Sunday, July 8, 2007
WE HAVE A WORLD OF PLEASURE TO WIN, AND NOTHING TO LOSE BUT BOREDOM
Come as you are as a friend as I want you to be.
The Honeydrips: (Lack of) Love Will Tear Us Apart (feat. Hanna)
"[W]e commented from the outside looking in. And that's what a lot of people have difficulty doing nowadays. There is no longer an 'outside'. They have no idea what the outside is. Some people think the Gap is outside."
- Genesis Breyer P-Orridge, in the July issue of The Wire
Name one person who thinks the Gap is "outside".
We all gotta live with the fact that we aren't Bob Dylan.
Hot Chocolate: It Started With a Kiss
Better never than late: Chinese Democracy. Better late than never: your offnotes RIFFMARKET Status Ain't Hood Quarterly Report, mid-year albums edition (traxx list ideally finally arriving before my wedding date).
1. Deerhunter: Cryptograms/Fluorescent Grey double-LP
2. LCD Soundsystem: Sound of Silver
3. Lil Wayne: Da Drought 3
4. The Tough Alliance: A New Chance
5. Josh Ritter: The Historical Conquests of Josh Ritter
6. The Field: From Here We Go Sublime
7. Panda Bear: Person Pitch
8. Sally Shapiro: Disco Romance
9. Feist: The Reminder
10. Simian Mobile Disco: Attack Decay Sustain Release
11. Justice: †
12. Art Brut: It's a Bit Complicated
13. Battles: Mirrored
14. Los Campesinos!: Sticking Fingers Into Sockets
15. Various Artists: After Dark
16. The Good, the Bad, and the Queen: The Good, the Bad, and the Queen
17. Lucky Soul: The Great Unwanted
18. The Tough Alliance: New Waves EP
19. Air France: On Trade Winds EP
20. The Twilight Sad: Fourteen Autumns and Fifteen Winters
PLUS:
A Sunny Day in Glasgow: Scribble Mural Comic Journal
The Clientele: God Save the Clientele
Dan Deacon: Spiderman of the Rings
Gruff Rhys: Candylion
Gui Boratto: Chromophobia
Dinosaur Jr.: Beyond
King Khan & the Shrines: What Is?!
The Postmarks: The Postmarks
Lullatone: Plays Pajama Pop Por Vous
The Crayon Fields: Animal Bells
Sakert!: Sakert!
Spoon: Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
Blitzen Trapper: Wild Mountain Nation
Deerhoof: Friend Opportunity
The National: Boxer
Electrelane: No Shouts, No Calls
The Studio: Yearbook 1
Okkervil River: The Stage Names (probably with a bullet)
Taken By Trees: Open Fields
Pantha Du Prince: This Bliss
David Torn: Prezens
Marnie Stern: In Advance of the Broken Arm
Bowerbirds: Hymns for a Dark Horse
Matthew Dear: Asa Breed
The Tuss: Rushup Edge EP
Lil Wayne: The Greatest Rapper Alive
The Manhattan Love Suicides: The Manhattan Love Suicides
Junior Boys: Dead Horse EP
Young Jeezy: The Inspiration
No Age: Weirdo Rippers
Klaxons: Klaxons
Kathy Diamond: Miss Diamond to You
The Capstan Shafts: Her Versus the Sad Cold Eventually
Liars: Liars
!!!: Myth Takes
No Age: Weirdo Rippers
Sea and Cake: Everybody
Frog Eyes: Tears of the Valedictorian
A-Trak: Dirty South Dance
Ne-Yo: Because of You
Deerhoof: Friend Opportunity
Grinderman: Grinderman
Nas: Hip-Hop Is Dead
Stars of the Lid: And Their Refinement of the Decline
Ricardo Villalobos: Fizheuer Zieheuer
Arctic Monkeys: Favourite Worst Nightmare
Amerie: Because I Love It
Swizz Beatz: One Man Band Man
Boris with Michio Kurihara: Rainbow
Want you to turn the lights off, me on.
Gorillaz vs. Men Without Hats: The Safety Dance
TOO SOON TO CALL:
Animal Collective, Super Furry Animals, all the stuff I really like that I forgot
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16 comments:
You're right, !!! need to be on there. Probably in the second half somewhere.
Incidentally, here's what I typed about Myth Takes:
http://www.playboy.com/arts-entertainment/reviews/music/chk-chk-chk/chk-chk-chk.html
The National album is good! But if you stack them up song-for-song against something like the new Josh Ritter album, for me there's simply no comparison. A songwriter vs. mood-creators, though both artists can do both quite well, of course.
Myth Takes review
sorry, i always forget blogger comments are weird
Beg to differ.
As far as the albums go, I doubted we'd have much overlap, but was wondering if ya heard the Fratellis album, which was good for an outside chance of the top ten on my list. Also recommend the Digitalism album. My current #1, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, is shaping up to be country crossover of the year but I dunno if it's up yer alley.
My Digitalism review should appear on Pitchfork shortly.
Haven't heard the Fratellis full-length, but always thought the love for the single was due to (a) Apple and (b) pretty people in the video. Didn't hear much appealing there. What's their next-best song?
Keep hearing good things about Miranda Lambert; didn't like her record at all on first listen, but came around on the single when I heard it again on CMT. I dunno, apparently there's a mohawk.
Also, Dave, I've been reading Christgau's "Grown Up All Wrong." I really like the way he deals with Garth Brooks (approves, which is appropriate, but has harsh criticisms, which I think is also appropriate) much better than the way poptimists deal with our present-day, similarly scoffed-at-by-rockists equivalents (which seems to me mostly like improperly uncritical praise of anything most people hate-- cf. Paris Hilton-- though I'm no expert on this discourse). Curious as to your thoughts.
Like, it's one thing to argue that a much-maligned artist has merit. It's another thing to argue that the much-maligned artist has mmore merit than everybody else. The latter is a more provocative argument, but I think it contains some obvious problems.
These days I hear people arguing that Def Leppard were better than the Replacements. The pendulum has swung too far, my friend.
Dang, you sound like Simon Reynolds with this "you poptimists" stuff. Hardly anyone dug that Paris album, really, and even I didn't rate it higher than the one album from last year that I'll probably take to tha grave (Marit Larsen) and the one that came in distant second (The Ark).
Do you really think my praise of Paris was uncritical? I have some alternately positive and harsh things to say about Kelly Clarkson's new one, which I'd like to want to carry to the grave but won't make it that far by a longshot. I tore the crap outta Aly and AJ's new one, which is fantastic.
What I think a lot of critics of poptimism are missing -- aside from the actual Poptimists community here where you can actually read what the (diverse) group of people think about, e.g., Paris (there is NO consensus on her album whatsoever, I assure you) -- is that some of the best and most incisive critics consider themselves fans of a lot of (stupidly) derided/dismissed music. So, I don't stick up for Ashlee Simpson because other people say she sucks. I stick up for her because she's put out two absolute no-bullshit 4 1/2 star (damn near 5 for Autobiography and I will carry that one to the grave) albums and asked some great questions and no one's paying attention to her because they align her with "corporate schlock," as someone put it to me yesterday.
Usually "schlock" is only hinted at, mixed with a weird reliance on stock stories about how the biz and stardom etc. work that seems arbitrarily pinned to certain (popular) artists (except that Kelly outsells most other rock chicks, has the AmIdol background, etc.) without recognizing the merits of the songs themselves (or heck lack thereof, though I don't usually find lack of merit in Ashlee or Kelly or Lindsay or Paris -- in fact, their consistency is kind of astounding, esp. in the face of yer Cheyennes and Veronicas and Pussycat Dolls and Christinas etc.). Cf the strange and unsatisfying Kelly C. criticism (I've also heard, and delivered, good and legit criticism of the album, but most people are telling a story about the drama, and I don't want no drama -- I'm here to figure out why my stomach churns when I listen to "Hole" and "Judas").
I've always hated the Replacements, even when I tried to like them for like two weeks by buying Tim, which I haven't listened to since. I put a song of theirs on a mix for my girlfriend and it was probably the worst mistake I've ever made in my entire life. Why shouldn't I think Def Leppard is better?
Woop, forgot a sentence. My point re: best critics around (plenty of 'em post on Poptimists, plenty of 'em don't) was that they ALWAYS give reasons for liking what they like, for exploring what their relationship to the music is, or what the music is doing, etc. etc. And their tastes are usually pretty complicated -- I was just rereading Chuck Eddy's review of "Elephant," which is incredible, and thinking that I'll never have a handle on his taste, no matter how much of his stuff I read (i.e., he makes me want to read more of what he has to say). But then I wouldn't even call Tom Ewing, the for all intents and purposes founder of poptimism, a poptimist! Because NO ONE could be the kind of (uncritical) poptimist that you seem to be dancing around and Simon Reynolds whips out all the time.
Thank you, Dave! That's what I needed to read. As you surmised, I'm not extremely familiar with the specific writing about Paris Hilton (or Ashlee Simpson) as I could be, so I can't single out individual writers or pieces... which does make it likely I'm dealing with a strawman.
Still, when I *do* read positive pieces about these artists, it seems to me they're generally about how the artists are TOTALLY RADICAL AWESOME, rather than how they're, y'know, not so bad after all. Sometimes "corporate schlock" might be truly great, sure, but it's refreshing to see Christgau dealing with Garth Brooks for what he is, rather than wielding the fact that he enjoys Garth Brooks as some sort of cred cudgel. (I certainly don't think you, Dave, would do such a thing, but that's the vibe I get from the general conversation around these artists. Or from my strawman.)
Hmm, someday in a different frame of mind you might enjoy listening to more Replacements. I'm not their number one fan, by any means, but I love plenty of their songs much much more than I will ever love the couple of Def Leppard songs I know. Maybe Def Leppard has a deep catalogue of brilliant album cuts... but for now the comparison seems ludicrous to me.
Here's that
Christgau piece, BTW. Thanks again for your insights -- always an honor and a pleasure.
As for the Kelly C. album, I found it interesting how many reviews (Kelefa, I'm looking at you) ended up focusing on the Clive Davis angle. While it's perfectly possible that the Clive Davis stuff was true, it's also obvious that news reports suggesting Kelly Clarkson is an anti-commercial rebel help her image, especially because her Idol past is as commercial and unrebellious as it gets. Music writers seem to be less skeptical of this stuff than "real" journalists might be, perhaps because so many of them don't like to think of themselves as journalists. The New York Post is not a reliable source! Besides, what does the backstory have to do with the music-- beyond providing a convenient review angle?
I'm being semi-facetious re: the Replacements, whom I haven't given much of the time o' day to. But I can understand saying what I said without nec. bullshitting you.
Just for curiosity's sake, where are the pieces that are so effusive but uncritical? My understanding of the "pop blogosphere" or whatever is that it basically divides pretty evenly in half, between pop blogs that give about as much insight into pop as indie blogs give into the mp3s they post (slim to nil) and the other half being the scattered musings of the people I'd call poptimisits, meaning those posting on or sympathetic to the actual poptimists community -- Frank Kogan and Tom Ewing and Matt Fluxblog and Eppy and Abby Poptext and Jessica Poptastic (and others) on the one half and the insane number of mp3 bloggers most of whom I probably couldn't even name (but have, uh, probably downloaded from in the past, hence more of these than the former category -- I'm certainly not calling for these sites to go away, I just don't read 'em for the articles, y'know). I guess there's a sizeable, predominantly British, Popjustice-derived pop blog circuit that I've never really gotten into -- but they aren't anti-intellectual so much as kind of congenial but uninteresting. Though there are even exceptions in this category (a couple of em on the bedbugs sidebar) I read occasionally. My actual rock-crit reads are pretty much limited to my LJ friends (including Poptimists community), the rolling ILM threads, Stylus, and a handful of blogs. And maybe NYT on occasion. Oh, and Tommy2, which is really awesome.
(Actually, the poposphere doesn't divide evenly in half at all, I'd say probably overwhelmingly mp3-posters, then Popjustice and followers -- mostly UK-based, some European special interest blogs -- then the dozen or so poptimist-types I read with any regularity.)
(Also TOTALLY RADICAL AWESOME is how I react to Ashlee. But she's an exception for the most part, even called teenpop-writ-large a "dry town" in my last Stylus column cuz it's been boring the HELL out of me this year so far except one or two albums.)
Yeah, I must probably be thinking of the just-post-it blogs and ILM, mostly. As I said, I'm not familiar enough with the discourse to single out specific pieces-- this is an area I dip a toe into occasionally but mostly steer clear of, maybe because Reynolds and I share a common suspicion about this stuff (guessing here).
Fluxblog is a regular read for me, and I would definitely not hold me guilty of any of this. Maybe he can point us to some of the uncritical Hilton fawning, though? Or maybe it really IS just a strawman. Anyway, interesting discussion, thanks.
er, that should say that i wouldn't hold "him" responsible for any of this, not "me"
then again, have you ever seen matthew and i in the same place?
Oh one last thing, might wanna check out the 103 post exchange between me and SR and a few poptimist posters here. Lotsa strawmen on display!
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