my entire pazz and jop comment spiel (including unused stuff)

2003: So what, I’m drunk

There really much in the way of obviously worthwhile social protest this year from where I sit in State College, PA (I’m pretty much waiting for the chance to vote against Bush) so while I was glad to hear from Ted Leo, the Drive-By Truckers, Liz Phair, Neil Young, Outkast and Northern State, it was the reckless hedonists: R. Kelly, Electric Six, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Junior Senior, and an endless stream of dance-floor filling crunkers who really defined the year for me – trying to have the best time of my life while waiting for the opportunity to vote against Bush.

While the Electric Six threw the best party (great music, everybody was happy and fuck if I didn’t walk away with a million anecdotes and in-jokes), the one given by the Yeah Yeah Yeah’s was the one where I fell in love. To be honest I was kind of drunk and the stuff we said to each other seems kind of incoherent and embarrassing when I tell friends. I remember jumping around the room with her to this GREAT music that was chaotic yet had snap, making funny faces at each other and pretty much knocking over everything, wrestling and laughing. I don’t think I ever felt so impulsive, so alive, so intoxicated by another person. Hell, I think we’ve been watching each other sleep, you know? I don’t think it’s always going to be like this (hell, first time I saw this girl I thought she was kind of obnoxious and uninteresting – maybe she’ll seem like that again once she stops wanting to be around me) but damn if that night isn’t going to be one of those amazing experiences that I look back on whenever I need to remember that I haven’t always felt alone.

If Fever To Tell was my new girlfriend, Liz Phair was an ex I hadn’t seen in awhile whose superficially SO DIFFERENT from when I last saw her (she’s totally tarted up and her new boyfriend looks like he’s actually upwardly mobile and probably has nothing interesting to say, oh fuck you Liz I bet you’re secret miserable now that you’ve entered the REAL WORLD) that it took me a long time to realize that she’s happier and more confident then I’ve ever seen her before. Sure her cynicism and bluntness was a lot more attractive when, like, she was in love with me, but if I actually stop thinking about myself for a second, I have to admit that she’s way too frikkin’ cool for me to be so possessive. I always feel awkward saying that having cool ex-girlfriends is, fuck, for the lack of a better word, educational. But in all reality I’m just lucky to know someone this honest, funny and observant.

Though I doubt I’ll support it, I’m incredibly curious when rap’s (or pop’s, same diff) current dancefloor obsession is going to inspire a “Disco Sucks”-type backlash. Maybe 50 Cent, Nelly, Snoop Dogg, et al will make a dialogue-free musical based around the Biggie/Tupac songbook. Maybe Victoria Beckham’s Roc-A-Fella debut will be the modern-day equivalent of the Ethel Merman Disco Album. Maybe Junior Senior and Electric Six will film “C-c-can’t Stop The Gay Bar.” Either way, this metrosexuality in da club seems like anathema to the Bush Adminstration and if GW gets re-elected I think we’ve got a serious case of Silent Majority coming. Hell, Toby Keith’s warning bells might sound a lot like N.W.A.’s did during the LA Riots. Don’t pretend they didn’t warn you.

The world needs heroes, but there’s no denying that Justin Timberlake makes a shitty Michael Jackson ’83 surrogate. “Cry Me A River” ain’t “Billie Jean.” CGI and awkward pop-lock ain’t the moonwalk. Pharrell Williams ain’t Quincy Jones (though I’d settle for Williams realizing he ain’t Curtis Mayfield). 3 million sold in a year ain’t 20 million in two. “Rock Your Body” ain’t “(Don’t Stop) Till You Get Enough.” “Never Again” ain’t “She’s Out Of My Life.” When JT was riding beats courtesy of Wade Robson and BT and standing next to folks like Lance Bass he had a commanding presence. Standing next to Timbaland he’s Jerry Lewis screaming “LAY-DEEZ!” - a fascinating clown. The only thing coltish about him is that he whinnies. Anybody whose most assured vocal performances are from the cuckold’s perspective ain’t much of a stud.

To be fair, it could be argued that Conor Oberst is a shitty Bob Dylan surrogate, tainted by indie rock hermeticism the same way Timberlake is tainted by the Mickey Mouse Club (both are tainted by CD-age indulgence). But watching Oberst (and his mainstream counterparts in Good Charlotte) reinvigorate American rock with genuine artistic ambition and an urge for testimony devoid of Bono-style messianicism is way more interesting than waiting for Star Search contestants’ vocals to merit their beats.

As the previous paragraph makes clear, I’m a rockist. While I definitely prefer Lil Jon’s “Get Low” to Ryan Adams’ “So Alive,” I’ve avoided purchasing much crunk in fear of singles-plus-filler baiting while I bought Rock’N’Roll DESPITE being unmoved by the multiple tracks I heard. The promise of Strokes/Interpol inspired guitar power and eccentric, earnest rock hero shtick was too great for me to not be sated until I knew for SURE that the album was uninspired hackery. Which it is. That Adams’ sentiments are based on stuff that’s “really happening” doesn’t make them any less limp and cliché. I know it really happened but Seabiscuit is still Rudy as a horse.

The irony of Kish Kash’s clutter would be the same as if Let It Be was credited to Phil Spector instead of the Beatles. These are shitty remixes of great guest collaborators by the “artist.” Me’Shell Ndgeocello, JC Chasez and Siouxsie Sioux remind us how far Alicia Keys, Justin Timberlake and Christina Aguilera have to go – they HOLD the screen - only to have their Oscar-worthy performances sabotaged by the overkinetic, shrill and jealous “auteurs.” Most of my peers don’t care because they’re not really into actors anyway. The prog-like fetish for technical achievement I find in “dance” music circles seems as ironic to me as John Ashcroft’s efforts to protect freedom.

Fuck Blur. Fuck The New Pornographers. Fuck the Kings Of Leon. Fuck Radiohead.

“Crazy In Love”: in which Beyonce confesses her love for Jay-Z, Jay-Z confesses his love for Jay-Z. It should be noted that Jay-Z doesn’t risk being upstaged by the trumpets.

“Ignition – Remix” took a while for me to appreciate. At first I was confused cuz everybody said it was a DANCE song, when really it’s an end of the night track, when you’re too drunk to do anything but smile and say “toot toot” while the credits roll. Plus I thought the song went too far into Kelly’s absurd hedonism until I noticed where he says he’s plowed (kind of explains how he’s kept from going insane with fear in 2002 – kind of explains how I did too!). But the Kelly number that knocked me out from the first listen was “Step In The Name Of Love – Remix,” the music is great, and you know somebody is falling in love (somewhere), someday it might be you so fuck it, step in the name of love. Hope springs eternal.

I’d like to make some wry comment about the absurdity of Snopp Dogg going from baddest gangsta ever to variety show host/AOL pitchman in ten years, but that’s way preferable to Kid Rock going from American Bad-Ass to most boring man on the planet in half the time.

I love how so many people don’t even notice that “Hey Ya” is the sound of someone trying to have fun right after dumping somebody they still care about. Everybody’s too busy shaking it like a Polaroid picture to tell him why we’re so denial when we know we’re not happy here. It’s totally bizarre to think of the Outkast album as being underrated, but damn if I feel like I’ve read a decent review of the thing.

Thank you for including me in the poll for a second go-around: even if my ballot was a little less comprehensive than I'd like, it still gives me a well-needed ego boost at a difficult time. (The occasional point here and there was already used by me on ilxor.com or my blogs. I hope that's OK.) (Also, I've already submitted the album/singles votes; they appear here for the sake of reference.)

DEMOGRAPHIC INFORMATION

Name: Michael Daddino
Code Name: Rosacea Boy
Place of Residence: Upper East Side, Manhattan, New York. Just a block and a half from Alan Light's apartment complex, in fact. I used to see him every once in a while getting a coffee or pushing a stroller around the neighborhood. I only knew of him from his appearances on VH1 and a byline here and there (and I can safely assume he doesn't know anything about me), but I'd see him and think "Hm. That's what a career rock critic looks like," an odd comfort considering all the embittered freelancers I know. I haven't seen him in a while, so I imagine he spends most mornings nowadays in the *Tracks* offices drinking cigarettes and smoking coffee to stay awake after chasing down deadlines all night. Poor guy.
Age: 32
Race: Caucasian
Nationality: American
Gender: Male
Sexual Orientation: The singer in Andrea Doria's "Bucci Bag" finishes her list of all the designer-whore clothes she's got on with a drag queen-defiant "...and. I. Am. Ready. To. ROCK!" Even if I'm just sitting down working intently at my computer, I am always ready to wiggle my body to each word, ending with an arm raised for a nice crisp SNAP! in perfect time with the very last one. Ergo, gay.
Position Within the Rock Critic Universe: I have two blogs I never update at epicharmus.com. I say deeply silly things on ilxor.com. And in 2003, I had two reviews covering the latest Luther Vandross and Guided By Voices records published in the Seattle Weekly. Go me.

THE BALLOT: ALBUMS

DJ/rupture: Minesweeper Suite (Tigerbeat6) 30
Jan Jelinek Avec the Exposures: La Nouvelle Pauvreté (~scape) 13
Soulwax: Soulwax Presents Hang All DJ's Volume 1 (Head Traxx Inc.) 12
Soulwax: Soulwax Presents Hang All DJ's Volume 2 (Head Traxx Inc.) 12
Philip Jeck: 7 (Touch) 7
Soundmurderer: Wired for Sound (Violent Turd) 6
Various Artists: Robert Crumb Presents Hot Women Singers (EFA) 5
Yo La Tengo: Summer Sun (Matador) 5
Various Artists: Flowers in the Wildwood: Women in Early Country Music 1923-1939 (Trikont) 5
Dizzee Rascal: Boy in Da Corner (XL) 5

THE BALLOT: SINGLES

R. Kelly: Ignition (Remix) (Jive)
M83: Run Into Flowers (Gooom)
Lil' Mo feat. Fabolous: 4Ever (Elektra)
Reverend Dan: It's Getting Bongo Rock in Herre (The Incredible Bongo Band vs. Tiga) (N/A)
The Deftones: Minerva (Maverick)
Wayne Wonder: No Letting Go (Atlantic)
Snow Patrol: Spitting Games (Universal/Polydor)
Andrea Doria: Bucci Bag (Southern Fried)
Linus Loves: Stand Back (Data)
Alicia Keys: You Don't Know My Name (J)

MICHAEL DADDINO'S TOP TEN MUSICAL MOMENTS OF 2003:

1. Fucking shit up in Vice City with "More Bounce to the Ounce" on the car radio.

2. Spending an entire day and night sequencing 11 1/2 hours music from 1984 for an MP3 CD-ROM, ending with Franco spinning loop after loop of guitar riffs like he was playing at the universe's birthday party.

3. Just before the war: Aaliyah and Timbaland as honorary stand-ins for the nation's conscience in DJ/rupture's *Minesweeper Suite.*

4. Pounding my fist into a basement ceiling to Daft Punk's "One More Time," the last song of Tom Ewing's pre-wedding party in London.

5. Flying back home, missing London but missing New York, too, with a slick R&B hit mix on the headphones.

6. Going home during the blackout, running around the city like a frantic goofball with ARE Weapons's "Streetgang" in my head. (I still don't know any of the words apart from "people on the street.")

7. Playing Galaga July 4th in a 42nd Street arcade with a Diwali riddim mix on the P.A.

8. Hearing "Mundian To Bach Ke" coming out of all the cars in New York this spring, everyone wired to the same thing at the same time.

9. Making fun of the hapless MTV video music awards with Fred Solinger via AIM.

10. Inexplicably moving: Soulwax mixing "Stand and Deliver" with the Chemical Brothers on *Hang All DJ's Volume 2*, to say nothing of "The Clapping Song" and "Dirty" on Volume 4.

THE DIFFICULT SECOND BALLOT

I fear I have become the future face of rockism. The albums I've voted for may have witty juxtapositions between x and y, or explosive recontextualizations, or they use them to create a texture that's uncannily like those found on David Banner's screwed album (that's the Jeck joint), or use genres the typical rockist qua rock doesn't recognize exists, such as jungle, disco, the rest of the world, whatever -- but ultimately they're all 'about' old music. I think my casual belief that the present will always catch up with me has me made deeply lazy as a listener and a thinker of music, and rendered me incapable of confidently saying anything about the last year beyond the obvious.

***

After having made the successful transition from guitar-based banality to electronic-based banality, "twee vocals overwhelmed by lots and lots of sound" has become the "open your record with a solo vocal over plaintive piano chords" of indie rock -- a cliche become unkillable partly because nobody seems to notice it, and partly because it sometimes still works. (Witness the appearance of M83 on my list.) I almost voted for the Manitoba album until I figured it didn't need my damned votes anyway. A wonderful afternoon nap kind of album, sure, but it irritates me the minute I pay attention, so overloaded is it with all the wonderful sonic details of the last thirty years. What made those gimmicks (or hooks, whatever) so effective back then was that they supported actual *songs* rather than their wispy intimations, and without the organizing concept of a song it all just sounds overcooked and static -- it'd be self-indulgent if the auteurs behind the album didn't efface all sense of self from it. Still, we're bound to hear more wimps with beats. How much you wanna make a bet Paul Simon hooks up with the guy from Four Tet once the reunion tour is over?

***

THE MODERN-DAY R&B PERVERT REFUSES TO DIE: R. Kelly, "Ignition (Remix)"

***

I must confess some disappointment upon discovering Dizzee Rascal doesn't wear glasses.

***

This year Lester Bangs' legacy was claimed for most loudly by a few hapless morons whose stuff -- save for the outbursts of Tourettic arbitrariness here and there for that quaint "punk" touch -- reads like Jackie Harvey's columns in The Onion.

It seemed like no reviewer of *Mainlines* could resist the parlor game of wondering what he'd be into were he still alive. Everybody's answers were "well of course he'd *love* this and he'd *hate* that," all of which sounded like "well of course we would be *best fwends*."

***

One thing I've never seen remarked about Lester is that he's got at least two prescient heavenly-jukebox fantasies in his writings. He used the image of a catacomb collection housing every album ever released a couple times, and in his *Incredibly Strange Creatures* review, he imagined a future with TV channels showing Sun Ra jamming with Iggy and every movie ever released in perfect chronological order. In 2004, I pay over a hundred bucks monthly for a cable hook-up with several hundred channels that don't even show *That Girl* (not ever!), and that kinda sucks on a level of not having miracle acrylic bubble cars that fly on the moon.

***

The very thing that helped "save" the record industry back in the eighties -- the compact disc -- helped smother it nearly twenty years later. Not just because of the ease with which digitized music can be shared or bootleged, but also because CDs and other technologies raised consumer expectations about the portability and availability of music so high that the industry eventually became unable to meaningfully meet them. CD technology (along with microcassettes, Walkmans, music delivered digitally etc.) and its economic upshots (the spread of "deep catalog" record stores and the never-ending reissue boom) in retrospect seem like steps in the road towards the heavenly jukebox, a scenario of frictionless consumerism where everything ever made would always be available to everyone everywhere. Yet once the listening public developed and collectively organized a botched, bootlegged version of that ideal via Napster et al., the music industry went ballistic, sued people, played fast and loose with individual rights, and even went so far as to curse the public not just for getting music for free but for DARING to define what the industry's appropriate business model should be. You could reasonably ask "well, what the fuck else can they do"? But you could also reasonably ask why they're seemingly incapable of understanding the implications of everything they've been doing for the last few decades.

Meanwhile, to fight the p2p menace, the recording industry has Operation Boomer Suck-Up, a brilliant long-term plan where they put all their remaining hopes in a demographic nearing its expiration date and get the likes of James Taylor and R.E.M. on the morning shows because radio and VH1 won't play them EVEN THOUGH IT'S *THEIR* FUCKING JOB, *THEIR* CULTURAL MANDATE to promote them, not *The CBS Morning Show*'s.

Or maybe what seems like stupidity and dawdling to everyone is really a vote of no confidence, a belief that popular music no longer has the power to stand on its own as a cultural force, and consequently is not something you can get *really* rich and powerful exploiting. (And I don't necessarily mean "exploiting" in a pejorative sense.) Otherwise, I can't understand how these companies can sit there with its thumb up their ass while all the traditional organs of music dissemination atrophy: radio held hostage by indie promoters and Clear Channel, video channels that don't show videos, "rock" magazines going "lifestyle," record store chains on the brink, and this shit has been going on for years, too, so you know it's not just an MP3 thing. The bizzers have completely lowered their expectations once again and settled for viewing music not as art, not as entertainment or distraction or narcosis but as something that at best attaches itself parasitically to bigger and sexier things, like movies, celebrities or TV shows. (At the highest stage of corporate synergy, every media form is parasitic on every other.)

***
I know full well that *Minesweeper Suite* was released in 2002 and giving it 30 points is some kind of futile gesture, but fuck it, it was the soundtrack to MY war. "Who should be hurt, who should be blamed?": through a cultural Doppler Effect, the obscene grinding sound of the bunker-buster bombs that fell on Baghdad got marshaled into beats supporting Aaliyah's pre-9/11 plaints, which, in this context, seemed to wonder why justice has to be so mercenary. Elsewhere, Orientalist exoticism is deployed critically, along with all manner of complaint and revolt and macho, people everywhere in the hip-hop diaspora uttering the six million names of Motherfucker. Wired for Sound had a few similar moments, especially the scared voice that bellows out WHO RUN TINGS?

I screwed up. Lamb Of God's As The Palaces Burn should have been on my list, and Zyklon's Aeon shouldn't have been.

Hip-hop makes me feel like David Horowitz; I used to love it so much, and now I hate it just as much, if not more. 50 Cent and Lil Jon make me want to smash my TV.

That's all.

But if its any consolation, Chuck, you're a better writer than I.

(Anthony and Michael might be good writers too, but I haven't read their ditties yet)

Sounds dull to me.

Yes.

Anyway, I'm not sure I get the question. Basically, with some occasionally successful attempts at me persuading (and disuading) him here and there, Bob picks ALL the comments. And edits them. I make suggestions, which he can accept and/or reject at will. As for my own comments, some years I'm lazy and can't think of anything to say and he begs me to write some. This year, though (for the first time since I was editor), I sat down to type and lotsa stuff just spilled out.

There's an interesting argument to be made about how thorough a cultural student one has to be in order to talk about something -- admittedly I think many threads have tackled it in far more detail and skill than I can. Still, like it or not, the iPodding of the universe is a further step along to the point where all music is is anonymous bits with a brief text tag and NOTHING else to suggest what it is or where it comes from. In which case, where or what is the context if not in a listener's head?

Ja sings and he's a pansy sellout hack. Dre 3K sings
and he's a genius. What gives? Clap Back is more
hip-hop than anything on The Love Below by virtue of
A) involving rapping, B) having beats and C) this is
important, INVOLVING RAPPING.

2003: Whew! Seemed like a new single every week! Who
can keep up? The year when a generatio of faux-ebonic
whitebread scandalmonger punster journos asked: Where
Da Beef At? When 50 raps about fat kids and cake, he
means cocaine, right? Rappers never talk about
anything but drugs!

Gag "concept" singles lists that woulda still brought
fiyah: all 50 cent, all R. Kelly, all southern, all
diwali, all anti-war, all multicult dancehall
crossover, all remixes, all jay-z guest spots, all
Murder Inc., all Jazze Pha.

Gag "concept" singles lists that woulda been awful:
Timbaland, Neptunes, Bad Boy, rock.

Dido does for herself on White Flag what Em did for
her on Stan.

Big year for jay-z with guest spots on the Aaliyah
"Miss You" remix AND Outkast's "flip flop rock" not to
mention the Roc firming up its film empire with Paper
Soldiers.

Favorite etymology for Crunk: Crass and a Monk, like
the Wu's Shaolin style back for the first time. Second
best: Crappy Hunk, like he's built and all but missing
a tooth, maybe?

Confidential to Pharrell: Call me, sexy!

Blood on the horizon: between Dizzee, Atmosphere, Em,
Budden and Grae hip-hop's emo plague can only
intensify.

Confidential to Village Voice -- beware the false
syllogism: L'Trimm were great and a hip-hop girl
group. Northern State and Fannypack are hip-hop girl
groups. Therefore Northern State and Fannypack are
great. (Amil, Gangsta Boo, and Angie Martinez: now
there's a girl group!)

Best slanderous rumor of year: Gangsta Boo goes
gospel.

Worst slanderous rumor: Jay-Z is retiring.

Best Unreleased Album: Foxy Brown -- The Fever. Could
this be the Yankee Hotel Foxtrot of rap? Except, you
know, actually good?

Trend that most invites and denies analysis: Screw.

Track to rescue the "izzle" horse-latin gag one last
time: Lil Flip, "This Is The Way We Ball".

Thank god there's no host of imitators yet, but it's
good this once: Chingy's "thurr".

Best setting for a single: in those jeans.

Best shoulda-been-tha-main-single: Luda's "Pussy
Popping".

Best video depiction of a stripclub: Luda's "Pussy
Popping".

Oh-no-he-didn't awkwardly maturing award: Nick Cannon
for "Feelin' Freeky".

Best radio edit: Youngbloodz "Damn" replacing "We
don't give a damn we don't give a fuck" with an almost
purely inverted "If you don't give a damn don't throw
it up".

Steaming hot robo-sex award: Sasha, "Dat Sexy Body".

Good single/artist still boring: Tyrese

Sadly still not a comeback: Nivea

The album was great too, honest!: Lumidee

How-did-nobody-rhyme-that-before-or-did-they:
"USA/CIA/KKK" in "Where Is The Love"

Multicult prediction 2004: Crunk meets Africa =
Diamonds on the Soles of Shoes! 2005: '93 revival and
new shoes for Souls of Mischief. 2006: Sandal scandal
misfire when Common sells out, soul.

Free Project Pat, R.I.P. Soulja Slim, and babygirl
we're still thinking of you. I'm out -- sterling sterl esclobar.

I bring all this up because I'll check out the Pazz and Jop list cuz I wanna be enlightened. I may get turned onto some music that I don't yet know of. That's why I check out this board. But if the stuff in the poll is there because of something like cultural inportance, then I guess its misleading to me.

Sorry Chuck I assumed you picked comments, which made your desire to write more than you'd publish seem kind of odd. But now it makes sense.

There used to be a time when I didn't feel particularly embarrassed about sticking up for poor old Ryan Adams when everyone else around me seemed to be trying to rip him to shreds; carrying the mantle of "spiritual heir to Gram Parsons" is probably enough to twist anyone, and with people hollering out "SUMMER OF 69!" at his shows, I felt bad for him. No more. Rock N Roll (or Llor N Kcor if you really must) is the sound of a temper tantrum, unleashed upon the world after the record company told him he couldn't release the CDs he wanted. The result is a piss-poor Paul Westerberg impersonation intercut with the occasional shitty U2 impression. I'd say that he really needed a spanking, but if I did that he might phone me up to let loose a string of whiny profanity.

And speaking of Paul Westerberg...
Without question, the worst album cover art this year is Come Feel Me Tremble, from Paul Westerberg, which looks like it was put together in 30 seconds by someone who had no clue what an album even was. It's almost as if he's completely given up trying to win over any new fans, figuring that his usual fanbase (almost certainly composed of hardcore fanatics by now) will buy any old piece of shit he releases these days, no matter how sick the artwork will make adjacent CDs on the shelf feel. The sad thing is, he's probably right.

I really wanted to put Spearhead's "Bomb the World" into my singles list this year just because; unfortunately the end product doesn't live up to the hype that was generated by the idea of the song. Still, in a year where most musicians were trying their damnedest not to take a public stand against the war in Iraq, Franti actually got in front of a mike and said it out loud, which is worth celebrating.

Dear Jane's Addiction:
I love you, but next time you attempt a comeback, spend less money on the production and more on the album artwork. I bought the limited edition version not because I wanted to see you guys all yakking about shit on the bonus DVD, but because the slipcover protected me from having to look at the front cover.
Your friend,
Sean
(ps. You might also want to start your next comeback album with words other than "Here we go!" I almost thought you were going to remake Ritual, which would have sucked even more than Strays already sucked.)
(pps. to Perry. That hat's really gotta go.)

The sooner all of the major labels merge into one big label, the better, because when it eventually goes bankrupt it's just a matter of time before Lars Ulrich can get down to doing what he really wants: coming to your house personally to beat you up (or to scream at you for 3 hours straight).

My industry rant 2003:
In 2003 the music industry dropped any pretensions whatsoever that they were in it to provide fantastic music to fans of fantastic music, and revealed without equivocation that it was all about the cash. People tended to fixate (and rightly so) on the fact that in the process of combating file-sharing, the industry went after a young girl and an elderly man with the full force of law, but it missed one of the deeper issues involved: why do the major labels somehow think that a downturn in its sales during a recession means that the record industry is under siege? Many other sectors of the economy are suffering the same kind of downturn and just accepting it--as they have for decades--as a standard part of doing business; the big difference is that these other industries don't have as attractive a scapegoat as the record labels do in peer-to-peer.

What the record labels should really look at, if you take it as a given that people are downloading new music for free, rather than going into the stores, is exactly why this is happening? The music industry would like us all to believe that it's because there are an awful lot of bad people out there would don't want to have to pay for new music, but it's not really that simple. Indeed, there are always going to be people out there who don't want to pay for their music, and there always have been--people have been making copies of their friends' albums for years and years, and recording their favourite songs directly from the radio (not coincidentally another free music distribution source, kids! try it out!). The problem is that over the course of the last decade the music industry has shifted from a model where longer-term development of an artist was valued, and where albums were considered important, to a model where an artist's career is over almost as soon as it's begun and, consequently, singles are more important. And there's the problem: WHERE ARE THE SINGLES? Used to be when you heard a song you liked, you could go down to your favourite shop, or even the corner store, and buy that song on 7-inch vinyl or cassette single; now when you buy a "single" you get a CD that has multiple remixes that people probably won't want anyway, and which costs almost as much as the full album. The incentive to make an impulse purchase is no longer there, because you're either going to spend more on the song than you wanted, or you're going to get the full album and feel ripped off because you don't like the rest of it. Universal took a step in the right direction by lowering the cost of its albums substantially, meaning people will be more inclined to buy the full album even when they don't know what the rest of it is like because HEY! It's only $10! But it still doesn't get to the heart of the problem...why people are downloading songs instead of buying them. It's because people don't WANT the other crap that comes along with the song they want; it's like going into the donut shop for one donut and being told they only come in 12-packs.

The decision to license individual songs for download through music services like iTunes is definitely a good start, but it might also be worth considering bringing back the 3-inch CD single. Yeah, yeah, it died a horrible unlamented death back in the mid-80s because people weren't buying them, but people didn't NEED to buy them, because there were other singles alternatives available. (Some might argue that it's also because albums didn't have as much filler back then, but of course that would be a putrid, bald-faced fuckin' lie.)

In general, the industry's solution to the problem is not to provide what people want but to provide them more of what they weren't even looking for in the first place. NOTE: appending a DVD featuring video footage of the band screwing around endlessly in the studio, onstage and in the tourbus to a substandard album doesn't actually make that album any better. Also, people don't really consider it a "bonus" when the price is higher. And when you keep re-releasing albums six months later with a bonus DVD, it tends to piss off the people who bought the album when it first came out, even if the bonus DVD is garbage. And the brand new brewing format war between DVD Audio and Super Audio CD is another ball of wax altogether. Thank God there are DVD players out there that will play all of the formats, because we won't feel so dicked over when one of them finally gets shitcanned.

2003 finds Stephen Malkmus on the driver’s side of my celebrity lust wagon.
He’s swapped out of smuggo-thuggo alt-god mode and into the gracefully
aging king of the Portland indie-rock retirement community, fortressed into
his post-Pavement life by his Dire Straits records and Trivial Pursuit
cards. The first solo record was the freedom flail of a gay divorcee -- the
Gen-X midlifer’s crisis isn’t Hawaiian shirts or sports cars, it’s Yul
Brynner jokes and pretending your “literate” relationship tableaus
aren’t rewrites of “Scenes From An Italian Restaurant.” But now he’s
settling down, getting it together with his new band, foraging for an
aesthetic among reams of Hannibal Records catalog numbers and
Swedish-language Geocities pages devoted to modal folk-prog from early ‘70s
Wales. Pig Lib is where Malkmus learns to play guitar for reals,
and he doesn’t quite have the stuff yet but he’s diligent and cautious and
he obviously wants to be good, better than the blur of dropped-D
dissonance and conspicuously mistakey leads that made him famous. (Which I
can take or leave right now; personally, I’m looking forward to Malkmus’
inevitable “Play Like a Pro in 30 Minutes or Less” DVD.) Somewhere in there
he discovered sex, too. The chilly speed-freak sterility of Slanted and
Enchanted now sounds like the grooviest lay a $4.99 Oregon merlot can
eke out; he’s all “check me out, I love so well” and preening about having
“your ballerina tights around my head/in a samurai pose on the bed.” He can
make fun of turning into That Guy in ways that, say, Steely Dan (who’ve
been That Guy since 1972 and would have trouble breaking character this
late in the play) really can’t. In his way, he's Matador's answer to R.
Kelly.

Jesus. I swear I remember you saying you liked Brian De Palma. (oops. sorry, what says in ILF stays in ILF.)

I want Daddino to have my babies.

Most Wow - Miccio
Most Fun - Clover
Id'd at Line 1 - Jody
Not Id'd before sig - Clover

Chuck, to be honest with you, I'd much rather read your piece than anything Christgau has to say. I like your writing much better. Sue me.

I'm fascinated by almost everything Xgau writes, but have never found anything remotely memorable in his P&J essays. What is their purpose?

Madonna and Britney’s historic mind-blowing kiss of the century was the only story important enough to captivate an entire globe’s imagination and turn attention away from terror, paranoia, fear, trembling, and dread. And it’s easy to see why. The symbolic and literal commingling of old, sweaty, desperate tongue with young, vibrant, desperate tongue in a microbal stew of tantric frigidity and panic at the thought of what the future brings is as old as the tale of Elihu and the twin sow babies. The writers of the Kabbala would have been proud.

It will be interesting to see what The Darkness, The Libertines, The Kills, Manitoba, and Fourtet do for an encore. Will they be able to build on their past....Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha...sorry, i couldn’t keep a straight face.

The choice for discerning ex-indie/hardcore kids in 2003? And it was a tough one. Especially for former Montessori students: Gang Of Four or 13th Floor Elevators! What’s it gonna be boy, yes or no? All of a happenstance free-folk/free-psych shows dotted the landscape across this nation like extra-smelly camp meeting hootenanys for smack-addled latte baristas. As many of the participants had only been formally introduced to their instruments the night of the show, free-admission should have gone along with the folk. In other words:I have seen Devendra Banheart in drag perform Tim Hardin songs, and I have smelled Devendra Banheart in drag sing Tim Hardin songs (quite nice actually. like incense and lilacs.) and you sir are not Devendra Banheart in drag singing Tim Hardin songs. As for the post-punk disco scene, let’s just say i’m still waiting for the pirate pants/Burundi drums/war paint stage of their retro development.

The same as a rollercoaster's purpose, more or less. But different.

Anyway, you should read his 1978, 1982, and 1987 ones. I'll NEVER forgot those!!

Sigh. Michael Inskeep...no, Michael Edward Inskeep. Sigh.

Janis Ian Between the Lines [Columbia, 1975]
In this time of dearth, it's probably improvident to laugh at someone so talented--good melodies abound here, and I can't think of a rock singer who has made more unaffected and pleasurable use of her or his voice lessons. But this woman's humorlessness demands snickers. It was one thing for society's teenager to pity herself because she didn't have the integrity to stick with her black boyfriend. It's another thing for a grown-up to pity her teenaged self because she was always picked last in basketball. I mean, face it, Ms. Ian--you're short. B-

I find the idea that I'm a country-music critic hilarious, since I'm so ignorant of the genre. But I suppose at this point the idea I'm a rock critic is just as hilarious. I mean, I can't remember if I've ever heard a blink-182 song. And I know I've never heard a Cradle of Filth song. Seriously, can you call someone a rock critic who's never heard Cradle of Filth? (Answer: Uh, I don't know. I've never heard them.)

Exclusively for ILX, not only am I posting the ballot, I'm posting a version with the typos corrected. Then I'm posting Josh Kortbein's reaction to the ballot. And then (to round out the box set), I'm posting the letter to Geoffrey Himes in which I ask him to correct the typos if he prints any of my ballot. (In the original I'd written "Hear 'em whip the women just around midnight" when in fact I should have written "Hear him whip the women just around midnight.") I believe this letter expresses my true personality better than anything I have ever written for publication.

Country Music Critics Poll 2003
Frank Kogan's ballot

As you'll see, I created a few award categories of my own.

BEST COUNTRY ALBUMS 2003
1. Dwight Yoakam Population Me (Electrodisc/Audium/Koch)
2. Winfred E. Eye The Dirt Tier (Luckyhorse Industries)
3. Deana Carter I'm Just a Girl (Arista)
4. Gary Allan See If I Care (MCA)
5. Toby Keith Shock'n Y'All (DreamWorks)
6. Brooks & Dunn Red Dirt Road (Arista)
7. Drive-By Truckers Decoration Day (New West)

BEST COUNTRY SINGLES 2003
1. David Banner "Cadillac on 22's" (Universal)
2. Faith Hill "One" (Warner Bros.)
3. Bubba Sparxxx "Deliverance" (Interscope)
4. Bubba Sparxxx "Comin' Round" (Interscope)
5. Deana Carter "There's No Limit" (Arista)
6. See first vomit song below (but don't give it any points from me, thank you)
7. Dwight Yoakam "The Late Great Golden State" (Electrodisc/Audium/Koch)
8. Dixie Chicks "Travelin' Soldier" (Sony)
9. Montgomery Gentry "Hell Yeah" (Columbia)
10. Kenny Chesney "No Shirt, No Shoes, No Problems" (BNA)

DUO/TRIO/GROUP
1. Montgomery Gentry
2. Brooks & Dunn
3. Dixie Chicks

MALE VOCALIST
1. Toby Keith
2. Dwight Yoakam
3. Gary Allan

FEMALE VOCALIST
1. LeAnn Rimes
2. Deana Carter
3. Martina McBride

OVERALL ACT
1. Montgomery Gentry
2. LeAnn Rimes
3. Toby Keith

BEST SONG TO MAKE ME THROW UP
Toby Keith "Beer for My Horses" (DreamWorks)

MEDIOCRE SONG THAT ALSO MADE ME THROW UP
Gary Allan "Tough Little Boys" (MCA)

CRUCIFIX RESTING AGAINST HER SEXY BREAST
Faith Hill

HER NAME WAS PAULINE AND SHE LIVED IN A TREE
Tim McGraw

IF I WERE JESUS I'D SAY FORGIVE HIM 'CAUSE HE DOESN'T KNOW WHAT THE FUCK HE'S DOING
Toby Keith

SHE'LL DO ANYTHING FOR LOVE, BUT SHE WON'T DO... WELL, ACTUALLY, SHE'LL DO ANYTHING, OR SO SHE SAYS
Deana Carter

COUNTRY COMMENTS
A song counts as a single for 2003 if that's the year that the song lived its life as a single or a radio emphasis track. Obviously, some of these were on albums released in 2002. Really, I only worry about release dates when I'm in prison.

Chuck Eddy has in fact seen a CD-single of "Comin' Round," though it's maybe a promo and hasn't yet been hawked to the radio.

My list isn't meant to comment on what is or isn't "country." It might do so accidentally. I vote for anything I like that visits or inhabits the socioemotional turf within the country contours of my headbox, or, when I like a song but it's not on that turf (e.g., LeAnn's disco records), if it's on the cw turf of enough other people's headboxes (or sandboxes, or record-store bins, or publicity sheets). In other words, I vote for what I want to, and find a way to rationalize. "Comin' Round" would be country on many people's headboxes, if the country chaps got a chance to hear it. "Deliverance" would be novelty in the country arena but is countryish nonetheless. "Cadillac on 22's" is almost beyond category: the chords resemble "Lay Lady Lay," the delivery is vaguely soul, I guess (or just plain vague, dreamy, eerie) but lacks the many soul shouty-n-melisma signifiers that you hear on (for instance) the Lee Greenwood LP and the Faith Hill, neither of which has remotely the feel of "Cadillac on 22's."

But anyway, hip-hop having reared its happy visage on my list, let's talk about it. For all of country's confusion about whether it could or should be rock or pop or disco, one thing country is sure of is that it's not hip-hop. The hip-hop mess is what the woman leaves Montgomery for in MG's "She Couldn't Change Me"; hip-hop is the destination that Cledus T. Judd imagines for the Dixie Chicks in his malicious kiss-off "Martie, Emily & Natalie" - which is absurd, since it's not the Dixies who are in hip-hop's range, but Brooks & Dunn in their crowded rhythms (on Steers & Stripes more than Red Dirt Road) and Deana Carter and Toby Keith et al. when they talk their songs. This doesn't make them hip-hop - while the Deana-Toby talk style shares some ancestors with hip-hop, it doesn't take in hip-hop. Brooks & Dunn, on the other hand... well, I bet if they called Tim and Missy, the answer'd be "We're coming right over."

So here's Bubba Sparxxx. He's unmistakably in hip-hop, he's accepted in hip-hop, and he's rapping in a voice whose cadences come from where southern white and southern black mix, one of his backing tracks is country (but with the hip-hop beats), and another is a kissing cousin. And as far as the country audience is concerned, so nothing. So far. We'll see.

As for pop - and Faith: Yeah, pop sounds may be inundating country, and I don't believe this is a bad thing, and this sort of pop 'n' soul was somewhat shaped by country in the first place, and it's nice that country lets women roam the world, even while it requires men to stay home and tend the hearth.

Now about rock: Yeah, rock is pouring into country. Rock guitarists find a home in country for their licks, rock formalists find a home for their songwriting. I have only a few qualms about calling Montgomery Gentry the world's greatest rock band (they sure rock). Etc. etc. etc. But, well, here's the hesitation: Even while Brooks & Dunn can prosper and gain kudos for making an album that resembles the 16th-best Rolling Stones album and that quotes platitudes from the seventh-best song on the 19th-best Rolling Stones album, and even as B&D endlessly and creatively run the riff from "Brown Sugar" (best song on the 14th-best Rolling Stones album), they simply won't let their music do what the Rolling Stones would do. I'm not sure how best to convey what I mean, but notice the lyrics to "Brown Sugar": "Gold Coast slave ship bound for cotton fields/Sold in a market down in New Orleans/Scarred old slaver knows he's doin' all right/Hear him whip the women just around midnight." And that sadistic slaver inhabits and contaminates every sex act in the rest of the song. And this stoking the fire, pulling the rug, yanking up the floorboards, is just what Brooks & Dunn won't do, with either their sound or the words. Not that they're required to, any more than the Stones were required to reincarnate Howlin' Wolf. I'm just pointing out what's missing, where the real barrier is. And hell yeah, sorry for wimping out, they should cross the barrier, or someone should, 'cause if they or Montgomery Gentry or some other performers of that caliber don't cross it (this feeling of mine colored by the fact that Toby's horse-vomit song cited earlier, which came within a hair's breadth of endorsing lynching, lived high on the charts), the genre will continue to be a fake moral, fake rowdy, bullshit lie. (But not an uninteresting one.)

Sincerely,

Frank Kogan
PO Box 9761
Denver CO 80209-0761
(In 2003 I wrote about music for ILX and for the Village Voice)

From: "Josh"
To: "Frank Kogan"
Sent: Tuesday, January 06, 2004 1:38 AM
Subject: Re: Frank Kogan's Country Music Critics ballot 2003

"Frank Kogan" sez:
"the genre will continue to be a fake moral, fake rowdy, bullshit lie."

surely you must know this is the most tendentious and contentious thing in your whole ballot. the one where the ballot should start, the one where the thinking should start.

happy 2004, frank.

From: "Frank Kogan"
To: "Josh"
Subject: Re: Re: Frank Kogan's Country Music Critics ballot 2003
Date: Thursday, January 08, 2004 11:53 AM

Giving me a taste of my own medicine, eh?

From: "Frank Kogan"
To: "Geoffrey Himes"
Subject: country music correx

Geoff - Don't know if it's too late to fix typos on my poll ballot, but my two proofreading buddies, Anal Spice and Pedantic Spice, inform me that "countours" should be spelled "contours" and that in "Brown Sugar" Mick is singing "Hear HIM hit the women," not "Hear 'EM hit the women." (And truly, it would be pointless for Aunty Em to hit the women.) I think the chances are miniscule that you'll be quoting those bits, but just in case. (Oh, and Steers & Stripes takes an ampersand, and I don't know why I put a hyphen between "sadistic" and "slaver," and I'm just wasting your time telling you this, but I'm compulsive and can't stop myself.)

But also, given the apparently real - and wonderful - possibility that David Banner's "Cadillac on 22's" will place high enough to get printed among the top singles, I want to say that I got the title right: it's "Cadillac" in the singular, despite how your other voters seem to have spelled it. (See your reminder email of a few days back.) It SHOULD be "Cadillacs," because that's how Banner sings it, and that's why everyone gets it wrong. But there's only one Caddy in the title.

Thank you for your attention to these earth-shaking matters.

P.S. I won't ask you to correct any of my mistaken IDEAS. That would be cheating. (I got hyperbolic and inarticulate there at the end of my comments, didn't I? 'Tis what happens when one waits to the last minute.) But you might be interested to know that a friend of mine who read my spiel pointed out that when she'd seen the Chicks perform in London (six months after the famous concert), Martie'd said between songs that they'd listened to a lot of bluegrass while making Home, but that now they were listening to a lot of Eminem and Missy, and she couldn't predict what the next album'd be like. So you never know. (Hear Em whip the dixie chicks just around midnight.)

Frank Kogan

That too - as in why someone would like and/or identify with a given artist - again coming back to their character.

Perhaps I overstate my case by calling it his obsession, though it is something that I notice more in his criticism than that of any other name-brand critic I can think of at the moment.

... again coming back to your character and the relative benefits/burdens (or, the relative utility) presented for you by the artist's work.

except for the not complete sentences glib thing, of course.

Upthread you were talking about the rap and rock cds your 12 year-old was listening to. My 9 year-old hears rap songs on the radio in the car but I would never play for him the Lil' Jon album I bought(most of it I don't like--except for Get Low) and I'm wondering if when your kids were younger they heard foul-mouthed rap cds in the house? He loves Good Charlotte and pop-punk and rock more which may also have its own lyrical flaws but their at least less obvious. How many recent rap albums can I play the unedited versions straight through? I don't mean to sound like some out-of-touch puritanical zealot, but I think 9 is a little young to hear even the likes of the Missy between good songs commentary. Perhaps some may take the Lenny Bruce/George carlin approach that we imbue certain words with too much power, nonetheless I think 9 is a little to young to have to be making those choices.

Well, not MY copies -- I mean, I still change the song in the car or change the channel if my kids hearing the words would make me squeamish. And I'd cover their eyes during sex scenes in movies, too. But that doesn't mean the words or scenes necessarily make THEM squeamish. And kids are gonna hear or see plenty of that stuff on their own these days anyway; they don't really need my help to do so. And if they understand what the words mean, it's probably too late anyway...and if they don't, maybe it doesn't matter.

http://claps.blogspot.com/2004_02_08_claps_archive.html

apparently read my pazz & jop spiel way up at the start of this thread, and didn't notice how cynical i am about protest songs; i.e., the whole point of the paragraph he quotes is that i HARDLY EVER LIKE THEM. (if he doubts me, he ought to read the "we can't complain but sometimes we still do" chapter of my second book, where i go off on bikini kill, rage against the machine, krs-one, the gang of four's ridiculous first album cover, i forget what else; then go on to talk about how lots of songs that people don't think of as "political" actually sort of ARE. which oddly enough is what he winds up arguing further down in his blog entry. which is to say, um, he's sort of preaching to the converted, i think.) guy also seems oblivious to the fact that most New York Times op-ed pieces don't have MUSIC as great as "beware of the boys" or "bombs below." which somewhat matters, i would think; maybe he's even suggesting you should just protest songs ONLY on their words! unless i'm misreading him, which is possible. he seems fairly smart in sundry other places on his blog*, despite an unhealthy obsession with chuck klosterman that i can't figure out....

(*he also calls my pazz and jop lists "hip" somewhere. i THINK he was being sarcastic, but i'm not really sure why. hmmm....)