OK, is this the worst piece of music writing ever?

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I'm losing my edge.
I'm losing my edge.
I can hear the footsteps every night on the decks.
But I was there.
I was there at the first indie rock thread on ILM.
I was there when the noize piece hit pitas.
I was there.

wat is teh waht (s.clover), Friday, 4 April 2014 18:32 (ten years ago) link

ground zero poptimist manifesto: http://freakytrigger.co.uk/ft/2000/01/do-you-feel-real-and-if-so-id-like-to-know/

in retrospect less a disciplinary matrix than a consultant's quadrant chart, but nonetheless...

wat is teh waht (s.clover), Friday, 4 April 2014 18:37 (ten years ago) link

who ever dares to try to put a stick in poptimism's whirring spokes
Don't know about sticks, but there a might have been a baseball card here and there.

Tompall Tudor (James Redd and the Blecchs), Friday, 4 April 2014 18:56 (ten years ago) link

Sorry, rounders.

Tompall Tudor (James Redd and the Blecchs), Friday, 4 April 2014 18:56 (ten years ago) link

That NYT piece is like a bunch of people who hate pop and want to keep it in its critically-reviled box having their very own "Feminism? That's all very well and good, but what about men? Where's the men's rights movement, eh, eh, eh?" moment.

oh, boy, .GIF! That's where I'm a Viking! (edwardo), Friday, 4 April 2014 19:01 (ten years ago) link

pop music is not feminism

coops all on coops tbh (crüt), Friday, 4 April 2014 19:28 (ten years ago) link

Yes, that's exactly what I meant in that sentence. Definitely.

oh, boy, .GIF! That's where I'm a Viking! (edwardo), Friday, 4 April 2014 19:33 (ten years ago) link

yep

coops all on coops tbh (crüt), Friday, 4 April 2014 19:34 (ten years ago) link

true but I don't think it's a coincidence that the description of critics he uses are shrill cheerleaders who shout. (liking speedy ortiz doesn't negate this)

katherine, Friday, 4 April 2014 19:51 (ten years ago) link

This article reads like an elaborate self-justification which in the writer's heart of hearts he knows is wrong.

Tim F, Friday, 4 April 2014 21:10 (ten years ago) link

Scott Seward Greenfield Ma 1 hour ago
If you are young and considering writing about music for fun or profit, read this piece very carefully. AND THEN NEVER WRITE LIKE THIS. Or think like this, if you can help it. Think harder and listen to a LOT of music. All kinds. From every era. And read a ton. Anything you can get your hands on. Read and listen as much as humanly possible. Listen closely. REALLY listen. Inspiration can come from the most unlikely places.

scott seward, Saturday, 5 April 2014 04:17 (ten years ago) link

i couldn't help myself...

scott seward, Saturday, 5 April 2014 04:17 (ten years ago) link

UM, is that freakytrigger essay Sterling posted like widely read and acknowledged and/or anything? it says "457 views" and it is really crazy and great and I wish I'd read it ten years ago, five years ago, or yesterday

poopsites attract (flamboyant goon tie included), Saturday, 5 April 2014 05:26 (ten years ago) link

FT migrated from one place to another - Blogger to Wordpress iirc- a few years ago, and a few of us copied everything across, article by article. The hits count you see there today means the hits since then; I don't know that anyone bothered to make a note of the figures for hits up to that point. If I happen across an obtuse shepherd I'll ask.

Tim, Saturday, 5 April 2014 10:48 (ten years ago) link

I've inwardly made a ???-face any time Lex has talked about "realness" :( I wish I'd read that essay first

poopsites attract (flamboyant goon tie included), Saturday, 5 April 2014 12:50 (ten years ago) link

Only 457 people read freakytrigger but all of them etc. etc.

ביטקוין‎ (Hurting 2), Saturday, 5 April 2014 17:18 (ten years ago) link

lol scott

have a nice blood/orange bitters cocktail (mh), Saturday, 5 April 2014 17:20 (ten years ago) link

B-b-but...

Tompall Tudor (James Redd and the Blecchs), Saturday, 5 April 2014 17:22 (ten years ago) link

re the FT post, now it's 804 views :-D

and yeah, the counter started from zero at some point after migrating to WP which was many years after it was first published - so it's languished in the blogging long tail. gonna promote it to our front page 'featured posts' for a bit.

Britain's Obtusest Shepherd (Alan), Saturday, 5 April 2014 18:12 (ten years ago) link

i'm glad someone agrees with me...

https://twitter.com/benratliff

scott seward, Saturday, 5 April 2014 19:02 (ten years ago) link

thumbs_up_mr_natural_smiley.jpg

Tompall Tudor (James Redd and the Blecchs), Saturday, 5 April 2014 19:04 (ten years ago) link

I'm a big

Tim, Saturday, 5 April 2014 23:19 (ten years ago) link

It's true that I am a big. But why I, or my trousers, chose to make that clear on this thread is not obvious. As you were.

Tim, Saturday, 5 April 2014 23:29 (ten years ago) link

Your big big pants

Ned Raggett, Sunday, 6 April 2014 02:43 (ten years ago) link

Who will be the 1000th reader of that piece. There should be a prize, anyone has 20p to spare?

The poptimism 'oh where has it gone?' discussion and that NPR blog sorta mesh into one.

Certainly -- this is waayy back in the day -- ILM had pop as driver for posts and discussion but also an openness to everything on the margins and beyond, which is why there are threads on any pop group, indie group or Robert Ashley and the like in new answers. This is a good thing, despite all the fragmentation that has always been there.

What hasn't happened is that its never been an environment where non-experts -- i.e. people that like music but don't have record collections could come in and talk about it with not even that much of a commitment or stake in it. So an equivalent of NPR person could not post here, would get shouted at and would probably go away.

Yes it was changing the discourse but also to include a wider set of attitudes and expertise. It could only grow with others, and in that sense it was a disaster.

xyzzzz__, Sunday, 6 April 2014 12:37 (ten years ago) link

a few non-experts have worked on their expertise tbf, and a few are still proudly non-experts :D

halber mensch halber keks (imago), Sunday, 6 April 2014 12:47 (ten years ago) link

'experts' needs to be more fully defined. Its just as much about non-listening or talking about a time when you loved music and now don't, for example. I think there are a few of those on 'Popular', where a new fashion/scene came in and something in them 'broke'. But something is there, a desire to participate and talk, not least because you are surrounded by people in your daily life that still listen and feel importance.

xyzzzz__, Sunday, 6 April 2014 13:13 (ten years ago) link

i shared that fake-real taxonomy with some friends last night and they seemed very convinced. a million views by sundown.

Merdeyeux, Sunday, 6 April 2014 14:00 (ten years ago) link

Merdeyeux and his Million Mates

robocop ELF (seandalai), Sunday, 6 April 2014 15:09 (ten years ago) link

"its never been an environment where non-experts -- i.e. people that like music but don't have record collections could come in and talk about it with not even that much of a commitment or stake in it"

Totally disagree, that describes me to a tee and I love ILM, even post in it some.

Guayaquil (eephus!), Sunday, 6 April 2014 23:43 (ten years ago) link

what the shit is that NYT piece

i should be glad i was offline all weekend, right?

have you all killed austerlitz yet?

lex pretend, Monday, 7 April 2014 15:08 (ten years ago) link

The narcissism of small differences there is bizarre. I could understand if he was a classic rock bore but his Pazz & Jop ballot includes Sky Ferreira, MIA, Daft Punk and Haim (the last two being poptimist hotbed ILM's top single and album of 2013) so I don't even know why he's pissed off. He likes Sky and Haim but not Lorde or Icona Pop? You can't squeeze an argument into a gap that narrow.

What is wrong with songs? Absolutely nothing. Songs are great. (DL), Monday, 7 April 2014 15:22 (ten years ago) link

he likes guitars

have a nice blood/orange bitters cocktail (mh), Monday, 7 April 2014 15:23 (ten years ago) link

he doesn't care
he loves it

I made a grave mistake with my balloon at the end (forksclovetofu), Monday, 7 April 2014 16:11 (ten years ago) link

lol

some dude, Monday, 7 April 2014 16:19 (ten years ago) link

I am a proud expert on every subject i discuss on ilx

très hip (Treeship), Monday, 7 April 2014 16:53 (ten years ago) link

lol

waterbabies (waterface), Monday, 7 April 2014 16:53 (ten years ago) link

My guess is he thinks Sky and Haim "transcend" pop through craft and emotion, whereas the others are generic or mercenary or shallow or something.

good and relaxing like akon dont matter (intheblanks), Monday, 7 April 2014 17:18 (ten years ago) link

hey likes frank ocean too so it can't just be guitars

Raptain Chillips (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Monday, 7 April 2014 17:21 (ten years ago) link

This pop, R&B and hip hop is fine but that stuff, oh dear me no, I need to write a NYT essay about the cultural poison of people who like that.

What is wrong with songs? Absolutely nothing. Songs are great. (DL), Monday, 7 April 2014 17:34 (ten years ago) link

Ok this article was kind of bad but you guys are strawmanning the shit out of it.

ביטקוין‎ (Hurting 2), Monday, 7 April 2014 18:40 (ten years ago) link

Like I don't think he's taking issue with any particular artist being written about/voted for, he's just arguing the balance overall has shifted in a direction he doesn't exactly like.

ביטקוין‎ (Hurting 2), Monday, 7 April 2014 18:59 (ten years ago) link

It's not strawmanning. I'm genuinely confused by it. If critics of mainstream pop were giving it a free pass or neglecting other kinds of music - music's equivalent to The Great Beauty - he would have a case but they're not, and Rolling Stone/MOJO/Uncut still exist to celebrate the rock canon, as do commenters like this:

Unfortunately since May 12, 1972, the release date of Exile on Main Street, there has been precious little music in the rock genre that would qualify as art, London Calling and Nevermind being glorious exceptions.

Or this guy:

more like ploptimism

As with all polemics it only makes sense if you name names instead of blaming some nebulous army of poptimists (especially confusing as he respects arch-poptimist Jody Rosen)

What is wrong with songs? Absolutely nothing. Songs are great. (DL), Monday, 7 April 2014 19:19 (ten years ago) link

I'm confused wrt his mention of The National, who're about as far from a "serious rock band" as I can imagine, neither serious-as-in-academic nor rock (I think of them as a pop band with rock signifiers, like Interpol, and, as I mentioned on Facebook, the National fans I know are or would-also-be fans of Haim and Sky).

poopsites attract (flamboyant goon tie included), Monday, 7 April 2014 19:42 (ten years ago) link

I mean if it was all a preamble to a base-hit for Zs I wouldn't feel the same confusion/horror

poopsites attract (flamboyant goon tie included), Monday, 7 April 2014 19:44 (ten years ago) link

looks like an old fashioned case of someone's very specific personal opinion being assumed to have universal pertinence. The pile of (by NYT Mag standards) semi-obscure band namedropping in the final dozen-or-so paragraphs strikes me as a sign of an author that may have realized the idea wasn't standing fully erect by essay's end.

I made a grave mistake with my balloon at the end (forksclovetofu), Monday, 7 April 2014 19:45 (ten years ago) link

Don't the National have the super earnest U2 thing going on though?

brimstead, Monday, 7 April 2014 19:45 (ten years ago) link

I think The Naitonal is definitely serious-as-in=academic. Bryce Dessner composes for the Kronos Quartet, among many other contemporary classical things

good and relaxing like akon dont matter (intheblanks), Monday, 7 April 2014 19:54 (ten years ago) link


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