Michael Robbins
Bobby has made Mailer’s tag his own, but this is an advertisement fa mice elf agin. I’ll be reading my poems at Myopic Books this Saturday, February 20, at 7 pm. Details here. Daniel Borzutzky is also reading, so please stop by if you’re in the neighborhood.
How awesome is it that Sawyer was blasting “Search & Destroy” last night.
Michael Robbins
The predictably yawn-inducing results (by which I mean I predicted the top six in my sleep—check my dream journal if you don’t believe me—& the reason I was asleep is that I had been listening to the top six) are in for the 37th (or, I insist, 38th) Village Voice Pazz & Jop music poll. Here’s my ballot:
Albums
|
| 1 |
Sonic Youth, The Eternal |
Points: 15 |
| 2 |
Mastodon, Crack the Skye |
Points: 15 |
| 3 |
Brad Paisley, American Saturday Night |
Points: 10 |
| 4 |
Raekwon, Only Built for Cuban Linx, pt. 2 |
Points: 10 |
| 5 |
Baroness, Blue Record |
Points: 10 |
| 6 |
The-Dream, Love vs. Money |
Points: 10 |
| 7 |
Converge, Axe to Fall |
Points: 10 |
| 8 |
Fever Ray, Fever Ray |
Points: 10 |
| 9 |
Deer Tick, Born on Flag Day |
Points: 5 |
| 10 |
Grizzly Collective, Veckatimest Post Pavilion |
Points: 5 |
Singles
|
| 1 |
Taylor Swift, “Love Story” |
| 2 |
Girls, “Lust for Life” |
| 3 |
DJ Quik & Kurupt, “9x outta 10″ |
| 4 |
Maxwell, “Pretty Wings” |
| 5 |
Lady GaGa, “Just Dance” |
| 6 |
Shuttle, “Tunnel [High Rankin Remix]“ |
| 7 |
Neko Case, “People Got a Lotta Nerve” |
| 8 |
Mew, “Beach” |
| 9 |
Kelly Clarkson, “I Do Not Hook Up” |
| 10 |
Modest Mouse, “Satellite Skin” |
And some of my comments here (note that I provide the tag line). As usual, this list doesn’t reflect my current thinking about
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Robert P. Baird
A song I heard a lot of last week (not that I’m complaining) here in a new rendition by Cody Canada, Lee Ann Womack, and Asleep at the Wheel:
Joel Calahan
A guest post by Ben Tausig.
I. The enterprise of writing about music/sound has recently entered an awkward stage, one of those moments when technological developments make us want to retreat to old habits, but when it nevertheless becomes obvious that we should instead move forward by experimenting with the contours of the medium. Specifically, in the last few years it has become possible, thanks to increased storage space and faster internet connections, to fluidly integrate sonic examples within textual reviews.
II. Music criticism has always been a fraught matter, about which many people are skeptical. I’m slightly embarrassed to dredge up the truism, “writing about music is like dancing about architecture,” although there’s no denying its purchase. It means, of course, that in order to know something worth knowing about music, one should just go hear it rather than wasting time pontificating. Music is best felt rather than thought, and the two approaches are inherently incompatible.
III. In deference to this prejudice, online music writers (full disclosure: like me) who provide audio samples offer them in a “ta-da!” fashion, as an object about which nothing can be said directly.
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