pitchfork is dumb (#34985859340293849494 in a series.)

i didn't excerpt all the paragraph sized "anecdotes" about unknown musicians who have recently made it rich. Marc Hogan (and Pitchfork/Conde Nast) are effectively advising all of their young readers to buy crypto and NFTs, highlighting the rare cases where it did "work" for some shitty musician, and minimizing and downplaying all of the risk. Did Marc Hogan bother to interview one who thinks all of this is an awful idea? Does he know anyone that minted an NFT and totally failed? That might seem similar to the stories of millions of artists who have tried to sell something and failed. but the whole reason people (I) get worked up about NFTs and Crypto is because it is NOT just some mediocre piece of art that wasn't purchased, and lands in the basement storage soon later. The bare minimum of participation in NFT requires buying into the whole crypto mindset. You have to. That, alone, is not something to be minimized And god, if some person really likes your tacky art so much that they buy an NFT, then you're REALLY into crypto, at that point.

I read the entire article and the closing paragraph is definitely more of a shrug than an endorsement?

The only somewhat pro-NFT hook is “maybe artists will do more nonlinear or experimental things” but the idea that people without much of an interest in music at large are doing most of the buying/trading is pretty clear imo

full disclosure, I used to drink at the same bars as Marc and see him around

did he ow2n an ape?

mh....hmmm.... :)

Genuinely enjoy Hogan's writing, both articles and reviews. Haven't had a chance to read this one yet but a couple random NFT thoughts:

I have always thought the concept of singular pieces of music owned like a painting or a sculpture was bizarre, unless you are keen to buy a lesser work or from a lesser artist. There are probably some exceptions though: a reclusive and/or aging musician with a rabid fanbase (e.g., Jeff Mangum?), live renditions, "from the vault" type demos, etc.

the closing paragraph is a land-of-contrasts shrug because the author has no particular insight into any of this but had to write the article anyway in order to fill the space between banner ads for nfts

seemed like a decent round-up, although there were a few artists I've noticed that have been talking about this junk for a while who I'd like to have been included

honestly, it's all noise to me and a round-up of what's actually happening, who is doing this music NFT thing, and to what end, is useful

the answer (as addressed in the article) seems to be people who already have tons of money/exposure doing it as just another platform and people I haven't heard of doing one-off little experimental clips

I don't know that the attitude that this junk can't be covered in any non-critical way as an anti-crypto excess ethos is especially useful? I've mostly eschewed the recent vinyl mega-revival (buy your Taylor Swift album on vinyl at Target!) as mostly wasteful as my impression is that most people are buying these as aesthetic objects and not something to regularly play, which I've been guilty of to some extent. Music NFTs are so low-volume in the larger stakes and the genuinely grifty/grifted people who just want to buy and trade.. something.. are doing that regardless and if some musician wants to grab a slice of that, fuck it

legislate all power-intensive coin farms out of existence, though

as far as how this is changing art (artists making dashed-off pieces, endless versions of the same song with minor tweaks)--it is a bit interesting from a historical angle, but not more so than artists making albums with lots of short tracks to game the streaming revenue system, or all the other internety b.s.

I tend to read partway into any summary of the current music/internet experiment landscape before David Letterman's "Is This Anything?" bit starts wandering into my head

if an artist is into NFTs, i simply stop paying attention to them or their art. Holly and Mat were once friends-- now they're dead to me.

That's what's up

These are people who died, died
They all got into blockchain, and just died

also posted today (coincidentally I'm sure)

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/latasha-indie-artist-nft-cryptocurrency_n_62548388e4b0723f800fd92d

The 34-year-old is creating freedom in her music career through cryptocurrency and non-fungible tokens ― essentially unique digital assets (usually art), transmitted on a cryptocurrency blockchain, most popularly Ethereum. These NFTs are housed in the ever-evolving metaverse, a term The New York Times describes as a convergence of virtual reality and a digital second life.

After years of dealing with an industry that typically undervalues musicians, Latashá set out to become one of the first artists to publish her music videos to the blockchain as NFTs for others to purchase. As a result, she’s seen more success in the past year than she imagined possible.

She told HuffPost that she wants to share that knowledge with artists who are often disempowered.

“I really do believe that being the artist that I am right now, and in crypto, I’m finding a home for me,” Latashá said. “I push for women rappers to find space in crypto because I think they will really win here more than they ever have. And I know for so many women rappers, they dealt with trials. I don’t want to see that for artists anymore. I just want to see people in their wellness.”

Hooray for free enterprise

Summer Walker does a lot of tweets like this

Hey y'all! @SnakethereumCC, a dope new NFT project with exclusive holder benefits that has got me obsessed with the NFT space. Dey Rgiving away 1x Free #nft & 10x WL spots.

Follow @SnakethereumCC
RT & LIKE
Tag 2 friends
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#paidpromo pic.twitter.com/qxCtpsJNIW

— SUMMER WALKER (@IAMSUMMERWALKER) May 23, 2022

#paidpromo

If there's truly a "democratizing" aspect to it then I guess cool, but crypto/NFT is absolutely a "this is where I get off the train" moment for me personally (even in a professional context, i.e. my job, I grit my teeth when it comes up).

Don't you want to see people in their wellness though?

I'll catch their wellness avatars in the M3t4verse

in other news, i thought this was a good article.

https://pitchfork.com/features/article/the-woes-of-being-addicted-to-streaming-services/

lots of things are technically democratizing but uncool tbf

nfts are an obvious scam and someone at conde nast is looking for a little help fattening/legitimizing their "holdings." pfork's a useful idiot, but we knew that already.

I'm pretty fuckin cynical but I would wager that the "Music and Technology" week was not a top-down Conde imperative to sell NFTs and probably just an idea to make the incredibly boring world of modern music look interesting.

The ads are for Amazon TV show Night Sky, which my have prompted some tech synergy but I'm not going to look up what Amazon TV show Night Sky is about

sissy spacek! j.k. simmons!

not a top-down Conde imperative to sell NFTs

agreed. they just got nfts out of the way first because they're obviously the dumbest.

let's see how the week unfolds.

problem with these music and tech pieces is they're largely fairly banal or even outright stupid if you pay any attention to the tech world - NFTs are a tiny niche that absolutely aren't the future of music or going to have any sort of impact on how music sounds more broadly and uncritically hyping them up is very irresponsible, and the "metaverse" probably doesn't mean too much for music right now because it's not a coherent concept yet, just some fragmented things a marketing buzzword is trying to tie together

The Cure Wish retro review was trite and poorly written, I thought. And the rating about double what it should be.

Really? I thought it was fine and needed saying.

I thought it was good (I don’t know the album).

I guess I just dislike the record a lot, but the potted-history felt like the writer had a quick flip thru the discography and a few articles rather than knowing the band and its oeuvre. And “Any one song from these records has enough character, vision, and atmosphere to spawn the careers of five entirely new bands”? Please. I finally bailed at “dark, artsy music”.

It was the brief history of the band as seen from the vantage point of the immediate post-Wish comedown. Bit confusing to follow and plenty of cliches to be found, however if all you know is Disintegration or "Just Like Heaven" it serves as a fine context-provider for the album.

(Agree the rating is too high.)

Wish >>>> Disintegration

but I'm an outlier, therefore the rating makes sense

It’s refreshing to see one of these Sunday reviews that jumps right into taking about the album, instead of detailing each band member’s first experience touching an instrument etc.

Alfred as much as I respect your knowledge and taste, I'm one of "those" Cure fans

idk that score is about what i'd have expected considering its place in the cure's discography

i'd put it just a little lower but i don't tend to rate cure albums that highly

Same. They recorded no "masterpieces" or whatever but every album b/w 1979 and 1992 has great songs, some more than others

Have long considered Disintegration overrated and even then, rating it below Wish makes me chuckle.

Will say this: as implied in the review, the b-sides from Wish are *easily* their best. Some of them are better than 80% of Disintegration.

Bit disappointed this review completely overlooked Mixed Up; surely that was an indicator that things were reaching terminal velocity?

the b-sides from Wish are *easily* their best.

I had to change my shorts in July 2016 when they played "This Twilight Garden" in the first 40 minutes.

https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/the-cure-wish/ fwiw

I’ll be basic and say “Disintegration” is their best album. That said I don’t think I’d rate it higher than 8.

Pornography, The Head on the Door and Faith are all 10s. But this seems to be about killing your idols so carry on.

*Ott siren*

*yelling above siren* I loved Disintegration when it came out but now find it pretty dull, excepting "Plainsong", "Lovesong" and "Untitled". Remain pretty fanatical about everything up to HOTD.

i'm totally basic and still think disintegration is the best album ever

some people think it is too long or some of the songs are bad; i argue that the length actually succeeds in making it feel deeper and denser, particularly in the way it's paced, starting off with impressionistically-formed pop songs which steadily warp into something way more gnarled and disturbed and by the time you hit the "prayers for rain"/"same deep water as you" stretch you feel like you've wandered so far into the record you'll never find your way out again. title track ironically refocuses things just as the mood of the record is at its most broken. "homesick" is an expression of desperation and denial, "untitled" one of reluctant, realistic acceptance. idk it's just so beautifully constructed, a big goth pool shrouded in mist and surrounded by exotic plants and i can't resist sinking into it. helps that every song is great i must admit

this is a ridiculous place, where i feel like i need to write a post defending disintegration

disintegration is their best

sometimes "prayers for rain"/"the same deep water as you" can be too much at times but if you're in the mood then they really really work

"last dance" is inessential but not bad, that's the extent of my complaints

I surrender and agree

as for Wish, though …

Wish and Disintegration are not far apart. Wish is refreshing, poppier, slightly excessive, in continuity with Disintegration and basking in its glory at the same time as it's in its shadow with lesser heights and consistency. I return to Wish more often for some reason, so I'm not shocked anyone prefers it to Disintegration, and I still think "From the Edge" is among their best songs. If the Cure wrote a masterpiece album, it's definitely Disintegration, though I value all their classic albums almost equally.

That's about as evocative a defense as I've read, Brad. Good read.

idk Disintegration was the first Cure album I bought at time of release, found it a drag ("Lovesong" still leaves me cold), then worked my way backward to THOTD and Kiss Me and thought, whoa, okay, I get them now. And these days I accept how fully Disintegration provides an immersive experience. Generally, though, "Sinking" earlier and "To Wish Impossible Things" handle the hothouse despair more succinctly for those of us who get that succinctness isn't the point for Disintegration's admirers.