Maybe this score obsession irritates me because student fight me over two tenths of a decimal point and I'm like, YOU EARNED AN A -- YOU WON.
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 00:45 (two years ago) link
one i can clearly remember is i wanted to give bieber's purpose a 5-point-something bc it is a dismal and depressing record and it got bumped to a 6.5. which was fine, who cares
― mellon collie and the infinite bradness (BradNelson), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 00:46 (two years ago) link
well you're on that thread
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 00:49 (two years ago) link
ohi don't think it's super prominent and i honestly can't think of a case in the last three years? but there used to be the occasional issue where it was noticeable and then the writer would get twitter hate bc no one understands the process
― ufo, Tuesday, 8 June 2021 01:05 (two years ago) link
in the era of stan attacks creating fraudulent racist tweets from freelance record reviewers, scores should be abolished
― bobo honkin' slobo babe (sic), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 02:10 (two years ago) link
oh yeah ultimately all scores should be stripped from the site imo, i hate coming up with them and i even forgot to assign one to clarity when i filed. it'll never happen
― mellon collie and the infinite bradness (BradNelson), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 02:15 (two years ago) link
also someone should shut down metacritic
― mellon collie and the infinite bradness (BradNelson), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 02:16 (two years ago) link
I'm not sure what this means?― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, June 7, 2021 4:23 PM
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, June 7, 2021 4:23 PM
jesus fucken christ
and by paying you guys well, i meant i hope you're at least taking them for all you're worth. because they certainly deserve writers of yours and brad's calibre.
and, while i understand their purpose, i absolutely agree that the overall scores can distract from the substance of the review.
― things repeat forever and there never is a remedy (Austin), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 02:16 (two years ago) link
because they certainly deserve writers of yours and brad's calibre.
certainly DON'T
― things repeat forever and there never is a remedy (Austin), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 02:17 (two years ago) link
Am I the only one who remembers the Brent DiCrescenzo review actually being fun back in 2000, or am I going to get chased off the board for mentioning that? I mean back then, I was used to reading stodgy Rolling Stone capsule reviews, and that blogger style was pretty new.
Yup, I had the same experience. Not with that particular review per se, but when I first started reading Pitchfork in the late '90s, I loved that half of the reviews felt like wacky creative-writing exercises, with albums as prompts. Not really what I'm looking for out of music criticism these days, but it did feel fresh and exciting at the time, IMO.
― jaymc, Tuesday, 8 June 2021 03:58 (two years ago) link
I also loved it at the time. I subscribed to spin around the same time, and enjoyed reading pitchfork reviews a lot more. I was 17 or so
― Karl Malone, Tuesday, 8 June 2021 04:34 (two years ago) link
As an aspiring music critic in ca. 2000-2001 P4k era, I used to see them as amateur hour and never really got over that feeling and thusly sought validation through the traditions of old legacy media. Long story short, Ryan is a millionaire, Pitchfork is the last website standing and I had to learn to code
― bruce spr!ngisH3r3 on broadway (Whiney G. Weingarten), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 04:55 (two years ago) link
I remember being actively annoyed by that style of reviews at the time, usually. They weren't always terrible, but those creative writing exercises very often gave little attention to what the record sounded like. There was also a tendency, sometimes, among certain writers of that era that readers had already heard the album and already had more than a passing familiarity with the artist, which came off as a way to prove their bona fides and "right" to write about them, but alienated readers who had little frame of reference.
― a superficial sheeb of intelligence (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 12:43 (two years ago) link
i theoretically love the ambition of early pfork, it was what attracted me to the site as a kid, but the great majority of the writing did not live up to that ambition
― mellon collie and the infinite bradness (BradNelson), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 12:45 (two years ago) link
^^^ otm
don't get me wrong, I still read it daily back then.
― a superficial sheeb of intelligence (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 12:46 (two years ago) link
stating the obvious here but tim f reviews from the late-'00s are roughly 10000x more lyrical and erudite than any of the gonzo pfork stuff
― mellon collie and the infinite bradness (BradNelson), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 12:46 (two years ago) link
very confused by austin’s moral crusade itt, i mean it’s fine to dislike a website
― the mai tai quinn (voodoo chili), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 12:47 (two years ago) link
there's a lot of that here tbh but Pfork's the last monolith standing, I guess.
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 13:12 (two years ago) link
There was also a tendency, sometimes, among certain writers of that era that readers had already heard the album and already had more than a passing familiarity with the artist, which came off as a way to prove their bona fides and "right" to write about them, but alienated readers who had little frame of reference.― a superficial sheeb of intelligence (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Tuesday, June 8, 2021 8:43 AM (thirty-four minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink
― a superficial sheeb of intelligence (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Tuesday, June 8, 2021 8:43 AM (thirty-four minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink
i remember this from the mid/late 00's. it created a sort of mystique around the site for me.
― treeship., Tuesday, 8 June 2021 13:18 (two years ago) link
that era feels really different from the earliest reviews, which seem like college newspaper reviews, with all the charms and limitations that this comparison entails
one person's mystique can be another person's patina of unearned soi-disant authority tbf
― imago, Tuesday, 8 June 2021 13:19 (two years ago) link
soi-disant, I learned that word from the Silver Jews
― Blues Guitar Solo Heatmap (Free Download) (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 13:27 (two years ago) link
hah was gonna comment something similar
why can’t monsters get along with other monsters
― the mai tai quinn (voodoo chili), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 13:35 (two years ago) link
among certain writers of that era that readers had already heard the album and already had more than a passing familiarity with the artist
because coolness in hip music circles was once measured by the vastness of one's perfect & complete knowledge of all artists and albums, so the default mode of communication was "as you know..."
― Evan, Tuesday, 8 June 2021 14:21 (two years ago) link
miss those days, when knowledge was social capital
― treeship., Tuesday, 8 June 2021 14:28 (two years ago) link
I'm going to sell my knowledge of obscure music as an NFT
― Muswell Hillbilly Elegy (President Keyes), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 14:35 (two years ago) link
Instead press it on hand numbered limited color vinyl with gatefold tip-on and we'll talk
― Evan, Tuesday, 8 June 2021 14:42 (two years ago) link
a lot of people take issue with the site's omniscient voice-of-god authorial point of view, and i personally don't love it when writers feel that they must convey an encyclopedic knowledge of all music in their reviews. tho some like philip sherburne do the encyclopedia thing well.
― the mai tai quinn (voodoo chili), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 14:53 (two years ago) link
"the most trusted name in music"
(proceeds to lie about its own history)
also funny that this is the thread for criticizing them and i (or anyone else) get dogpiled on every time i attempt to do so.
“One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we’ve been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. We’re no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us. It’s simply too painful to acknowledge, even to ourselves, that we’ve been taken. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back.”―Carl Sagan
Long story short, Ryan is a millionaire
― things repeat forever and there never is a remedy (Austin), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 15:14 (two years ago) link
Should've posted that Sagan quote to the Xgau thread instead.
― pomenitul, Tuesday, 8 June 2021 15:15 (two years ago) link
the kinfolk said, Ryan, move away from there
― Muswell Hillbilly Elegy (President Keyes), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 15:16 (two years ago) link
more like soy disant
― bruce spr!ngisH3r3 on broadway (Whiney G. Weingarten), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 15:18 (two years ago) link
― pomenitul, Tuesday, 8 June 2021 15:15 (four minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink
lol I thought this was that thread reading it for a second
― imago, Tuesday, 8 June 2021 15:20 (two years ago) link
oh yeah ultimately all scores should be stripped from the site imo, i hate coming up with them and i even forgot to assign one to clarity when i filed. it'll never happen― mellon collie and the infinite bradness (BradNelson), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 02:15
― mellon collie and the infinite bradness (BradNelson), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 02:15
What's funny is that the moment I saw that there was a Sunday review for Jimmy Eat World's Clarity and it was written by Brad, I immediately guessed that the score would be 8.6, and I was right. I'm not really sure what that says about me, Pitchfork or Brad at this moment.
― MarkoP, Tuesday, 8 June 2021 15:50 (two years ago) link
sorry, i'm still on my old school pitchfork remembrance journey. the writing was definitely sometimes very bad - even as a teen i knew that some of them were like HS creative writing exercises. however, they were very frequently experimental, and i REALLY liked that as a kid. and sometimes - frequently, even - they were better than anything in the print outlets, even if they combined typos and if the writers weren't really pro critics. that's why i (and i suspect many) kept reading every single day for so many years.
pitchfork needs a new vertical for "the experiment zone". sure to be profitable for conde nastay
speaking of,
We aren’t on strike yet, but we will be picketing @CondeNast Chief Content Officer Anna Wintour’s block tomorrow. Join us at 6:30 P.M. at N.Y.U. Stern, and then we'll march over together. Solidarity! pic.twitter.com/gKOYl4ezBC— The New Yorker Union (@newyorkerunion) June 7, 2021
― Karl Malone, Tuesday, 8 June 2021 15:57 (two years ago) link
applicable to so many threads but gonna resist the urge to post this to the Spotify thread because I have discovered that people there are really, really protective of Joe Rogan's meal ticket for some reason
― Paul Ponzi, Tuesday, 8 June 2021 16:03 (two years ago) link
maybe using that quote to apply to a site that reviews music is a tad dramatic? again, i understand disliking p4k and disagreeing with its institutional opinions, but i don't really see the basis of a moral crusade here
― the mai tai quinn (voodoo chili), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 16:36 (two years ago) link
Pitchfork is a big windmill.
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 16:37 (two years ago) link
acting like writing a freelance review for pitchfork here and there - especially as the number of venue for serious rock writing continues to shrink - is like being a lawyer for monsanto or something is pretty weird
― Blues Guitar Solo Heatmap (Free Download) (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 16:41 (two years ago) link
https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/2771-the-eminem-show/
― Bongo Jongus, Tuesday, 8 June 2021 16:50 (two years ago) link
voodoo chili otm, Sagan was talking about science v. pseudoscience iirc ffs. but this thread has been locked in the same groove for years now, so I accept that posting at all is part of the problem
― rob, Tuesday, 8 June 2021 16:51 (two years ago) link
I, for one, am consistently entertained by this thread's shenanigans.
― pomenitul, Tuesday, 8 June 2021 16:53 (two years ago) link
is it time for threads on “people who complain about pitchfork are dumb” and “people how defend pitchfork are dumb”
Or maybe just a simple “people are dumb” thread and we can make every thread on the board redirect to it
― 80's hair metal , and good praise music ! (DJP), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 16:55 (two years ago) link
#onethread!!!!!
― mellon collie and the infinite bradness (BradNelson), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 16:55 (two years ago) link
When you're a dumber
xp
― pomenitul, Tuesday, 8 June 2021 16:56 (two years ago) link
xps turn that thread groove upside-down and it's motorik
― Karl Malone, Tuesday, 8 June 2021 16:57 (two years ago) link
someday people will collect threads like dead shows, and there will be this really infamous 2021 sequence that goes "pitchfork is dumb" --> "people are dumb" --> "you're dumb" --> "no you're dumb" --> "im dum"
― Karl Malone, Tuesday, 8 June 2021 16:58 (two years ago) link
― 80's hair metal , and good praise music ! (DJP),
US Politics June 2021 - "Where we're going, we don't NEED bipartisanship"
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 17:00 (two years ago) link
― Karl Malone,
when Holger Czukay joined for that one set iirc
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 8 June 2021 17:01 (two years ago) link
https://i.imgur.com/C9DvIex.gif
― Karl Malone, Tuesday, 8 June 2021 17:05 (two years ago) link