Black Kids

[King Kamala 0]

So is that review insinuating that if we buy this Black Kids album the economic recession will be over?

 

The only time I can ever recall enjoying Spin Magazine is an article they did six or seven years ago about a ripoff version of Frankie Goes To Hollywood led by some beefy midwesterner who claimed to have done session work on one of their albums. I remember it said that they closed with a medley combining "Enter Sandman" and "Relaxed".

[Mik 0]

Fuck Pitchfork on this one.

 

They are just cowtailing to popular opinion because it's one thing to not like the album. In fact, it's completely understandable... it's not for everyone.

 

But you can't give a great review to Wizard of Ahhs and then shit all over Partie Tramautic because they are practically the same fucking thing. In fact, 4 of the 10 songs on the full length overlap with the EP and the other six are in the same exact style. If you're going to completely reverse your position on two albums that are nearly identical then you need to do better than a picture of two dogs.

[Guest The Elements of Style]

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertai...and-870520.html

Indie is the 30-year-old genre that gave us The Smiths, The Stone Roses, Blur and Arctic Monkeys. [boldface supplied] But in that period it has also produced Ocean Colour Scene, Menswear and Joe Lean and The Jing Jang Jong.

I know I shouldn't undermine the article in the teaser, but whaaaaaaaat.

[At Home 0]

So, in summation, it's saying "Yeah, there's good and bad, so fuck the whole thing."

 

I don't understand "INDIE MUSIC ISN'T WORKING." That doesn't make sense. What was indie even trying to accomplish other than just be something other than ALT-ROCK. It's just kids being resourceful. Are there a lot of guitar-based and similar-sounding bands? Sure. But the grey areas extend out further into the spectrum than metal or rap or country could ever hope to.

[Mik 0]

Arctic Monkeys aren't as bad as Czech makes them out to be. "Flourescent Adolescent" and "Bigger Boys and Stolen Sweethearts" are great songs.

[Kinetic 0]

Oh, that Pitchfork. I guess recycling the "monkey pissing into its own mouth" video would have been too obvious. I really do hope that they write a real review for this thing, as I feel it's necessary for them to fully atone for this crime before I can ever again trust one of their 7.9 ratings for totally nondescript Finnish psych-pop outfits.

[PUT THAT DICK IN MY MOUTH! 0]

So, in summation, it's saying "Yeah, there's good and bad, so fuck the whole thing."

 

I don't understand "INDIE MUSIC ISN'T WORKING." That doesn't make sense. What was indie even trying to accomplish other than just be something other than ALT-ROCK. It's just kids being resourceful. Are there a lot of guitar-based and similar-sounding bands? Sure. But the grey areas extend out further into the spectrum than metal or rap or country could ever hope to.

 

I think their point is that "indie rock" has, in fact, become an aesthetic/genre unto itself instead of just a catch-all term for music put out by independent labels and that that aesthetic is starting to wear out its welcome pretty bad. It's all the stupid British music press's fault, really, since they're the ones who started labeling any band with jangly guitars and half-assed dance rhythms "indie rock" regardless of distribution/financial backing/etc.

[Guest The Elements of Style]

So, in summation, it's saying "Yeah, there's good and bad, so fuck the whole thing."

 

I don't understand "INDIE MUSIC ISN'T WORKING." That doesn't make sense. What was indie even trying to accomplish other than just be something other than ALT-ROCK. It's just kids being resourceful. Are there a lot of guitar-based and similar-sounding bands? Sure. But the grey areas extend out further into the spectrum than metal or rap or country could ever hope to.

I felt the point was that these bands are becoming increasingly interchangeable and disposable. The developmental process you'd expect out of the indie business model, the same process that helped really brilliant stuff make it out on major labels in the past, is gone. The lifespans of these bands are so short and that's accepted as understandable, if not ideal, in the brave new world of Pitchfork and so forth. Bands like Vampire Weekend or Black Kids are not running on a sustainable model: they have neither the chops nor the repertoires to be where they are right now (the reviews for their live engagements seem universally dismal), and they're going to suffer in the long run as a result. They're all one-and-dones now. That one Jang Jong or whatever band just had its debut album cancelled because they weren't ready. Preemptive burnout. And what do you mean by resourceful youth? They're certainly not crafting memorable songs or employing superior musicianship; that's why we're in this rut. If you mean it's resourceful for the kids in The Fratellis or The Redwalls or Clap Your Hands Say Yeah or any of these bands to find a loophole in the system and be ridiculously hyped until summarily wadded up and thrown away, then yes, that's clever stuff, but the product itself is so often uninspiring.

 

Indie is a stupid term, now more than ever.

 

EDIT: to piggyback on Byron's point above, it is really necessary for the NME to just stop doing what it's doing and hyping every guitar outfit that comes out of their country or ours as the next big thing. I'm surprised that the NME's anointing hasn't become rock music's Madden Curse by now, since their post-Smiths track record is so crappy: the Stone Roses never really reached the great heights expected of them, Oasis has become a punchline, the Strokes finally seem to be dwindling, and the Arctic Monkeys were never any damn good in the first place. I alluded it to it in that post where I freaked out about Vampire Weekend making a Wes Anderson music video (he wasn't involved, I checked, but c'mon, those fuckers even used his Futura Bold!), but I really wonder if we're finally approaching an indie critical mass where there needs to be some wholesale change just to keep the whole thing from imploding under its own weight, like when punk needed to deflate prog, or grunge needed to deflate hair metal. I don't know what's going to dethrone The Indie Aesthetic, though. How about word jazz?

[PUT THAT DICK IN MY MOUTH! 0]

I really wonder if we're finally approaching an indie critical mass where there needs to be some wholesale change just to keep the whole thing from imploding under its own weight, like when punk needed to deflate prog, or grunge needed to deflate hair metal. I don't know what's going to dethrone The Indie Aesthetic, though. How about word jazz?

 

The problem is, whatever comes along next is just going to fall victim to the same hype-cycle as indie rock. Blame the internet, which has really been a gift and a curse as far as music goes. On the one hand, it grants super-easy access to an obscene amount of music and as such it's easier than ever to be "musically informed." On the other hand, this easy access can produce the sort of mindset that you and Inc touched on back at the beginning of this thread:

 

I wonder to what extent I'm part of the problem. I think I listened to like 43 albums from 2007. Some of these, I'll never care about; I just wanted to keep digesting more new material.

Big reason why I gave up trying to follow contemporary music. I wasn't really absorbing anything; I just wanted to have an opinion on whatever people were talking about. That isn't being a music fan; it's status. A pose.

[Gary Floyd 0]

Thing about the Stone Roses is this: they had one great album. Just one, and it was their debut. Their follow up album was terrible, and the band called it quits. The lead singer went on to have a rather uninteresting solo career, and that's about it. At least they were always better than The Happy Mondays.

 

If you want proof of how the Internet can ruin things, look at all the obnoxious music review sites that have come after Pitchfork. Look at how we are getting more magazines catering to what some see as "Indie" or whatever. See how older and newer magazines are now trying their damndest to imitate Pitchfork and their ilk. It's pathetic really.

[At Home 0]

So just ignore them. I'm sure they help some people out. Not to mention there's a pretty big group of people that maintain that PF is full of shit and irrelevant.

[Guest The Elements of Style]

I liked Stylus, but it closed up. They did a nice piece about John Cale's Fear. I remember that.

[Dr. Zoidberg 0]

...I like Arctic Monkeys...

 

 

Well, I used to love them, now I'm not as into them. I'm more into Klaxons now.

[PUT THAT DICK IN MY MOUTH! 0]

I liked Stylus, but it closed up. They did a nice piece about John Cale's Fear. I remember that.

 

For my money, the best "not pitchfork" music review site is cokemachineglow. Mark Abraham's Retconning column is pretty much essential reading. Click that link and get educated.

[The Man in Blak 0]

Saw these guys on Letterman last night. Kinda goofy but, overall, sucked. That Pitchfork felt the need to apologize for the hype with a JPEG review speaks volumes about the band, as well as "P4K".

[Ravenbomb 0]

Does Stereogum count as a Pitchfork ripoff? I like Stereogum.

[Guest The Elements of Style]

what the fuck is this the Wiggles?

 

EDIT: it's actually closer to Operator Please, now that I think about it more.

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

While Democrats debated whether an African American or a woman should be our next president, Black Kids became the most buzzed-about new band since Vampire Weekend.

I laughed so hard at this.

[At Home 0]

OH MY GOD

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

If Pitchfork's review of the Black Kids album is their mea culpa, it fails. They've hyped so many other lousy bands—are they going to start dissing them, too? That said, the pic/caption combo made me laugh, but an actual review explaining why this album stinks would've been nice. As far as I can tell, the only thing separating the LP from the EP is better production values.

 

Also, mik, Pitchfork, for once, were working against the indie music media grain. And you appear to have confused "popular" opinion with "critical" opinion, which rarely overlap, even in indie circles. (Not to keep beating up on these guys—okay, actually, I do mean to—but I swear I've never knowingly met someone who liked Tapes n Tapes.) Popular (relatively speaking, natch) and critical opinion agree that Black Kids are some really neat 80s revivalists.