Pazz and Jop 2004: If Only Women Voted

HAHA girls rule boys drool proved yet again.

(let's just ignore that Killers jump)

I'm not really into Usher or Brian Wilson (or SMiLE, anyway), but I suppose that I would rather side with danceable black pop than cozy up with the "let's vote for the album from the 60s cos it's elligable" bloc.

The women's list additionally has Thermals, Tegan & Sara, Le Tigre, Jill Scott, Futureheads, Hives, Gwen Stefani, Air, De La Soul, Walkmen, and Garden State.

Whereas the overall list has Drive-By Truckers, Madvillain, Animal Collective, Tom Waits, Hold Steady, Youssou N'Dour, Sonic Youth, Black Keys, Big & Rich, and AC Newman.

yet they bumped up danger mouse, which is at least partly a beatles vote.

i'm most interested in the significant demotion that interpol gets from the women. maybe they're mad at carlos d for giving them herpes!

Yeah, interesting. One big difference between Nellie and say Tegan and Sara or Gdn St is the satire quotient. /speculation

xpost

Women be cryin'.

How many people make up this voting pool?

Gwen's record is very very very girly. It totally makes sense to me that the love for that album would be disproportiately female.

Look up the lead-singer, Hutch Harris, girls love him. He's earnest and stuff.

Also add a couple exclamations to that sentence, too!

Also, interestingly, both (positive) Thermals reviews on Pitchfork were written by women (Julianne Shepherd and Amanda Petrusich). And neither of them voted for Fuckin A -- which I mention just to show that their support among female critics runs even deeper than this poll indicates.

xpost -- It's still early

sort of surprised Loretta Lynn held steady -- Lynn and McKay were the two women I thought would actually drop.

great to see Jill Scott so much higher -- finally heard that record for the first time this week and I really like it.

Even though I like a lot of the records that rose and am more than happy to see U2/Brian Wilson tumble, not sure I like this list better since three records I actually voted for fell off (Sonic Youth, Big & Rich, Hold Steady).

What was the impact on Gretchen Wilson?

The Hold Steady is a such a guy band.

xpost

1. Franz Ferdinand
2. Nellie McKay
3. Rilo Kiley
4. Loretta Lynn
5. Big & Rich
6. Ted Leo
7. Modest Mouse
8. Drive-By Truckers
9. Scissor Sisters
10. Gwen Stefani

41 (77) Mos Def, The New Danger
41 (50) Ted Leo + The Pharmacists, Shake the Sheets
43 (65) Magnetic Fields, I
44 (50) Sufjan Stevens, Seven Swans
44 (205) Visqueen, Sunset on Dateland
46 (84) Ambulance Ltd, Ambulance Ltd
46 (101) Death From Above 1979, You're a Woman, I'm a Machine
46 (11) Madvillain, Madvillainy
46 (98) Patty Griffin, Impossible Dream
50 (150) White Magic, Through the Sun Door
51 (29) Tom Waits, Real Gone
51 (57) Van Hunt, Van Hunt
53 (38) Black Keys, Rubber Factory
54 (59) Nas, Street's Disciple
55 (48) Iron & Wine, Our Endless Numbered Days
56 (107) Alison Krauss and Union Station, Lonely Runs Both Ways
56 (75) Courtney Love, America's Sweetheart
56 (136) Joseph Arthur, Our Shadows Will Remain
56 (50) Prince, Musicology
56 (37) Sonic Youth, Sonic Nurse
56 (109) Talib Kweli, The Beautiful Struggle

This is a ludicrous mis-characterization of Newsom's music. Most of her stuff is pretty upbeat.

and one of those was the 30 points given to it by Sarah Zupko, PopMatters editor

Can I just say that's a lame-o characterization, Matthew.

Women don't go for assless chaps.

1 (1) Kanye West
2 (2) Brian Wilson
3 (3) Loretta Lynn
4 (4) Franz Ferdinand
5 (7) Streets
6 (5) Green Day
7 (6) Arcade Fire
8 (8) U2
9 (11) Madvillain
10 (9) Modest Mouse
11 (10) Danger Mouse
12 (13) Wilco
13 (12) TV on the Radio
14 (14) Nellie McKay
15 (16) Drive-By Truckers
16 (14) Rilo Kiley
17 (17) Fiery Furnaces
18 (21) Animal Collective
19 (19) Interpol
20 (18) Bjork
21 (23) M.I.A./Diplo
22 (22) Elliott Smith
23 (20) Joanna Newsom
24 (24) Dizzee Rascal
25 (25) Nick Cave
26 (32) Ghostface
27 (29) Tom Waits
28 (28) Devendra Banhart
29 (31) Hold Steady
30 (26) Scissor Sisters
30 (34) Youssou N'Dour
32 (30) Libertines
33 (27) Killers
34 (39) Big & Rich
34 (37) Sonic Youth
36 (41) Junior Boys
37 (40) AC Newman
38 (33) PJ Harvey
39 (38) Black Keys
40 (46) Gretchen Wilson

Wait, this doesn't explain Big & Rich too, does it?

The Faint, Wet From Birth: finished #321 overall, but tied for #56 on the women's list (I accidentally forgot to count it in that "next 21" update). Four critics voted for it -- Char Davidson, Amy Phillips, Mara Schwartz, and Annie Zaleski -- for a total of 40 points.

Rilo Kiley drops the same amount on the men's list, and when something like that happens, it means that the support from both groups was nearly identical.

But Big & Rich are both MORE stylish and CHEESIER! So what the heck??

(and if my home life is any indication -- the cryin'/shoppin'/dancin' cliches are so totally real!)

(Okay, now I'm totally doing a Pazz and Jop if only critics voting for mainstream country were counted. Look for a thread on this before the weekend is over!)

that does seem obvious, except for the whole interpol thing. why do they alone drop among those bands? or do they not quite belong among those bands? i've never tried dancing to them myself, and i'm not sure i'd want to either.

It's not just mainstream. The Drive by Truckers and alt country Wilco both drop as well.

Maybe there isn't and the drop of both BnR and Gretchen are just a coincidence? I dunno.

(My hunch is that Nellie McKay drops because women voters actively decided not to vote for her and Gretchen Wilson dropped because they haven't heard her album)

Women accounted for 15.6% of all voters (124/793)

Franz Ferdinand on the nr two spot? I think I'll go have a sex change then.

34 (83) Gwen Stefani, Love.Angel.Music.Baby

As much as I like the music, the lyrics are just horrendous. I've grown to love some of the tracks but on the whole I think it's just an enormous disappointment. I like her kawaii image but she could've spent more time writing sth better than "Take a chance you stupid ho."

so this explains why the girls dislike Eminem, too?

Believe you me, that'll never happen with me. (Then again perhaps I am secretly a woman.)

This is v. interesting to me (maybe for women and those of you guys who know them better than me, it's obvious). I would like to go into it more but I'm headed out.

For what it's worth: The only stuff on that list that I voted for on the women list were Loretta Lynn, The Futureheads, Fiery Furnaces, and Rilo Kiley. Though I did vote for singles for Franz Ferdinand and The Streets. Also, what happens to me every year is that I have my Top 5 and then about 20 other records I really liked, and whittle them down by voting for the stuff I love and will get the least amount of votes.

The man list is roughly the same, though The Futureheads drop off.

With that said, I did not vote for PJ Harvey or Le Tigre (as I usually do without fail) because I honestly didn't think those were their best albums.

Nelly McKay and Joanna Newsom sound good on paper, and I usually will get behind the smart asses and the flakey spacey girls but I find both of them precious in different ways. I appreciate that they are out there pusing the envelope musically, performance-wise, gender-wise, but I have no desire to listen to either of those records again.

I do like dancey new wavish stuff, but The Killers leave me cold. I've been wanting a skinny tie revolution since 1996 and now I got it, and it seems like a rather hollow victory to me, as I feel like I'm too old and not skinny enough to get misshaped or whatnot.

And finally, 15% of P&J electorate is women? WTF?

But of course, the larger question is, why are there so few women who post to ILM? Unless there are more drag kings here than I realized...

eminem is the judy garland for gay men.

Don - The Country Music Critics Poll is 85% male, 12% female, and 3% variable transsexual.

Cant wait to join'em. *sigh*

I'm not denying that certain artists connect with listeners on different levels, and so singers like Tegan and Sara whose music speaks loudly of a specificly female experience will find a more 'natural' listenership with women who can identify with the emotions expressed, but this discussion has been suggesting that there needs to be some gender-based explanation for all voting differences (for which some of the ideas posed are rather insulting), instead of the fact that as Sara has emphasised, this was a poll of what critics enjoyed. If you assume that since I'm a woman, I'm going to vote for women, then you're implying I have no critical abilities that reach beyond my sex.

The 15% figure is the most interesting part: who qualifies for P&J voting, and who extends the invites?

Two things, though:

1. I don't think I (or most others) are going so far as to presume that a woman is always predisposed to voting for a female artist, without any thought given to the music. If I've said something to that effect, I really mean something more like the example you give with Tegan and Sara.

2. The reason it probably seems like men are the "normal" voters and women are the "anomalies" to be explained away is that the analysis has a specific goal of spotlighting women. They're also the smaller sample size (that 15% you mention), so the discrepancies with the overall list are more pronounced. The men-only list went unnoticed I think because it wasn't as interesting.

But hey, this is just one idea for part of an explanation. Maybe some of the p&j critics does this, maybe none of them do, or maybe it's in-between.

Feminists and Feminist Sympathizers Unite: A Bold Call for Pazz & Jop Activism may be of interest.

I'm one of them knocked-up ones, but lately I've actually started lurking and posting more on ILM than on ILE.

(yes it is an essentialist argument but I think the key is realising that masculine listening habits are not solely the preserve of men and vice versa: it does hold true, mostly, I think (the male-dominated history of rock criticism is evidence of sorts esp. with regard to which genres are canonised and wich sidelined). and actually I don't think essentialism is particularly unhelpful here because by and large gender is crucial to these distinctions - dancing vs not-dancing, irrationality vs logic, context vs 'just the music, man' - and any attempt to qualify the argument would end up diluting it.)

So they can stand closer to their Killers albums!

To reiterate what Abby wrote: We 15% women, so 'lone sipping our seltzers at the rock-crit party, are not necessarily voting on affirmative action (though I do not believe there'd be anything wrong w/it if we were, especially in a voting buffet offering so much of just one thing). It makes sense there isn't a huge disparity between the man/woman votes in the P&J, based on either gender or genre; we are not writing from an island--we do get to select from the same pool of music that men do! We even download from the same internet!! (Though if you're really getting armchair sociology about it, you might want to ask the execs at certain major and minor labels why they don't release more women artists... whether, perhaps, they think there's "no market" for a true pluralism of lady band/MC/clarinet jockeys etc.--an excuse/lie I've heard before, most recently about LA Reid.)

The real question, as I think someone asked above, is "Why doesn't the gender ratio in the US music-crit 'club' better reflect the gender ratio in the world at large?" 'Cuz straight up, i FEEL like an anomaly--i spent my weekend at music-writer parties and two of them were total sausage fests (no dis to my friends, the sausages)...tho interestingly the hip-hop music writer party I attended had an almost-one-to-one gender balance (and far more people of color, of course)... (props to SPIN, XLR8R and VIBE for having a proliferation of ladies high-up in their editorial mastheads). I'd like to hear other women crits' experiences, and whether fewer women get into the game (or, rather, get UP in the game) because they/we see it as a phallocentric arena and do not feel included (see: Venus magazine, which started on its own terms), or if women crits have been dissed by editors they/we perceive as masculinist, or what. I really am curious.

Although--considering P&J is dominated by Rock Critics (is it? i'm just assuming), and there seem to be more women writing in mags about electronic, hip-hop and R&B--perhaps this whole thread is a side effect of its context.

Also, i like the thermals because i think they are a good band.

hey perpetua, there's plenty of satire and nudge-nudge-wink-wink in joanna newsom's lyrics. it's not all about "crying" (and jeez, dude, do you realize what a chauvinistic ass you come across as by saying that?).

has something to say about all of this.

Hey there -- decided to delurk to answer this question as far as what my own personal answer would be to this query. Anyway, I consider myself a huge fan of music, absolutely crazy about the stuff, but way too often here on ILM, I can't even begin to catch up to the vast quantity of things that you guys here on ILM listen to. You guys seem to listen to a never-ending variety of musical artists, too, many of whom I'm never going to get around to checking out, even if they sound interesting to me.

I do regularly have questions as to what I should be listening to that's new and upcoming, since last year was the first year in my life I've been as interested in what's new in the world of music as I was, but I still had to play catch-up and inform myself of a lot of artists you guys have been listening to for years. I still feel like I have to play catchup. I will always be playing catchup. I will never, ever catch up to you guys. Which is a HUGE reason why I don't post here but rather have decided to lurk here again. If any of you have any Duran Duran questions you guys need to have answered, I can cover that. Anything else and at least a handful of other people can and will cover it.

I will never ever EVER give birth, BTW, not even if I wanted to.

...but i've noticed that these hip-hop blogs (or even these political blogs) end up being a testosterone fest, fueled often by competition and of course the outshowing of who has the most knowledge of any given particular subject. most women just don't waste their energies in this type of atmosphere. and i'm not saying i'm different than most, and i can't even speak for them, but...

And I'm a huge sucker for the new wave of new wave, obviously; I mean, I can completely identify with Sara here in that I too have been dreaming of this moment for a LONG time (actually, my starting point was in 1993), but now that it's actually happening, it seems kinda anticlimactic. Not that I'm unappreciative of this sudden devotion to the music I have considered my musical comfort food for over twelve years; no, I'm incredibly grateful to that. It's just that -- well, okay, back when I was a teenager, I completely fetishized the 1980s. I worshipped at the big pastel '80s altar. I perfected my Valley Girl. I watched endless loops of '80s teen movies -- er, at least the John Hughes ones and Valley Girl. I daydreamed constantly of one day stumbling onto a time machine that would allow me to go back in time and be a 14-year-old in 1983. I scheduled my weekends around the syndicated '80s flashback radio programs and timer recorded VH1's "The Big '80s" so that I could watch it in the time span between coming home from school and having dinner (or taking a shower). I was addicted to the '80s.

I still love the '80s, but my love for it totally pales in comparison to the devotion I had for it when I was a teenager. I have grown to appreciate the era I was a teenager in. In my post-teen years, I have become a '90s fan. Still, deep within resides the '90s teen who felt sad that she couldn't experience life as an '80s teen, and this is when the appreciation for this nowfound resurgence of that decade comes in. However, when I remember just how much has changed about me, about my loves and devotions, from that time period, that's when the victory starts to feel just a little bit hollow, as if it were all happening ten years too late.

(i agree)

(xxpost to myself, that lynne quote taken out of context perhaps seems more sexist than she meant it or it was, don't take it as "women are scared to argue" plz because thats not what i meant by posting it here)

and teeny quite probably otm (and as I voted for Nellie McKay as my no. 1 and the Hives at no. 2 I must be a transgender or something)

Honestly, I wouldn't know. I can't really make it past two or three songs of hers at a time. Her voice is so awful that I just want to turn it off.

(and jeez, dude, do you realize what a chauvinistic ass you come across as by saying that?)

Yeah, I do actually, and I didn't fully notice the implication I made until just after I wrote it. So in terms of an inadvertant generalization: yeah, sorry, that was a jerk move. Guilty. But I do think that a lot of Newsom's appeal comes from her music being pretty slow and sad sounding, which is more popular in indie circles relative to smug showtunes.

I actually talked to Julianne the other night about this thread and she made some really great points that I wish she'd de-lurk and post, because I can't remember what they were. (and if I could, I'd credit her with them--I'm good like that.)

Jessica's a pretty sharp cookie, actually, and I do agree--nobody got the Hold Steady for a long time. but I'm addressing specific complaints I've heard, from men as well as women, that C. Finn's whole steez comes across as so guy it's a turnoff. please note that in my above post I said that "everyone I know who hates the Hold Steady" etc. (itals after the fact.) I didn't specifically cite women (though the example I cited afterward might have made it seem that way).

(also why has no one commented on the jump of tv on the radio in this particular iteration of the poll? oh is it because THEY ARE NOT PRETTY LIKE BRANDON SO THEREFORE IT DOESN'T MATTER)

Hopper's always been a hack but I coulda told you that 4 years ago as well.

2. Some of Joanna Newsom's music does sound sad, surely -- I mean, at the very least, a lot of it's minor-key-inflected -- but some of it also sounds hopeful, some playful, some world-weary, etc. (In other words, the bit about "crying fits" or whatever is still very off the mark.) I do understand, though, that some people can't take her voice -- I think it's great, but whatever, different strokes.

For instance, she takes issue with "the supposing and wondering why the vagina'd writers are not voting for more of the vagina'd bands or singers" -- asking whether there's "equal surprise that Oliver Wang and Jeff Chang do not have more Asian-repping tickets." But we're only wondering why women aren't voting for Nellie McKay, given the fact that they've otherwise voted for PJ Harvey, Tegan and Sara, Le Tigre, etc. Hopper makes it sound like there's absolutely no correlation at all, which helps make the very notion of this thread seem suspect.

She also refutes the women-vote-for-bands-that-are-fashionable-and/or-cute hypothesis by asking "Who is voting for Interpol because they are cute?" and going on to demonstrate Carlos D's unprettiness. Well, if she'd read the results up top, she'd see that in fact Interpol dropped 11 places!

and i can't believe people are still vibing jessica for something that happened when SHE WAS 14. You "knew she was a hack" based on her junior high school fanzine?!

matos, i do not remember what i said. but i am sorry for generalizing my man-friends as "the sausages," i meant it as a joke.

is there a way one can suicide bomb a thread?

sorry, people who are that adept at/place so much value in their own self-promotion really bug me. esp. if they're that way at 14. relax, don't think about your "career," be a kid.

It just so happens that, in lieu of demographic data on all the voters, gender is the only breakdown you can reasonably do off a list of names, and even that isn't at all perfect, of course.

Article on riot grrrl. and boy are you naive.

OMG I just looked at the calendar! It's 2005! I don't mean to be a shitheel and stop people hating Jessica Hopper or anything, but God, if we're going to be judged by the very possibly stupid and corny shit we did when we were 14, then fuck it, it's over for all of us. I disagree with her blog entry too, and I think John nailed the reasons why, but holy crap, is there no statute of limitations anymore?

I'm not sure what you are implying, but I kinda doubt that young Jessica was lobbying Newsweek to include her in their magazine.

And Matthew, if I was bitter, I might make claims like yours, that all girls want to do is cry.

Oh fuck off. I realize that wasn't my best moment on ILM, but that is NOT NOT NOT NOT NOT NOT NOT what I was saying. All I was saying is that there is a much greater support for weepy folky music in the selection of female critics than for smug faux showtunes. It's my own fault for being snide and sloppy, but fuck you for putting those words in my mouth.

Yeah, I would say that I am slightly less cynical about journalists, at least in my own experience with being interviewed for various publications. I've never hit up anyone for press, people have always come to me. I am sure that it was no different for Jessica.

I don't even know what this has to do with anything. I'm certainly not saying my wife is or should be ashamed of what she did. But isn't the impulse always to tell young people that they're stupid and don't know what they should be doing like the good wise kind moderate adults? And isn't the message to girls even more strong than the message to boys?

Ah, hell, whatever. There should be more women reviewers, there should be more women artists, but no one should vote for anything on the basis of anything other than what they like for whatever reason.

oh like that's better.

I don't even know what this has to do with anything. I'm certainly not saying my wife is or should be ashamed of what she did. But isn't the impulse always to tell young people that they're stupid and don't know what they should be doing like the good wise kind moderate adults? And isn't the message to girls even more strong than the message to boys?

it hasn't a thing to do with i'm saying. Again, what I had to say had nothing to do with age. What your wife does sounds like it was actually cool and certainly she shouldn't be ashamed or be told not to speak (did anybody on this thread tell hopper not to speak? I didn't nor would I even if I presumed I had the power to tell her not to!), esp. when what she was doing was ostensibly about making things better, not interning (ha!) for a future career.

x-post

http://www.christiananswers.net/spotlight/movies/2001/homealone2.jpg

put it to a dancehall beat and pretend it's from some developing nation and all you critics will be masturbatin'!

Jesus, it's almost enough to make me stop reading this thread, and I was even interested!

Seriously, back to the substance - some good points have been made. Namely, that different demographics support different artists in interesting ways, and furthermore, that only 15% of the voters are female. 15%. 15% (approx;).

I'm thinking maybe that figure would be even less if we female teenage critics-in-the-making paid attention to people like hstencil, who seems to direct a disproportionate amout of rage towards one woman who had a little ambition.

i don't like people with too much (not just some) ambition, it hasn't a thing to do with jessica being a "woman" or not.

Newsweek found me through an article Terri Sutton at City Pages, who wrote about my fanzine, which in 1992, was on issue number 3. It was about 70% music, 30% riot girl. The writer, Farai Chideya, found that through some LexusNexus (sp?) search perhaps. Oh, and the giant billboard I had up in Times Square with my braces-smile looming large that read "pick me!" and had my parents home phone number.

I had no "career" interest at that age, because I just wanted to work at the record store i worked at for the rest of my life. I started a fanzine because no one in town would let me write for them because I was 14. So I made a fanzine, which was pretty ridonkuliss, but it got me writing work at City Pages. So, blame Will Hermes for giving me the foothold, dog.

I started doing publicity because all my cameras got stolen on my 18th birthday, while I was getting a star tattoed on the back of my neck, shitfaced drunk, somewhere in North Hollywood. I had just graduated from high school, was making a little bit of $ doing writing stuff (fanzines, city pages, grand royal), but ultimately, was trying to pursue photography. I could not afford to replace my cameras, and so I had to fall back on doing pr, which I had learned how to do from summer internships at Amphetamine Reptile. My parents are both editors, ( yes, my mom still has the same job, no need to update your files), I had worked at magazines a bit through high school, and thusly, held a pretty solid understanding of PR, solid enough to be able to get a job doing it.

And whomever called me a self promoting hack, not to steal yr thunder, but you are correct!

Yours very truly,

JH in MN

I don't like showtunes (unless Hedwig counts) or The Killers. I do cry, but not to Joanna Newsom. Saying that girls vote based on looks is pretty hypocritical, considering how many dudes wet themselves over former P& J fave Liz Phair over a decade ago. ("She said, blowjobs, heh, heh"), and countless others. And besides, I agree with Jessica: Interpol and The Killers are fugly.

Say what you want, but the number of women posting to ILM dwindles by the day. Look at the similar thread from a year ago: scant posts from Maura Johnston, no Daphne Carr. Go back even further. Where's people like Ally Kearny and Carey Price (who I don't know at all, I just admire their internet chutzpah)?

As it is, I have very little internet time. I'm one of the few people in the world who doesn't have a job where I can waste time on the internet. When I come to a place like ILM and constantly see posts and threads that are demeaning to my female peers, it makes me not want to take the time to read and post.

Angry bitter dudes, do us all a favor, and get some girlfriends, or at least talk to a girl, once a day**

**Not directed towards Jay Mc, who started what could have been an interesting thread, or any of the guys who actually do have a clue (Ned, Scott Seward, Ant'ny, Matt P., Don A.)

The rest of you can fucking blow me...

tho yeah, some of the ilm geek dudes should really talk with girls, and not just to or at them.

* inside joke, sorry everyone, you had to be there

sterling, drink the brown liquors, more anti-oxidants. at least that's what my bro says, and he's a medical doctor. he owns a mansion and a yacht.

It is very easy to get on the P&J list. You just drop a line to Chuck and say, I review these records for _______publication. And I got the same idea from Christgau as well. And I would think with the internet, it makes it much easier. Would someone who is just a blogger count?

Chuck does go out of his way to find not just female voices, but those who aren't typical rock crit voices, and that is really rare and cool.

Gotta get Chuck's back on this one.....

i think there's a few bloggers on there, yeah.

(1) If someone says something interesting and intelligent, and lots of people comment on it, then the thread is about the interesting and intelligent thing that was said.

(2) If someone says something boring and stupid, and lots of people comment on it, then the thread ends up being about the boring and stupid thing that was said. Even if the comments are more intelligent than the original stupid one.

In other words, your response makes the thread. You have a choice.

(Yeah, and it's not always quite that simple, since there can be comments that are intelligent but boring, and ones that are stupid but interesting. In general, though, the stupid and the boring attract one another.)

I think they decided that she was the "sound of london."

Well
Here it comes
Here comes the sound
The sound of london