depressing motherfucker

I don't feel depressing

seriously dude that's like saying "most people don't actually have ears they just grab the CD with the same cover everyone else has"

Yeah I don't think it's true for even a vast majority of listeners let alone a vast VAST one.

It's a pretty condescending viewpoint IMO, both to the audience and the artists.

i liked your speech whiney! you're a good speaker. i kept hoping you'd throw us a bone and say something like "listeners today are drowning in a deluge of choices!"

yeah i mean for every like brad paisley or rhianna there's like a zillion country singers or R&B singers that are totally trying to do the same thing but totally fail, and are trying to be just as "commercial" or whatever, so it's not like ppl just fall for anything that's handed them

of course, we also don't have a technical vocabulary for aesthetic appreciation

Shakey's right though. Condescension isn't really very depressing.

i mean, rather than 'music is something most people who listen to music are only into as a lifestyle accessory' maybe read 'a lot of people are genuinely engaged with the music they like, but in a way that some other people might read as being naive and self-regarding'

maybe I'm just a jerk (entirely possible) but the average non-music-dorks in my life spend at most less than a few minutes a day thinking/talking/searching out music. Yes, they do mostly take what's handed to them - they find some outlet they like and they take whatever comes out of that outlet (ie, NPR or 106 and Park, same diff)

spare me the faux populist routine guys

I don't think that consuming music in a reactionary manner means you don't like music and that you don't have opinions about it.

wow if people are just buying everything they hear on NPR or 106 and Park it's amazing the music industry is doing poorly

most of the people I know who don't spend a lot of time thinking about or seeking out music still have some kind of visceral engagement with the music they do like -- think the chorus is catchy, find the lyrics deep, like dancing to the beat, love the singer's voice, etc. i guess you could say their enjoyment is less valid or 'earned' or something because they bought less than 12 CDs last year but saying their enthusiasm is less sincere or more tied to lifestyle or social status is mostly bullshit imo.

So you think people go around saying I've chosen an NPR lifestyle or a Hot 97 lifestyle and therefore I have to listen to such songs that have been "handed" to me? Where and how would you have people expose themselves to music and decide which songs they like or don't like, or are you not being critical of people's chosen outlets?

if they were listening critically on some level then there would be no big huge, zillion dollar marketed albums by big artists that ever flop, and that happens all the time

wow if people are just buying everything they hear on NPR or 106 and Park it's amazing the music industry is doing poorly

lolz note I didn't use the word "buy" anywhere

so if your tastes aren't eclectic enough to have you scouring the radio dial, music is just a "lifestyle accessory" to you

late to the game but wanted to say whiney u are a v. entertaining speaker and about 99% correct in yr assessment of things.

wow you guys are really misreading me ... I'm not saying the mass of music consumers out there don't enjoy or engage with the music they listen to. Obviously they do. But the music they listen to is closely tied to the kind of person they want to be, the kind of culture they want to be involved in, the kind of images they aspire to, the kind of aesthetic worldview that they are comfortable in. People like things that reinforce their established image of themselves (and none of us are any exceptions to this, btw) - this is what I meant by music being treated as a "lifestyle accessory". People develop a conception of themselves and the music they listen to is part of that. This is not really a unique or challenging or condescending concept, so you can all kindly fuck off with your stone-throwing.

I don't think you're totally wrong, but I don't think the mindset is nearly as aspirational or tied to self-image as you do. Basically, everyone picks and chooses what songs they like or dislike out of what's in front of them, whether it's 10 songs or 1000.

this is where the whole "identity politics" aspect of music ties in as well - ie, "I am this kind of person and I subscribe to these cultural tenets, ergo I enjoy Christian/country/R&B/indie music. This music comes to me through this outlet, which more often than not plays things I enjoy." rinse and repeat

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But, Shakey, I don't know anyone who listens to music that way!

I am this kind of person and I subscribe to these cultural tenets, ergo I enjoy Christian/country/R&B/indie music. This music comes to me through this outlet, which more often than not plays things I enjoy.

This should be a Gang Of Four lyric

yeah i hafta say, people i know who have limited tastes or small cd collections, most of them still can be pretty passionate about the stuff they do like. i think the "lifestyle accessory" people exist, but they're a relative minority. i think most people have some music they really care about.

There's no causal relationship between voting for Bush and downloading a Swans song.

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I don't see why you can't really care about a lifestyle accessory...?

I object to the idea that being satisfied by a mainstream music source somehow implies that you don't care about music and see it solely as a box to be ticked on a lifestyle checklist; it seems to be completely counter to why people gravitate towards lifestyles in the first place, namely because the trappings give them emotional satisfaction. You seem to be putting the cart before the horse here.

I mean lolz consumer capitalism, isn't that what its all about

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somehow implies that you don't care about music and see it solely as a box to be ticked on a lifestyle checklist[

I see there is an issue here with the semantics of the term "lifestyle accessory"

the last time I heard the phrase lifestyle accessory was on some ad for a head shop

something about like "we have all your 420 lifestyle accessories here"

are lyfestile accessories dead?

to me "lifetime accessory" means "boyfriend".

and that was like 5 or 6 yrs ago

I mean, for every Christian out there who only listens to Christian rock, there are a bazillion others who listen to other things as well or who actively abhor Christian rock; it's not nearly as simple as "I am THIS so I only listen to THAT".

this is where the whole "identity politics" aspect of music ties in as well - ie, "I am this kind of person and I subscribe to these cultural tenets, ergo I enjoy Christian/country/R&B/indie music. This music comes to me through this outlet, which more often than not plays things I enjoy." rinse and repeat

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― Kitchen Paper Towel (Shakey Mo Collier), Wednesday, June 17, 2009 8:43 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

i was sitting next to this dude on a plane a couple weeks ago and he was scrolling through all these bands on his itunes and i didn't know one of them so i was spying on him, them some michael w. smith popped up...so i finally was like "ah dude is a big xian born again" dude...but then all of a sudden "ill communication" by the beasties popped up and also "what's the story morning glory" so who knows?

Haha in fairness, I think that like 80% of MN listens to Michael W. Smith!

Chuck Eddy and I have a few Amy Grant albums that Mike Huckabee and his band might wanna cover on Sunday nights.

I mean, for every Christian out there who only listens to Christian rock, there are a bazillion others who listen to other things as well or who actively abhor Christian rock; it's not nearly as simple as "I am THIS so I only listen to THAT".

I see no one raised this complaint when Whiney "objectively" cited the compartmentalized listening tastes of Bonnarroo attendees

I, for one, didn't listen to the talk because I'm still at work; my reactions are to the discussion much more than they are to the source material. At any rate, I think croupier was reacting against that in his posts.

that MINDSET grr

I'm getting my threads confused. Shouldn't Shakey be attacking Ferris Bueller again?

actually i didn't but one thing that i thought whiney was weird (a little off shakey's point here) but was the fact that while you sort of decried the camps of fans on the bonerro tweetfest (god what a term)...you yourself seemed to just write off all the "jam band crap" which, for me, if i went to bonerroo would be the most interesting thing to check out, just cuz it's sort of the roots of the fest and who the fuck knows, maybe like string cheese incident would rock my sox off in a live setting?

well Dan to sum up (pardon me for paraphrasing here Whiney) part of his point was that people's tastes are in general becoming very NARROW - listeners find a comfortable sub-section of music that they are into and they stick with it, they are oblivious to things going on outside it, and there's no critical mechanism readily available to break those listeners out of that.

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if i went to bonerroo would be the most interesting thing to check out, just cuz it's sort of the roots of the fest and who the fuck knows, maybe like string cheese incident would rock my sox off in a live setting?

lolz M@tt I love you bro

" there's no critical mechanism readily available to break those listeners out of that."

somewhere sasha frere jones is raising his hand eagerly

btw String Cheese Incident likely WOULD rock yr sox off in a live setting, I ushered a show they did with Bela Fleck and MMW and they were great

"well Dan to sum up (pardon me for paraphrasing here Whiney) part of his point was that people's tastes are in general becoming very NARROW - listeners find a comfortable sub-section of music that they are into and they stick with it, they are oblivious to things going on outside it, and there's no critical mechanism readily available to break those listeners out of that."

Is Whiney not aware of the existence of specialty music mags prior to the www?