it would be more or less like the NME top 20 list, but instead of pulp, oasis, and arctic monkeys - we'd have animal collective, neutral milk hotel, and kanye west.
I agree with you, but different genres of music put different emphasis on "the album" as a delivery medium - and that could account for some (but certainly not all) of the imbalance. K Pop, for example, which is more single centric, might host a pretty poor representation of "great albums." And a lot of great Afrobeat acts never recorded full LPs. When international music does become available to Western listeners, it's often in the form of compilations (the kind that Sublime Frequencies puts out).
That this list features mostly Western popular music albums, might simply mean that the album is mainly a Western popular music concept. Although, it's probably just a little bit of that - mixed with the sheer laziness/bias/ignorance of the NME editors.
This is why trying to talk about things on the internet is the worst.
"So my friend pointed out something interesting the other day..."
"OBVIOUSLY, you fucking idiot. You didn't know that? What an idiot."
I'm sure it was only LONG after M.I.A. decided to perform at the superbowl half time show, collect a paycheck from the NFL, and unite their brand with hers, that she discovered "felonies committed by its stars, the bounties placed by coaches on opposing players, the homophobic and racist comments uttered by its players..." etc. A bigger hypocrite has never been born.
I get that, but I mean, are they really deserving of sympathy? Or, are these just two incredibly privileged people engaging in incredibly selfish behavior with no outward demonstration of remorse or contrition? I dunno, I like both of these people well enough, but I hate seeing someone waste their talent. Sky Ferreira doesn't even have an album out, for fuck's sake.
Wow, I never thought about Sheryl Crow like that before. Next time I'm in the car, I'll put in her greatest hits CD and ruminate about the divide between mainstream and indie culture. I will realize that, truly, every day is a winding road. And this discovery will lead to further discoveries, such as my blossoming desire to engage in various fun activities, commonly referred to as just "fun". Perhaps I am not the only one? Perhaps I will make new friends and we will all engage in fun activities together, while listening to Sheryl Crow. I, for one, look forward to this day, and when it finally arrives, when I am engaging in fun activities like getting jerked off in the parking lot of a cheap motel listening to "Picture", Crow's seminal duet with Kid Rock, with my new friends who I am simultaneously jerking off in return, and we are all being jerked off together, I will cry out in orgasmic relief and whisper a silent prayer of thanks for both Tom Breihan and Claire Lobenfield, and the day I stumbled across this conversation. God bless you both.
I dunno, I think the Arcade Fire has started to become way too topical and zeigeist-y. Neon Bible to a smaller extent, then The Suburbs, and now Reflektor...sometimes I wish they'd just do an album that wasn't so thematically structured, and didn't try to encapsulate so ardently whatever Win finds "modern experience" to be. It all gets a little strained after awhile, and feels less like someone is relating their experience to me, which just so happens to be "modern", but that they are instead desperately straining to condense everything that is "modern" into a polemic. It's like slogging through a dense essay instead of just reading a good story - the latter of which is what Funeral felt like.
I'm sorry, I thought your original post was criticizing musicians for "using movie plots for inspiration" as opposed to "actual human inspiration" (whatever that means). Now it seems like you are saying that motion picture soundtracks, in general, aren't really that good - which seems like an entirely different point, with which would I agree.
"I mean, I liked it when it came out but it doesn't hold up very well to repeat lessons" -idiots in this thread gushing over this EP after reading the pitchfork review.
I can understand why that would be your gut reaction -- because obviously someone using the black slave dialect from Uncle Tom's Cabin out of nowhere to characterize modern-day black speech would be racist. But that's not what I'm trying to do here. It's worth noting that the speaker in the above post is a specific human being, from which no general principles or sweeping assertions about race can be extrapolated. Two, the dialect isn't a non sequitur because Kanye has previously characterized others as "new slaves" in contrast to his anti-authoritarian stance. I was sure to mention that line. The dialect, in context, is meant to be Kanye deliberately AFFECTING an outsized rendition of servility in order to demonstrate the vastness of his hypocrisy. But if I offended anyone, I'm sorry.
"Fuck you and your corporation! Y'all niggas can't control me. I know that we the new slaves."
"Here's three million dollars."
"Yes, massa. I be good, massa. I don't make no trouble no more."
I've always been creeped out by the refrain "I know you want it" in that song. I mean, that's not sexy --- that's the last thing a drunk girl hears before she passes out.
Guh! Blurt! Oofh! I stared at the screen for awhile, considering if it was really a wise decision to reply and attempt to write about why I love "Lost In Space", and finally said, fuck it, we'll do it live!
I don't see the song as a "string of unrelated ideas" at all. To me, it's pretty clearly about loneliness and isolation - and there's a stream of images and conceits that lap together and pull apart in rhythm to that simple breath-like guitar part that exhales and then seems to gather air to exhale again. The song opens with the repeated plea "live with me" but it doesn't sound like an imperative at all. In Neil's delivery it's tenuous and hesitant; this is a person who might not want to hear the answer to the question he's asking. The metaphors about isolation of being "lost in space" and "out on the ocean floor" fit neatly with other metaphors about making some sort of order out of the world ("gardening again...keeping all the world around you clean" and the futile endeavor of drawing buildings on the "infinity board"). And when Neil finishes the song by saying "he has to lose the deep sea blues", you can read it two ways. On the one hand, the speaker is plainly stating that "living with him" would eradicate his loneliness. Our buildings won't last forever, but let's try to make a go of it. On the other hand he could be saying that he MUST lose his loneliness and is willing to do whatever it takes to do so (I GOT to lose the deep sea blues). Couple this with the previous statement that he is "losing" the one he loves ("I heard I was losing you"), and the "live with me" refrain takes on a weird desperation this second time around. It starts to feel less about domestic cohabitation, and more of an existential proposition.
Plus the overlaid ukelele (mandolin?) is just so goddamn gorgeous.
I just wanted to make a point about "Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere". I mean, that album invented modern guitar playing. Look at all the other guitar virtuosos from the 60s - Clapton, Hendrix, Duane Allman -- their goal was to achieve more and more arduous heights of technical complexity. I mean in a song like "White Room" the guitar is just babbling all over the place, constantly declaring the "skill" of the guitarist. Neil Young just obliterated that whole conceit in "Down by the River" by tapping out that telegraph-like opening solo - one note, repeated over and over. Neil Young wasn't into technical mastery -- he just wanted to create rhythms and textures and moments of beautiful abrasiveness that would puncture the traditional pathways of what a guitar or a guitar soloist was "supposed" to do. 40 years later people aren't playing the guitar like Hendrix or Clapton; they're playing it like Neil Young: Doug Martsh, Jack White, Thurston Moore, etc. all owe a debt to those solos.
That's why in my own rankings "Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere" is one of the hardest albums for me to place. It's not really Neil Young's "best" album, but it might just be his most important.
Tonight's the Night is my #1, but I'm just happy to see it here at #2. The top 5 are the best 5 neil young albums, and we could argue about the order forever.
I think Ragged Glory is far too low. It's his best electric album probably of the last 3 decades.
Hawks and Doves is a bit too low, and I'm disappointed you didn't mention "Lost in Space" -- one of Neil's most winsome and haunting and overlooked songs.
I love that you say to give Silver and Gold another chance. For what it is, it's quite possibly a perfect album. An album about middle age, nostalgia, and disquiet - but also contentedness.
I'd put "Are You Passionate?" as one of the worst albums. Surprised to see it here over very solid albums like Broken Arrow
However flawed Mirrorball is, it still has "I'm the Ocean" which makes it more worthy of purchase than at least 6 or 7 of the albums ranked higher than it (Landing on Water? This Note's for You? Come on).
Anyhow, as you can probably tell I'm a huge Neil Young fan. Thanks for doing this list.
run the jewels, baby.
I've come to the conclusion that despite p4k's rating, Yeezus is not good. i don't know anyone can listen to "i am a god" - i just spoke to jesus / he said what up yeezus / i said shit i'm chillin' / trying to stack these millions. What a boring fucking conversation. Shut up, assholes.
Nice raps, but he needs to add some inflection and emphasis into his delivery. On a lot of these verses he sounds like the kid in class who moves his lips when he reads silently.
As Tom suggested, this is a big bucket of who gives a shit. Although if you have listened to Grimes' know phase or, well, her music itself -- she is obviously into a bunch of genres beyond sugary, mainstream pop. A benefit of being a successful musician is having the power to publicly advocate for other artists - and it's a little weird to use your platform in service of Mariah Carey and Taylor Swift, who really don't need any more help. But again, who cares.
One time Ian Svenoious went on a rant at one of his shows that kind of blew my mind. Granted I was a sophomore in college and a little drunk...but the gist of it was that "punk rock" was actually the capitalistic peak of rock n roll...because now you have bands who were willfully "self destructing" as part of their aesthetic/ethos; as a result, you got a product that, like a time bomb, would publicly "expire" and continually require more consumption on the part of the audience. Audience has to go out and seek a new band, that band implodes of their own volition, and the cycle of consumption is repeated.
I'm not sure if the point is valid, but it sure is interesting. I think Death Grips might consider it.
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