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

Argh, nu-ilx has shrunk it slightly past readable; here's a direct link - http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v236/njsouthall/Screengrabs/onsellingoutexepose.jpg

I just boggled at this over my lunch.

"Jonny" is a name for gaywads

This only proves again that editors and writers are two different professions. Hence the two names.

You are actually posting a scan of an article from a student newspaper as the basis for a thread, aren't you? Good lord.

It's a screengrab from the pdf off the website! They didn't have a normal text version...

can you link to the website? photobucket seems to be banned here.

http://www.exepose.ex.ac.uk

goes from strength to strength -- feeder mention is possibly the high point.

System of a Down's top 20 single was six and a half years ago, fact fans.

"Recent developments in music have given Architechs a top 5 single"

surely this can't be THE jonny garrett?

http://www.myspace.com/chasingfaces

(yeah, they have a myspace already, the sellouts)

I suspect it must be, StanM.

I assume, from their name that they like Snow Patrol and The Small Faces.

um, holding up articles by students as examples of 'bad music writing'? talk about shooting fish in a barrel. Matt DC OTM.

Following in the footsteps of West Country acts like Muse and Thirteen Senses by already winning over interest from various major and independent record labels, things are definitely looking good for the boys. Having recently been asked to support New Zealand favourites The Checks who have just finished touring with the likes of JET and Oasis.

"I know someone who knows someone who knows the guy from Young Heart Attack quite well"

blueski and Matt DC offtm, this is the new web2.0 media era, we're all critics now, user provided content is the new professionally written content.

Even in the realm of student media this is BAAAAAAAAD though, Steve - I flick through Exepose every week and this is BY FAR the worst thing I've ever seen in it; hence not starting a thread every week.

Haha I used to write for that paper. I wonder how long before he Googles his own name and finds it.

It would be so wonderful if he googled this thread and responded. What an utterly thrilling discussion and exchange of views that could lead to.

Hey, with any luck he might hop over to ILE and start posting about his sex life or something.

(my question: is the article motivated by his own band possibly signing to a major soon?)

Maybe I should unleash the views of Chris Erasmus at you all?

Haha, yeah, I'd imagine so, StanM.

Hello Jonny's mom! No, he hasn't posted about his sex life yet. Try again later. Bye, ILX.

blueski and Matt DC offtm, this is the new web2.0 media era, we're all critics now, user provided content is the new professionally written content.

-- Dom Passantino, Monday, 18 June 2007 12:36 (11 minutes ago) Link

Dom is entirely correct here. I mean, the chuckle factor is diminished by him being a student, but the democratization of criticism basically leaves us with this sort of landscape (coughcoughP.E.W.cough).

also why do nearly all student newspaper writers write in what feels like the same voice? there's certain syntax and word choices that only student newspapers ever seem to have.

Nobody knows how to sub-edit when they're 21, that's why.

^^not unrelated to why writers in the say, New York Times tend to sound the same. for that matter, ever read Blender? Despite the bylines it seems to be written by one many-armed poprockbot.

that really is quite incredible.

New York Times doesn't have sub-editors? That's crazy!

Hey Jonny, your band fucking suck.

Jonny Garrett of Exeter University, that is.

I think you mean <a href="OK, is this the worst piece of music writing ever?;>Jonny Garrett</a> of Exeter University.

BOO HTML

Kudos on sticking it to Westlife, tho, Jonny Garrett of Exeter University. Those bastards have had it their own way for too long.

Does Westlife even exist anymore?

highlights:

"...bands like westlife who can, quite frankly, go screw themselves with a rusty spoon and get tetanus"

"had nirvana not signed to sub pop... we would probably never have heard one of the most influential artists of our time and dave grohl may have never founded the foo fighters."

the pathos!

but the democratization of criticism basically leaves us with this sort of landscape (coughcoughP.E.W.cough).

democratization of criticism = people slagging this shit off just because they can rather than for any constructive cause. it's just easy target practice, who gives a shit? no-one/nothing is ever going to stop under-grads inheriting these absurd ideas about 'how things should be' in the music industry. surely we've all read this same article many times in the past.

i'm just more relieved than ever my music writing from college days was too soon for blog-era internet heh.

"had nirvana not signed to sub pop... we would probably never have heard of..." Sub Pop.

Was there ever a thread for people to post their own abysmal juvenile music writings from uni days?

Not that I'd post on it, my capsule reviews of Kinesis singles were all fuckin bang-on.

perhaps one day i will post my 8/10 track by track review of 'Be Here Now' from the time.

Yeah, you real writers are all jealous that you've lost the ability to write like that, aren't you?

I wrote a two-part article in my uni paper called "Rhythm & Sound", which basically stated that all rock music that's based on melody or lyrics is boring crap, and that beats and sound are the essential components of good music - hence electronic dance music (and fusion jazz) is the best music there is. I got some angry comments from the indie kids.

Kudos on sticking it to Westlife, tho, Jonny Garrett of Exeter University.

and kudos to you lot for bravely and relentlessly going after such a signifivcant target as jonny garrett. sure showed him!

ts being one of many thick students w/ bad music taste who can't write, vs being someone who actually gives a shit about what said student writes in some minor student rag

or, matt'n'steve otm, u r all losers

but the democratization of criticism basically leaves us with this sort of landscape (coughcoughP.E.W.cough).

student newspapers have nothing to do with the "democratization of criticism"

I can't copy and paste from the Exeter Expose, but if you Google you can find a review where our Jonny talks about "Indy music".

also why do nearly all student newspaper writers write in what feels like the same voice? there's certain syntax and word choices that only student newspapers ever seem to have.

paul please, please tell me you don't actually care about the answer to this

I like getting a peek behind the curtain and seeing the failupwardsons that run everything now and how little they bring to the table in terms of ideas and how their one ideological move is always meritocracy which is refuted by their own existence

Last September, the rapper Killer Mike was DJing hip-hop classics like Snoop Dogg’s Ain’t No Fun at a music festival afterparty in Louisville, Kentucky. “The inspiration for the night’s set is freedom of speech, so say what the fuck you want!” he told a crowd of hundreds. Killer Mike, half of the duo Run the Jewels, is known for speaking out against police brutality and racial injustice, as well as campaigning for Bernie Sanders.

But this night’s set was co-sponsored by Stand Together Music, an organization backed by the libertarian billionaire Charles Koch, who made his fortune in fossil fuels. Other sponsors of the party included the free-speech group Fire (which has received millions of dollars in contributions from the Charles G Koch charitable foundation), as well as the music outlet Spin, an official partner of Stand Together Music.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/dec/07/koch-family-stand-together-music

lmao that suuuucks

I feel bad for the section editor, who presumably / hopefully cringed the whole way through that process, starting when Bob messaged one day and was like "This is the best rap record in decades, I'll write about it for album of the year!" ... and from that point there was no stopping it.

Maybe it didn't go that way, but you can picture it.

Banging Left posts

Enthusiasts of this style may appreciate Charles Lyons-Burt, who "covers the government contracting industry by day and culture by night." Certainly his eye-watering takes on contemporary hip-hop and rap albums capture the vibe and hustle of government contracting.
https://www.slantmagazine.com/author/clyonsburt/

I'm putting this Zachary Lipez essay about Pitchfork here because, while he makes some decent if obvious points, his prose style fills me with an unquenchable thirst for blood. I haaaaate this style of 21st century knowitall in-joke rockwritin', because it presumes an audience that gets all the references while bemoaning the fact that nobody reads this shit. I mean, maybe there's a connection between those two things?

You mean stuff like this:

At the end of January, overnight, with only eight years of buildup, Pitchfork went from being “The Most Trusted Voice in Music” to being as trusted as a big butt and a smile; with a reduced staff of Jeremy Larson +1 sharing a basement cubicle with Graydon Carter’s wig, the desiccated mummy of the last Details coverboy, and a spec script for a Ghostbusters remake where Bill Murray plays all the characters and is in a May/December relationship with a Japanese girlfriend.

^ i didn't understand a word of that fwiw

AI prompt: Try too hard to be clever. Humorous hip artsy movie voice narration.

in-joke rockwritin', because it presumes an audience that gets all the references while bemoaning the fact that nobody reads this shit. I mean, maybe there's a connection between those two things?

completely agree with you here -- relying on references to communicate a point is (at least part of) why no one wants to read music writing. i don't necessarily think it's a 21st c thing but it's def a music writing thing. not a fan!!

Only so much can be gleaned from chatter picked up by hanging out at the Fishbone “Party at Ground Zero” Mall which stands across the street from P4K headquarters like a giant memorial food court. And there are limits to how much fruit a holiday text from one of Ryan Schreiber’s ex coke dealers might bear. But even an observer as disconnected as this writer received emails containing theories. These theories ranged from site-appropriate conspiracies of an inside job—with the role of the Mossad being played by ex-Fader types bearing grudges—to the possibility of Pitchfork being hurt by a refusal to give special preference to artists/publicists important to other Condé Nast publications. The occasional middling review of Eurovision pablum and diaristic nepo-babies may seem like no big deal to peasants like you or I, but managers and publicists act on their own peculiar morality. Ron Laffitte has been indie rock’s monied whipping boy for twenty-five long years and maybe a 6.2 for Gracie Abrams was the final straw. Theory mongering, in this case, bears the pellucidity of old Pavement lyrics.

As well the theories should. For most analysts’ purposes, a love for Demolition Plot J-7 was enough. You don’t bring tequila to an Irish wake.

maybe he's going for early p4k style?

i hate that writing not just because it presupposes the reader gets the references but also because it seems like a cover for saying nothing new whatsoever, and just trying to say it with style and not even a good style.

pretty funny that he positions himself as someone who might not otherwise be told theories about what's going on in the music writing world. feel like that is not really the case

I like it, but I've been accused of doing hipster Dennis Miller schtick on this very site, so ymmv

Also, it's a Substack

Lester Bangs was a malign influence

lol people pay for this insight, then

Also, it's a Substack

No, no; our boy has moral objections to Substack. He publishes on Ghost.

I was just gonna say - that stuff reads like Knock-Off Whiney to me. (Whiney's works, imo. ZL's doesn't.)

i like some of the music he digs up, but his tweets are at least half eye-rolls

that's like someone's blog. that doesn't count for me. you can write anything on your own space.

jeez louise no fair bringing whiney into this. he's a real riter.

i couldn't really read much of that thing above though. i think i'm just getting old.

i went looking for some old thing on google last night and i saw the very first rock review i ever wrote (for the VV) and it came out 25 years ago this month!! i felt like graydon carter's dessicated mummy or whatever. where does the time go.....

xpost i know, but Lipez is a real writer, too. i'm not just comparing Whiney to a guy with a blog ... although yes, he wrote this on his blog, or newsletter, or whatever it is.

Yeah, Lipez writes for zombie Creem. Which I haven't read, but I hope he's got someone reining him in a little bit more over there.

The phrase "hipper-than-thou" was coined for this sort of prose voice...

And there are limits to how much fruit a holiday text from one of Ryan Schreiber’s ex coke dealers might bear.

srsly our whiney would never. this is very bad. the guy is bad with prepositions, doesn't know the requirements of metaphor, actually writes "pellucidity."

Men like deBoer tend to be glib about aspects of culture which are fascinating when taken seriously and they tend to be humorless about the absurd.

this is a good line

I think I got two paragraphs in and then had to tap out.

(And, yes, I got the references! But this writing style is insufferable.)

<q>And there are limits to how much fruit a holiday text from one of Ryan Schreiber’s ex coke dealers might bear

srsly our whiney would never. this is very bad. the guy is bad with prepositions, doesn't know the requirements of metaphor, actually writes "pellucidity."<q/>

argh!

was gonna say, dude also seems to think that coke grows on trees....

he calls out coke snorting like a homophobe does gay sex

he's good re deBoer

The 'Ex-Fader as Mossad' dig seems to be directed to Will Welch, the GQ EIC. That's all I got lol

I understand the hate, but I enjoyed the piece, despite his reliance on coke jokes. It was a funny, ranty, know-it-all blog post and in that sense it Made me feel nostalgic lol

I was just like “Dennis Miller has a music blog now?”

https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/1JoAAOSwQjFlNDpe/s-l960.jpg

lmao

Before it closed, the Fun Factory arcade in Redondo Beach still had tons of talking Dennis Miller dolls the last time I was there

One of those guys where it's like "what the hell happened to you?" He was really great on SNL and if you watch a lot of old reruns, it's easy to see why he was considered the gold standard for Weekend Update for so long. In some ways, I think he was everything Charles Rocket's Weekend Update shtick hoped to be and failed to be, but even better, and he sort of did it accidentally. There's an early Letterman interview (maybe two seasons into his time at SNL) where amazingly he discusses how he really didn't address real news as standup material until Lorne Michaels hired him specifically to anchor Weekend Update - so from that point on, he really had to do his homework to keep up with politics and world events. I've seen him claim 9/11 changed him (maybe the way it changed Ron Silver) and I've seen Al Franken claim he has NOT changed, that he was always more of a libertarian with as many conservative tendencies as liberal ones. But based on the visual evidence, it's mind-boggling to see him suck up to a nitwit like George W. Bush while savaging Reagan for his intellectual shortcomings.

"The Blinders’ latest album, ‘Beholder’, offers a darkly romantic odyssey that sees the Doncaster-born band, now sporting an expanded new line-up, reaching new heights. Capturing the raw energy of the band’s debut, it takes that spark and sends it soaring into more adventurous and cinematic territories.

With a richer, more layered sound that still retains that punch they made their own, there’s a newfound unpredictability that adds an exhilarating edge. But it’s ‘Nocturnal Skies’ that stands out, a testament to the band’s ability to craft a powerful, emotive song that resonates long after the last note has faded.

This is The Blinders at their most ambitious and confident, a band that has embraced their darkness and turned it into something truly captivating."

https://readdork.com/albums/the-blinders-beholder/

No shade meant to you, irrational, actually more of a thank you, as I was lost in my Cali election work, thus was unable to do much music reading this past week. Dork was totally right about The Blinders' new alb. Hell yeah!

https://www.vox.com/culture/24099908/justin-timberlake-everything-i-thought-it-was-britney-scandal-forgiveness

why

Now, after years away from the spotlight (and one Instagram apology), Timberlake is releasing a new album titled Everything I Thought It Was. So far, its lead single (“Selfish”) and promotional track (“Drown”) point to a more mellow, R&B-lite direction for the singer — with the exception of the gospel-flavored song “Sanctified,” which previewed on Saturday Night Live. And the album’s artwork, influenced by 1971’s Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory and Federico Fellini’s masterpiece 8 ½, hints at an emphasis on visuals.

why

His third record saw a softer, more romantic side of Timberlake, with sultry serenades that reflected his personal life, including his marriage to actress Jessica Biel. His newfound maturity was best represented in the album’s blockbuster single “Mirrors,” which — despite its arguably narcissistic lyrics — signified his commitment to monogamy.

Unfortunately for Timberlake, he would experience a significant fall from grace in the following years, both as an artist and as a wife guy.

whyyyyyyyyyyyyy

Music writing basically just summaries social media these days

summarizes I mean

Summaries
Make me feel fine
Blowin' thru the Justin in my mind

a wife guy

pretty fly for a wife guy

Summaries
Make me feel fine
Blowin' thru the Justin in my mind