Mark Jenkins v. Xgau, Pazz & Jop, and hip-hop supporters claims

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Here's Dance of Days author and Washington Post and City Paper contributor Mark Jenkins' latest What Goes On online column at washingtoncitypaper.com http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/indc/what/what.html

By Mark Jenkins
This is a biweekly online column that's sort of about music. The idea is to be less formal and more personal than ink-on-paper music writing. Its conclusions are supported by 0.46 percent of American rock critics.

Pazz attack
OutKast, the White Stripes, Fountains of Wayne, Radiohead, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, the Shins, the New Pornographers, Basement Jaxx, Drive-By Truckers, and Dizzee Rascal. How could a 2003 Top 10 like that engender any controversy? I voted for only one of the Village Voice's "Pazz & Jop" chart-toppers myself, but I don't hate any of the other nine (except for Fountains of Wayne's Welcome Interstate Managers, maybe, and that's just because it's so much weaker than Utopia Parkway). Given 40 slots to fill on my own, I might have voted for most of the top 10 myself (except Yeah Yeah Yeahs, who are an NYC delusion, and OutKast, whose double CD is actually a single—and I don't mean album).

Actually, I've been told I should have voted for more of the chart toppers, albeit not by the Voice. When the Washington Post Weekend section ran Top 10s by four regular critics, including me, an editor there wrote an intro that offered a backhanded salute to our independence—which really meant that he thought there should have been more votes in line with the critical consensus.

Ah, but there is no consensus. OutKast's Speakerboxx/The Love Below won votes from 308 of the Pazz & Jop participants, which sounds impressive if you don't know that 732 crits participated in the poll. In other words, almost 60 percent of voters didn't pick OutKast at all, not for slot No. 1, and not for 2 through 40, either. After that, consensus disappears faster than my patience for "Where Are My Panties?" A mere 61 people (8 percent) voted for Dizzee Rascal's No. 10 Boy in Da Corner, which I kind of liked, and 24 (3 percent) for Broken Social Scene's No. 40 You Forget It in People, which I didn't get. The percentage for OutKast is in line with the one for last year's winner, Bob Dylan, while the number for the Broken Social Scene is a bit lower than 2002's cellar dweller, who happened to be Yeah Yeah Yeahs (4 percent).

Pazz & Jop potentate Robert Christgau has his theories on why the poll respondents are so dumb—that is, don't agree with him. The aging white liberal blames, for one thing, "institutional racism." He's also suspicious of young college-radio veterans whose choices are intentionally "arcane." And he worries that "our rolls are larded with part-timers who buy many records and miss many more."

I don't know if that means Xgau disdains people who are so low on the PR food chain that they actually purchase CDs, but I'd say one of the problems with Pazz & Jop is that many of its contributors actually don't buy much music. That's why the lists are, well, larded with releases from the major labels and the bigger indies, and usually bereft of imports. This year exactly one import made the Top 40—Boy in Da Corner, although its showing may in part based on advance copies of the U.S. version. (The album was released domestically in January 2004.)

Year after year, Pazz & Jop's voters ignore not African-American music, but the rest of the world, shortchanging even Britain. This year seven U.K. acts made the list, a high number by recent standards, bolstered by a fair amount of electronica (Dizzee, Jaxx, Four Tet) and a Led Zeppelin reissue. Also honored were one German band (the Notwist) and such honorary Americans as Canadians (the New Pornographers, Broken Social Scene) and Scandinavians who sing in English (Junior Senior). There were no entries from Africa, Asia, Latin America, or the Middle East—or even most of Europe.

As for that "miss many more" crack, late last year Xgau recommended Festival in the Desert, a compilation that includes a track by Mali's Tartit, a group listed among the many "I'd never heard of." Months before the self-appointed Dean of Rock Critics wrote those words, I'd reviewed both Tartit's latest album and its April 2003 D.C. show.

Does that mean that Xgau is not doing his job? Of course not. There's just too much music being released for any one person to hear it all. I'm positive I don't get as many free CDs as the Dean, and yet I have hundreds of discs I've never heard piled on tables and shelves. Odds are good that I wouldn't like most of them, but there are probably gems in the stacks somewhere—maybe even a Top 10 contender.

Most—probably all—music critics winnow not just individual CDs, but entire genres. And no one complains, unless the exclusions can be used to allege "institutional racism" or some other ideological fantasy. Pazz & Jop is annually accused of shorting hiphop, but its Top 40 includes six hiphop albums and no metal, goth, emo, jam-band rock, bluegrass, jazz, or any of multiple varieties of world music. As for country, P&J voters only go for the kind that the country-music mainstream has either forgotten (Johnny Cash) or never heard of (Lucinda Williams, who commercially is as arcane as, say, the Wrens—Xgau's No. 4). I didn't vote for Evanescence, Dave Matthews, or Linkin Park either, but their records connected with a lot of people. Doesn't that mean something?

To many of the poll's supposed populists, commercial success matters only when it validates hiphop and other varieties of Anglo-American "black music." In his annual P&J essay, Xgau proclaims that "in 2003, hiphop became America's official pop music." Yet hiphop sales, which in a good year are about 12 percent of the market, were down slightly in 2003.

So how can it be that, as one P&J participant exults, "Ten songs by young black artists dominated the Billboard Top 10. What more can I say?" The answer is that hiphop and dance-pop have monopolized what's left of the Top 40 format, but that Top 40 doesn't dominate pop music. (It hasn't, in fact, since around 1970.) Some advocates of "young black artists" argue that anyone who ignores singles isn't involved with what's happening now. But what's happening now is all over the place, and includes lots of what was happening then: Led Zeppelin on the P&J list, King Sunny Ade, Television, and the Go-Betweens on the Dean's List.

I'm one of the 224 voters who skipped submitting a Top 10 singles list, and I'd guess that most people who did vote in the category did so from force of habit more than conviction. Singles literally don't exist any more, and the notion of "emphasis tracks" is too vague to be meaningful. Xgau notes that 1,461 different songs were cited, although 63 percent of the voters did pick the ubiquitous (and quite catchy) P&J "singles" champ, "Hey Ya!"

I, too, am suspicious of other people's choices. Do that many people really like the new Radiohead? Did anyone vote for Yeah Yeah Yeahs on the basis of their music, rather than Karen O's provocative stage presence? Would Warren Zevon have placed if he hadn't died? (And why not Joe Strummer for the R.I.P. vote?) But if the other P&J voters are anything like me, they do plenty of second guessing on their own, and don't need any help from racial triumphalists, generational insurgents, or other conspiracy theorists.

Deciding what to list is hard enough without others questioning your motives. Did some voters miss things? Of course. I'd say most of them missed about three-quarters of the world. As for me, I'll definitely be picking up a copy of that Lifesavas album.

― Steve Kiviat (Steve K), Friday, 27 February 2004 14:42 (twenty-two years ago)

2 more cents on P & J discussions...

― Steve Kiviat (Steve K), Friday, 27 February 2004 14:51 (twenty-two years ago)

I made up all of my singles

― Andy K (Andy K), Friday, 27 February 2004 14:55 (twenty-two years ago)

snort

― Nate in ST.P (natedetritus), Friday, 27 February 2004 15:21 (twenty-two years ago)

>To many of the poll's supposed populists, commercial success matters only when it validates hiphop and other varieties of Anglo-American "black music."

Dead. Fucking. On.

― Phil Freeman (Phil Freeman), Friday, 27 February 2004 15:30 (twenty-two years ago)

I'd momentarily forgotten he calls himself 'the Dean'. AHAHAHAHAHAHA.

― ENRQ (Enrique), Friday, 27 February 2004 15:35 (twenty-two years ago)

OutKast's Speakerboxx/The Love Below won votes from 308 of the Pazz & Jop participants, which sounds impressive if you don't know that 732 crits participated in the poll. In other words, almost 60 percent of voters didn't pick OutKast at all, not for slot No. 1, and not for 2 through 40, either.

that's obviously just plain wrong, suggesting that every voter got to pick 40 records.

but there are some valid points in there.

― fact checking cuz (fcc), Friday, 27 February 2004 15:39 (twenty-two years ago)

I met this guy at a Morrissey show once who told me he was reviewing it for US News and World Report (???) but I've always secretly thought it was Mark Jenkins, clueless Post critic extraordinaire.

Pazz & Jop is annually accused of shorting hiphop, but its Top 40 includes six hiphop albums

Oooh! SIX. Please. Probably 25 of the 40 best records of last year were hip-hop.

― adam (adam), Friday, 27 February 2004 16:53 (twenty-two years ago)

Not that Xgau isn't clueless too--the Wrens wtf?

― adam (adam), Friday, 27 February 2004 16:53 (twenty-two years ago)

hip hop = pop's Taliban

― jack cole (jackcole), Friday, 27 February 2004 16:56 (twenty-two years ago)

Probably 25 of the 40 best records of last year were hip-hop.

In the whole world right? Hahaha. Six is more than enough.

― Rockist Scientist (rockistscientist), Friday, 27 February 2004 17:02 (twenty-two years ago)

>To many of the poll's supposed populists, commercial success matters only when it validates hiphop and other varieties of Anglo-American "black music."

Dead. Fucking. On.

---

there's something to this, but there's also the honest and widely held belief that there's a stronger correlation between popularity and quality in "black music" than in other pop genres, and that this has largely been the case for at least 30 years.

i.e. mainsteam hip-hop >>>> mainstream rock is not an opinion driven by political correctness or racial self-consciousness

― chris herrington (chris herrington), Friday, 27 February 2004 17:04 (twenty-two years ago)

I think the current canonization of chart hip-hop is just the inevitable swing of the pendulum after so many boatloads of critics missed out on hip-hop completely when it was flourishing artistically in the late '80s. I mean look at the Pazz N Jop lists for '88 or '89. It's embarrassing. So now of course critics are overreacting in the opposite direction.

― o. nate (onate), Friday, 27 February 2004 17:04 (twenty-two years ago)

I mean take '88 for example. People complain about critics who only vote for Outkast and no other hip-hop. Look at the '88 album poll. Public Enemy at #1 and not a single other hip-hop album in the Top 40. Thats right! No EPMD. No BDP. No Ultramagnetic MCs. No Slick Rick or Biz Markie. No NWA. No Eric B and Rakim. Etc. Etc..

― o. nate (onate), Friday, 27 February 2004 17:09 (twenty-two years ago)

Yeah, that's pretty stupid. Kinda forgot about that.

Oh and guess which album is THE GREATEST RAP ALBUM EVER SO SAYETH ROLLING STONE?

― Nate in ST.P (natedetritus), Friday, 27 February 2004 17:10 (twenty-two years ago)

Public Enemy at #1 and not a single other hip-hop album in the Top 40.

Holy shit! Is that true? To robertchristgau.com I go.

― chris herrington (chris herrington), Friday, 27 February 2004 17:12 (twenty-two years ago)

And "Fast Car" destroyed "It Takes Two" on the singles list. I like "Fast Car," but, um …

― chris herrington (chris herrington), Friday, 27 February 2004 17:14 (twenty-two years ago)

That's for the overall poll results, not the Dean's list. You can see it here:

http://www.villagevoice.com/specials/pazznjop/03/search_return.php?poll_year=1988&type=A&keyword=

― o. nate (onate), Friday, 27 February 2004 17:15 (twenty-two years ago)

The Mona Lisa's Sister one spot ahead of Appetite for Destruction is pretty funny. Those looking for "metal gets shafter more than hip-hop" arguments can start with that.

― chris herrington (chris herrington), Friday, 27 February 2004 17:18 (twenty-two years ago)

"shafter" = "shafted"

― chris herrington (chris herrington), Friday, 27 February 2004 17:19 (twenty-two years ago)

In the whole world right? Hahaha. Six is more than enough.

I can say with certainty that any three albums with Lil Jon-produced tracks would trounce the entire Arab world's musical output for 2003. Note that I say this without having heard the entire Arab world's musical output--if Lil Jon in fact produced any tracks on any of these records the contest may be somewhat closer to fair.

― adam (adam), Friday, 27 February 2004 17:25 (twenty-two years ago)

So...one album in the top 40 in '88, and six albums in the top 40 in '04? That constitutes "an overreaction in the opposite direction" ?

― Michael Daddino (epicharmus), Friday, 27 February 2004 17:27 (twenty-two years ago)

(Of course, if we take singles into account, things might be a little different.)

― Michael Daddino (epicharmus), Friday, 27 February 2004 17:28 (twenty-two years ago)

but on examination of 1988's Pazz and Jop top 20, isn't actually more diverse than 2004 genrewise?

― jack cole (jackcole), Friday, 27 February 2004 17:31 (twenty-two years ago)

(This might be minor sniping on my part, but why oh why is Jenkins still using the term "electronica"?)

― Michael Daddino (epicharmus), Friday, 27 February 2004 17:32 (twenty-two years ago)

Jacko, my gut reaction is yes, 80's P&Js sure seemed a LOT more diverse.

― Michael Daddino (epicharmus), Friday, 27 February 2004 17:33 (twenty-two years ago)

(Uh...sorry about the "Jacko.")

― Michael Daddino (epicharmus), Friday, 27 February 2004 17:34 (twenty-two years ago)

any three albums with Lil Jon-produced tracks would trounce the entire Arab world's musical output for 2003

I wasn't thinking specifically of the Arab world. Maybe, maybe not. Probably not if you count N. Africa.

(I'm being too serious about it as usual.)

― Rockist Scientist (rockistscientist), Friday, 27 February 2004 17:35 (twenty-two years ago)

ha ha ha -- and does Lucinda Williams always make the 20 everytime she puts out an album?

(aint got no problem with Jacko -- worry not)

― jack cole (jackcole), Friday, 27 February 2004 17:36 (twenty-two years ago)

I agree. But it may be both more diverse and more conservative (by which I mean more tied to classic-rock and past-their-prime artists -- Keith Richards, Graham Parker, Leonard Cohen, Van Morrison, etc.).

The key is that the huge indie-rock voting bloc hadn't materialized yet, and, as Xgau and others have kvetched, this voting bloc has threatened to make the poll less relevant to (or maybe "reflective of" is better)the real pop music world.

― chris herrington (chris herrington), Friday, 27 February 2004 17:38 (twenty-two years ago)

As Xgau wondered, why does the JAYHAWKS make the Top 40 every single time?

― Michael Daddino (epicharmus), Friday, 27 February 2004 17:39 (twenty-two years ago)

ah, but there is the rub -- what does "relevant to the real pop world" really mean? seems like a pretty widescreen to project whatever strikes one's fancy upon.

― jack cole (jackcole), Friday, 27 February 2004 17:41 (twenty-two years ago)

I guess what I'm saying is that, up through the mid-Nineties, the poll seemed to reflect more diversity of opinion, at least in terms of different genres and scenes (even if a lot was still missed), but since the mid-90s, the alt-rock voting bloc has become so huge (impact of college-radio, webzines, etc.) and specialized that it distorts the poll. This seemed especially the case last year with the Wilco-Beck-Flaming Lips trio at the top, where the Flaming Lips seemed (to me at least) to finish that high soley on picking up votes from the same large group of alt-rock specialists who were already voting for Wilco and Beck. Or maybe I'm wrong.

― chris herrington (chris herrington), Friday, 27 February 2004 17:54 (twenty-two years ago)

The top selling album of the year was a hip-hop album and this guy has the nerve to ask why hip-hop is more well represented than international movement, which barely makes a dent in this country? I mean, its just not LOGICAL for critics to be expected to be well-versed in music that comes from without.
That said, ignoring hip-hop WITHIN one's own country is at this point on some elitism and shit.

― djdee2005, Friday, 27 February 2004 18:08 (twenty-two years ago)

I don't know what i was thinking, but "movement" should be "music" obv.

― djdee2005, Friday, 27 February 2004 18:09 (twenty-two years ago)

Can we get back to this one subject?

I'm one of the 224 voters who skipped submitting a Top 10 singles list, and I'd guess that most people who did vote in the category did so from force of habit more than conviction.

Force of habit? He needs to get out more, I think.

― Michael Daddino (epicharmus), Friday, 27 February 2004 18:59 (twenty-two years ago)

enjoying songs is so hard.

― strongo hulkington (dubplatestyle), Friday, 27 February 2004 19:07 (twenty-two years ago)

by which I mean more tied to classic-rock and past-their-prime artists -- Keith Richards, Graham Parker, Leonard Cohen, Van Morrison, etc

"Past their prime"? Leonard Cohen!? I'm Your Man is his best album. (Okay so it's also the only one I've heard all the way through, but still - if anything, it should have ranked higher.)

― o. nate (onate), Friday, 27 February 2004 19:16 (twenty-two years ago)

"Force of habit" is a poor phrase, but the idea he's conveying is the nagging feeling that one should (or should be seen to) give a fuck about singles.

― Phil Freeman (Phil Freeman), Friday, 27 February 2004 19:18 (twenty-two years ago)

by which I mean more tied to classic-rock and past-their-prime artists -- Keith Richards, Graham Parker, Leonard Cohen, Van Morrison, etc

"Past their prime"? Leonard Cohen!? I'm Your Man is his best album. (Okay so it's also the only one I've heard all the way through, but still - if anything, it should have ranked higher.)

--
I wasn't knocking the individual artists or albums, just trying to make a point that a lot of voters back in 1988 started writing pre-punk (and hip-hop, and disco …) and tended to vote for artists who also predated that change. See also Traveling Wilburys, etc. I mean, was that Keith Richards album really one of the 10 best of 1988? Was it even close. (a real question -- I haven't heard it, beyond whatever single was out at the time, which I vaguely remember)

― chris herrington (chris herrington), Friday, 27 February 2004 19:21 (twenty-two years ago)

"Deciding what to list is hard enough without others questioning your motives."

Boo hoo. You're a critic. It's your goddam job to justify your motives and your opinions; you're not just supposed to list stuff you like.

Especially when you can't even be bothered to rank your top ten:

http://www.villagevoice.com/specials/pazznjop/03/critic.php?criticid=241&poll_year=2003&type=A&keyword=

― Keith Harris (kharris1128), Friday, 27 February 2004 19:29 (twenty-two years ago)

I think he has a good point about the "Singles" category being vaguely defined though. I think that is probably the root of the huge discrepancy between the Singles poll results and the Album poll results.

― o. nate (onate), Friday, 27 February 2004 19:35 (twenty-two years ago)

they should just do away with the album category altogether

― cinniblount (James Blount), Friday, 27 February 2004 19:36 (twenty-two years ago)

I wouldn't go that far. But maybe they should make it more clear that singles (in the context of the poll) just means songs, and let people just vote for the favorite songs. As it is, you have people with 100% indie album lists and 100% pop singles lists. If someone really likes indie best, then I think they should be picking indie singles as well.

― o. nate (onate), Friday, 27 February 2004 19:41 (twenty-two years ago)

singles means singles, and once upon a time indie rock was easily as (and even more) pro-single than pop.

― cinniblount (James Blount), Friday, 27 February 2004 19:45 (twenty-two years ago)

Do that many people really like the new Radiohead?
Yes.

― Melissa W (Melissa W), Friday, 27 February 2004 19:48 (twenty-two years ago)

If the Voice's goal were to expose readers to more music, rather than less, then they wouldn't run a poll. The poll exists to simplify the year in music down to a very small subset that can then be ranked and extolled, as if fighting over who has the pithiest backhanded put-down of Fountains of Wayne is how one properly expresses a love of music.

A more useful service for readers and listeners might be for the editors to try to structure an overview of the year in music, and use the contributors to identify particularly good work in various areas that the average radio listener wouldn't have been exposed to, drawing some connections between well-known material and obscure so that readers would have some reason to explore. I admit that I really don't know what a P&J reader who didn't vote in the poll is supposed to do with its results. Buy the top ten?

Asked another way, what is the purpose of the poll as currently run?

― ara, Friday, 27 February 2004 19:50 (twenty-two years ago)

how does one properly express a love of music, dare I ask?

51 weeks of the year's worth of the Voice music section to thread.

― Matos W.K. (M Matos), Friday, 27 February 2004 19:52 (twenty-two years ago)

though that piece was disingenuous in the places others have already noted here, it's actually pretty well thought out, I think.

― Matos W.K. (M Matos), Friday, 27 February 2004 19:56 (twenty-two years ago)

it may be both more diverse and more conservative (by which I mean more tied to classic-rock and past-their-prime artists -- Keith Richards, Graham Parker, Leonard Cohen, Van Morrison, etc.).
The key is that the huge indie-rock voting bloc hadn't materialized yet...

but is it really all that different? is voting for keith richards, graham parker, etc., in the late '80s any different from voting for wilco, radiohead, etc., in the mid '00s? as far as i can tell, both are examples of the working music press clinging to the singer/songwriters they grew up with, for better and/or for worse. the one difference that i can see is that the new class of veteran singer/songwriters, the tweedys and the yorkes, appeal not only to people who grew up with them, but also to the older critics who grow up with keith and graham and jackson browne and whatnot, so they're getting votes from both sides.

― fact checking cuz (fcc), Friday, 27 February 2004 19:58 (twenty-two years ago)

Skipping 64 messages at this point... Click here if you want to load them all.

I do like how completely thoroughly this thread has derailed, btw.

Chuck: they were your no. 3 single of 2002, which, gee, seems close enough for an outsider to think of it as something akin to "apeshit." or maybe just chimp-shit, I dunno. anyway, you liked them a lot, as do I

― Matos W.K. (M Matos), Friday, 27 February 2004 22:41 (twenty-two years ago)

for me P&J is more interesting in its lower rankings, since the top ten is pretty predictable and resembles an Entertainment Weekly best-of more often than not.

― Gear! (Gear!), Friday, 27 February 2004 22:42 (twenty-two years ago)

nobody is more twee then me!! you should read my trembling blue stars review. i voted for it too.one of them. i own every field mice record for christsake!!

― scott seward (scott seward), Friday, 27 February 2004 22:43 (twenty-two years ago)

huh. OK, then, fine. I still like the record.

― Matos W.K. (M Matos), Friday, 27 February 2004 22:44 (twenty-two years ago)

i voted for t.a.t.u. too i think. i can't remember. matos, i'm gonna e-mail you my t.a.t.u. review, okay. you might get a kick out of it.

― scott seward (scott seward), Friday, 27 February 2004 22:45 (twenty-two years ago)

Was that song really NUMBER THREE on my singles list last year? Well, it did come out late in the year. And I DID like it a lot; the rest of the album was okay, too, but nothing came close to their first single, near as I can tell. Anyway, obviously, teenage girl music has hardly been one of my major preoccupations in the past half decade or more, and I hate more of it than I like, and I probably like five times as many indie rock groups as teen girl singers lately. So there.

Also, I actually don't hate the Postal Service songs that I remember. They're okay; I just can't imagine why anybody would get exicted about them. (Worst song on Matos's generally great 6-CDR best of 2003 burn comps was the Dan Bern one, near as I can tell. Worst disc was whichever one had the most elecronic stuff on it. Though maybe I'd think differenly if I'd played it at bedtime instead of at work.)

― chuck, Friday, 27 February 2004 22:46 (twenty-two years ago)

>>no. 3 single of 2002, which, gee, seems close enough for an outsider to think of it as something akin to "apeshit." or maybe just chimp-shit,<<

Chimps ARE apes!! #3 single is mandrill shit at best, and you know it.

― chuck, Friday, 27 February 2004 22:48 (twenty-two years ago)

no I don't know it! eight or nine of my top 10 singles this year could have easily been no. 1--at least 15 (if not 25 or 30) could have been no. 1 in 2002! I had trouble keeping songs OFF that list.

― Matos W.K. (M Matos), Friday, 27 February 2004 22:50 (twenty-two years ago)

and yeah, "excited" isn't how I'd describe my PS-like, it's more like that record grew and grew and grew on me, the way a band like Luna (who I bet Scott thinks are boring too!) do.

― Matos W.K. (M Matos), Friday, 27 February 2004 22:52 (twenty-two years ago)

Postal Service got such great earnestness going for them. Yet the earnestness of Death Cab makes me want to blow up The Stranger. Why is that?

― Sym (shmuel), Friday, 27 February 2004 22:54 (twenty-two years ago)

[[stifles response]]

― Matos W.K. (M Matos), Friday, 27 February 2004 22:55 (twenty-two years ago)

No, let it out.

― Sym (shmuel), Friday, 27 February 2004 23:03 (twenty-two years ago)

Luna ARE boring, Matos!

Song on Matos's CD which has wonderful words and a passable singer but would really be a whole lot better if it had some music to go with it: The Amy Rigby one about when we will have sex again.

Song that sounded like every other song Greg Dulli has ever sung, which means still okay I guess: The Twilight Singers one.

Song way duller-sounding than I'd remembered it being: Drive By Truckers, "Outfit," which isn't awful, but jeez louise.

Song I was really surprised to love: the Obie Trice one.

Song I liked exactly as much as I figured I would, which is, um, a little bit: Richard Thompson's Britney cover, on which maybe he should have played guitar more.

― chuck, Friday, 27 February 2004 23:03 (twenty-two years ago)

haha Luna are grebt

― Matos W.K. (M Matos), Friday, 27 February 2004 23:07 (twenty-two years ago)

see, all 3 of us like Richard Thompson's Britney cover! Harmony is restored. (i liked galaxie 500 a bunch and the first luna but then i lost track. still have never heard penthouse which everyone sez is their bestest.)

― scott seward (scott seward), Friday, 27 February 2004 23:08 (twenty-two years ago)

Sym: I was just being funny. Please don't blow anybody up. Thanks.

Scott: Penthouse is their bestest but I like all of it. Sue me, I'm a sucker for that band (though I don't like G500 as much, so it's not just a Dean thing; I suspect I like the Luna rhythm section--and songs--better is all).

― Matos W.K. (M Matos), Friday, 27 February 2004 23:10 (twenty-two years ago)

(the only good postal service song is only good cuz it sounds like jimmy eat world)

― Yanc3y (ystrickler), Friday, 27 February 2004 23:10 (twenty-two years ago)

So was I. The Stranger is actually a great paper, but they do write about Death Cab far too much, so I blame them for Gibbard's existence.

― Sym (shmuel), Friday, 27 February 2004 23:12 (twenty-two years ago)

I shall take my leave now.

― Matos W.K. (M Matos), Friday, 27 February 2004 23:15 (twenty-two years ago)

Matos, don't you think The Stranger is a great paper?

― Keith Harris (kharris1128), Friday, 27 February 2004 23:16 (twenty-two years ago)

nice seeing you all today!

― Matos W.K. (M Matos), Friday, 27 February 2004 23:16 (twenty-two years ago)

Tell us how you feel about your direct competitors! Pleeeeeeeease....

― Sym (shmuel), Friday, 27 February 2004 23:17 (twenty-two years ago)

how do feel about The Stranger as an album?

― M@tt He1geson (Matt Helgeson), Friday, 27 February 2004 23:28 (twenty-two years ago)

do you feel

― M@tt He1geson (Matt Helgeson), Friday, 27 February 2004 23:30 (twenty-two years ago)

Sorry Matos! Come back! I didn't mean to walk into a shitstorm! I'm from Vancouver! I used to pick up the Stranger often a few years ago!
I feel bad now.

― Sym (shmuel), Friday, 27 February 2004 23:31 (twenty-two years ago)

And it was like knocking four quick times on the door of unhapiness...

― Scott, Friday, 27 February 2004 23:32 (twenty-two years ago)

I prefer Stranger in Town.

― Broheems (diamond), Friday, 27 February 2004 23:32 (twenty-two years ago)

"i just hate when people think synthpop=music played really badly by dorks. when it is really music played really well by dorks."

This is why the first Future Bible Heroes album is the best thing ever. (this is irrelevant to the quality or otherwise of Postal Service, who I haven't heard).

― Tim Finney (Tim Finney), Friday, 27 February 2004 23:34 (twenty-two years ago)

Matos died today. Or maybe yesterday, I don't
know. I had a telegram from the home: `Matos
passed away. Funeral tomorrow. Yours sincerely'
That doesn't mean anything. It may have been
yesterday.
The old people's home is at Marengo, fifty
miles from Algiers. I'll catch the two o'clock bus
and get there in the afternoon. Then I can keep the
vigil and I'll come back tomorrow night. I asked my
boss for two days off and he couldn't refuse under
the circumstances. But he didn't answer. Then I
thought maybe I shouldn't have said that. After all,
it wasn't for me to apologize. It was more up to him
to offer me his condolences. But he probably will do
the day after tomorrow, when he sees me in mourning.
For the moment it's almost as if Matos were still
alive. After the funeral though, the death will
be a classifed fact and the whole thing will have
assumed a more official aura.

― Gear! (Gear!), Friday, 27 February 2004 23:42 (twenty-two years ago)

Is that Under the Volcano?

― M@tt He1geson (Matt Helgeson), Friday, 27 February 2004 23:44 (twenty-two years ago)

Posting on a board with a gun in my hand
Staring at the good, staring at the bland.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Friday, 27 February 2004 23:44 (twenty-two years ago)

fuck I'm dumb...camus....doi!

― M@tt He1geson (Matt Helgeson), Friday, 27 February 2004 23:45 (twenty-two years ago)

I'm Raggett, I'm Ned
I hate The Stranger and that band Death Cab

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Friday, 27 February 2004 23:47 (twenty-two years ago)

he bounty hunts for Jabba Hutt to finance his MBV bootleg collection

― Nate in ST.P (natedetritus), Saturday, 28 February 2004 00:20 (twenty-two years ago)

my name is Ned and I'm here to say
I like Fruity Pebbles in a ma-jor way!

― M@tt He1geson (Matt Helgeson), Saturday, 28 February 2004 00:26 (twenty-two years ago)

Weeeeeeeeeeelllllllllll I'm the Space Raggett and I'm here to say
That stayin' in school is A-OK!

― Nate in ST.P (natedetritus), Saturday, 28 February 2004 00:27 (twenty-two years ago)

NONE OF IT MATTERS

― Lynskey (Lynskey), Saturday, 28 February 2004 00:28 (twenty-two years ago)

(i am pissed)

― Lynskey (Lynskey), Saturday, 28 February 2004 00:29 (twenty-two years ago)

Does that mean angry or drunk?

― Rockist Scientist (rockistscientist), Saturday, 28 February 2004 00:42 (twenty-two years ago)

or both?

― M@tt He1geson (Matt Helgeson), Saturday, 28 February 2004 00:47 (twenty-two years ago)

There is a third meaning

― pete s, Saturday, 28 February 2004 00:55 (twenty-two years ago)

That you actually emerged from somebody's bladder?

― Nate in ST.P (natedetritus), Saturday, 28 February 2004 00:56 (twenty-two years ago)

we are all god's piss in a very real sense

― pete s, Saturday, 28 February 2004 01:01 (twenty-two years ago)

can i just say the rappin fred reference onthis thread made my year

― strongo hulkington (dubplatestyle), Saturday, 28 February 2004 03:32 (twenty-two years ago)

we learned it from you, dad

― Matos W.K. (M Matos), Saturday, 28 February 2004 03:33 (twenty-two years ago)

That was made about me once :(

― Nate in ST.P (natedetritus), Saturday, 28 February 2004 04:49 (twenty-two years ago)

Let a thousand hegemonies bloom.

― Rockist Scientist (rockistscientist), Saturday, 28 February 2004 08:11 (twenty-two years ago)

Hegemony boom.

― Rockist Scientist (rockistscientist), Saturday, 28 February 2004 08:12 (twenty-two years ago)

and ironically enough the Jenkins article is living in the shadow of Bloom's hegemony!

― Sterling Clover (s_clover), Saturday, 28 February 2004 08:50 (twenty-two years ago)

I'd appreciate if you could explain that tomorrow when I'm more sober and less tired.

― Rockist Scientist (rockistscientist), Saturday, 28 February 2004 08:52 (twenty-two years ago)

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