horse shit! I’m totally with you, awindofsuchviolence. I know better than to read these things … they always seem like a fun idea, but inevitably leave me feeling like “goddamn, LCD Soundsystem? again? I just don’t get all the fuss, critics.” Though I guess most people might say the same of Joanna Newsom. Oh well.

I’m not really asking this out to be critical of your writing or the content you provide on this site. Just reading this post struck me as strange to the point where I’m admittedly curious. I’m not entirely sure why, but reading the first part of the article struck me as having a bit of restrained hostility toward Joanna Newsom. The “too fawning” link pointing to stereogum’s review of Have One On Me is a large part of the hunch, but also the way your entry seems to be relating stereogum’s relationship with her… as if you’re defending your work personally. Basically, I got the sense that when I got to the excerpt, I was going to find some specific citation from stereogum that would be read as an attack by the staff. But she was just talking about how she can’t engage in the blogs because people feel free to both attack her and to praise her in ways that interfere with her job. It seems like a totally reasonable stance; she wasn’t saying “these music writers are thoughtless bastards and shouldn’t be writing about me.” So basically I’m wondering, when stereogum published the review of Have One On Me, do you think you weren’t entirely evaluating the album based upon its quality alone, but under the sway of some level of charm or infatuation with Joanna Newsom herself? If so, does her admission that blogs get under her skin dampen the feelings you had toward her, causing you to retort by saying the review is overly fawning? Did the album simply sound good at first and then get stale? I mean I don’t think it’s easy or even entirely possible to totally disengage from a performer’s persona these days, evaluating an album on its content alone. So I’m not accusing you of being bad journalists. It’s something that just makes me curious.