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12-02-2002, 11:29 AM
| #1 (permalink) |
| <3 Billy Corgan Join Date: Aug 2002
Posts: 152
 |  www.Pitchforkmedia.com Look, I like Indie rock as much as the next guy, being a huge follower of it for years. But the pretentious little bastards who review music on this site seriously need to choke on something pink and hairy. Their reviews are based more on the hype and label of a band as opposed to the actual quality of the music, and they seem to take delight in shooting down popular music on a whole, except for their pet band Radiohead. Their reviews are poorly structured, arrogant, and uninformative. They seem more content dropping buzzwords and describing record labels than they would be with actually reviewing music. |
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12-02-2002, 03:53 PM
| #2 (permalink) |
| Registered User Join Date: May 2002
Posts: 72
| Yeah, those guys pretty much piss me off. Here's how to write an arrogant indie-rock review. First off, is the album popular? Is there a band that is less popular that has received less attention? Then you hate this album! Sometimes I think I learn more about the arrogance of the writers than I do about the album. I don't always agree with the critics at AMG www.allmusic.com but I think they're less arrogant, and more apt to look at the big picture of the music. They completely trashed a lot of the albums I really love, like Porcupine Tree, Beck's new disc, hell even Garbage 2.0, but AMG has been more than fair on these. I really couldn't stand hanging out with arrogant music bastards in college, and I don't think I like reading the sight they all work for now either ;p |
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12-02-2002, 05:01 PM
| #4 (permalink) |
| Registered User Join Date: Mar 2002
Posts: 121
| I like Pitchfork a lot. I don't think they're hype driven at all, and they definitely don't trash records just because they're popular. They're about the most honest national level music review outlet around, in my opinion. The accusation that they trash anything popular and praise anything signifigantly obscure and hyped breaks down when you actually go through their reviews. Look at some of the artists to release albums pitchfork ranked a 9.0 or better: Bjork Pavement Keith Fullerton Whitman The Fall Isis Ween Mouse on Mars Add N to (X) Low Godspeed You Black Emperor! Ryan Adams Miles Davis XTC Tom Waits Elvis Costello Sonic Youth Dick Dale Radiohead The Chemical Brothers Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds Beck (for Mutations and Odelay) The Strokes The White Stripes Eminem Múm Mark Eitzel Blur Wilco And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of The Dead Sleater-Kinney Yo La Tengo Amon Tobin Pretty Girls Make Graves The Microphones Built To Spill Bauhaus Interpol Aphex Twin Pennywise Sunny Day Real Estate Clinic Sigur Ros The Roots Spoon Modest Mouse The Flaming Lips Eric B & Rakim The Avalanches Manic Street Preachers I don't know how you can look at that list and say pitchfork hate popular music, and only push albums hyped by record labels they represent. Yes, they're arrogant, and they trash a lot of music, but that's their mandate, and they do a damn good job of it. They cater to knowledgable music fans who have been around a while, and they don't praise an album unless it deserves it. And they only savage an album if it deserves it (like Audioslave). They're balanced, otherwise. |
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12-02-2002, 08:45 PM
| #7 (permalink) |
| <3 Billy Corgan Join Date: Aug 2002
Posts: 152
| I don't want a mainstream site, I just want honest reviews of indie bands like the website advertises. But instead it lambastes bands like The Smashing Pumpkins and Tool whenever fancy strikes, then goes back to having conditional reviews of indie bands. |
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12-02-2002, 11:26 PM
| #8 (permalink) |
| Registered User Join Date: Mar 2002
Posts: 121
| Smashing Pumpkins - Adore (8.1) Smashing Pumpkins - Machina II (7.7) Tool - Lateralus (1.9) Yes, they slammed Lateralus, but you can't tell me that review wasn't amusing and informative. Plus, it's mentioned, right in the review, that the reviewer liked Undertow. The only Smashing Pumpkins release they've ever really hated was Machina, which did indeed suck. Even the boring and overproduced Melon Collie got a respectable 6.8. Do pitchfork love some obscure bands? Yes, but they don't have any sort of bias against success. Look at their top 20 albums of the 90s: 1. My Bloody Valentine - Loveless 2. Radiohead - OK Computer 3. Pavement - Slanted & Enchanted 4. Guided By Voices - Bee Thousand 5. Liz Phair - Exile In Guyville 6. Nirvana - Nevermind 7. DJ Shadow - Endtroducing... 8. Tori Amos - Little Earthquakes 9. Beck - Odelay 10. Pavement - Crooked Rain 11. Built To Spill - There's Nothing Wrong With Love 12. The Pixies - Trompe Le Monde 13. Radiohead - The Bends 14. Weezer - Weezer 15. Sunny Day Real Estate - How It Feels To Be Something On 16. Beastie Boys - Check Your Head 17. Walt Mink - El Producto 18. Bjork - Homogenic 19. Jawbox - For Your Own Special Sweetheart 20. Jeff Buckley - Grace You can make a case Pavement, Built To Spill, The Pixies and Jawbox are obscure and pretentious bands favoured by the literati, but all of them sold millions of records. Apart from Walt Mink, who are definitely obscure, every other album on this list was both a commercial and critical success. Most went platinum, and all of them produced at least one hit single (although My Bloody Valentine never really made it in North America). |
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12-02-2002, 11:28 PM
| #9 (permalink) |
| Registered User Join Date: May 2002
Posts: 72
| Haha the guy who reviewed one album (at around a 6.5?) said that listeners were better off sticking to "album Y" which, another reviewer gave a 2.3. I call bullshit. It's a collective of crabby pretentious arrogance-mongers. Screw it. |
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12-03-2002, 12:45 AM
| #10 (permalink) |
| Registered User Join Date: Mar 2002
Posts: 121
| If you don't like their reviews, don't read them, but it's pretty clear they're not the industry-hype-machine-who-hate-mainstream people here want them to be. And Tarissa, different reviewers have different opinions, just like different people here have different opinions. Pitchfork loved Interpol, I think they're shit. That doesn't mean they're always wrong. |
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12-03-2002, 05:09 AM
| #12 (permalink) |
| Conquest  Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: Switzerland
Posts: 4,397
+3 Internets | I would like to take a minute to say that "And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of The Dead" is a pretty amazing name for a band. Special mention to "Godspeed You Black Emperor!" too (that got a great review from my regional newspaper btw). That is all.
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12-03-2002, 06:34 AM
| #13 (permalink) |
| Banned Join Date: Nov 2002 Location: Houston
Posts: 43
| I thought Bareback Ride was Walt Mink's best album, but nonetheless anyone who hasn't should check them out. They were probably my biggest inspiration (guitar-wise) back in high school. ... I actually think the site has some pretty good reviews of indie stuff. I don't pay attention to their other reviews really. I wouldn't go to a hardcore site to get reviews of the latest N'Sync, but whatever. Last edited by twistidd : 12-03-2002 at 06:39 AM. |
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12-03-2002, 08:17 AM
| #15 (permalink) |
| Conquest Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: Switzerland
Posts: 4,397
+3 Internets | huh? I heard of 20 of this list and am familiar with the music of 14... maybe that because there is a lot of european stuff?
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