Pitchfork Rebuttal No. 6: Pinback's 'Blue Screen Life'

One of my confreres here at Something Vexes brought up the fact that amidst the wide concourse of album reviews posted at Pitchfork Media, there just isn't much of what we like. Sure, I realize we're different people with superior taste and knowledge in music, and if we could run that excrable website our way, we'd just delete the account altogether.

But the difference in mentality doesn't excuse their knack for misunderstanding a band's/artist's work to the point where a staff writer goes longwind on a hairbrained critique, which thousands and thousands of young idiots (they don't have to be idiots, though!) will adopt as their own, personal views on the matter. Music taste is subjective. We know that. But reviewers out of their elements claiming authority over an album on first kiss just doesn't make a grain of sense. Give something simple, like Chuck Berry's St. Louis to Liverpool, to a neglected Somalian teen and have him write a critical view on the music and its intentions; see what you get, then. That's a wild exaggeration, I know, but you see my point: You can't get sex tips from a newborn.

Going back to the call that there just isn't much at Pitchfork we, here, can get into, we're left to defend abused works of the underground's upper crust (the staff writers don't look much deeper than that). This time it's Pinback's not-bad-at-all full-length, Blue Screen Life (Ace Fu, 2001).

In the silliest of assertions, reviewer David M. Pecoraro pins (harhar) band members Rob Crow and Armistead Burwell Smith IV (an unnecessary name, I'll admit) as going "emo," picking, specifically Jimmy Eat World as influence.

But first, well, here's how the review tees off:

Did I miss something here? Is emo the next big thing?

No? Then I'm totally stumped. How else can you explain so many excellent bands turning whiny all of a sudden? First Death Cab for Cutie, now Pinback. I swear, if the new Flaming Lips album so much as mentions heartbreak, I'm going to shoot myself.

Pecoraro has, very early into this review, flashed us with a laminant devoid of any credentials through his fairly fingerless grasp on "emo," making it also safe to assume he's a reader of Spin Magazine. But, but, but I guess I can't assume that too early: I'd be a hypocrite! I don't want to claim I know what he's all about.

But--

Aside from his cute misunderstanding of the word "emo" and his application of it to anything dealing with love and heartbreak, he cites Death Cab For Cutie as another group to slip in the sap. Was DCFC a ragin' rock band at birth? AC/DC-type stuff or something? DC/FC? Meanwhile it's hipsters like Pecoraro (am I assuming too much?) that laud classic country singers and portend fandom of their wrenching songs of love and loss (which is, by the way, great stuff, but I don't buy everyone's applause--seems too convenient to like that stuff these days).

I'll grant his saying "I'm going to shoot myself" as sarcasm, though cheap and predictable.

Movin' on, here's his next chunk:

For the sake of total disclosure, I'll admit the following. There was a period of about six months when I was kind of into emo. Back then, those off-kilter repetitious chords meant enough to me that it didn't matter that they never changed. And something about the way the singers tried so for harmony but never quite made it hit me hard. And then, somewhere along the line, I grew up. Ambition supplanted self-loathing, and with each passing day I had less of a place for emo. I watched as, completely independent of my own musical evolution, the same thing happened to most of my friends. The days of pumping the volume and getting all cathartic to the Get Up Kids were gone. Nowadays when we hung out, we all kicked back in our La-Z-Boys, chillin' to Stan Getz and Joao Gilberto.

I don't understand his tense in that last sentence, but whatever. The Get Up Kids are his frame of reference for "emo" music. And he's attaching their stylings to Pinback. Because of common instances of heartbroken lyric writing. I mean, that's the commonality he's pinpointing (harhar) right? I mean, they sound nothing like eachother. So it's the subject matter, which he identifies in his opening bit.

If you don't see where I'm going with this, then here: Pinback and Willie Nelson and Elvis Presley and Elvis Costello and every blues musician there ever was are all, evidently, emo. Emo is one of the most strained copout terms in all of music journalism. And aside from the purists who deem Rites of Spring and Embrace and such as emo proper, no one can boast a definition.

Okay, so after he quotes a few lines of sentiment from Blue Screen Life, he's all like:

This happens a lot on Blue Screen Life. "X I Y," "Prog," "Tres" and "Your Sickness" all have long, dragged-out, whiny vocals that sound a hell of a lot like Mr. Lucky Denver Mint. Not only is the sound unoriginal, but it also leaves me wondering: of all the people in our rich musical heritage that Zach and Crow could've ripped off, why the fuck would they choose Jimmy Eat World?

He sounds pretty positive that Jimmy Eat World is the turning point for Pinback's lyrical (and perhaps musical) direction, rather than say there's a perhaps innocent similiary that turned him off. He also condemns it for its alleged unoriginality, but using Jimmy Eat World as the diving board is pretty darn funny. It infers that Jimmy Eat World are a world their own, without acknowledging that Jimmy Eat World is open about borrowing heavily from Christie Front Drive.

After smiling on a few moments that resemble Pinback's earlier, less "emo" songs, Pecoraro drops his gavel and deems Blue Screen Life "fucking boring," and that "nothing grabs [his] attention." Weird, I had assumed otherwise based on his review. "All the songs sound alike," he then says. But, but, wait--aren't some songs good, like their earlier material? And some songs lean to emo-dom? Didn't you just say that, Pecoraro? Coulda sworn.

But that's nit-picky. I'll let that go. What I will comment on is what he kicks up next:

Frankly, I wouldn't recommend this to fans of Hey Mercedes any more than I would to those who run screaming at the first mention of the word Kinsella.

Dude, you're misleading everyone! Whether you like the work or not, don't infer a connection with the sound or subject of Hey Mercedes. They're completely different. Drastically. Black and white. McDonalds and Outback Steakhouse. Kinsella? Closer, but which Kinsella? And what band? He's making a generalization about fans of the Kinsella fold, but altogether a weak call. 'Uninspired,' some would say. Speaking of which, here's Pecoraro's closer:

It seems sad to me that a perfectly good pop group would deliberately choose to emo-fy themselves, even though I concede that it's all just a matter of personal taste. But even sadder is a perfectly good pop group putting out an album as boring and uninspired as Blue Screen Life. Come on, guys, really.

He saves himself an inch or two by acknowledging "personal taste," but it comes a bit late after a length of lambasting Pinback for supposedly making a voluntary, intentional move to "emo," instead of an INSPIRED progression away from their earlier sound--and I might add that had Pinback repeated themselves for Blue Screen Life, some horn-rim from Pitchfork would've said something like, "They're just one trick ponies, unable to pull themselves from the sound of their debut album, therefore they're just uninspired."

Pitchfork Rebuttal No. 5: Bats and Mice "Believe It, Mammals"

I found another "gem" in Pitchfork Media's review archive today when I stumbled across this piece, in which Alison Fields, who may be the most self-aware of Pitchfork's reviewers that I've had the pleasure of reading, basically talked about herself throughout her entire review of a damn fine album before slapping it with a six-out-of-ten and then going off to do whatever asshole hipsters like her do.

Fields spends way too long talking about the Sleepytime Trio, a loud-as-hell rager of a band that preceded Bats and Mice and included two of its members, (she also mentions that she lived in the town where the label that released their records got its start, and that she went to like, all of their shows in college but doesn't really dig that anymore now, and that she had a totally wack haircut back then) and then laments the fact that Bats and Mice doesn't sound a whole lot like them.

There's not a single instance of extended clanging, shattering guitar, fuzzy, unintelligible samples, or vicious yelping on the whole album.

Well, duh, it was four or five fucking years later. Bands change. Musicians do different things. If these guys had made a Sleepytime Trio album, Fields probably would have written a review about how done "that sound" is instead of longing for it.

But a couple of grafs down, she writes that the album's opener "erupts into a considerable amount of screaming and dissonance at the chorus.

All I can really do here is hold down the 'shift' button on my keyboard and then push the 'forward slash' button. When I do that, it makes this symbol:

?

She also gives the band a few points for their "consistency."

Again: ?

The most puzzling part is how easily Fields could have discovered that Bats and Mice weren't really meant to sound a whole lot like the work of the members previous bands. How could she have done that? Well, for starters, she could have familiarized herself with their back catalogue. Sure, the only thing Bats and Mice released prior to "Believe It, Mammals" was a three-song ep that didn't make a whole lot of heads turn despite its fairly solid nature. But how could Fields have known that, or what it mapped out as far as a sound for the band? Well, she could have read this review of it, which appeared in the publication she works for and which I found by using the web site's simple search feature.

I don't know.

Pitchfork Rebuttal No. 4: Party of Helicopters' 'Mt. Forever'

Several times already we've charged Pitchfork Media with allowing writers out of their respective elements to review and misapprehend solid and deliberate works of music. To review and critique is one fair thing, yeah, but to misidentify a group's intention(s) and base a foul-ball argument on such to a legion of impressionable readers is some real crap.

I wonder if Pitchfork writer John Dark even gave listen to the Party of Helicopters' divine Mt. Forever before shanking it with a 4.5 out of 10 rating, because, well--his critique was daffy (not to mention it being launched off one of the silliest, most desperate intro paragraphs I've read on the site--check out how he connects his analogy to the Party of Helicopter's sound--hilarious).

But okay. To start with, Dark asserts the less-than-half truth that the Party of Helicopters are a metal band. Not the kinda-sorta metal-guitar-riff-here'n'there-that-suits-their-completely-non-metal-foundation-quite-nicely kind of sound that it is--Dark actually misreads their music as "efforts to reinvent metal."

"They [don't] though," he makes clear. "Their liberties don't amount to much and neither are they convincingly presented."

I guess the best way to deflate Dark's initial boner is to just let him know, nicely, that such isn't the intention of Mt. Forever nor the band that authored it. It just--well, it just isn't.

Guitarist Jamie Stillman digs metal and classic rock, and that's pretty apparent in his playing. But how about J. Mascis and Dino Jr? Or Stephen Eggerton of the All/Descendents fam? Classic metal licks are embedded in abundance across the rock'n'roll plane, and there are a great number of examples to cite. While that's goin' down, the Party of Helicopters have tastefully added that dynamic to the style of music the members had already been playing in the '90s in bands like Harriet the Spy and the Man I Fell In Love With--both of which were pretty advanced for their scene and era.

That brings us to the next bit of funny business with Dark's perception of the Party of Helicopters and its members. Read this:

Sadly, a dash of flat-toned countermelodies and unaligned harmonies aren't exactly grand innovations, even in metal, where new ideas are subject to the same kind of trickle-down cultural delay that causes places like Des Moines, Iowa and [POH's hometown] Kent, Ohio to get "new" fashion trends four years after New York (and six after Milan).

Besides the metal blooper, Dark assumes Stillman and company to be late on cool ideas, waiting in ignorance like 21st century analog boys in Billabong jackets until music trends that have already been disowned in the Big City are able to footloose their ways over. Well, alls I gotta say to that is: dude, check out Harriet the Spy and weigh them against the indie/emo horse hockey NYC and other big cities were enjoying at the time--and today.

Next up:

The Party of Helicopters' tendency to overreach is a shame, really, because their consistently intriguing metal is often undermined by too-earnest efforts at creating a self-styled signature sound.

Weird. Pitchfork's whippits of innovation-pleas have really dusted their skulls. I thought they LOVED bands with supposed "self-styled signature sound[s]." Dark must be the bad-boy of the gang.

Beyond this distance in the review, Dark really doesn't have anything else to say, other than that he digs the songs at the end of the disc that lay off the riffin', which is funny because it's comprised of only eight songs total. Oh, and he gets silly again with that aforementioned analogy.

But let's crunch it down. The Party of Helicopters (RIP), was a more guitar-centered version of the members' past groups. An out-of-his-element music writer at Pitchfork Media doesn't even mention these important, beloved bands. He just readily assumes the Party of Helicopters to be a gang of bored, unexposed kids who sat around the thrift store waiting for their sound to arrive, like a Turbo Grafix 16. He also says their reinvention of metal failed. I guess that bag of Doritos I had the other day failed to deliver a tangy apple flavor.



That's cool though.

Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you, fuck you

Fuck all of you.

Pitchfork Rebuttal No. 3: Cinemechanica's "The Martial Arts"

I can safely speak in truth when I say all of us here at Something Vexes have enjoyed nearly every minute of recorded output from this Athens, Ga. four-or-five-or-six piece (depending on what night you catch them on) rock band. They're inventive, they're monster players, they're super nice guys (and gal), and they understand that for all their chops, a good song is not based on how many notes they can cram into a musical passage (and it's quite few with these guys). They're just as apt to dazzle you with a break-neck math song structure as they are to make your head bob by kicking into a fist-pumping Sabbath-style groove. It's good stuff.
So, of course, the talentless hacks over at Pitchfork Media went and missed the point by spending four agonizing, wordy paragraphs trying to figure out how to label what I'd simply call an awesome rock band. To give reviewer Cory D. Byrom some credit, he did rate the album at an impressive 7.5 out of 10, showing a rare convergence of quality music and the misguided-at-best opinions of Pitchfork's self-important review staff. But then he. Well. I'm not sure what he did.

Genre labels have become so divided and sub-divided over the years that it's virtually impossible to identify a band's style without resorting to comparisons, vague descriptions, or complex strings of abbreviated, one-syllable tags to offer a general idea of the various styles a band might be dabbling in. Forget simple terms like rock, punk, or hardcore; we've already soared past to post-rock, post-punk, and what seems like a never-ending list of "-cores."

Athens, Georgia's Cinemechanica are a product of this sort of puzzling problem. As I listen to the nine tracks on their debut full length, The Martial Arts, reference points flash from all over the place.

Okay, so he uses quite a few too many words to point out that this is a unique band. And the review takes a promising turn when Byrom starts dropping a few names for reference. Doing that can be a cop-out, but I'd rather hear him mention Don Caballero, Q And Not U, and Drive Like Jehu than insult his readers by throwing terms such as "brooding bass lines," "chaotic chords" and "screamed vocals." Oh, wait, he did exactly that.
Following up, he jumped into a throwaway paragraph where he did that rock-writing cliche thing. You know the one, the one where he identifies each member of the band and lists their instrument. It made my nuts shrink into my belly for a little while:

Along with Joel Hatstat's bass, drummer Mike Albanese's frantic beats create a powerful rhythm section that, despite being in constant motion, leaves room for Andy Pruett and Bryant Williamson to interweave their dizzying guitar lines in the foreground.

The last line of the review drove me the most nuts, though:

Hell, if not for the straightforward instrumentation and the brevity of the songs-- the average length is about three minutes-- even prog-rock could be a descriptor. But really, genre labels rarely aptly describe the bands they're attached to, and they certainly do little to explain the spastic, razor-sharp music on The Martial Arts.

Well, Cory, neither do you.

Pitchfork Rebuttal No. 2: Challenger's 'Give the People What They Want In Lethal Doses'

Famous for missing the point, Pitchfork Media yet again demonstrated an inability to submit a substantial argument in a review of Challenger's 2004 record, Give the People What They Want In Lethal Doses, which they gave a 5.6 out of 10 rating.

The review, written by Amanda Petrusich in 2004, bears the following intro:

It's always been kinda impossible to isolate the defining ethos of punk rock, but over the course of the last twenty-five years, the genre has been kicked over, dismantled and reinvented so many times that the term itself has devolved into little more than a hip euphemism for "obnoxious." In 2004, dubbing a band "punk" and walking away is, essentially, a completely meaningless exercise.

And thanks for a completely meaningless intro. If it's useless to argue the meaning of punk in that countless bands have stretched the genre's supposed foundations to a blur, why try? And why base the rest of the argument on Challenger's use of "hammering drums, loud guitars, [and] shouting," as signifiers of punk "ethos"? Can there even be a particular punk ethos? Did the Ramones roll out a mission statement? Was Johnny Ramone not a progressive right winger? Does every punk band use the same formula? C'mon. You can't argue the ethos of a genre; only of its bands. Plus, I thought "hammering drums, loud guitars, [and] shouting" were just standards of rock'n'roll.

Anyway, she goes onto say that Challenger has set out to break away from today's fruitless, so-called punk music with a nod to the heavies of the '80s punk underground, such as the Minutemen and Black Flag, but in the process, they end up sounding just as lifeless as the "quasi-authentic nu-punk" of the moment. To drive it in, she says it's not that they aren't full of life and energy, "...[but] that their entire founding principle seems so painfully, tediously borrowed; in sticking to that ever-nebulous true-punk formula, they've abandoned their only shot at capturing an original, non-nostalgia laced sound."

"True-punk." She sounds like an outsider, here. A heavy reader of Spin Magazine. A writer for Pitchfork Media. A person who--oh hey!

So basically, Challenger's crime is that they wanted to write a heavy, naked, bullshit-free album out of an obvious love for generations of good music carrying the punk tag--rather than create "original" work.

The author proceeds to cop out: "Most of Give People What They Want," she says, "is fairly textbook."

Textbook. So over-used. So meaningless.

But let's finish 'er out:

Not too many of these tracks are especially discernable from each other. Which is fine, when you're just thrashing around your apartment in big boots-- but it's not so promising when you sit down to weigh the respective heft of Challenger's own brand of punk rock.

"Big boots." The reviewer is a bonafide outsider.

Challenger may punch up their songs with some exhilarating vocal harmonies and unexpected structural shifts, but in the end, they never really transcend their own love/appreciation for their legendary influences-- a choice which prevents them from making a sizable dent in the ever-flexing history of punk.

Taking into account the respective pasts of Challenger's core members--they left the excelling basics of Hellbender and Griver for the chance to do something a little different/"original" in Milemarker and a number of other non-traditional projects--how can one not understand that this "punk" band was an intentional step away from innovation, for the pure and respectable goal of just having fun playing the type of music they enjoy? Nostalgia can be a sincere drive. It can produce a meaningful effort. It can create great music for people who understand that.

Otherwise we'll just have to eviscerate cover bands for being "unoriginal."

Wheelin', Dealin', Limosine Ridin', Jet Flyin', Son of a Gun

Sometimes you have to go find the crap, sometimes the crap comes to you. Today Yahoo!'s Entertainment page features a fluffy AP about "Chris Lighty: Hip-Hop's Dealmaker." The article felicitates Lighty on having the job of making hip hop's most famous artists very paid. The author uses that term "very paid."

"Lighty didn't get to be hip-hop's go-to dealmaker by accepting the status quo. So while sales may be down, Lighty is still working magic to make sure 50 and other high-profile clientele like Diddy and Busta Rhymes keep getting very paid."

The article baffles me in its ability to overlook the commercialization of music and act like endorsement deals are great for the music industry. "Well, Fiddy was about to sell his private plane, and I was like, hold the phone. That’s when I got him that Cheerio's commercial." That seems to be the mentality the author and Lighty have, screw music as a creative art, we need to maintain our ridiculous and unnecessary extravagant lifestyle.

"As music sales go down because kids are stealing it off the Internet and trading it and iPod sales continue to rise, you can't rely on just the income that you would make off of being an artist."

Yes, let us all blame Mr. Internet and Steve Jobs for the decline in record sales. Perhaps if these artist made records worth buying, and created a fan base that respects their success, then they could make a success of their creative expression. What am I saying, Steve Jobs is responsible for P Diddy not being able to afford a third yacht. And yes, he just referred to people like 50 Cent and P Diddy as "artists."

"During an interview in the swank cafe of the opulent Beverly Hills Hotel, Lighty rattles off various opportunities for 50, including a vitamin supplement deal, a role in a Brett Ratner movie, and his own condom line. Coming soon for another client, LL Cool J? A Chapstick deal for the rapper known for licking his lips."

Ooo! Swank! Opulent! That place sounds nice!

A Chapstick deal for LL Cool J, who is known for "licking his lips." How about a "Icy Hot" campaign for KRS One who is known for pain in his joints?

I still don't understand why hip hop has become the most commercialized brand of popular music. There are many rap artists who struggle and output great expressions of musical creativity. The "artists" that Lighty represent are not known for their creative expression, or for writing songs of any importance. Mostly it involves degrading women, killing someone, or bragging about how much money they have. I have a hard time believing 50 Cent's upcoming vitamin commercials will keep his head above water while he struggles to make ends meet. I'm positive that if he lived a reasonably normal lifestyle the "decline in record sales" wouldn't make much of a difference.

Oldies Night

Tonight the destruction of American Idol continues. Sanjaya Malakar, the terrible androgynous contestant that has captured America's interest is safe for yet another week. This week he sang poorly as usual, but since it was "Oldies Night" he was sporting a "retro-look." He ended up looking like an emaciated Cab Calloway.

The only remarkable aspect from this week's show was guest star Tony Bennett's befuddlement over contestant Melinda Doolittle's resemblance to Shrek.

Pitchfork Rebuttal No. 1: Jason Loewenstein's 'At Sixes and Sevens'

I can't speak for everyone at Something Vexes, but I know at least three thirds of the writers here think Pitchfork Media to be quite the overrated force in "underground" music matters. Inject me/us with sodium pentathol while on the subject and you'll hear graphic cries for its demise for advancing words like "angular," "quirky" and "meandering." It really is a pale shit of a thing.

But getting to it, here's the first in a series of Pitchfork album review rebuttals I/we plan to write. This one's for the great Jason Loewenstein, whose flawless solo album, At Sixes and Sevens (Sub Pop, 2002) was pelted with an argument of empty eggs by a member of the PM gang. Fine work guys, you wrote off the first great indie release of the 21st century. And it's one of the few.

To criminally bestow a 4.2/10 score upon it, Pitchfork writer Rob Mitchum makes his flimsy case here:

Loewenstein's problems seem to spring from a penchant for textbook hard rock and an almost astonishing lack of range, failings that are amplified by his choice to record all of At Sixes and Sevens' instrumentation himself. Track one, "Codes", is reasonable enough with its thick guitar chug, canter speed, and what might be the obligatory kiss-off lyrics, but after ten more variations on the same theme, even a brisk forty-minute album starts to drag. For a time-killer, you might internally debate which is more unremarkable: Loewenstein's double-tracked flannel shirt vocals or his close-to-uniformly forgettable melodies ("Circles" being the sole exception).

So he requires range over consistency, eh? Well, let me retrieve for you a line from his review of the Rapture's Pieces of the People We Love: "...what ultimately makes Pieces a step or three down from [earlier album] Echoes is a drop off in consistency."

I guess Mitchum is a little tizzed at the fact that Loewenstein's music is apparently more consistent than Mitchum's rationale. He shows range, though.

But to be fair, I realize that maaaaybe his range complaint has to do with lack of some sort of [obnoxious] flair, as demonstrated--if you like this sorta thing, which I don't--by the Rapture. He does accuse Loewenstein's writing of being "textbook." (Oh and just quickly, I'd like to point out the massive copout/cliche of the "textbook" citation, used by far too many music writers who embody their own accusations) But didn't Loewenstein, alongside Lou Barlow and Eric Gaffney, add important chapters to the beloved/hated "textbook" in their Sebadoh days? More credible critics the world over seem to think so. Personally, all my favorite Sebadoh cuts were authored by Loewenstein. They had more burst, more grit. Is that what Mitchum dislikes? That sort of sound? Why didn't he just say that? And just a guess: Mitchum loves acoustic music. Range.

Plus, there's plenty of range on this album. At Sixes involves several different moods and volumes, but so what if most of them are dark? That's the mood. An album needs to incorporate every mood, genre, audience, deodorant brand, sexual preference, holiday and religion to achieve its goal? What the fuck does range have to do with anything if you've presented something so obviously intent on delivering a particular sound?--Not to mention from a guy who aided in its pioneering!!

And then Mitchum goes on to subtract more points for Loewenstein's complete, impressive control over the songwriting, performance and production. Heh. That "amplifies" his supposed shortcomings? Um. Why? I dunno. Mitchum doesn't say.

Here's some more:

Sorry to say, At Sixes and Sevens shows little-to-no evolution from his makeout-session-ruining songs on [Sebadoh's] Harmacy. While the record might have had some throwback potential (seeing as Loewenstein has yet to move on from Seattle circa 1993), the contents are nowhere near quality enough to kick off that grunge revival...

Yes, it's an absolute disgrace that Loewenstein can't pull himself away from a great sound he helped to advance. May the Lord condemn anyone influenced by a particular era, especially those who were part of that era. I guess if Loewenstein had gone for something a little more "neo-baroque," or nu new-wave, or of oxidized blues, everything would be okay (wait, don't those genres stem from another time?). But I can toss that argument to the heap, because: this isn't grunge, and nothing about this album suggests any such intention.

But alright, let's get fair again and assume Mitchum may have been saying that, while other bands have moved on with new ideas, Loewenstein is just stuck in the early '90s, citing At Sixes' stylistic relation if you need to stretch it to that point for the sake of connecting it to your argument (talking to Mitchum). Well to me, that's such a good thing. What's today offering that the "critics" love so much more? The Rapture? The Shins? TV On the Radio? Clap Your Hands Say Yeah? Have you heard that lumber? Range? I don't know what it is with these bands that pop so much praise in the midst of Loewenstein's 4.2 rating, but I see it all as some of the most lifeless, hackish "indie" (whatever) music to date. Loewenstein stuck in the old days? He's so much more the wiser.

enemy rock

Sufjan Stevens is a pretentious fuck. I'm sure, if you've heard his music, you already knew that, but I'm just saying.
I've got a lot of problems with this guy, but this is my latest one.
It's an essay (not an editorial, an essay) he wrote on the website of his label, Asthmatic Kitty, which is also one of many sites on the Interdome devoted solely to fondling Stevens' folky, cute Christian balls non-stop.
In the essay, he lashes out about what he calls "friend rock," or, going to see your friend's band play. He says it's a problem, because even if your friend's band is good, you knew them outside the context of their music first, and so, somehow, that means you shouldn't be subjected to it (the music). What the fuck?
Maybe in magic hipster New York City land, going to see your friends' shows is like required. Because apparently, having to do it so much is getting in the way of Stevens "having coffee with you, or flying kites, a picnic in the park, cross-country skiing, something active, aerobic, conversational, therapeutic, enriching, interpersonal, paint-by-numbers, dodge ball, falafel sandwich, sunset, holding hands, human touch." What a fucking asshole.
Seriously, I'm going to break that entire quote out here:

Oh friends, friends-of-friends, friends-of-colleagues, friends-of-distant-relatives, upstanding, good looking, perfectly nice people with masters degrees who want so badly to be on stage: it’s not so much that we don’t like your band, or your songs, or your hairstyle, or your promos, or your one-sheet, or your website, or your flying-V guitar. It’s just that you were our friend first, and an aspiring musician second, and, honestly, in the end, we would rather be having coffee with you, or flying kites, a picnic in the park, cross-country skiing, something active, aerobic, conversational, therapeutic, enriching, interpersonal, paint-by-numbers, dodge ball, falafel sandwich, sunset, holding hands, human touch. Can we still be friends?

No, we can't still be friends. Eat your faggot sandwich alone.

I Was Provoked

I was fishing around the internets to find something to complain about (due to a fairly bland American Idol episode last night) and ended up on Blender Magazine's website. In their blog section I noticed the newest blog's title was "The Year's Most Provocative Music Video" and my interest was provoked. I rarely see music videos, for they have gone the way of the snow leopard. They are hard to find and I'm too lazy to go looking.

With the help of an embedded YouTube movie:

The snoozefest known as Dizzee Rascal: “Sirens” by Director: W.I.Z. is a British rapper's political piece against...uh...racial profiling? Here is the write-up by Blender:

In the most recent issue of Blender, there’s an excellent piece by Dorian Lynskey on the plight of "hoodies" in England. The term has come to define a spectral type of hood-wearing troublesome youth that many--including the British government--have come down upon in recent years with petty restrictions. But, while so-called hoodies have been responsible for some violence, statistics show the idea of an out-of-control teen gangs looting and stabbing their way through life has been largely manufactured by the media. London rapper Dizzee Rascal takes this controversy and spikes it with racial signifiers in his remarkably powerful video for “Sirens.” The clip has a group of pale, red-coated fox hunters (old England) chasing after a hoodie'd Dizzee (new England) as if he were just another piece of prey. Brilliantly filmed by prodigious video director W.I.Z., “Sirens” is provocative, suspenseful and, above all else, unsettling in its depiction of Britain’s current culture wars.

This video is neither "remarkable" or "powerful." This video takes a long time to make a single point which is entirely literal. White people on a fox hunt chasing a black man through the streets at night with a repetitive lethargic hip hop soundtrack. I'm not a fan of hip hop. It has its moments, but overall I dislike the fact that it is sometimes elevated so eagerly to some high level artistic plane. I just have a hard time appreciating this song and video as "provocative, suspensful, and above all else, unsettling" when the song is about a guy getting chased by "Sirens" and the video shows him being chased. Wow, thats powerful stuff.

the bordering-on nearly practically not-quite close-upon near-to

Why would I even bother to look at Spin Magazine or its associated web site? To paraphrase a fellow poster who was talking about something else, I know I'm probably not going to see anything I like there, and it'll just make me mad.
Well, I guess look at it (Spin, not the other thing) to find things to write about on this site, which I use to tear down the hard work that other people put into their creative ventures.
Like this. Which says that Utah rockers The Almost are Spin's "band of the day."
I'm not shocked by this shitty band receiving an honor like that from Spin, a magazine which basically can't stop itself from gushing praise at mediocre nu hardcore-tinged "emo" bands of The Almost's ilk.
What did get to me was what always seems to get to me when I read these blurbs - the interactive feature at the end:

Talk: Do the Almost bring the rock all the way or just partway?

Partway? I mean, what kind of question is that anyway? And "Partway?" How much is that? Let's sleuth. It must be less than all the way. Okay, that's a given. But is it halfway, or two-thirdsway? Three-fourthsway? One-fifthway?
Dicklicking Spin writers.
So I thought they asked this because the band's singer also plays drums in the absolutely atrocious Underoath, who apparently bring the rock "all the way," which I think maybe means chugga-chugging a lot and wearing a lot of makeup and croaking about Jesus. But then I finally got the pun. I think. Maybe they asked this because the band is called "The Almost." Get it? They ALMOST rock ALL THE WAY! That's so clever!
Anyway, I listened to their songs, and their rockingness is pretty rocking, if you were to measure by tempo and guitar levels and such. But their songwriting ability
is definitely partway.
On a sidenote, there sure are a lot of comparisons flying around about the ginger-headed singer of The Almost, whose name is Aaron Gillespie, and Dave Grohl. I'm not even going to address that.

Aina Mania

All of us here at Something Vexes really like the band Aina. That would be the indie/punk/whatever-rock supergroup from Barcelona, not the metal opera collective. Although they are often lumped together by sources such as allmusic.com, they really couldn't be more easily distinguishable.

Anyhoo, after I found a nifty collection of videos from a recent Aina reunion show on YouTube, I decided to take another look at their listing on allmusic. After breezing past the aforementioned 20-member metal opera collective, I found a review of our Aina's 2001 album Bipartite. A dude named Kurt Morris wrote the 3-star (out of 5) review, and he really heaped on the lukewarm praise. He basically said that the sound is too strongly rooted in Burning Airlines and Jawbox to be taken very seriously on its own. Leaving aside the fact that I probably would have rated it a solid 5 stars, this is the part that bothered me the most:

Supposedly Aina puts on a rocking good live show and that may be part of the reason for this otherwise unspectacular disc being released.

Do what now? I guess if it were a live album, this would make sense. "You know, these guys have several records out already, and they have a loyal following. And, boy, do they rock the shit live. You know what? Let's get them back in the studio. Quick."

American Idol, Gwen Stefani, et al

Why am I currently watching American Idol? Mainly because I hate George Lopez and Jim Belushi. American Idol, of course, is the obnoxious overrated large-scale karaoke contest that uses an audience of mindless drones and exuberant preteens to determine who will be famous among the group of carefully chosen amateur singers. I would be lying if I didn't say that the first few episodes of the show are always great TV, where we the audience is entertained by a gallery of carefully chosen "freaks" who show up to the auditions for whatever delusion they are currently under.

The first few episodes of American Idol are just solid television. It reminds me of the gong show. I love to see delusion slowly fade away, and one of two things occur; the person who thinks they can sing becomes violently defensive and leave the audition feeling misunderstood. The second thing that happens is the person is demoralized and they are swept out of the room like so much broken glass.

Sometimes they bring in a famous musician or songwriter to act as a gimmick to entice even more people to watch the show. Diana Ross was on the show one week and each contestant had to sing a Diana Ross song, no matter what their individual style was. Even the white dudes whom, not surprisingly, struggled. Diana Ross is kind of a specific singer, but whatever, It was really bad. The next week was themed "British Invasion Night" where the contestants sang songs from that era. In to coach the Idol hopefuls were Lulu, and living joke Peter Noone from Herman's Hermits. A band that claims to be the "original British Invasion band" with a song "I'm Into Something Good" that was a remake.

The contestants were graced this week by living joke Gwen Stefani. Gwen Stefani is defined by being hot. In fact she graced the cover of Entertainment Weekly with the headline, "Gwen's New Look." It said nothing about her new CD, but I guess some people like to listen to the audio of a hot girl rather than see the visual. Now I hate the "sellout" label. I gave that up when I left high school. It's a lazy argument attached to any band that either has matured, changed, or gone after some monetary success. No Doubt certainly worked their way up the ladder of success and never made any claims that they were some pioneering pop/ska hybrid band. Slowly, album after album they started experimenting, much in the same way Rancid started getting worse and worse.

When I look at someone in a band who branches out to do a solo project, I assume it is a decision to make music of a more personal nature. To make music you wouldn’t have the opportunity to make within the band's identity you have already established. What I don’t understand about Gwen Stefani is why she felt like she needed to make the music she is making now. I mean, besides making a lot of money. Which is fine, but that doesn't make her an artist, it makes her a whore. Like Justin Timberlake, or the whole idea of American Idol. If American Idol allowed the contestants to write their own songs or have songs written specifically for them, then it might be more interesting to judge the various styles and personalities. But the focus of the show is to mold the unsuspecting contestant into a commodity who sings for money.

So Gwen Stefani is invited to the show to critique the singing of the contestants. All of whom sing better than she does. Gwen never got by on her pipes, she got by on her looks and the catchy music that backed her up when she was in No Doubt. Her pseudo-retro warbling hasn't translated to her nonsensical Asian hip-hop music very smoothly. Not to mention she has the personality of wet cardboard. So what did the contestants sing on "Gwen Stefani Night"? Two Police songs, two Donna Summer songs, and three No Doubt songs. All of the glorified karaoke performances were bad, but the No Doubt songs were especially bad. They stood out head and shoulders from the crowd as lame, cheesy garbage. The Police and Donna Summer? Oh, they were considered influences to Gwen Stefani. Not bands like Madness or The Specials that she pretended to like when it was cool. I guess she just recently found Police" 20th Century Masters in the used bin and really dug it. So inspired by the music of the Police she wrote two albums full of vexingly shit-tacular pop music.

Next night on the "results show" on American Idol, Gwen performed with her entourage of Asian girls. Actually, it may be more proper to call them her "collection of Asian girls." Apparently this is part of her creative expression, to accessorize with humans from Asia.

Gwen sang her song (a Madonna-esque song called "The Sweet Escape") and not only was it a bad song, she sounded flat and terrible. After watching the show for a while, she seemed like an amateur. Who am I to judge who can sing and who can't? Gwen Stefani, Ashlee and Jessica Simpson, or any of the people on iTunes' Top Songs that I don’t recognize can sing their bad songs poorly all they want. It shouldn’t reach a level where the shit wins awards and is broadcast on network television. I shouldn't be exposed to it. There is no quality control in any facet of the entertainment industry. Gwen Stefani is a prime example of someone who is allowed to make jackass music and dick around onstage purely based on looks.

I look forward to special guest Jennifer Lopez who will be on the show in a week or so. Take everything I said about Gwen and multiply it by 15.

The One With The Talent

NME.com reports Robert Smith will join forces with the punk-rock street cred-having Ashlee Simpson to share blame for her next album. The trainwreck-in-waiting has yet to be titled, but it's hard to imagine it having a worse name than 2005's "I Am Me." I'm going to go ahead and suggest "He Isn't Me." That might work. How about "This Am I?" Or "Me, That's I!"

Pete Wentz denied any involvement in putting the unusual pair together, even though both of them are his personal friends.

I think pretty much any piece of music news these days requires a Pete Wentz update. He's the guy from Fall Out Boy who is regularly shirtless.

A geography lesson for the Spin-sters

Tim Armstrong of Rancid fame is preparing a solo album for release, according to this blurb over at Spin Magazine's web site.

I wonder if he'll safety pin a Crass patch to his tux when he goes to the Grammys. Anyway.

"SoCal punk legend Tim Armstrong, branded for his work with Rancid, Operation Ivy, and the Transplants, among others, will release his solo debut album, A Poet's Life, May 21 on his label Hellcat, NME.com reports.

Tim Armstrong is from Berkeley, Calif. Which, as this handy map will show you, absolves the jackass Spin writing staff of any potential idiocy I referred to when I bitched about their Henry Rollins coverage by being totally right smack dab in the middle of "SoCal" (that abrevation is soooo kewl!). Punk rock!

Commercial Music (Read on to discover this title is a double-pun!)

I used to love “Just What I Needed” by the Cars, but now I can’t hear it without picturing a Toyotathon or one of the blue-shirts at Best Buy pointing at the flatscreen on a Kenmore fridge.

Has this happened to you, too? Has a once beloved song been drained empty by television commercials?

I remember, as a youngster, hearing the splashes of rich white people cannonballing into my neighborhood’s country club pool (I’m a white guy too, but you know what I’m saying). The kids would laugh, the silver-haired business dads would grunt, their blonde wives would squirt SPF 5 and the lifeguard would blow his whistle at the troublemakers. Streaming under it all was the sound of a cheap radio, hissing from the snack bar. Tuned to the now-defunct WHSL, it would broadcast “the hits of today and the classics we love” or something, which meant the turf between Huey Lewis and the Rolling Stones. Van Halen might have been a bit too bristly for this crowd. Anyway, believe it or not I have a vivid memory of first hearing the Who’s “I Can See For Miles” over that very FM station by the pool. The verse of the song wasn’t familiar to me, so it didn’t particularly grab my attention. When the chorus kicked in, however, I knew that song! I chimed in: “I can drive for miles and miles! I can drive for miles and miles!”

But then I stopped myself. Something was off. Those were the words I surely knew, but the band on the radio wasn’t singing that. Instead of “I can drive for miles,” the singer said “I can see for miles.” Weird. Why?

I asked my mom, who did her best to explain that this was the real version of the song that the Firestone tire company based their jingle on. It was in that commercial I always saw on TV at home. All the sudden, the Who’s version felt real lame to me, like the corny ad it now was. I never grew to like that song. Firestone ruined it. Today, every time “I Can See For Miles” streams through the radio, I can only picture a new set of Hi-Tread Potenza Pole Positions on the shiny rims of some ol’ GTO as it burns rubber into the sunset. And a jackass is behind the wheel.

Saddest thing is, that’s a song I might otherwise love.

As hard as I’ve tried, I can’t remove the commercial associations from these adopted songs. I don’t know what band does that song in the Progressive Insurance commercials, nor would I be a fan anyway, but I do remember hearing it on the radio earlier on. I can just imagine how dead that song must be to an actual fan of the band that penned it. It’s now on TV every seven minutes.

Lately I’ve noticed more and more incidences of hit songs (or could-have-been-hit songs) in advertisements and TV show intros. When I first heard the Dell commercial tracked by the 13th Floor Elevators’ “Won’t You Miss Me?,” I was really put off. I didn’t want to hate that song. I had always loved it. I didn’t want it attached to a brand. Was it, inadvertently, a test to separate true fans from the unworthy? “Ya know, if you really loved that 13th Floor Elevators song as much as you say, you wouldn’t let the Dell Corporation ruin any of its sweetness. Your will is quite weak.”

But I don’t know. It’s like having a crush on the hottest girl in school, only to find out she has irritable bowel syndrome and can’t go an hour without storming her diaper. Yes, she wears diapers too.

Know what I mean? It’s that stigma that latches on forevermore until something can, somehow, remove it. Would I hate the Shins any less if I hadn’t seen Garden State? Can I ever remove Zack Braff’s spikey nose from their plain-bagel sound? Yes, I already thought the Shins to be wholly overrated, but Braff’s generic movie seemed like a commercial for that band. They brought one-another down even further.

But back to the issue of enjoyable songs being tarnished by popular business, it kinda bugs me that a songwriter would allow their work to be woven into a brand name. Sure, I know it’s not as easy as that (sometimes the record label is the dealer, while the songwriter has no control over the fate of his/her music), but still, it kills the song. “Just What I Needed” will never again be that once-catchy summer song by the Cars. It’s now a zombie feeding on Dominoes Pizza at Office Max.

The trend of catchy, connective music to track advertisements is catching on in creative marketing departments the world over. I wonder what song will be drained next. Stephen Malkmus had a close call with that Sears ad. Let's not even mention Pepsi and the Rolling Stones.

It's not a play and there's no music and it's not his band to get back together.

I think Henry Rollins seriously needs to shut the fuck up. I do.
A recent post on Spin Magazine's web site is devoted to "a performance" by Rollins, Janeane Garofolo and Marc Maron called "It's Not a Play and There's No Music."
Which I guess means it's a glorified stand-up routine.

"We kept the show out of the comedy club world so none of us would have the obligation to be funny -- although, I think that will occur anyway."

Henry! You've done this before! Remember, it was called a "spoken word" performance? Spoken word. I wish they would have been "thought word" performances so dumbasses all over the country could have paid $20 apiece to see Rollins' hulking, stupid ass stand on stage and think.

Anyway. That's not what this is about. Whoever wrote the article about the "punk icon" (seriously) added this sentence at the end:

Talk: Will Rollins ever reunite Black Flag?

Snob Parade thrashes about madly, knocking things over and farting curse words

Ahem. Excuse me.

DUMBASS SPIN WRITERS!

That's like asking if Pete Rose is ever going to get the Reds back together. Well maybe not quite. But Rollins - who was Black Flag's like third or fourth singer - himself said more than once, in rare instances of not being a bloated and self-satisfied idiot, that Black Flag was Greg Ginn's band to do what he wanted with.
It also ignores the 2003 reunion shows Black Flag played. With Dez Cadena on vocals.

Head Start

This here post serves no other purpose than being the first, anxious bit of writing at Something Vexes. Soon there will be much more to read; provocative mess that writes itself.