i'm late to this party, but apparently the second week of may was THE WORST WEEK FOR ALBUM SALES SINCE THEY STARTED COUNTING THEM IN 1991! fucked.
justin bieber's shit sandwich was number one that week, and it was 300 sales away from being the lowest selling number one album ever.
this was reported on may 20, and since then billboard has updated the script on their website, and it's pretty but it also makes it rather impossible to find out how many copies an album were bought.
that week, 5.3 million albums were sold. TOTAL. that's roughly equal to a third of the population of the LA metropolitan area.
if it's not clear to record execs now, it will be very soon, that no super-clever method of digital distribution is going to repair this situation. they keep producing the shit, but no one's fucking buying it. everyone who wants new music has enough money to steal it.
the record industry: kaput, finito, el deado meato. record companies are zombies, wandering the land, hungry for brains. you have to shoot them in the head!
Showing posts with label cultural decay. Show all posts
Showing posts with label cultural decay. Show all posts
Monday, June 14, 2010
Friday, November 6, 2009
some people deserve a chance
thus is the conclusion of this bit of noisy nostalgia. (this time it's a birthday party we get to remember) marc richardson is a dumb piece of shit and i hope he googles his name frequently enough to find this.
after quoting jim o'rourke saying this: "You can no longer use context as part of your work [...] because it doesn't matter what you do, somebody's going to change the context of it;" marc richardson responds with this: "The O'Rourkes of the world may argue that this trend is a bad thing, but it's obviously going to open a new world of experience, and right now we're just scratching the surface of possibility."
first of all, "scratching the surface of possibility" is a piss poor turn of phrase. second of all, "a new world of experience" is also a pretty meaningless group of words. it's the "new world" that makes it okay to steal music, makes it okay that even successful musicians all over america are going broke. the "old world", where people paid musicians for their work, and musicians had say in how that work was structured -- a thing of the past!
except, and here's the crucial part, except when marc richardson believes artists "know what they're doing". for them, "i give myself over to their work in a very particular way." so you're actually supposed to pre-determine, before hearing anything, whether or not an artist is supposed to be taken seriously. if yes, BUY WHOLE ALBUM. if no, download shit for free and continue "scratching the surface of possibility."
it turns out marc richardson's other job -- you know, when he's not ruminating -- is telling people what music they should take seriously. it's for this reason that i don't doubt him when he says: "These are exciting times."
i'm sure they are.
after quoting jim o'rourke saying this: "You can no longer use context as part of your work [...] because it doesn't matter what you do, somebody's going to change the context of it;" marc richardson responds with this: "The O'Rourkes of the world may argue that this trend is a bad thing, but it's obviously going to open a new world of experience, and right now we're just scratching the surface of possibility."
first of all, "scratching the surface of possibility" is a piss poor turn of phrase. second of all, "a new world of experience" is also a pretty meaningless group of words. it's the "new world" that makes it okay to steal music, makes it okay that even successful musicians all over america are going broke. the "old world", where people paid musicians for their work, and musicians had say in how that work was structured -- a thing of the past!
except, and here's the crucial part, except when marc richardson believes artists "know what they're doing". for them, "i give myself over to their work in a very particular way." so you're actually supposed to pre-determine, before hearing anything, whether or not an artist is supposed to be taken seriously. if yes, BUY WHOLE ALBUM. if no, download shit for free and continue "scratching the surface of possibility."
it turns out marc richardson's other job -- you know, when he's not ruminating -- is telling people what music they should take seriously. it's for this reason that i don't doubt him when he says: "These are exciting times."
i'm sure they are.
Monday, August 17, 2009
THE DECADE IS OVER! THE DECADE IS OVER!
well, kind of. i mean, the decade will be over, in seventeen months, five if you don't count right. whatever, the decade is over. do you people even know what that means?
it means soon we get to find out what were the best albums, tracks, and music videos of the last ten years. we'll surely get to find out what some writers think the decade "meant" -- lots of long essays about mp3's, about how online distribution is SO FUCKIN AWESOME!
one thing's for sure: the current crop of pitchfork writers is probably starting to get nostalgic for their college days. consequentially, look for smarmy indie dance bands to be extremely well represented (you know, fast guitar music with no backbeat [whites gotta dance, too]), competing most directly with smarmy indie folk bands (sweet christ on a cracker, i hate those woodland brooklynites who seem to practice their instruments as frequently as they shave).
expect certain TITS bands to be erased down the memory hole (black kids, arctic monkeys, clap your hands...), and expect the editorial staff to show diversity of taste by including a bunch of hip-hop records that they never bothered to promote.
i won't miss the 00's (pronounced "oooohs"). it's kind of been a militarist corporatist nightmare of a decade. if there's one thing we can learn from it, it's that dystopian writers like Huxley and Orwell weren't as imaginative as modern-day republicans and democrats.
musically? general taste has been eviscerated by the atomization of the public, corporate sponsership of music is UP (sales are, of course, DOWN), and brittney spears had more fight in her than the beta band.
while pitchfork has presided over the death of anything like counter-culture, many of us just last november participated in the untimely death of political activism. the next decade's movers and shakers need to survey the wreckage, and realize that being king of the mountain now means only that you reach the peak of a pile of rubble.
it means soon we get to find out what were the best albums, tracks, and music videos of the last ten years. we'll surely get to find out what some writers think the decade "meant" -- lots of long essays about mp3's, about how online distribution is SO FUCKIN AWESOME!
one thing's for sure: the current crop of pitchfork writers is probably starting to get nostalgic for their college days. consequentially, look for smarmy indie dance bands to be extremely well represented (you know, fast guitar music with no backbeat [whites gotta dance, too]), competing most directly with smarmy indie folk bands (sweet christ on a cracker, i hate those woodland brooklynites who seem to practice their instruments as frequently as they shave).
expect certain TITS bands to be erased down the memory hole (black kids, arctic monkeys, clap your hands...), and expect the editorial staff to show diversity of taste by including a bunch of hip-hop records that they never bothered to promote.
i won't miss the 00's (pronounced "oooohs"). it's kind of been a militarist corporatist nightmare of a decade. if there's one thing we can learn from it, it's that dystopian writers like Huxley and Orwell weren't as imaginative as modern-day republicans and democrats.
musically? general taste has been eviscerated by the atomization of the public, corporate sponsership of music is UP (sales are, of course, DOWN), and brittney spears had more fight in her than the beta band.
while pitchfork has presided over the death of anything like counter-culture, many of us just last november participated in the untimely death of political activism. the next decade's movers and shakers need to survey the wreckage, and realize that being king of the mountain now means only that you reach the peak of a pile of rubble.
Friday, July 17, 2009
Friend Request
so i talk about the fork a lot, and now i have an opportunity to explain why.
every time they publish one of these "poptimist" columns, i know damn well that something stupid is contained within -- something abrasively, arrogantly, obviously stupid. i'm sure one or two can be dug out that aren't masturbatory pieces of garbage, but if that's what you go in suspecting you usually won't be disappointed.
this one, subtitled "chartopia" is quite disturbing in that it addresses much of the crap i've been yelling about on and off for a few years now. he's talking about culture, about our much vaunted "new media", and how it's affected whatever remains of aggregate taste.
he says something that is stupid, and it's importantly stupid. "In a recent blog post, marketing guru Seth Godin touched disdainfully on the much-predicted demise of newspapers, writing 'Neatness is for historians.' This bon mot duly buzzed around the digiverse. Godin was addressing-- and dismissing-- journalism's much-honored role as 'the first draft of history,' its mission to make sense of the world for its readers. Social media, according to Godin and many similar thinkers, give people the tools to do this for themselves."
now here's why this is really stupid. some people call bloggers "citizen journalists". david simon once asked if you would call a man who puts out a small trash fire he sees while on a walk a "citizen firefighter". he then asked if your next conclusion would be that real firefighters are obsolete.
in reality, bloggers tend to be parasitic (as this blog). we live commenting on other companies' actual reporting. foreign policy blogs link to the new york times and the washington post, and most people don't follow links, meaning readers are consuming the product of a news company, but the company itself has no imaginable way to profit from it. aggregators (blogger's spell check doesn't recognize this last word; is it made up?) like google news and huffington post are the biggest violators of this, but the same dynamic exists for low-traffic blogs.
now, extend this to "social media" (i'm now realizing how orwellian this term truly is). some asshole TWEETS about a band; of the thirty five people who read his TWEETS let's say five take interest in the band; of those five presumably plugged-in folks, let's say one buys a few songs on itunes, while the rest torrent every single song the band has ever recorded and proceed to live the rest of their lives with thirty additional never-to-be-listened-to mp3s. the artist thanks the tweeter for the additional eight cents of income.
the problem with newspapers going out of business is that in order to produce news you actually have to pay some poor cunt to go somewhere and ask some questions and write some shit down. as adorably motivated as most "citizen journalists" are, someone needs to buy your food while you sit around at courthouse all day. reporting news is not an inherently profitable thing to do. neither is making music.
what tom ewing promises in his column is that social media allows people "to make sense of the world". i disagree. i think social media confuses its users, and disrupts any perception of the difference between the real world (of people, things) and the digital world (of pixels, numbers). as this happens, the real life institutions of the real world (newspapers, concert venues, etc.) die very rapidly, because the entire money-having nation spends ten hours out of every day typing and staring and typing and staring and typing and staring, all the while expanding their knowledge of everything, finding more people they know, being lords of their own universe.
sideshow bob once threatened to kill all television from a jumbotron, and i feel kind of like him, i guess. a luddite born in the 80's has a hell of a time these days. at the end of his sprawling, unfocused column, mr. ewing actually says, "There is still a great deal to be poptimistic about." as a musician, i find myself in another camp.
"social networking" (another phrase our society could probably do without) is incredibly useful for self-promotion. as an artist without any institutional support, it's more or less irreplaceable. but the rest of you, those non-creative people, whose generosity has fed us guitarists since the birth of our profession, you need to get off your god damn screens (right after you agree to attend my show). stop talking to each other all the fucking time and do something!
there's only so much that people can share. part of the equation has always been injecting new ideas, previously non-existent and unknowable, into the stream. mr. ewing thinks new media can do this job just fine, and that's why i called him stupid before. for real culture to happen, culture that we can be proud to pass to our children one day, we need to interact with one another in a way that can never be mechanized, a way that simply won't be made obsolete by tiny little machines that break if you kick them.
i'm talking, of course, about live music and fucking. who's with me?!
every time they publish one of these "poptimist" columns, i know damn well that something stupid is contained within -- something abrasively, arrogantly, obviously stupid. i'm sure one or two can be dug out that aren't masturbatory pieces of garbage, but if that's what you go in suspecting you usually won't be disappointed.
this one, subtitled "chartopia" is quite disturbing in that it addresses much of the crap i've been yelling about on and off for a few years now. he's talking about culture, about our much vaunted "new media", and how it's affected whatever remains of aggregate taste.
he says something that is stupid, and it's importantly stupid. "In a recent blog post, marketing guru Seth Godin touched disdainfully on the much-predicted demise of newspapers, writing 'Neatness is for historians.' This bon mot duly buzzed around the digiverse. Godin was addressing-- and dismissing-- journalism's much-honored role as 'the first draft of history,' its mission to make sense of the world for its readers. Social media, according to Godin and many similar thinkers, give people the tools to do this for themselves."
now here's why this is really stupid. some people call bloggers "citizen journalists". david simon once asked if you would call a man who puts out a small trash fire he sees while on a walk a "citizen firefighter". he then asked if your next conclusion would be that real firefighters are obsolete.
in reality, bloggers tend to be parasitic (as this blog). we live commenting on other companies' actual reporting. foreign policy blogs link to the new york times and the washington post, and most people don't follow links, meaning readers are consuming the product of a news company, but the company itself has no imaginable way to profit from it. aggregators (blogger's spell check doesn't recognize this last word; is it made up?) like google news and huffington post are the biggest violators of this, but the same dynamic exists for low-traffic blogs.
now, extend this to "social media" (i'm now realizing how orwellian this term truly is). some asshole TWEETS about a band; of the thirty five people who read his TWEETS let's say five take interest in the band; of those five presumably plugged-in folks, let's say one buys a few songs on itunes, while the rest torrent every single song the band has ever recorded and proceed to live the rest of their lives with thirty additional never-to-be-listened-to mp3s. the artist thanks the tweeter for the additional eight cents of income.
the problem with newspapers going out of business is that in order to produce news you actually have to pay some poor cunt to go somewhere and ask some questions and write some shit down. as adorably motivated as most "citizen journalists" are, someone needs to buy your food while you sit around at courthouse all day. reporting news is not an inherently profitable thing to do. neither is making music.
what tom ewing promises in his column is that social media allows people "to make sense of the world". i disagree. i think social media confuses its users, and disrupts any perception of the difference between the real world (of people, things) and the digital world (of pixels, numbers). as this happens, the real life institutions of the real world (newspapers, concert venues, etc.) die very rapidly, because the entire money-having nation spends ten hours out of every day typing and staring and typing and staring and typing and staring, all the while expanding their knowledge of everything, finding more people they know, being lords of their own universe.
sideshow bob once threatened to kill all television from a jumbotron, and i feel kind of like him, i guess. a luddite born in the 80's has a hell of a time these days. at the end of his sprawling, unfocused column, mr. ewing actually says, "There is still a great deal to be poptimistic about." as a musician, i find myself in another camp.
"social networking" (another phrase our society could probably do without) is incredibly useful for self-promotion. as an artist without any institutional support, it's more or less irreplaceable. but the rest of you, those non-creative people, whose generosity has fed us guitarists since the birth of our profession, you need to get off your god damn screens (right after you agree to attend my show). stop talking to each other all the fucking time and do something!
there's only so much that people can share. part of the equation has always been injecting new ideas, previously non-existent and unknowable, into the stream. mr. ewing thinks new media can do this job just fine, and that's why i called him stupid before. for real culture to happen, culture that we can be proud to pass to our children one day, we need to interact with one another in a way that can never be mechanized, a way that simply won't be made obsolete by tiny little machines that break if you kick them.
i'm talking, of course, about live music and fucking. who's with me?!
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
yo
this guy's thesis, broadly speaking, is: "The model for record labels was that the U2s paid for the Hold Steadys, and that's supposed to keep regenerating. But obviously the labels aren't able to do that so well anymore because they're shrinking their rosters." this is true, but he misses what is important, which is that bands like the hold steady were always an awkward fit for the mass media industry. t-pain can sell millions of records; simply put, sleater kinney cannot.
you have to shell out a ton of money before you get a marketable mainstream hip-hop album, while the cost of producing an "indie" record ought to be quite modest. with such records, modest sales should be able to reap modest profits. these profits are way too small for GIGANTIC companies like sony and time warner, which is why i've always found it odd that the big labels want anything to do with indie music in the first place. undeterred, however, labels merged and acquired all sorts of smaller, once independent labels over the last ten years (as was the style in the times). and now they bitch that the hold steady doesn't make enough money.
there's another problem here, one which steve knopper, rather oddly, doesn't mention: there aren't any record stores left (if he expects to find a viable profit model for digital distribution, then he should really give the new york times a call; i hear they've been waiting for one of those for a decade). it's hard to make money off of theft, and bundling your digital product (easily attainable for free all over the internet) with a t-shirt and a concert ticket is a stupid fucking idea. the music is the product, and if you can't sell it, then you can't fucking sell it.
at this point i would say, "figure something else out", but that's not what i believe is going to happen. more importantly, that's not what i think SHOULD happen. the record industry is FUCKED, and that's OK. record industry folk believe, as does knopper, that the purpose of a label is to "develop" new artists, but nothing could be further from the truth. an entire, globe-spanning industry has been built on the profits that are made from the sale of music; all of those salaries (fewer and fewer every year, but still) are paid for by the sale of music. they make the music as much as a supermarket makes soda. the industry develops nothing; its only jobs are promotion and distribution.
but the digital revolution is really a self-promotion revolution, and now that there aren't any record stores left, exactly who are they distributing to? and if they're so goddamn good at developing musicians, why are they all broke?
what profits there are to be had from making and selling music will be paltry -- generally, this has always been true and it will always be true. music may even be such a poor career choice that it might make sense for us to declare ourselves "not-for-profits". shit, my private liberal arts college did that, and they charged 36 grand a year. but whatever the particulars are of whatever future model we can imagine, i would hope only that ALL profits generated by the sale of music return to those who were integrally involved in the creation of that music.
the key word there, of course, is "integrally". edgar bronfman may own dozens of different imprints, he may be very rich, but it's creativity that makes music, not capital.
my advice to decaying labels would be this: if you want to make money selling music, maybe you should write a song or two; i insist, however, that you stop shitting down my throat and calling it cake.
you have to shell out a ton of money before you get a marketable mainstream hip-hop album, while the cost of producing an "indie" record ought to be quite modest. with such records, modest sales should be able to reap modest profits. these profits are way too small for GIGANTIC companies like sony and time warner, which is why i've always found it odd that the big labels want anything to do with indie music in the first place. undeterred, however, labels merged and acquired all sorts of smaller, once independent labels over the last ten years (as was the style in the times). and now they bitch that the hold steady doesn't make enough money.
there's another problem here, one which steve knopper, rather oddly, doesn't mention: there aren't any record stores left (if he expects to find a viable profit model for digital distribution, then he should really give the new york times a call; i hear they've been waiting for one of those for a decade). it's hard to make money off of theft, and bundling your digital product (easily attainable for free all over the internet) with a t-shirt and a concert ticket is a stupid fucking idea. the music is the product, and if you can't sell it, then you can't fucking sell it.
at this point i would say, "figure something else out", but that's not what i believe is going to happen. more importantly, that's not what i think SHOULD happen. the record industry is FUCKED, and that's OK. record industry folk believe, as does knopper, that the purpose of a label is to "develop" new artists, but nothing could be further from the truth. an entire, globe-spanning industry has been built on the profits that are made from the sale of music; all of those salaries (fewer and fewer every year, but still) are paid for by the sale of music. they make the music as much as a supermarket makes soda. the industry develops nothing; its only jobs are promotion and distribution.
but the digital revolution is really a self-promotion revolution, and now that there aren't any record stores left, exactly who are they distributing to? and if they're so goddamn good at developing musicians, why are they all broke?
what profits there are to be had from making and selling music will be paltry -- generally, this has always been true and it will always be true. music may even be such a poor career choice that it might make sense for us to declare ourselves "not-for-profits". shit, my private liberal arts college did that, and they charged 36 grand a year. but whatever the particulars are of whatever future model we can imagine, i would hope only that ALL profits generated by the sale of music return to those who were integrally involved in the creation of that music.
the key word there, of course, is "integrally". edgar bronfman may own dozens of different imprints, he may be very rich, but it's creativity that makes music, not capital.
my advice to decaying labels would be this: if you want to make money selling music, maybe you should write a song or two; i insist, however, that you stop shitting down my throat and calling it cake.
Friday, January 30, 2009
major labels and indie labels and why they're the same fucking thing
want to see something funny? read this.
it's a badass article about how badass the fleet foxes guy is because he's squashing a rumor that his stupid crappy band is signing with virgin. he says, "Fleet Foxes will never, ever, under no circumstances, from now until the world chokes on gas fumes, sign to a major label. This includes all subsidiaries or permutations thereunder. Till we die." pretty bold.
why not major labels? "I just don't see the point. Most major labels seem anti-music." pretty firm. it lacks an attention to detail that many arguments possess, but who am i to pick nits?
at the beginning of the article, pitchfork newsman Tom Breihan talks about how many records they've sold. 180,000 by early january, 211,000 to date. these are pretty impressive figures for an "indie" record, especially one put out by a guy who so vehemently opposes the chokehold that major record labels have on the music business.
trouble is... subpop, the "indie" label to which fleet foxes are signed, is owned (49%) by warner music. if you'll recall my previous post whining about fleet foxes, you'll recall that warner music is a subsidiary of raytheon industries, one of the largest weapons manufacturers we've got.
so an indie band, signed to an indie label, owned my a major label, owned by a weapons manufacturer, won't sign to a major label "until the world chokes on gas fumes." this fucking country.
incidentally, why is it ok to go on saturday night live but not ok to sign to a major label? could it be because robin pecknold is an idiot?
it's a badass article about how badass the fleet foxes guy is because he's squashing a rumor that his stupid crappy band is signing with virgin. he says, "Fleet Foxes will never, ever, under no circumstances, from now until the world chokes on gas fumes, sign to a major label. This includes all subsidiaries or permutations thereunder. Till we die." pretty bold.
why not major labels? "I just don't see the point. Most major labels seem anti-music." pretty firm. it lacks an attention to detail that many arguments possess, but who am i to pick nits?
at the beginning of the article, pitchfork newsman Tom Breihan talks about how many records they've sold. 180,000 by early january, 211,000 to date. these are pretty impressive figures for an "indie" record, especially one put out by a guy who so vehemently opposes the chokehold that major record labels have on the music business.
trouble is... subpop, the "indie" label to which fleet foxes are signed, is owned (49%) by warner music. if you'll recall my previous post whining about fleet foxes, you'll recall that warner music is a subsidiary of raytheon industries, one of the largest weapons manufacturers we've got.
so an indie band, signed to an indie label, owned my a major label, owned by a weapons manufacturer, won't sign to a major label "until the world chokes on gas fumes." this fucking country.
incidentally, why is it ok to go on saturday night live but not ok to sign to a major label? could it be because robin pecknold is an idiot?
Friday, January 16, 2009
fleet foxes ----> SNL
a good many years ago, godspeed you! black emperor put this on the back of their album 'yanqui uxo'.
the flow chart shows that every major record label is a subsidiary of a weapons manufacturer. they were roundly mocked for being naive. the point they were trying to make wasn't that military contractors are force-feeding us pro-war music in a nefarious effort to accomplish... something. the point was, simply, that major record labels are amoral, joined at the hip to an industry of mass death; companies have no values, and as a musician, you can do better than to let them be the ones who feed you.
this is "naive" because survival is the ethic of any musician, and only in movies do people turn away money because of principle. cut to present day:
fleet foxes, the hottest shit in the universe for the moment, will be performing on saturday night live this weekend. usually it takes a while for a "cool" band to end up on SNL. (modest mouse weren't allowed on until they wrote "float on".) even more usually, saturday night live's stage plays host to ashlee simpson, justin timberlake, perhaps mudvayne.
last winter, vampire weekend played SNL mere months after their album was released. now it's fleet foxes' turn. NBC is owned by GE, the third largest military contractor in the history of the world. what's my point?
bringing it back to godspeed, they would never be invited to play saturday night live, nor would they be likely to accept such an invitation, were it ever to be extended. is this because they are better people? no. it's because they are better artists.
if GE doesn't mind pimping your music, you're probably playing something the suburban dads of this country can get behind. i, for one, believe this means you suck, out of hand. fleet foxes suck. vampire weekend sucks. (glad i got that out there)
when i was working in a record store in san francisco, we had one section called "indie" and another called "rock". a co-worker tried to move vampire weekend from the former to the latter, since the promotions blitz our employer was engaging in cast serious doubt on the independence of vampire weekend's operation. (story continues in next paragraph)
did you know that record labels send assholes around to record stores in order to make sure that their shit is being pushed with appropriate enthusiasm? they do. it turns out, vampire weekend was in the "indie" section because of a financial arrangement between my record store and their distributors. ain't that a kick in the teeth?
long story short, "indie" bands who get put on saturday night live to promote their debut record are not "indie". they are "corporate", like "christina" aguilera.
the flow chart shows that every major record label is a subsidiary of a weapons manufacturer. they were roundly mocked for being naive. the point they were trying to make wasn't that military contractors are force-feeding us pro-war music in a nefarious effort to accomplish... something. the point was, simply, that major record labels are amoral, joined at the hip to an industry of mass death; companies have no values, and as a musician, you can do better than to let them be the ones who feed you.
this is "naive" because survival is the ethic of any musician, and only in movies do people turn away money because of principle. cut to present day:
fleet foxes, the hottest shit in the universe for the moment, will be performing on saturday night live this weekend. usually it takes a while for a "cool" band to end up on SNL. (modest mouse weren't allowed on until they wrote "float on".) even more usually, saturday night live's stage plays host to ashlee simpson, justin timberlake, perhaps mudvayne.
last winter, vampire weekend played SNL mere months after their album was released. now it's fleet foxes' turn. NBC is owned by GE, the third largest military contractor in the history of the world. what's my point?
bringing it back to godspeed, they would never be invited to play saturday night live, nor would they be likely to accept such an invitation, were it ever to be extended. is this because they are better people? no. it's because they are better artists.
if GE doesn't mind pimping your music, you're probably playing something the suburban dads of this country can get behind. i, for one, believe this means you suck, out of hand. fleet foxes suck. vampire weekend sucks. (glad i got that out there)
when i was working in a record store in san francisco, we had one section called "indie" and another called "rock". a co-worker tried to move vampire weekend from the former to the latter, since the promotions blitz our employer was engaging in cast serious doubt on the independence of vampire weekend's operation. (story continues in next paragraph)
did you know that record labels send assholes around to record stores in order to make sure that their shit is being pushed with appropriate enthusiasm? they do. it turns out, vampire weekend was in the "indie" section because of a financial arrangement between my record store and their distributors. ain't that a kick in the teeth?
long story short, "indie" bands who get put on saturday night live to promote their debut record are not "indie". they are "corporate", like "christina" aguilera.
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
The Perpetuation of Rock and Roll
This is old news, and it doesn't really matter, but last year Grand Master Flash and the Furious Five were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Strange and stranger still is the list of groups that are "eligible" for inclusion this year:
Afrika Bambaataa
Beastie Boys
Chic
Dave Clark Five
Donna Summer
John Mellencamp
Leonard Cohen
Madonna
The Ventures
Read it again. And again. I will now list the nominees respective genres.
Hip hop/Rap
Hip hop/Rap
Disco/R'n'B
Folk Rock
Disco/R'n'B
American Rock
Folk
Dance/Pop/R'nB/Electro/Kabbalah
Rock and Roll
Notice anything? Yeah, so did I. Two straight up Rock acts. Two.
What the fuck is going on here? It pissed me off when they opened this supposed "Rock and Roll Hall of Fame", honoring a completely ridiculous and seemingly random number of artists. Also, could the idea of a Hall of Fame be any more embarrassingly American? In driving to my new home town of Outside of Chicago, myself and the Cleverest One passed the "RV Hall of Fame" in Indiana. They have Halls for everything. It is not a grandiose place of legends, it's a capital-driven tourist attraction, located in Cleveland, the Fertile Crescent of Rock and Roll that spawned such great groups as...well, not many great groups, I don't have time to cherry pick here.
This is besides the point. Has Rock and Roll really run out of useful candidates to induct? Or is Rock really trying to stake a claim for all other genres? Again:
Africa Bambaataa-in the mid to late 70's, he spurred a cultural movement in the Boogie Down Bronx, DJing block parties to give the youth something to do. He later teamed up with Renaissance man Arthur Baker and Funk and Soul pioneer James Brown to name a few collaborators. He and the Zulu Nation helped shape the early age of Hip Hop as we know it.
Nothing to do with Rock and Roll. Nothing.
Beastie Boys- one could make a claim that their marraige of hardcore rock ideals and aesthetic with the booming bap of Rick Rubin's 808 drum machine could make them semi-suitable candidates. I semi-agree. Only semi-wise, though.
Chic- The music was funky and made you dance like nothing else. Unless you were white, because white people dance like uncomfortable robots with self esteem issues. But that's the core of the issue. This music is not rock and roll. It spans several genres, but last time I checked Rock and Roll wasn't defined as any music played with a guitar, bass, drum and singing.
Dave Clark Five - Sure, why not. It would get the naysayers like this guy off of your collective back, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame:
"They were a hard driving group who played with all their heart and soul. Their music is still played today by a lot of people. Mike Smith had one of the best voices of the time and maybe in all of rock and roll. They sold over 50 million records as a group and they should be in the Hall of Fame."
Playing with their heart and soul? I'm sure that's easy criteria to assess. There has to be some universal gauge for heart and soul lying around. And no, their music is not played by a lot of people. Only old codgers and indie bands doing Garageband remixes. Also, when was the last time you read or heard anything about Mike Smith being a great vocalist? Never. That's right, never. Howling Wolf, Chuck Berry, John Lennon, Robert Plant, Harry Nilsson, the list goes on. And it usually does so without Mike Smith. Fuck you.
Donna Summer - What the fuck? What the fuck is going on here? Seriously, like, what the fuck? She did a disco cover of "The Wanderer?" I just...fuck. Is this...where am I? I'm blinded by this...Wait, seriously, I'm writing about Donna Summer and Rock. No. Disco. She did disco. Instrumentally, there were some...nevermind, it's fruitless.
This hurts too much to even finish the list. The real kicker is the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's criteria for a candidate:
"Criteria include the influence and significance of the artist's contributions to the development and perpetuation of rock and roll."
Awful. Rock has been teetering on the brink of extinction for a while now, but that perpetuation line is a kick in the crotch of the movement itself.
The idea that a form of music that was so alive is now dead is sad enough. To state that other genres are mere perpetuations of Rock is just wrong. If it was true, and we're basing this on honest to god chains of influence, rock came out of the Chicago and New Orleans Jazz scenes, which were in turn birthed from the New Orleans brothel house music. So really this should be the New Orleans Brothel House Music Hall of Fame, and it should encompass all music everywhere.
A message to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame: No need to be pathetic. Why not choose from any number of great bands out there who deserve a ridiculous and arbitrary award? Husker Du, Minor Threat, Black Flag, Television, New York Dolls, etc. Rock and Roll is great, and you don't need to grab other genres to make yourself feel good.
Unless you're Madonna. There was supposed to be a humorous drum shot there. Nevermind.
Strange and stranger still is the list of groups that are "eligible" for inclusion this year:
Afrika Bambaataa
Beastie Boys
Chic
Dave Clark Five
Donna Summer
John Mellencamp
Leonard Cohen
Madonna
The Ventures
Read it again. And again. I will now list the nominees respective genres.
Hip hop/Rap
Hip hop/Rap
Disco/R'n'B
Folk Rock
Disco/R'n'B
American Rock
Folk
Dance/Pop/R'nB/Electro/Kabbalah
Rock and Roll
Notice anything? Yeah, so did I. Two straight up Rock acts. Two.
What the fuck is going on here? It pissed me off when they opened this supposed "Rock and Roll Hall of Fame", honoring a completely ridiculous and seemingly random number of artists. Also, could the idea of a Hall of Fame be any more embarrassingly American? In driving to my new home town of Outside of Chicago, myself and the Cleverest One passed the "RV Hall of Fame" in Indiana. They have Halls for everything. It is not a grandiose place of legends, it's a capital-driven tourist attraction, located in Cleveland, the Fertile Crescent of Rock and Roll that spawned such great groups as...well, not many great groups, I don't have time to cherry pick here.
This is besides the point. Has Rock and Roll really run out of useful candidates to induct? Or is Rock really trying to stake a claim for all other genres? Again:
Africa Bambaataa-in the mid to late 70's, he spurred a cultural movement in the Boogie Down Bronx, DJing block parties to give the youth something to do. He later teamed up with Renaissance man Arthur Baker and Funk and Soul pioneer James Brown to name a few collaborators. He and the Zulu Nation helped shape the early age of Hip Hop as we know it.
Nothing to do with Rock and Roll. Nothing.
Beastie Boys- one could make a claim that their marraige of hardcore rock ideals and aesthetic with the booming bap of Rick Rubin's 808 drum machine could make them semi-suitable candidates. I semi-agree. Only semi-wise, though.
Chic- The music was funky and made you dance like nothing else. Unless you were white, because white people dance like uncomfortable robots with self esteem issues. But that's the core of the issue. This music is not rock and roll. It spans several genres, but last time I checked Rock and Roll wasn't defined as any music played with a guitar, bass, drum and singing.
Dave Clark Five - Sure, why not. It would get the naysayers like this guy off of your collective back, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame:
"They were a hard driving group who played with all their heart and soul. Their music is still played today by a lot of people. Mike Smith had one of the best voices of the time and maybe in all of rock and roll. They sold over 50 million records as a group and they should be in the Hall of Fame."
Playing with their heart and soul? I'm sure that's easy criteria to assess. There has to be some universal gauge for heart and soul lying around. And no, their music is not played by a lot of people. Only old codgers and indie bands doing Garageband remixes. Also, when was the last time you read or heard anything about Mike Smith being a great vocalist? Never. That's right, never. Howling Wolf, Chuck Berry, John Lennon, Robert Plant, Harry Nilsson, the list goes on. And it usually does so without Mike Smith. Fuck you.
Donna Summer - What the fuck? What the fuck is going on here? Seriously, like, what the fuck? She did a disco cover of "The Wanderer?" I just...fuck. Is this...where am I? I'm blinded by this...Wait, seriously, I'm writing about Donna Summer and Rock. No. Disco. She did disco. Instrumentally, there were some...nevermind, it's fruitless.
This hurts too much to even finish the list. The real kicker is the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's criteria for a candidate:
"Criteria include the influence and significance of the artist's contributions to the development and perpetuation of rock and roll."
Awful. Rock has been teetering on the brink of extinction for a while now, but that perpetuation line is a kick in the crotch of the movement itself.
The idea that a form of music that was so alive is now dead is sad enough. To state that other genres are mere perpetuations of Rock is just wrong. If it was true, and we're basing this on honest to god chains of influence, rock came out of the Chicago and New Orleans Jazz scenes, which were in turn birthed from the New Orleans brothel house music. So really this should be the New Orleans Brothel House Music Hall of Fame, and it should encompass all music everywhere.
A message to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame: No need to be pathetic. Why not choose from any number of great bands out there who deserve a ridiculous and arbitrary award? Husker Du, Minor Threat, Black Flag, Television, New York Dolls, etc. Rock and Roll is great, and you don't need to grab other genres to make yourself feel good.
Unless you're Madonna. There was supposed to be a humorous drum shot there. Nevermind.
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
time to like another band!
all signs point to black kids (the name of the band) being totally hot right now. all the essential ingredients of indie fame are there: awkward synths abound, the lead singer sounds like robert smith doused in reverb, the songs are "dance songs" without even a hint of a backbeat (perfect for white audiences), and the choruses are dependably louder than the verses (which makes rock critics happy). the band's self-released EP ("wizard of ahhhs") is available for download at their myspace page. check it out for tomorrow's hype today.
if anybody's reading this, i'd be interested to see if you actually like these songs ("i'm not gonna teach your boyfriend how to dance with you" is apparently good). please leave a comment explaining what you enjoyed. usually when i make such a request, i'd be baiting someone into a fight. this time, however, i'm genuinely curious.**
to my ears, it sounds like music meant for a john hughes movie (maybe "the breakfast club" or "weird science"). it's not uniquely terrible in any way; it just doesn't seem exciting or new. perhaps "indie" music has, at last, fully evolved into the new bubblegum pop.
pitchfork tells me that black kids "make catchy, tightly executed songs that put a memorable stamp on pop's classic themes." catchy? perhaps. tightly executed? whatever (claims this vapid are tough to disagree with). i hear "classic themes" all over the place, but what their "memorable stamp" is, i can't quite tell.
black kids don't have a label yet, but it's only a matter of time. and who knows? maybe they'll make a terrific debut record and i'll be eating my words. but i can't avoid the feeling that they're destined to be yet another moderately fun band, just waiting for effete college students to chew them up and spit them out.
in the course of his review, marc hogan manages to drop the arcade fire, the go! team, morrissey, jim henson's "labyrinth", and motown (most of these references make sense, but that last one really comes out of left field). critics love saying that stuff reminds them of other stuff, and "wizard of ahhhs" certainly lends itself to that practice. maybe this is what's good about it.
in the end, this episode seems to me like one of the final stages in "indie" music's regression into irrelevance. entering our seventh year of global war, our fifth year occupying the heart of the middle east, as the constitution continues to be dismantled amendment by amendment, we are told to enjoy songs that even a young molly ringwald may have found trite.
whatever keeps the educated class in lline, i guess.
** i really mean this. feed me your thoughts.
if anybody's reading this, i'd be interested to see if you actually like these songs ("i'm not gonna teach your boyfriend how to dance with you" is apparently good). please leave a comment explaining what you enjoyed. usually when i make such a request, i'd be baiting someone into a fight. this time, however, i'm genuinely curious.**
to my ears, it sounds like music meant for a john hughes movie (maybe "the breakfast club" or "weird science"). it's not uniquely terrible in any way; it just doesn't seem exciting or new. perhaps "indie" music has, at last, fully evolved into the new bubblegum pop.
pitchfork tells me that black kids "make catchy, tightly executed songs that put a memorable stamp on pop's classic themes." catchy? perhaps. tightly executed? whatever (claims this vapid are tough to disagree with). i hear "classic themes" all over the place, but what their "memorable stamp" is, i can't quite tell.
black kids don't have a label yet, but it's only a matter of time. and who knows? maybe they'll make a terrific debut record and i'll be eating my words. but i can't avoid the feeling that they're destined to be yet another moderately fun band, just waiting for effete college students to chew them up and spit them out.
in the course of his review, marc hogan manages to drop the arcade fire, the go! team, morrissey, jim henson's "labyrinth", and motown (most of these references make sense, but that last one really comes out of left field). critics love saying that stuff reminds them of other stuff, and "wizard of ahhhs" certainly lends itself to that practice. maybe this is what's good about it.
in the end, this episode seems to me like one of the final stages in "indie" music's regression into irrelevance. entering our seventh year of global war, our fifth year occupying the heart of the middle east, as the constitution continues to be dismantled amendment by amendment, we are told to enjoy songs that even a young molly ringwald may have found trite.
whatever keeps the educated class in lline, i guess.
** i really mean this. feed me your thoughts.
Friday, September 14, 2007
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)