Music Reviews

[snipelfritz]

I'm probably going to start writing music reviews for a local blog. Before then, I thought I'd check out some other critics and read some of their writing to get some ideas of style. I'm quite confident of my own writing, but it couldn't hurt.

So does anyone have any favorite music critics/writers/bloggers or whatevs?

[SPACERITUAL]

You really need to go read the buddy head archives. Everything PRE 2006 by aaron north and travis keller is gold.

[Chankgeez]

Lester Bangs

[casecandy]

Lester Bangs, Robert Christgau, David Fricke are some of the all-timers.

My personal favourite book on music of all time: https://www.amazon.ca/Love-Mix-Tape-Lif ... 1400083036
S e r i o u s l y, it's fucking incredible

Some other favourites: https://www.amazon.ca/Nothing-Feels-Goo ... feels+good, https://www.amazon.ca/Sound-Beast-Compl ... +the+beast, https://www.amazon.ca/Rock-Snobs-Dictio ... 0767918738, https://www.amazon.ca/Cello-Suites-Eric ... llo+suites

Looking forward to reading: https://www.amazon.ca/Collection-Critic ... ica+hopper, https://www.amazon.ca/How-Equal-Tempera ... emperament, https://www.amazon.ca/Storm-Static-Slee ... 791&sr=1-7

The all-time gold-standard: https://333sound.com/

[casecandy]

I don't really read rock magazines anymore but Mojo, Q, Rock-A-Rolla, Skyscraper, those were my favourites when I did.

My favourite music magazine ever was a Canadian hip-hop magazine called Pound. Editors wrote this awesome book: https://www.amazon.ca/Enter-Babylon-Sys ... 0679313893

[D.o.S.]

I'm probably going to start writing music reviews for a local blog. Before then, I thought I'd check out some other critics and read some of their writing to get some ideas of style. I'm quite confident of my own writing, but it couldn't hurt.

So does anyone have any favorite music critics/writers/bloggers or whatevs?

Pride cometh before the fall.

[popvulture]

The Quietus has a bit of a "we don't give a fuck what you think" tone to their reviews. I don't think it'd be the ideal MO to take at all times, but it's good for reference and can often be quite effective (and hilarious).

[D.o.S.]

To that ^^ you also have to consider that no one gives a shit about the writing behind music reviews in 2016. It's all Metacritic'd out, so that casecandy and company can find out whether or not they're supposed to actually like a record when they google it discreetly when someone asks them if they've heard it. There's a reason that dude who reviewed Stripes' record for zee 'fork has never actually given an album an unabashedly high rating -- either he only writes about records he doesn't care about (which, I mean, srs?) or he's very very brand conscious of both the bands being reviewed and the publication he's writing for. My money, obvs, is on the latter.

[popvulture]

Oh of course. I particularly like The Quietus for that reason... I personally value the writing and how the person relates to the music just as much if not more than his or her final verdict. Additionally, I often learn about tons of other band via their references, which is actually probably the main reason why I read reviews at all.

Early Pitchfork reviews had that sort of reckless abandon that TQ has, writers going off on silly tangents, etc. It wasn't always effective or "professional," but it certainly was a lot more fun to read. Then basically when Pfork made Arcade Fire and vice versa, they got so far up their own asses that they were absolutely insufferable for years, priding themselves as these golden tastemakers, shamelessly shacked up with management / PR companies.

What's funny to me is that after being bought by Conde Nast, they've started taking on this friendlier tone—it's sort of Buzzfeed-y at times. Like "________ is the Soundtrack of your Friday Night" or some crap like that. It's friendlier but obviously manufactured and hilariously uncool. It's like the site sold out and literally became the thing it hated. Ha. Ha.

[D.o.S.]

Actually I think everyone who ever aspires to write anything should read their Andrew WK review and just do the opposite.

[popvulture]

Ha, yeah... quite a bit of their earlier reviews really tried to be brutal, and while I think they're often totally wrong (AWK being a great example), at least it had the feeling of being the opinion of one person, vs their own internal metascore that's run through a committee of hooded oracles. But then they'll take those opinions back, as they did with I Get Wet the second time around (Best New Reissue, golly!) The Boy with the Arab Strap was another one... they gave it like a 0.6 or something and it's been conspicuously absent from search results for years. My other favorite that was missing for quite a while but has since returned is their review of Source Tags & Codes, which they gave a 10. I mean, good record, but... 10.

[casecandy]

I forgot about The Quietus. That's honestly my favourite music site. Found Katie Gately on there.

D.o.S., you don't get me at all, no offense, but the last thing I would ever do is find out if I'm supposed to like a record before I've actually heard it. I could really care less. I listen to what I want to listen to and I read the stuff I want to read. You know this in your heart but you just enjoy mocking me too much.

No one concerned about listening to what they're "supposed" to be listening to would ever listen to as much MCR as I do.

[D.o.S.]

tfw casecandy tries to play it both ways.

[D.o.S.]

Pretty much identical to the I Get Wet phenomenon tbqh.

[Adamadamadam]

I appreciate music reviews that acknowledge the subjectivity of the exercise.

Will Butler (Arcade Fire) did a write-up of Grimes' Art Angels for The Talkhouse that basically says, "Look: it's good for what it is, but it's not my bag, and here's why."

It also has some gems like, "I appreciate and admire Art Angels. That sounds lame — no, it’s like how Orthodox Jews and devout Mormons get along. “I respect your devotion, and you probably understand me better than, say, anyone else on this F train — but I really, really don’t care that much about your Jesus. High fives on father Abraham, though.” He also talks about Elijah and the priests of Baal, so maybe it has less to do with candor than unexpected references to the old testament.

I did my undergrad in Confusing Words, so take my opinions on writing with a peck of salt.

Aaaand here's where I get stoned to death for mentioning Grimes and The Arcade Fire in the same post.