why I don't read music reviews. mostly.

In which I gripe about music criticism.
Back in the day, when I was a teenager and hungry for as much information about music as possible, I read every single music publication that I could get my hands on.

Now, I don’t give a shit.

Why? Mostly because I find that so much of the music journalism today is just shallow posturing by whichever guy wants to show the size of his proverbial dick. Also, why is it that almost all of the people writing reviews of music professionally are men? Caitlin Moran? Where ARE YOU, goddamnit?

Case in point: the recent New York Times review of Robin Thicke’s new album by Jon Caramanica.

He managed to write a review of the album, on the basis of one fucking song. Seriously. Blurred Lines? you can’t write about any of the other songs on the album in depth (yeah, Ooo La La and Ain’t No Hat 4 That both got a quick mention, in one sentence, towards the end.)

Caramanica also writes about the album as if all the songs were the same “retro soul” throwbacks as Blurred Lines. Which makes me question whether or not he actually listened to the entire album, or just listened to the first three or four tracks on the fucking thing and called it a day.

Yes, I have written professionally, (yeah, yeah, let’s not comment on the quality of my writing right now, I want to bitch about other people, goddamnit) for actual publications, and yes, I know that editors, limited space, intense deadlines, being forced to review a genre of music that you hate, and a whole host of other considerations, can cause an article/review to have all the good shit cut out of it.

Whatever.

What’s really bugging me about these music reviews/reviewers is that they tend to put so much of themselves into the review (fine, I do it too, duh, hence my blog), but also attempt to maintain the pretension of being 1. an expert and 2. objective. Which they’re not (at least in these reviews). And whether or not the actually DO have these pretensions, the very act of writing for a publication such as the NYT, Spin, Rolling Stone, or whatever, kind of FORCES them into that particular role, and I feel like they should at least TRY to honor the position that they’re holding in the eyes of the audience. (and all caps denote that I’m REALLY PASSIONATE about this subject, right?)

In the past, while I’ve enjoyed Caramanica’s work, (like his absolutelyGENIUS interview with Kanye West), it is this type of dismissive, know-it-all bullshit that just really gets my goat. (Sorry Mr. Caramanica. You just happen to be the most recent person who has hit this nerve. I read some of your other reviews this weekend. They were fine. Didn’t piss me off at all.)

Reading music criticism these days really reminds me of going into record stores and dealing with snotty ass clerks who, regardless of what you purchased, would look down on you as either not worthy of whatever you were purchasing, or sneer because you were buying the album of a sell-out.

See, kids, back in the day, there used to be actual retail stores that sold only music…