well yes, is there a band championed by what used to be known as the music press worthy of the plaudit 'hype' this year who doesn't have just two members or a bad case of the New York Dolls shakes?

What do you have against a 2-person band???

Come on Everett, punk is the new punk. You could at least have the courtesy to go through the motions and pretend to be excited by a bunch of Johnny Thunders wannabes. There's not a hell of a lot else to do.

The printed music press has long since had its last drop of blood siphoned off. Long live this here internet thang.

gorgeous, grandview, life without buildings, the tigers.

I'm not sure if Venga is kidding or not, but after thinking long and hard, I've decided the Str*kes are my favorite new band. Still haven't heard 'em, though.

punk is the new punk

There's something so perfectly Zen about all this that I'm going to sit in my room with one hand clapping.

I do indeed know people who work at A Certain IPC-Published Paper who honestly and happily love both said bands. So they may not be decrepit themselves, but the end results of such love when translated into front covers and the like, that's another story.

And is it me, or are the Strokes absolutely fucking *nothing* in America? I mean, I've seen a variety of White Stripes stories and reviews around, even three times in the LA Times, and the Strokes none at all.

You are correct sir.

Which is what prompted me to ask (in the "Strokes Media Orgy" thread) where all this coverage was coming from.

When I saw them listed as a hot import in Other Music I should have known some British writer was getting his panties into a knot.

a bad case of the New York Dolls shakes

That doesn't exist. That can only be quite positive. However, since I've never heard most of the new bands championed by the music press, I'm not really to judge... I just play the Dolls instead!

Come on, the Daft Punk records fantastic.

Ah, but it's not rawk music. Which is what rawk critics like. (Or so I'm told.)

The fact that the Daft Punk record is my favorite of the year so far aside, you're never going to find any rockist (esp. Amurrican) critic who's going to stand behind two French guys wearing robot heads writing oceanic pop-house music with a tap-on guitar solos that could've come from a Kenny Loggins album. T'aint gonna happen. (Although - SHOCK! - Greil Marcus liked it. Excuse me while I'll go die of surprise.) Tis much easier to stand behind upright retro-rock and roll; Americans by and large hate the French and like it when people in tight pants play guitars.

Oui, oui.

No. Contemporary bands suck.

Where's DJ Martian? He'll set us straight!

Pinefox = our Nick Hornby? ;]

No, I wasn't being sarcastic. I haven't heard the Strokes or White Stripes either, but the two people who still speak to me reckon I'd like them, and if I can drag myself away from playing old Heavenly records and the new CD from Eleni Mandell then I will... but only to play Quasi and something that doesn't disturb my decrepit old bones any further. I mean, I bet they're right and all, but I bet they're not cos instantly someone tells me I like something I don't. But. I saw a picture of the Stripes in The Sun and they looked fantastic, even better than Gillespie drumming for the Mary Chain, and that's what counts.

No. I was being serious. Aside from the Stripes and Strokes, who has been on the receiving end of hype. Or isn't it perceived as hype any more, just 'serious' broadsheets writing 'seriously' about fucking crap music.

The Strokes have been covered in Spin, Rolling Stone, Magnet, AP, Billboard, Time Out NY, Entertainment Tonight, NY Times, etc. There is plenty of American press, 's just they don't write about 'em every week like NME.

I saw The White Stripes play last night on Pier 54 in NYC. Jack had blown out his voice, and the sound was wretched. Love the new album though.

I don't want to think about a weekly rag like NME being published in the US. The bi-weekly rags are bad enough as is. Like we need MORE gossip about Limp Bizkit and Limp Bizkit and LIMP BIZKIT!?! Oh - and Destiny's Child, too.

And, obviously, since we're all hacks that can't get paid to write about music, it's a given that we believe that the music press is totally decrepit, isn't it? (Insert wink here.)

The Amerindie press still seems to love Guided By Voices & Modest Mouse to death - I'm still not sure why, though. Can't think of any "new" bands getting the royal treatment, though - Lightning Bolt, perhaps? (That simmered & fizzled out, though.)

I think the GBV worship may be petering out somewhat since they went all glossy and signed to a major. It's not as cool to dig something which *actually sounds* like Cheap Trick, rather than something recorded on a boom box that *wants to sound* like Cheap Trick. ;)

Speaking of being recorded on a boom box (although I think they'd rather sound like whoever wrote "Eye of the Tiger"), Lightning Bolt shocked the hell out of me when I saw that a band I had shared a stage with in the dim recesses of my memory was featured in both Spin and the VV. I stil contend that they are the GREATEST ROCK BAND CURRENTLY PLAYING. (And I'm only half-kidding.)

Lightning Bolt is great though I've only seen them live. Has anyone heard their record? I can't imagine putting it on at home for some reason, or anywhere else really. I get the feeling that it would be very difficult to translate what they do onto a recording.

Of Lightning Bolts records, I'm actually most partial to a CDR I have of a live-in-the-studio radio performance. I do think they are best experienced live. Their first album (LP only, I think) is a nice little skull-scrape of hardcore-noise-jam, not entirely unrelated to what you might get if you crossed godheadsilo with the Dead. Their newest record ("Ride The Skies") is *grate*, but it's much looser than their live thang, more No Wave than Uriah Heep. ;]

Oh, shit, I just remembered...LB only has two members. Oops. ;]

Hey, look! Jess is talking out of his ass! You should write for the New Yorker.

Jess - might I ask in what fashion you shared Lightning Bolt's stage? They are superb, by the way. Give them HYPE, damn it! Make Load Records LOTS of money!

I played a show in Philadelphia in another lifetime where I was merely in another band on the bill and LB had, to my knowledge, one record out (a split 7" with Landed) burbling out of the Providence noise/hardcore axis. They were grate then, they're grate now. (In fact, they've gotten better by leaps and bounds.) "13 Monsters" is my song of the year, for what it's worth.

And how am I talking out my ass Davey? I think my assessment of the Bolt was pretty well spot on. Am I not "down with the scene" enough? Do I have to show you my "Why I Live" 10" and my collection of Ft. Thunder comics?? ;]

Lift to Experience are the shit. Trust me.

Absolutely. I am very excited that they play Brighton next week.

Enlighten me pleez.

Yeah, 'White Blood Cells' is excellent, though it sounds like nothing I would normally like. Bluesy-Garage? Bleh!

Talkin' 'bout music press hype - it's gone a bit quiet on the Terris front ain't it?

terris = dropped, apparently.

i wouldn't say gbv sound particularly Cheap Trick, spesh not on their new 'isloation drills', which is just heratbreak rem to these ears (and very fine too)... airport 5 and soft-rock renegades are fine too,,,

What about the Mercury contenders? Have they been chosen on merit or hype or what? I hope it's the second... I'm a very big fan of hype

I just heard the Strokes for the first time on the radio (found out it was them after the song). Im now more confused then ever about all the hype.

So funny (in a good way) to see Everett_True on ILM. Have been rereading / culling (reluctantly) ditching tons of old NME / MM and had forgotten how much he did c.1993 or so, Riot Grrrl / Seattle era. Fascinating reading experience. Some sense now that some writers (inc ET? Stubbs?) were holding themselves back / watering themselves down for weekly market? Not sure.

Rereading old MM = major route into Pop Thought as ever. We should all do it lots and Report Back.

I have a stash of MM's from 1991 to 1994 or so, and digging back into them is indeed a bizarre treat. One of my favorite bits came in early 1992, when some writer was complaining about watered-down alternative noise and saying something like, "And so it gets duller and more lowest-common-denominator, from the Wonder Stuff to Kingmaker to Thousand Yard Stare to Radiohead." Heh heh heh.

and the thing is...he was right!

I kinda prefer my stuff written during my sojourn in Seattle, when my capacity for self-righteousness and nastiness suprised even me... I think some is still at www.thestranger.com (between late 98 and April 99)... but none of that can hold a candle to the way mark s writes here and now. The bugger always was smarter than me.