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I demand to know who downvoted this so that we may formally exile them.

Is anyone else at work just watching the Blue Ivy gif instead of working? It's been twenty minutes.

....did you turn it off before Beyonce did literally any part of her act or what?

Finally remembered my login info and have so much to catch up on. Did we like the Braid album? I kind of liked the Braid album but mostly the parts that Bob Nanna sang. Where's _? I just listened to Spiritualized for the first time this week and I have no one to share this unbelievable, earth-shattering moment with because everyone had this moment in '97 or whatever but I am here to tell you I listened to Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space and that shit fucking rules supremely.

That said, not including "Tolerated" is a crime against humanity and should be prosecuted as such.

I can't describe the rollercoaster of emotions upon seeing that there is "Video With a Social Message" category but then seeing that Macklemore is in no way involved. It's not all bad, guys.

I find it really weird that media/music people are spilling many words about QotSA/Muse/Arcade Fire/Outkast/etc. but there's very little talk about what it means for NMH to be playing a festival like this. For anyone who saw them on the last tour: there were some bigger venues, to be sure, but those shows really thrived in smaller/dingier settings: when I saw them at the 40 Watt in Athens, I was pretty sure I couldn't have been in a better place to experience that show, lackluster sound aside. The outdoor festival thing...maybe it'll be joyous, but I can't help feeling like that kind of electric energy will lose something outside four dirty club walls.

Early contender for top comment of 2014 I will remember you come awards season

I agree that Chance got a lot of attention from that feature--despite the fact that his breakout tape, 10 Day, actually dropped before Royalty--but I don't think that makes this move any less shitty. To pull Chance in for a single line that, despite his unique delivery, doesn't actually contribute much (if anything) to the song seems designed to put Chance's name on the track, not give daps to his dude, you know? I don't think anyone should ~have~ to do anything because of the rap internet, and God, I hope fewer people do things because of the rap internet. However, Chance has talent, ability, and provides a fresh voice in 2013. Gambino, despite his ability to turn a phrase, has neither the raw ability nor the fanbase Chance has at this point. The inclusion of Chance the Rapper (please say the rapper) can't help but be a capitalization on his cohort's success. And in the end, my problem isn't really that Chance is on this track--Chance is on a Bieber track and that rules, after all. My problem is that Gambino doesn't really have much to offer, and it's a bit disheartening to see so many people rush to his defense when 2013 was actually a pretty great year for rap and there's a lot to dislike about Glover's bland approach. Let's praise what should be praised--Acid Rap, for example--and let's not get all uptight when someone calls out a bad rapper for being a bad rapper.

I cannot believe people are out here still stumping for Gambino. Dude has been making garbage water air-quotes-"RAP" music his whole career, but suddenly we're all defending him from the mean old critics? Nah. Dude can technically put syllables together pretty efficiently. But if that really made someone's career, Eminem would have released the best album of the year, and he didn't. The beat selection is tepid and the lyrics are consistently uninspired. To have Chance on a song and deny him a verse is saying, "I understanding what is trending in rap right now and I will attach this rapper's name to my song in order to improve my hit count while I will still handle all the verses because I am the voice to be prioritized." Song isn't very good and it's a stupid internet click-bait tactic to have Chance in for a single phrase--an unfunny joke, at that. This isn't just "different" or "nontraditional" rap or rap that "isn't hood": it's bad rap.

I'm not saying they aren't obviously satirical: she says as much blatantly in the song. She's not promoting these things--only an idiot would think that. I'm just not sure if it's successful satire if she can't avoid using the same loaded signifiers that critique stereotypes black entertainment culture (rims, gold bars, a variety of black dancers gyrating and pouring champagne). The Blurred Lines joke is actually hilarious, but much of it feels kind of counter productive.

Glad we're getting this kind of message, but isn't it a bit bizarre that to criticize Miley/scum-pop at large she resorts to doing pretty much the same thing they do but she's "sarcastic"? I'm supposed to cheer about the sexualized back-up dancers and jokey hip-hop signifiers because they're "ironic"? Maybe I'm being uptight but I just dunno.

And by that I don't mean that I don't understand that the whole issue feels a little like a foregone conclusion: now that it has already happened, it's probably a little late to try and stem the tide of unFair Usage/etc., but seriously: fuck Rap Genius

So are we psyched that Rap Genius is getting sued or nah? Cause fuck those guys.

Fishscale over Supreme Clientele, much less being included instead of Ironman? Both OB4CLs and no Return to the 36 Chambers or Tical? I understand that Ghost, Rae, and Liquid Swords comprise the hall-of-fame category for Wu solo releases, but any top five list gotta be less lopsided than this. And Fishscale over Supreme Clientele???

Dude is clearly tired of being that character. His vine account is fading into just boring six-second clips of boring dogs, I haven't heard him say "rap game ________" in months, and I've never seen an interview/video with Riff Raff where he seemed more completely unhappy being Riff Raff. I only wish the video had lasted ten minutes and ended with a classic chain-break/storm out: http://www.spin.com/articles/riff-raff-drunk-freestyle-basketball-101-barz/

Guys, it's threads like this that make this site my primary music news joint. The articles are good, the lists are silly, and everyone here really loves the Crutchfield sisters, but the real selling point is that I am laughing out loud at internets comments right now. You guys...you're the best.

As a serious fanboy for the better part of a decade, I have no ability to critically analyze this, but: I saw them in Richmond last night. I grew up not only on the music but the mythology: the E6 collective in Athens, the 33 and 1/3 book (which is one of the best in the series--really solid oral history and excellent narrative of the creation of the album), the endless search for bootleg live recordings and uploaded cassette demos (anyone else remember the Shannon Monroe House demos and how insane that moment was when new NMH hit the internet?). That record wove itself into my adolescence, soundtracking long drives with nothing to think about, homework, ill-advised makeouts, family vacations, my first time smoking weed, and the moments when I truly bonded with my little brother and best friend. I came to the show last night at a low point emotionally. I had been planning this for so long, and the intensity of what I felt leading up to it was so great, that I had no way of processing what I was supposed to be feeling. I felt like my lifetime of NMH enthusiasm couldn't be consummated in a single night, and seeing them finally was almost too real, too tangible--the mystery and the mythology was evaporating in a regular ass show at the National, a venue I've been to a dozen times. I got my seven dollar cup of beer, chatted distractedly with my girlfriend, and waited to see a show that I knew would be enjoyable but would probably be just that. It's not that my greatest hopes were validated; it's not that the years of passionate, obnoxious love for the band found an outlet in ecstatic dancing and screaming; it's not that it was everything I'd hoped it would be. It was something else entirely. It was the only people that loved the songs more than I did coming back together after 15 years, taking the stage in a whirlwind of instrument switching and pogo-ing. The noisy moments were as raucous and ass-kicking as they sounded on the bootlegs of the Carrboro and San Fran '98 shows, the quiet moments simultaneously gentle and triumphant. The horns were note-for-note perfect during these quiet parts, straining only during the frantic energy of the sped-up versions of Song Against Sex and Gardenhead, but all the more emotive and authentic for that. Snow Song pt. 1 has never, in any demo or bootleg I've heard, sounded more anthemic or more uplifting than last night. During the singing saw interlude in In the Areoplane Over the Sea, I saw my girlfriend wipe away tears. All this to say: I went to the best show of my life. Not because it was Neutral Milk Hotel, but because I saw a group of people take 19 songs that they held dear and put everything they had into them. The band was having fun. Jeff was having fun. When he said thank you, which he did often, you could tell he meant it. And to Jeff I say, in return: thank you.

Yo not to rub it in but I went to the Richmond show and it was completely totally unreal.

Strongly agree. This isn't mediocre D-Plan, this is happy D-Plan. Of course it sounds different than it used to, less wired and tense and just-sniffed-three-lines, but the lack of sharp turns and dissonance doesn't mean that they softened or weakened their sound, just that they have different goals. And did they succeed with those goals? Pretty much my dude, yeah. It's not Change as far as like skull-fucking heart-rending POWER goes, but it's sets out to do something and succeeds and it's pretty damn good so let's dance about it.