Mar 032008
Me three!
Oats wrote, in response to a write-in answer on our current poll:
I’d like to hear more from the Eno-haters who voted in the current poll.
Me too! I don’t think anyone doubts the depth and sincerity of your feelings, but I believe Oats and I are not alone in wanting to hear more about how you arrived at this conclusion, the criteria you feel Eno does not meet for “greatness,” and so forth. Please share. Some may bark, but we will ensure against biting. In fact, we’ve decided to grant Rock Cool Points Immunity to any Townsperson stepping forward in support of his or her poll answer.
I think I can safely say, We look forward to your responses.
For what it’s worth, I was also intrigued by the anti-Eno sentiment in the current poll. My favorite album is Before and After Science and I tend to prefer his vocal works (esp. the ’70s stuff) over the ambient stuff, although I generally like all of it. I’m also a big fan of Old Land, the record he did with Cluster in 1985, as well as the Air Structures boot that I know Mr. Mod and others on here are quite fond of as well, so there are exceptions. I’m also a huge fan of his production work and that even includes U2 but mostly it’s Talking Heads and Devo. I don’t know how much credit he should take for No Wave, though I credit him for giving that music wider exposure than it would’ve gotten exposure. Of course, I’m also a big fan of the Berlin trilogy.
How bold these anonymous poll responders are, Oats! Come on, you two (and counting?), we’ll grant you Rock Cool Points Immunity.
I’m a huge fan of a lot of Eno’s stuff, specifically *because* of his lack of Greatness. His main instrument, if you will, is an attitude. That a sense of articulate fun can make highly enjoyable music with not only a lack of genius at the controls, but sometimes nothing smarter than the i-ching running the board! He worked with consistently fascinating people, many of whom had the extreme chops he lacks. His hand is in a lot of my fave records. Remain In Light, Bush of Ghosts, the Bowie albums noted above, and from Baby’s On Fire to Discreet Music, he encounters a huge breadth of music whole-heartedly. To read him is ungodly, it’s true. I remember an interview of John Cage he did, where it took him two pages to elucidate his namby-pamby British elocutions, and Cage’s answer would be, “Yes, I think so.” Compare this to my hesitations about Thurston Moore. Why does he bug me more than the clearly self-involved Mr. Eno? I don’t know. That was why I posted my question about Moore. It relates, I suppose, to Eno’s huge presence in my awakening that there was a lot more to music than “musicianship.” And whereas I get the impression that Thurston Moore is trying to show me something he does that’s great, I always felt Eno was showing me something that neither of us knew what the hell it was, and that’s much more fun. (These are only impressions, SY fans, don’t have a coniption.)
In the 70s as a horn player, it was all about skill and arrangements and effect. So when the Ramones came along, and almost every identifiable musical knob (except volume and tempo) could be turned to zero or one, and leave huge fun, I came across Some of Them Are Old, and Swastika Girls as just more escape valves from Genesis and Maynard Ferguson. I don’t know the overall critical regard in which he is held now, or in which his 70s work is held. I would have thought the range of opinion would echo the ones here. Mr. Mod, you turned me on to the Harold Budd “Possible Worlds” stuff back when. Do you find Eno over-rated?
General Slocum asked:
Not one bit. Like you say, to read the man in an interview is a fate no rock fan should have to bear, but for his own work, his early work with Roxy Music, and his productions for Talking Heads he’s been able to create a “space” that previously had not existed in rock recordings. A big part of what he did was organize strong and interesting rhythmic beds over which his chops-laden contributors could fly. The much-vaunted “non-musician” angle that’s part of the self-created Eno myth never impresses me. Joe Strummer was not a technically proficient musician. John Lennon wasn’t playing hot licks on guitar. Keith Richards is not John McLaughlin. Who cares? Eno was a hub of musical ideas, and that’s as essential a musician’s role in a group as any other role.
If he’s overrated in any area it’s as a producer beyond Talking Heads. I think that first Devo album pretty much sounds terrible. The earlier singles they produced themselves are better. That No Wave album Eno put his stamp of approval on wasn’t much of a production, was it? I always thought he was more of a curator. Then there’s his production for U2. I don’t feel he had a lot to work with, and I’m not sure exactly what he added except finding a way to smooth out the seams that were showing in the band’s first few records. I’ve seen one of those Making of… docs for one of their big albums with Eno, Lanois, et al, and when they pull up a 73rd track of The Edge playing a 2-note riff in an 8th-note pattern through a delay pedal, I’m unimpressed. Then you hear stories about Eno leading the boys through a series of blackboards to help them construct their songs. Then you hear yet another variation on “I Will Follow”, which they did without Eno’s involvement, and I’m thinking that by this point Brian was actually most concerned with padding his bank account.
general,
I think Thurston Moore and Brain Eno demonstrate the differences between American and British art-punk.
I like this from Mr. Mod’s assessment:
“Eno was a hub of musical ideas, and that’s as essential a musician’s role in a group as any other role.”
aye.
I would only add that this is true whether in a group or not! Eno’s contributions are vast, pervasive and expanded the modern musician’s lexicon on a number of fronts ranging from practice, to technique, to the technological and the aural.
if anything, he’s probably underrated, regardless of how annoying his celebrants may be, especially when arguing this very claim!
fire when ready, cynics….
Eno is the prime example of what Malcolm Gladwell would call a Connector. If nothing else, he’s hugely useful in playing games of Six Degrees of Rockpile.
If Eno is an idea man, why the complaints about his use of words to espouse those ideas? I remember reading that year’s diary book and wanting to use a highlighter. It seemed like every page had usable ideas. I used to have a deck of the Oblique Strategies cards, and I thought some of those ideas were quite applicable to the recording process.
I was listening to Manzanera’s Diamond Head album the other day. Besides singing some of the songs, he does a lot of ‘treatments’ of the guitars. I wish I knew more about what those consisted of. I guess it was the Eventide harmonizer.
I wish I knew more about what those consisted of. I guess it was the Eventide harmonizer.
Apparently that device was the go-to piece of equipment for My Bloody Valentine.
The reason I sometimes feel like burning my Eno albums whenever I forget to avoid reading an interview with him or essay by him is because he goes on forever. I don’t mind if someone’s a little long winded if I find myself needing to highlight half of what he or she says, but to read a 2-page answer to a simple question only to want to highlight one sentence is a pain in the ass. Where’s a trace of the intuitive approach to making cool-sounding records that I hear? Where’s a description of the faces Fripp was making while playing the fadeout solo on “Blank Frank”? The musicians on those records sound like they were experiencing “far-out” emotional responses to the music on those records, yet all he gives me is 2 pages on those Oblique Strategies cards. When he talks about his music, I get the sense he’s trying to artificially elevate the mythology surrounding his music making.
at least part of the problem, mr. mod, is that fripp probably didn’t make any faces during that solo.
Does anybody know who invented the concept of ambient music? I’d be curious to know more about that.
I’m guessing, by the way, that bakshi is the critic of Eno who typed in that poll answer and will not speak up here. Do you deny it, bakshi? Continued silence on your part will prove to me that I’m correct. But if I’m wrong, here’s your chance to give me the big slapdown, which I will deserve.
I suppose you’re all waiting for a 3,000-word diatribe on the topic of Brian Eno and why he SUXX so bad. Well, I hate to disappoint, but my reason for disliking him — and for thinking that most Eno-Love is misplaced — is that Brian Eno was *not* a rock counter-revolutionary from my impressionable youth. Consequently, all I hear with these adult ears (my first Eno LP experience was “Taking Tiger Mountain…” in 2006) is a free-thinker (good) with a bad haircut (bad) trying *really hard* to tweak the nose of standard rock Form (yawn).
History is full of examples of tightly knit communities who experience a weird kind of communal suspension of disbelief when they all really want to believe that a funny shaped cloud is actually the Virgin Mary coming down to Earth, or a giant UFO coming to swoop them away or whatever. Every Eno album I own (Tiger, Warm Jets, Green World) tells me that’s what’s going on with this dude.
Sorry, guys!
Immunity granted, HVB. Thanks for stepping forward. Who’s still holding out?
My hunch for #2 culprit is much less definite, but I wouldn’t be surprised to find that 2000 Man also pulled the Eno disdain lever.
Gotta get me some immunity cool points. I voted Tiger Mt. Has anyone before or after used a typewriter for percussion? Kewl man.
What was your vote Mod?
Taking Tiger Mountain as well, Sammy. For me, it’s the one time when Eno really put himself out there yet managed to fully run the show. He’s right out there on Here Come the Warm Jets, but he often gets swallowed up by his collaborators. I think he’s highly swallowed on Another Green World. I love Before and After Science, but by that time he’s holding something back, he’s less footloose and fancy free. I’m also a huge No Pussyfooting and Discreet Music fan.
Erik Satie invented ambient music, which he called furniture music (musique d’ameublement), in other words music that would be as unobtrusive as furniture. Eno’s theory is slightly different, in that his ambient music can be unobtrusive, but it also repays close listening, should a listener be so inclined.
Nothing to add really other than I’m in the “I like him” camp. I was prompted to listen to my box set of the “non-vocal” stuff by the poll the other day. I particularly like the track “The Lost Day”…and some of the stuff he did with Wobble.
I would also recommend the diary book he wrote – as stated earlier – dense (and yes – sometimes pompous) but full of interesting ideas.
mwall, it’s not me. I think Eno is pretty scattershot, but I think he’s the guy Lester Bangs really meant when he was talking about how great it was that people that didn’t know how to play could make music. Granted, Lester came up with some examples of “music” that I truly feel ripped off about, but Eno had some great musical ideas and actually knew some musicians.
I really like Here Come the Warm Jets, and I like 801 and I think the first Roxy Music album is fantastic. I know Eno’s not three chords and a cloud of dust (which is the stuff I can really get behind), but I think he has a really good ear and he can be really valuable as a producer or band member.
I also agree with HVB in a way. I think the ambient music is crap, and I think it’s a case of the emperor having no clothes. But I’ve thought 801 Live is one of the coolest live albums ever since before I even had a driver’s license. So I’m gonna go vote for Warm Jets now.
O, come now, Hrrundie! You don’t need to make all Eno fans a tightly knit community who believe in God or UFO’s just to aggrandize your dislike of him. A simple “no thank you” is fine. Are you the friend who tells his best friend, when he marries an annoying woman, that his love is “misplaced?” You don’t have to find said wife lovable, but why does he need to feel the same? I will (and do) tell you plenty about why you consistently over-rate ZZ Top. But you do, and I don’t fault your feelings! I fault their music (after the first few records,) which is different. But as so often happens, you don’t spend any time supporting or exploring your relatively incendiary comments. Eno isn’t a drag for any identifiable reason, but rather, all who are fans are at fault. At fault in a gullible, lemming-like way, at that. So go put on “I Can See For Miles” very loud, and sit looking at the naked emperor, but don’t, heaven forfend, go near the computer to explain yourself. (Yawn.)
Hey, Slokie — for fuck’s sake, if this forum ain’t all about aggrandizing our likes and dislikes of stupid Rock stuff, then what the heck are we here for?!
Look, Eno does nothing for me. You love him. I can either say: “Yay! We’re all okay!”, or I can say you’re crazy. The former path negates the rationale for this gathering spot. As for the latter, I *could* don my lab coat and spend 3,000 words detailing all the things that irk me about the guy and his music, but — believe it or not — I have a life, and I do that enough around these parts. I already suggested that I find his music artsy and self-conscious in a very irritating, boring way, and that ought to be enough. I may be a trained monkey, but there’s only so many tricks I do for a peanut!
Sorry, man, but the guy’s music is a waste of my time, and I mean that literally.
Well, I have to say, that while I freely acknowledge you must have “a life” down yonder, you’ve got to admit you put it on hold for a mighty flimsy pretext from time to time, here at RTH. I am certainly not suggesting you don’t gripe – that is a lot of what blogs do, after all. I was only suggesting you gripe at Eno, since that entire side of this question has gone unsupported. It is to keep our standards of heckling above “Eno – duh! He’s so gay,” that I have tried once again to have you back up an opinion with more detail. Many of us belly up with more substance on the pro and con on any number of picayune topics. The English Beat vs. the Specials? That could well have been a joke thread around here. You often start these questionaires, or throw out an edict, and when everybody has spun their tales out, you bow out with a dismissive comment no more detailed than the average scrawl of graffiti. And if you want to go whole hog on the grand put-down, do it to Eno! I look forward to it.
To change gears a little bit here, I’d be really curious to find out what some of these records are. I have a feeling that The Shaggs, the aforementioned No Wave comp or perhaps just some of its affiliated bands and other like stuff will among your answers, but I’m curious to see if I’m right or not.
Not really related to the gear-switching Berylant initiated, but has anyone else found that much of Bangs’ writings and positions have aged rather poorly?
General Slocum wrote:
You mean it wasn’t? I’m offended!
Honestly, the failure of getting Hrrundi to give us more detail on why he finds Eno a waste of his time is with me. I did a much better job of setting up and cultivating the English Beat vs Specials thread. You guys came through better than I could have expected, but I really worked hard for that one. In this thread, I felt that merely throwing down the gauntlet on Oats’ behalf would raise the Rock Ire of the two people who had voted that Eno was overrated. Then, when the gauntlet alone failed to raise anyone’s hackles, I had to grant immunityt. Hrrundi, to his credit, accepted his immunity and gave us a little piece of his mind. We could spend all day beating up on the man, but wouldn’t our time be better spent, as Mwall has begun to do, trying to smoke out the other person who voted in the poll that Eno was overrated and get a piece of his or her mind, however small?
Seriously, Townspeople, I apologize for not giving this thread my best, but that’s no reason to give up hope.
For the record: when I “vote” in the RTH Big Choice Poll, I consider the secrecy of my ballot a sacred democratic trust. Just as George Bush has no right to demand an accounting of who I vote for and why in my local elections, I feel no obligation to explain whether I voted this way or that on the topic of Brian Eno, earbuds, or hardest-rockin’ breakfast cereal. When I paused to address the issue of Brian Eno, I did so — partly — to shed the glaring light of truth and reason on the unruly mob mentality that poisons this site. I would have hoped that the thrill of being *able* to vote freely, to empower your consciences at the virtual ballot box, and to nobly take sides on the most contentious issues of the day would have been enough for you. But it seems you all demand more from governance — a tawdry reality show-like display of bitch-slapping and he-said/she-said-ism. Well, I prefer to take the high road. When I vote, I shake the hand of God, trembling, blindfolded, and deeply respectful. While the rest of you are screaming and leaping at each other like baboons, you’ll find me kneeling in a quiet corner of the chapel of democracy, praying for your souls.
Also, I voted twice.
HVB
Thanks for your honesty, HVB, even if under duress. I’m no George Bush!
Well, after that admission, I now know what my choice would be if I had to vote on what my favorite Rock Town Hall comment ever was.
It would be chickenfrank’s “Goats Head Poop” from that Some Girls vs. Goats Head Soup thread, by the way.
I did like the way Lester refused to go along with calling the music that grew out of no wave ‘skronk,’ a term that had been gaining acceptance, though I don’t know that it has entered the critical lexicon permanently. Lester’s preferred musicological term? ‘Horrible noise.’ He liked it.
berlyant, Lester owes me the price of Lou Reed’s Metal Machine Music, which at one point he claimed to be driving around with blasting it out of his car windows. No way. I just don’t believe it.
The other one is The Godz Contact High. I found it on cd and I couldn’t believe my luck as I’d been looking for it for years. I got it used, but it wasn’t cheap and it was still in the slipcase. It’s awful.
I borrowed The Shaggs from someone, and that’s stupid bad. So I learned my lesson and I rarely buy an album Lester claimed to love on his recommendation alone.
Oats, I think his writing has aged really well. Then again, I can remember a lot of what it was that was going on when he was writing. I always liked the fact that I felt that he really cared about what he was writing about, even if I didn’t. Too many critics today seem too interested in coining new terms (Rockist, instead of snob really bugs me), and name dropping bands you haven’t heard. They aren’t half the fun Lester was.
hvb shouted: “When I paused to address the issue of Brian Eno, I did so — partly — to shed the glaring light of truth and reason on the unruly mob mentality that poisons this site.”
Put down your copy of Atlas Shrugged, dude.
I really like Taking Tiger Mountain, and almost voted for it, but finally didn’t, although I was pleasantly surprised to see that other voters recognized its virtues. I think Green World is the Eno masterpiece because it seems poised so perfectly between the past and future of rock (even if that future never happened). In some ways it makes all his earlier albums, including those with Roxy, seem a bit like roots rock. Green World turns the music into something that almost isn’t rock and roll while at the same time it gives up none of rock and roll’s basic virtues of hooky, memorable tunes. There aren’t many records as fascinating.
I think there’s something to be said for Eno’s four album run from Jets to Science as being as impressive in its development and variation as the four album run of The Velvet Underground.
Also, how is it that HVB could vote twice? Or is he kidding? If not, this error needs to be corrected or else all the polls will be suspect. Next thing you know, it’ll turn out that RTH thinks AC/DC is the best rock and roll band ever by a vote of 221-19.
I think the ambient music is crap, and I think it’s a case of the emperor having no clothes.
Eno’s ambient music or ambient music in general? I dislike most opera, but I’m certainly no opera expert and can make the distinction between not enjoying opera and thinking it’s “crap”. I enjoy my share of ambient music, Eno’s included. Like anything else, there is a lot of crap ambient music out there, too.
Like Eno, I have employed typewriter on one of my recordings. Like Eno, I got someone else to play it (professional typewriter player Mr. Clean, actually)
Bangs takes you somewhere in his writing; it’s not just a matter of how many stars a certain album deserves, but whether it changes in some way his life.
Thus Bangs seem to understand, more thanmost critics, what art is and what it does. he had little patience for music that was emotionally pre-programmed. And I always liked how he poured cold water on those who thought it was musically the best of times.
Bangs always asks the reader, “Shouldn’t you be wanting something more out of what you listen to? Why are you settling for less.”
And, I’ve said it before, his review of Chicago is the greatest. Ever.
Bangs’ writings hold up for me. I still love the fact that he put himself, the music fan and listener, into his pieces. I don’t recall him pretending to be an expert on anything and asking me to buy any of his opinions wholesale. I don’t think he asked that of himself either, which makes for fun reading.
tvox, I think the whole ambient genre is crap. Why make music people aren’t supposed to actively listen to? Isn’t that Muzak’s job? While I don’t know anything about Opera either, I think it’s art because it’s meant to be listened to and to try to make you understand someone else’s perspective. If you cut a piece of my drywall off my dining room and framed it and called it ambient art I’d call that crap, too. I think it’s important for art to make you feel something. Ambient music and ambient noise are the same thing. Why will people pay for one and try to make the other go away?
Thank you all for sharing about Bangs’ appeal. I sometimes think I may be too much of a 21st-century smart-ass, and consequently some of his more emotional writing embarrasses me. Also, the first-person mountain-of-verbiage writing style isn’t something I’m a huge fan of anymore, but that may partially be I overdosed on it myself when I started music writing, under the influence of LB.
I will say though, that Bangs seemed to prefer music that means it, maaaan, which meant he pretty much missed the boat on acts like Roxy Music and maybe even Bowie.
Overall, though, I think my reservations say more about me than him. I did read the shit out of Psychotic Reactions when I was younger, and I’d argue that no rock critic stands up to constant re-reading. You’re bound to notice little quirks — personal cliches, obnoxious habits — and then they get more and more noticeable each time you read it.
I think the whole ambient genre is crap. Why make music people aren’t supposed to actively listen to?
Well, I actively listen to a lot of it. I’m a little unclear on your ability to discern how people should or shouldn’t listen to music. Maybe you can help me out with that.
Isn’t that Muzak’s job?
I like music that engages my mind and emotions. Who cares what genre it falls in if it pushes the right buttons? I’m all for cheering on rock ‘n’ roll as though it were a sports team, but there is a right time and place to listen to all sorts of stuff. It might be Muzak’s job, but that doesn’t make decent ambient music Muzak. For me it doesn’t elicit the same emotional and intellectual responses even slightly.
While I don’t know anything about Opera either, I think it’s art because it’s meant to be listened to and to try to make you understand someone else’s perspective.
So ambient music can’t be art? Gee, they really pulled the wool over my eyes!
I think it’s important for art to make you feel something.
Hear hear. Or don’t hear. Whatever floats your boat.
I think 2K’s comments on ambient music speak to one of the dangers of Eno having opened his mouth to explain himself. Did I ever need to be told I shouldn’t actively listen to his ambient stuff? No! When I start hearing whatever ambient piece, I can’t help but listen. I love what I hear on some of those records – Discreet Music and the 4th of the ambient series of records, especially. On the other hand, I think Music for Airports kind of sucks. I don’t bother playing that one anymore, even when I don’t want to hear it by mistake.
To be fair to Eno’s explanation, however, I think what he’s really getting at, beside covering his ass if you don’t happen to like one of those albums over another (ie, “See, you were listening too actively!”), is that he tried to arrange the music in a way that does not dictate a hierarchy of sounds and rhythms, and to that extent, I think his ambient albums often work. I can listen to the best of them and hear them in new ways, from new perspectives, more than I can a typical rock or pop recording. His latest vocal album from a couple of years ago has this characteristic as well. I think he was able to sneak some of that into his Talking Heads’ productions as well. However, I can’t say that I hear the 72nd Edge guitar overdub any differently one time or another, in one room or another, etc.
See, I think the first track of MUSIC FOR AIRPORTS is *meant* to be listened to at least semi-actively, because it’s the only ambient music I can think of that has an actual hook.
I have a bit of trouble listening to that album myself, but for personal reasons. I took a kind of enforced break from college circa 1990-1991 because my mother had a massive stroke and I had pretty much had to be her home health care worker. At some point, my mom discovered that she really, really liked MUSIC FOR AIRPORTS and she took to listening to a cassette I’d made of it pretty much all day every day. It’s not that I heard it too much, it’s just that it actively reminds me of a really painful period.
tvox, I don’t think I told anyone how they had to listen to music or appreciate art. I just said what I thought it was. I won’t claim to be an expert on anyone else’s opinion. The only reason I’ve ever even heard any ambient music is because rock musicans have at least dabbled in it, and I wanted to see what it was about. But then reading about it and hearing Eno say I’m not supposed to actively listen to it seemed akin to saying “My new painting is best appreciated when viewing it through a closed door.” I’m not the one saying “how” to listen to the music, I’m just repeating what I read that Eno and some other guy said.
The only music I’ve ever found that I understood less than ambient was an old radio show on NPR years ago that was playing non rhythmic music that sounded very much like clunks and clanks to me.
If you get something out of ambient music then good for you. It’s nice to find things you like, even when other people like me think it’s crap. At least I tried.
I do however, think the time is always right to bask in The Power and Glory of Rock and “cheer it like a sports team.” Maybe we could get coupons for Nacho Hats when we buy new music.
You know, I like some of those Eno ambient records just fine, but I don’t listen to ambient music very often. And the reason may be that I listen to a lot of music like it’s ambient music. There’s all sorts of music that one can listen to not actively. One of my favorite rock bands for doing this with, for instance, is Slayer, which when played low has a very pleasant ambiance. I’m not kidding.
For what it’s worth, I like Metal Machine Music, but I actually think its template was greatly improved upon by people like Glenn Branca and Sonic Youth (at least in their early days), both of whom I listen to a lot more often than that album, to be totally honest. Still, like you I can’t imagine listening to that album in a car. It’s definitely one you have to be in a stationary place for, whether to concentrate or to zone out.
I like The Shaggs because they, in a completely un self-conscious way, destroyed the myth that you have to have any competency whatsoever to make listenable music. Now, of course, you may disagree that it’s listenable but it has rudimentary hooks and repetitive devices (completely unintentional) which to my my ears at least, make it so. Now you could argue the same about any terrible high school garage band, but it’s not the same. I can’t fully explain it. Maybe it helped that I first heard The Shaggs via Chris Butler’s cover of “Who Are Parents”.
I agree with your take on Lester, but I have a couple of points to add here. The term “rockist” was actually coined in the early ’80s by Pete Wylie of the band Wah!, though it was revived recently by Kelefa Sanneh, a writer for the New York Times. Also, who is this monolithic “you” that you’re referring to here? This just smacks of people vs. the critics here and I think that’s a false dichotomy to choose from since everyone’s tastes are so splintered now (see: the long-tail effect).
berlyant, my monolithic “you” is what I think the average rock music reader is, like me. I know a lot about what I like, but I’m looking for filters to find out about things I don’t know I like. The general critic I don’t like is the one that would tell me something along the lines of, “Silver Mountain by the Deadstring Brothers is an album that draws deeply from the same well as New York’s Izzys mixed in with a little Two Cow Garage.” Now I’m stuck looking up three bands when a brief mention of Exile on Main St. would have actually helped me and led me to either find out more, or disregard the Deadstring Bros.
I think a lot of reviewers can fall into that “Us vs. Them” kind of thinking, especially with blogs. I think it’s okay, too. But I think some critics really like to name drop and that’s one thing I miss about Lester. If he reviewed a band he didn’t think anyone had ever heard, he didn’t use even more obscure bands to describe them. He worked at it. I think it’s always kind of been an “Us vs. Them” relationship with readers and critics, and now a lot of readers can just put up their own opinions and I think that worries some critics (it’s not like reviewing music makes people rich and famous). I bet it’s a tough way to put food on your family, and seeing fans do it for free with blogs has got to be worrisome.
I remember that NYT article about Rockism. I thought the same thing then, “why coin a new word when we have one that’s shorter that is understood by everyone already?” It’s hard enough to get people to understand what you mean, especially when writing. I thought the article was condescending and for every “punk that hates disco,” there’s three disco lovers that hate punk. There’s snobs everywhere. I won’t deny being a snob and having snobby friends that agree with me and disagree with snobs that don’t agree with us.
Anyway, I have no problem with the Pitchfork critic that mentions four bands I never heard of in a review of a band I never heard of when I find out it’s just some kind of music I don’t like and wouldn’t know the names of the artists. But if a band sounds like Black Sabbath, then say so or come up with another way to explain things.
If a reviewer’s job is to inform and promote, then I think that’s what the average reader would appreciate. If a reviewer’s job is to entertain and provoke, then I can handle that. But if a reviewer’s job is to be the most obscure, then I think that reviewer should reap all the rewards obscurity provides.
Indeed. I hadn’t even thought about that, but you’re right on the nose there. Furthermore, I would add that there are 10 more people (for every one of those mentiond above) who love punk AND disco (and bands who blended it in the early ’80s) and have formed disco-punk hybrid bands in the last 6-7 bands or at least that’s what it seems like given LCD Soundsystem, The Rapture, !!!, The Faint, Radio 4, Franz Ferdinand, et al.
As for the reviewer thing, I think you’re just taking out your own personal frustrations, but to a certain extent I think you wanna have it both ways. Pitchfork and the like are geared towards those of us who follow popular (and not so popular, as the case may be) very closely, so when they namedrop a band who have a following in the indie scene, they expect the readers to know who the bands are. To me, if there’s a fault in this, it’s that some of the details that their writers DON’T know are embarassing. For instance, they interviewed No Age (which ran last week), a great band from LA, and they admitted (now granted the band didn’t know this either) that they didn’t know that “Hanging on the Telephone” wasn’t originally a Blondie song nor who Paul Collins or The Beat (the US one) were. Of course, in the grand scheme of things, this type of rock ephemera is well-known by dorks like us, but unknown to 99% of the general population.
However if your only frames of references are classic rock acts like The Rolling Stones or Black Sabbath, then I can see why you’d be frustrated with them. Thus, I guess my point is that it really depends on what you already know (obviously) and that things like “obscure” and “well-known” are relative.
Yeah, I agree with berlyant, and I’d say that the problem with 2k’s take on reviewers is that he doesn’t admit the complexity of the marketplace in assuming that most fans of rock and roll wants what he wants. He has no grounds for that assumption really; his taste is no more the average taste than anybody else’s. Different publications that review rock records have different audiences with different reference points, and rather than all reviewers writing for the same audience, they’re often very attuned to their particular audiences.
That said, his advice on how to write reviews probably makes a lot of sense for general audience publications like newspapers and so on. But magazines that focus more on developed fans or a particular genre, say a heavy metal magazine, get their cred by knowing their industry in detail.
Of course, I’m only saying the obvious here, but it seems to need saying.
they didn’t know that “Hanging on the Telephone” wasn’t originally a Blondie song nor who Paul Collins or The Beat (the US one) were.
That song was by the Nerves, which, admittedly, Paul Collins was in, but was written, I think, by Nerve Jack Lee. Sung by Peter Case.
This has been your pinz nez moment of the day.