A Year of Music

so yesterday i was all lastfm is giving away music for free and u were all no wai and i was all un hunh their dooin it and u were all their dum and watevr and then like today yahoo is all like hai guyz were dooin it 2 come look at our kool adz and ur all like wtf evar dood who cares im downloadin all that shit off pirat bay n e wayz an im like piracy is killin the music bizness and u r all \/\/ and really who cares cuz nobodys makin no $ on it n e wayz

This is an example of why I have John Darnielle, aka The Mountain Goats, prominently included in my diminutive blogroll. This is the sort of thing I wish I wrote:

These guys are from Minneapolis and they sound like they are pissed off about it. Singer is up on the early-90s screaming-at-mom-because-she-fucked-up-the-French-toast emo style. No not that kind of emo you worthless piece of shit. The other kind. Remember Gravity Records? No I didn’t think you did. I’ll be right back I gotta go put my head in the oven.

Now I gotta find some Ganglion. I remember Gravity Records. Shit. I’m old.

UPDATE: Ganglion have some free MP3 samples up on Interpunk, and their pleasant mess reminds me a lot of Circle Takes The Square, who doth rule. Quoting my own review of Circle Takes the Square’s first full-length, As the Roots Undo:

Overwrought sincerity coupled with music so intense it verges on breaking down throughout its running length makes for a chaotic tangle of gothic punk / hardcore that is a splendid mess from start to finish. Positively baroque. My favorite record from 2004.

and this other mention, from one of my paleoblogs:

I picked this one as the record of the year back when it came out at the beginning of the year, and I see no reason to change my opinion now. Sprawling and organic, heavy and anarchic, too emo to be punk, too punk to be metal, too metal to be emo: truly, it takes you in circles.

All of which is evidence that I need to get me some Ganglion bad, because I love this kind of post punk splatter.

I have sort of a disdain-hate relationship with Nick Denton’s would-be media empire. Over the years, I’ve read Gizmodo, Gawker, Defamer, Jezebel, io9, Fleshbot, Kotaku and Idolator. Sooner or later, all of them except Jezebel have started to really piss me off. Denton encourages an irreverent house style that’s reminiscent of a brain-damaged version of British tabloid culture: gossip reigns supreme, sincerity is toxic, and a cheap, facile presumption of auctorial authority oozes out of every page.

Jezebel makes it work. At least one of the editors is like a retarded kitten, and you want to pet her even as you kind of pity her, and the rest of the editors know how to be provocative (and funny) enough to get Jezebel’s thriving community going on a given topic. Their commenters have sort of taken charge of the site’s vibe, and they’re an interesting group. That’s the only reason I still read Jezebel, even though I probably shouldn’t.

Idolator, on the other hand, makes me crazy in the head. Maybe it’s just that they’re treading very close to where I live, but for all of their cheap cracks and flashy insider knowledge, they still come across as no-talent assclowns. They act like they’re letting you in on the scene, but it’s all written from the consumer’s side of the music biz firewall, so they never really offer you the economic analysis or industry context that would allow you to understand the larger forces at work – something I think is critical in understanding how and why we get the music we do. In place of thoughtful analysis (or useful criticism) we get the same tired-ass shallow celebrity gossip horseshit: who’s got beefs, who flashed their beaver in public, which famous person said something dumb or mean about some other famous person, Amy Winehouse is gonna die, Britney’s still alive, etc. And occasionally some totally insipid “pop” criticism from writers who I know are capable of much better.

That’s the thing that gets to me the most, I think: I know that Jess Harvell and Maura Johnston are die-hard music fans with interesting tastes. Anyone who will go to the mat for Scritti Politti is clearly on my team, and Harvell’s recent analysis of what internet hype is doing to the development of new artists was sharply written and perceptive. It’s just when they write to match the Gawker style that they piss me off, because it does a disservice to music, which I fervently believe deserves to be taken seriously, and it does a disservice to their own skills when every sharp insight is immersed in a sea of semi-pointless snark.

I only subjected myself to them (again) because I’m trying to keep a closer eye on the business end of music myself, and it sort of seemed like they might have some insight into deals like the recent flaps at EMI. But they’re using the same primary sources I am, and tossing it into Nick Denton’s Borg processor to be extruded as partially hydrogenated meta-cultural product, and it’s all terrible and makes me sad. Don’t support their asinine bullshit. Even Pitchfork is better, and that’s not something I admit lightly.

(NOTE to Annalee and Charlie, should they ever stop by: I like you guys just fine, and I wish you all the best in your new gig, but trying to read io9 just makes me sigh. No offense. I think I just come at fandom from another angle.)

Thanks, Jesse. I was sending around that video you were so obsessed with last night and now I have “Whoomp! There It Is” stuck in my head. Stupid Soulja Boy. Stupid Tag Team!