A Paler Shade of White---Sasha Frere-Jones Podcast and New Yorker article Criticizing Indie Rock for Failing to Incorporate African-American Influences

isn't that why SFJ writes for them in the first place?

haha but they should know panda bear, right?
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i mean i thought the whole idea is that he was presenting a cliffs notes version of hipster culture for those that purchase mont blanc fountain pens and expensive watches

"hip hop culture referencing indie: Cocorosie

Drew what you trying to start, total war?

-- J0hn D., Tuesday, October 16, 2007 3:02 AM (6 minutes ago) Bookmark Link"

see what I did there?

i guess what i'm saying is, he has to use the big easy examples (Arcade Fire, Wilco) in a piece like this, so his audience will "get" his point. . .either that or he didn't include LCD because he knew it would really undercut his point, which would really suck I guess.

indie is wicked white tho - even if there is lcd soundsystem and whatnot

but no one really cares right

see what I did there?

I kiss you so hard it leaves bruises

indie IS wicked white, but i think the point is that the "issue" deserves a better article than this

mostly he's probably just trying to figure our why so much of it is so boring

discloser: did not read article

i hestitated saying "the problem" because it strands me in the same mire sfj is in, i.e. WHY is it a problem that indie is so wicked white, i.e. the thing we never find out, other than that three hours of indie rock leaves sfj feeling tired and old

i think we should blame the arcade fire for making him write this article.

He's written a piece on LCD in the last couple of years, or at least on "Losing My Edge".

and the new yorker's fiction sucks ass

u go q

http://www.newyorker.com/arts/reviews/recordings/2007/03/26/070326gore_GOAT_recordings_frerejones

"About five years ago, indie rockers began to rediscover the pleasures of rhythm."

-SF/J

i mean of all his examples of "miscengenation" prince is the only one that really stood out for the fact that i get so many different...things from his music. rock and funk and dance-pop and whatever. as "funky" as the stones and zeppelin are, and as much as that funk contrbutes to the quality of their music, i still turn to them because they "rock," even if that funk allows them to rock in a more supple (and therefore even more rocking?) manner. i think its idiocy to start earnestly comparing them to james brown.

i stopped subscribing - i mean i love factiods but i dont really need a whole magazine full

hahaha mark for the win. lock thread. go home. nothing to see here.

who's that french chanteuse he creems his jeans over all the time?
i guess chicks can sound white in sasha's world.

lol its from march

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In regards to his discussion of "racial sensitivity" I keep thinking about Yo La Tengo and others embracing avante-jazz. Is it easier to play such sounds and not have folks questioning how well you swing or sing (I think this has been discussed on ILX before), than other African-American styles or do the band members of such groups merely gravitate musically to such genres--yea I know that Ira Kaplan was a critic and djs on WFMU etc.). But on the other hand others have embraced and incorporated current popular African-American approaches with varying degrees of success apparently without worrying as much about 'racial sensitivity' (Eminem, uh Maroon 5, even, ugh, jam band Galactic).

Maybe he sees LCD more as a "Dahnce" act than one that incorporates African-American sounds. If Vampire Weekend were not based in NY would they get a quarter of the attention they've gotten?

Oops, great find Mark.

I mean, given that we all agree that indie bands such as Battles, Vampire Weekend, CocoRosie, etc do have some elements of black music, I think the question he's really pussyfooting around with this whole piece is more "Why do we STILL have boring, revisionist, funkless Leave It Beaver bullshit bands like Arcade Fire and Band Of Horses and Clap Your Hands and Hold Steady when everyone has such easy access to such diverse music?"

Splintering of the market. Each niche of music need only do one thing. It doesn't have to appeal to a huge swath of people.

It blows my mind that people still get excited by regular rock bands, but my Sandinista was Pork Soda, so what the fuck do I know?

my Sandinista was Pork Soda

worst lunchbox ever

Nitpicky point: "Grizzly Bear has no relation to black music" As evidenced by the their cover of "He Hit Me (It Felt Like A Kiss)" that they've been doing all year?

a sandwichnista and pork soda

I think an important thing w/ a lot of the "white" bands that he mentions is that they seem anti-technology, old-fashioned, and perhaps more authentic to some people because of that. Contemporary associations with hip-hop and r&b now are a far cry from the Isley Brothers and the Meters. People associate these genres now with technology and celebrity culture. So for people looking for something removed from that, a lot of these bands fit the bill.

No, it's because indie rockers are to intimidated to "take on Snoop, one of the most naturally gifted vocalists of the day"

i agree w/sfj that these bans are often tedious

I don't want to be a grump.

I'm really glad he's saying a lot of the stuff he's saying here, even if I disagree with a lot of his examples.

the problem is that he's tried to shoehorn what really needs to be a book into a short magazine article and so no wonder it's glib and contradictory but who's honestly gonna pay for a book blah blah

yeah, ask frank kogan ;_;

i like arcade fire :)

FUNK IT UP!
http://www.nonesuch.com/Hi_Band/DB_Images/Artist_Photo/merritt_stephin.jpg

I would love to write a book about how Pavement ruined rock for a generation. I also think, besides whitening up the landscape irreparably, they're responsible for making it cool to pretend like you're not moved by what you're playing.

I think Camus did that.

http://myweb.wvnet.edu/~jelkins/lawyerslit/images/camus_fall.jpg

We just wrote chapter one, bnw.

yeah, i remember the "minority" multitudes at husker du & replacement shows back in the day

I'd have been more comfortable with a reactionary but worthy-of-discussion-in-a-mainstream-liberal-publication essay on the twentysomething music fans who want to talk to you about Of Montreal's album over Ciara's -- who'll privilege the former over the latter for reasons they can't even articulate.

-- Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Monday, October 15, 2007 11:31 PM (Yesterday)

Another potentially interesting thing to think about is Our Band Could Be Your Life, one take on 80s (American) underground rock. These bands were discussed:

* Black Flag
* The Minutemen
* Mission of Burma
* Minor Threat
* Hüsker Dü
* The Replacements
* Sonic Youth
* Butthole Surfers
* Big Black
* Dinosaur Jr.
* Fugazi
* Mudhoney
* Beat Happening

Was there more black music influence then? These bands were much less popular, and generally more abrasive, but I'm not sure I see a whole lot more black music influence. (I know--the Minutemen were funky, and Fugazi too sometimes I guess.)

-Minutemen loved funk and jazz for sure.
-Fugazi were all huge dub heads.
-Black Flag swung REALLY hard towards the end (see "Swinging Man" for proof) and Ginn was a huge jazz nerd.
-Minor Threat loved go-go but I don't know how much of it made it into their music. But punk rock of that era in general can get traced back to Chuck Berry fairly quickly
-Mudhoney had a blues feel whether they cared or not.

All those bands "grooved" a LOT more than the current crop of indie rockers tho for sure (with the exception of Beat Happening)

Would it be oversimplification to say that rock's black affectations just got kind of played out?

Pavement sounded fresh (albeit I came to them late) in part because they seemed like such an antidote to grunge's *soulfulness*, which by the time Eddie Vedder was doing it felt like a caricature of a caricature.

To jerks.

:P

I would love to write a book about how Pavement ruined rock for a generation. I also think, besides whitening up the landscape irreparably, they're responsible for making it cool to pretend like you're not moved by what you're playing.

so many years, i thought i was alone...

well now there's emo so chillax

(not to mention the fact that a lot of the most popular white music [way more popular than Arcade Fire] is still very miscegenated [which I guess has been pointed out upthread])