commendation for outstanding service to human race: resident advisor

will it? or will it hurt the many smaller scale artists who would be boosted when seen among big-ticket artists who already have huge publicity machines behind them

seems to me that people haven't really thought through what happens to power structures when power is ostensibly abdicated

they’re still making lists, just not numbered afaik? like a roundup of works people liked, maybe I misread it

just no aggregating picks to create a top ten where an album one person loved doesn’t get equal billing because no one else was into that fringe movement. so that album is in there with everything else, no ranking

so Dixon might be in there but there’s nothing distinguishing his single from Elysia Crampton, each just gets a blurb

an unranked list is good

yeah, my understanding was they were just doing away with the numerical ranking specifically, maybe i’m wrong. i thought the point was that creating a hierarchy was harmful, not that curating a list was. they can’t escape curating anyway

I don’t really think the heirarchy is “harmful” lol

kinda agree this is about embarrassment towards their readership, maybe dislike. i guess it began as a prog/trance site and there's prob always been that element to the readership, somewhere along the line there have been various efforts to make it some sort of intellectualised (and maybe american) take on dance music without ever really losing some of the old readers. ra's identity struggles are just a microcosm of dance music's version of the same, the music is simultaneously cerebral and physical, intellectual and fun, ephemeral, hard to pin down. true of all music i suppose and a problem for all music writing but worse with dance music given its structural rules.

i mean i accept that the polls were leading to homogenised results but they were polls of the site's readers. essentially this is an admission that they don't like their readers or wish their readers were different in some way, i can't tell exactly what that difference is though because i'm not sure many people voting for their favourite dj or tune think "have i been fair and representative here" - they prob just think "i took an e at dixon and had a wonderful night"

if it's just an editorial decision that nobody needs to read the bullshit results of a huge internet-wide poll then by all means go for it but it's not like that makes for as good an editorial reason as saying you're doing it because your readers are bigots.

Among their stated points for the decision: uncomfortableness with erasure of non-white dudes in their poll results

also i don't think this take is borne out by the statement. for better or worse they don't mention race actually - there are certainly a lot of white men in the ra polls but it's not all white men. the statement seems to clearly suggest this is more about gender.

i think it's a kind of dangerous game to acknowledge, on your own site, "hey audience, your choices aren't diverse enough, both musically but more importantly when we asked you your favourite dj we expected your tastes to feature more women"

who exactly has failed here? or what exactly is failing?

even their internal polls were skewed male though. last years album list had only two female artists in the top 20

that's p much what i'm getting at.

they clearly stated that they thought the hierarchy reinforced through their lists was harmful because it reinforced certain power dynamics in the dance community xpost to D-40

agreed that they're admitting discomfort with their readership, but the response to the decision in the comments is overwhelmingly positive. which is weird b/c the last time i remember reading comments on RA a few years ago they were mostly terrible

yeah same, not familiar with the site at all these days really.

1) I've never heard of Dixon

2) deej that's just silly, there won't be a lack of headlining acts just because there no ranked poll

3) Ranked lists are the patriarchy

Dixon was #1 on their “best dj” polled list from 2013-2016

I’m pro ranked lists & anti the results, it’s the results that are patriarchal not the lists themselves

I don't know, not to over-generalize, but I think of an obsession with ranking and scoring things as an extremely male trait.

Btw I've only started reading RA in the last year or two, but I get a lot out of it. The comments however are hilarious/terrible, of course. And people seem bent on interpreting the review scores as objective across the site (as in "you really think record A is better than record B, that has a lower score?!"), when it seems pretty clear that it's usually situated within the context of an artist's previous work, or the maybe the genre they're working in.

I don't know, not to over-generalize, but I think of an obsession with ranking and scoring things as an extremely male trait.

flag on the play. essentialism. offense number 79. 15 yard penalty. automatic 1st down

1) I've never heard of Dixon

if only tim had done a poll

i'm fairly sure i don't like much of what dixon has been playing for the last 3/4 years, tho not paid much attention, most of that crew seem to have gravitated towards a sort of prog nouveau

equally i think it's good he became massively popular solely on the basis of djing with barely any production along the way - for a long time he was one of the best selectors and 100 times better than the producer-centric crap that passes for dance music or dj sets on this board.

don't read much on the site but pod + https://www.residentadvisor.net/tracks are essential

i didn't realize their eoy lists were crowdsourced/reader polls; surprisingly good if that's true. but re these concerns they should just switch to editorial list and hire more non-whitemale writers

otm

the top dj list is a complete ouroboros, much like a lot of dj lists. there’s no easy solution, but when high profile events feel they have to have top-ranked djs, and then the attendees are the same who vote in polls for top dj, just creates a death spiral. uncreative promoters who have large events and have money but no curation skills aren’t helping

equally i think it's good he became massively popular solely on the basis of djing with barely any production along the way - for a long time he was one of the best selectors and 100 times better than the producer-centric crap that passes for dance music or dj sets on this board.

Not really sure who you mean by that last sentence but while he was an amazing DJ I'm not sure he'd have been able to build his rep in the same way if he wasn't so closely associated with Innervisions. Like he was a fantastic remixer (the Mark E mix in particular I still love), but it feels like he was able to come up at least partly off the back of Ame and Henrik Schwarz's production works, before completely eclipsing them as a DJ.

Dunno what he's playing now but if I had to guess he's moved towards a more Tale of Us-type festival friendly thing?

Can we have a Search & Destroy on the podcasts from this year? I think I listened to every single one up until about April or May and then tailed off. A lot of fairly nondescript grey warehouse techno in there.

still not the same, to me, as the usual route of becoming famous for a few productions and then becoming a hugely popular dj for being okay at it. he was doing it for a long time before the huge popularity too. he dj'ed his way to the top more than many of the rest of these lists.

as i say, don't care for him now but he's done enough good stuff to merit respect.

Yeah fair enough, I just looked at their 2016 list and it's full of those sorts of names, unsurprised they canned the poll tbh. I guess production means a shortcut onto the festival circuit for a lot of these guys and that's how they end up there. The overlap between that poll and the group of DJs who seem to be on every other European festival bill is massive as well.

Can we have a Search & Destroy on the podcasts from this year?

I've not really connected with any of the podcasts in a long while, even the ones from DJ's I like (Saoirse, Del Garda). Whenever it does pop up that there's a new podcast it always seems to be someone called Blarg or Morlock playing DVS1 records. This is what happens when you let people have black and white photos for their profile

thank u saer for giving me some possible dj aliases if I ever get a gig

thank u saer for giving me some possible dj aliases if I ever get a gig

― mh, Saturday, 25 November 2017 15:55

Have a scan at the Brighton teamsheet today if you need any more

Dunk, Gross, Proepper, Knockaert and Bong

I don't get into many of the podcasts either, the only ones I remember from this year are Egyptrixx and M.E.S.H. (both great). I really like their features and interviews though.

Some of the Exchange podcasts are worthwhile too.

I listened to a bit of the one with Janina, but it as people talking and I started to feel tense so I turned it off again

I don't think this is an issue of RA's demographics so much as the demographics of readers of music sites in general. almost all readers' polls end up like this

there's definitely something self-selecting about the people who love to rank things as opposed to people who just like to share impressions and talk about stuff they like

No headphone today but I see Etienne has done number 602. I liked his record on Undersound last year so hopefully this has some cheeky miscreants downing pints in deckchairs or failing that some records with moody dockers with dangerous dogs is also acceptable as long as they have a heart of gold and hats askew

https://www.residentadvisor.net/podcast-episode.aspx?id=610

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DZcZwgsWsAAXb6b.jpg:large

Tomorrows is very good - especially the second half, hats off!

yes mate

https://www.residentadvisor.net/podcast-episode.aspx?id=619

wasn't sure what thread to put this in but the new mix from TRAXX is essential

https://www.residentadvisor.net/podcast-episode.aspx?id=627&comments=1

would you say it's an... essential mix?

yes i would

I'd second that

ok I'm 10 min in and it's just been lots of chopped up samples that feel kinda clunky, is it like this for 2 whole hours?

you kids and your goddamn seamless mixes

nvm it got good

the opening track !
one of the most extreme on-u sound productions.
I have actually blown speakers with that track.

https://www.residentadvisor.net/podcast-episode.aspx?id=632

loving this from Raphael Top-Secret: nothing particularly innovative and for a "digger" I was familiar with more of the songs/artists than I would have expected, but it's a really nice vibe

Yup enjoying this. Want to like a lot of the RA poddies but most too clubby for an old bastard like me.

New John Gomez one feels akin to Raphael Top Secret in many ways - a "digger" putting something sunkissed together - but its got a much more obscure vibe and feels very global in its reach