Missing the boat: maybe some critics overvalue certain musicians for fear of making the mistakes of their predecessors?

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This is strictly a devil's advocate sort of question. A lot of early rock music, girl-group stuff, punk rock, new wave, metal, dance, hip hop, disco etc. was dismissed early on, only to really be appreciated later on for its true quality. So out of fear of missing the boat and casually dismissing new acts without delving too deeply into them, are some acts now overpraised and overintellectualized when in fact there's nothing worth talking about in the music?

I'm not saying I believe this at all, but I'd be interested in hearing opinions/examples.

(I'm sure this question was posed the day these boards went up and probably every month since, but a perfunctory search didn't bring up anything.....sorry if I'm being repetitive)

― Gear! (Gear!), Tuesday, 27 January 2004 19:47 (twenty-two years ago)

I think some music writers are certainly looking for new bands to hype, or attach their names to bands/scenes they believe look promising - but on the whole, I'd say the opposite (critics dismissing bands before they break through) happens more often.

― dleone (dleone), Tuesday, 27 January 2004 19:51 (twenty-two years ago)

i dunno precisely how, but i've concluded that some rationale akin to that in this thread's header is the ONLY reason why Sigur Ros has gotten such a good critical reception.

― Eisbär (llamasfur), Tuesday, 27 January 2004 19:52 (twenty-two years ago)

I agree with that. Or dismissing bands until they're realized to be highly influential. I remember reading those Galaxie 500 reviews in the hopelessly awful Rolling Stone Record Guide, which assigned each of their albums 1 star. For some reason it can still be found in stores.

Great S-lab review BTW (if you're the same D Leone!)

― Gear! (Gear!), Tuesday, 27 January 2004 19:55 (twenty-two years ago)

star-hitching usually happens on pretty sly level.

― Huck Everlasting (Horace Mann), Tuesday, 27 January 2004 19:57 (twenty-two years ago)

Thanks, Gear.

― dleone (dleone), Tuesday, 27 January 2004 19:58 (twenty-two years ago)

Electroclash to thread!

― Jon Williams (ex machina), Tuesday, 27 January 2004 20:00 (twenty-two years ago)

Bootlegs to thread!

― scott seward (scott seward), Tuesday, 27 January 2004 20:00 (twenty-two years ago)

you know what though, i think fads and trends and hype can be kinda fun. or fun to watch anyway. sometimes silly, sometimes a trainwreck, but always entertaining. until it just keeps going and going and you want to kill somebody or yourself.

― scott seward (scott seward), Tuesday, 27 January 2004 20:02 (twenty-two years ago)

Electroclash to thread!

yup ... along with the 20-years-too-late lionization of numan, human league, et. al.

― Eisbär (llamasfur), Tuesday, 27 January 2004 20:03 (twenty-two years ago)

I like it when music crits (or any really, but certain music crits are especially bad for this) overcompensate for missing a boat by continuing to paddle furiously long after it's run aground.

― Huck Everlasting (Horace Mann), Tuesday, 27 January 2004 20:04 (twenty-two years ago)

i mean, reading about Iceland's Rock Revolution! can be kinda cute at first.

― scott seward (scott seward), Tuesday, 27 January 2004 20:05 (twenty-two years ago)

Ya gotta fill up those papers and magazines with SOMETHING. and journalism is all about angles.

― scott seward (scott seward), Tuesday, 27 January 2004 20:06 (twenty-two years ago)

until it just keeps going and going and you want to kill somebody or yourself

Isn't this what happens almost all the time? It's like one long passing of the trends, from a small group, to a larger one, to a larger one and then backlash.

― dleone (dleone), Tuesday, 27 January 2004 20:08 (twenty-two years ago)

I think it's kinda dumb to casually dismiss any scene, really. It wouldn't be a "scene" unless it was important to some people, so it's worth figuring out why.

― Mark (MarkR), Tuesday, 27 January 2004 20:10 (twenty-two years ago)

I often wonder when soon-to-be-forgotten rap acts are given the college-style essay treatment while the Russian Futurists are ignored so much they can't even get an allmusic.com entry.

― Gear! (Gear!), Tuesday, 27 January 2004 20:10 (twenty-two years ago)

Most people would be better critics if they didn't worry so much about being right.

― Tico Tico (Tico Tico), Wednesday, 28 January 2004 12:10 (twenty-two years ago)

iwww.adena.com/adena/ mo/ccjail.jpg

― Cyril Connolly (Enrique), Wednesday, 28 January 2004 12:14 (twenty-two years ago)

Most people would be better posters if they didn't worry so much about html.

― Enrique (Enrique), Wednesday, 28 January 2004 12:16 (twenty-two years ago)

Surely the best recent example was Oasis, whose actually-quite-good second album was savaged by critics. Many subsequently decided they'd got it embarrassingly wrong and extravagantly overpraised the atrocious third album to make sure they didn't get caught out twice.

― ArfArf, Wednesday, 28 January 2004 12:34 (twenty-two years ago)

Fear of missing the boat is the driving (unconscious?) force behind the critcal "appreciation" of Britney, Backstreet, NSync. Flash back to the knuckleheaded critics' debate of 1984: Cyndi Lauper vs. Madonna. Hence ten or fifteen years of overating Madge's every move by all the self-styled highbrows who couldn't initially stomach the material girl. Today's indie-rockers-turned-pop-pundits are scared to death they'll miss the boat on kids bop the same way their forebearers blew off new wave and synth pop. Loathing Britney Spears et al doesn't mean you hate all pop music -- just BAD pop music.

― keeftalent, Wednesday, 28 January 2004 15:43 (twenty-two years ago)

What he said.

― LondonLee (LondonLee), Wednesday, 28 January 2004 16:01 (twenty-two years ago)

Early Kylie was well praised at the time, "Motown of the eighties", etc.

No-one says that now...

― mark grout (mark grout), Wednesday, 28 January 2004 16:16 (twenty-two years ago)

kylie minogue - rhythm of love - her true masterpiece

― Tico Tico (Tico Tico), Wednesday, 28 January 2004 16:17 (twenty-two years ago)

http://www.toothpastefordinner.com/051303/writing-about-music.gif

― Stupid (Stupid), Wednesday, 28 January 2004 16:40 (twenty-two years ago)

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