Most overused cliches that lazy music critics describe bands with

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Besides "bombastic"

― Tinky-Winky, Thursday, 3 May 2007 18:55 (eighteen years ago)

and really fantastic

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Thursday, 3 May 2007 18:56 (eighteen years ago)

Shit.

― Noodle Vague, Thursday, 3 May 2007 18:57 (eighteen years ago)

"Criminally overlooked/ignored/neglected." As if someone's gonna arrest the listening public for not appreciating the work of genius in question.

And "on acid" is a perennial hate.

― mike a, Thursday, 3 May 2007 19:19 (eighteen years ago)

Jewish

― Dom Passantino, Thursday, 3 May 2007 19:20 (eighteen years ago)

Cock-gobblers

― Noodle Vague, Thursday, 3 May 2007 19:22 (eighteen years ago)

If I read "sonic terrorism" one more time imma vomit.

― Belisarius, Thursday, 3 May 2007 19:23 (eighteen years ago)

Paedo-lookin'

― Noodle Vague, Thursday, 3 May 2007 19:24 (eighteen years ago)

I'm glad that ANGULAR's reign of terror is over.

― poortheatre, Thursday, 3 May 2007 19:33 (eighteen years ago)

Results 1 - 10 of about 2,310 from www.pitchforkmedia.com for angular. (0.26 seconds)

― Dom Passantino, Thursday, 3 May 2007 19:34 (eighteen years ago)

srsly

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Thursday, 3 May 2007 19:35 (eighteen years ago)

Seminal.

I mean, c'mon.

― JN$OT, Thursday, 3 May 2007 19:37 (eighteen years ago)

- any and all food analogies (e.g., "a rich musical gumbo")
- anything to do with notches and/or kicking ("they really kick it up a notch...")
- whatever follows "by jim derogatis"

― Lawrence the Looter, Thursday, 3 May 2007 19:38 (eighteen years ago)

Munificent

― Noodle Vague, Thursday, 3 May 2007 19:40 (eighteen years ago)

eclectic

― kornrulez6969, Thursday, 3 May 2007 19:41 (eighteen years ago)

Whelping

― Noodle Vague, Thursday, 3 May 2007 19:44 (eighteen years ago)

Fongs

― Noodle Vague, Thursday, 3 May 2007 19:46 (eighteen years ago)

loud

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Thursday, 3 May 2007 19:47 (eighteen years ago)

influential

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Thursday, 3 May 2007 19:47 (eighteen years ago)

rifftastic

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Thursday, 3 May 2007 19:47 (eighteen years ago)

Arcade Fire

― Noodle Vague, Thursday, 3 May 2007 19:49 (eighteen years ago)

you guys, a solution would be not to read music criticism you suspect to be crap

― Tim Ellison, Thursday, 3 May 2007 19:50 (eighteen years ago)

"suspect"

― JN$OT, Thursday, 3 May 2007 19:52 (eighteen years ago)

Dental

― Noodle Vague, Thursday, 3 May 2007 19:56 (eighteen years ago)

insert-noun-here-adelic

― henry s, Thursday, 3 May 2007 19:57 (eighteen years ago)

http://www.ilxor.com/ILX/ThreadSelectedControllerServlet?boardid=41&threadid=22235

― everything, Thursday, 3 May 2007 20:00 (eighteen years ago)

myspace

― whatever, Thursday, 3 May 2007 20:02 (eighteen years ago)

"suspect"

-- JN$OT, Thursday, May 3, 2007 12:52 PM

yes, i.e., before you bother starting to read it

― Tim Ellison, Thursday, 3 May 2007 20:06 (eighteen years ago)

Derivative

― Geir Hongro, Thursday, 3 May 2007 20:08 (eighteen years ago)

Overproduced

― Geir Hongro, Thursday, 3 May 2007 20:09 (eighteen years ago)

Results 1 - 10 of about 2,430 for sdfsdfsdfsdfsdfsdfsdfsdf. (0.30 seconds)

― Dom Passantino, Thursday, 3 May 2007 20:09 (eighteen years ago)

In classical music criticism:

"magisterial"
"mercurial"
"freshly-sprung"
"Janus-like"
"curate's egg"

I could keep going...

― Jon Lewis, Thursday, 3 May 2007 20:31 (eighteen years ago)

Lazy

― Mark Rich@rdson, Thursday, 3 May 2007 21:14 (eighteen years ago)

T/S Lazy Music Critics vs. Too-Serious Music Fans

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Thursday, 3 May 2007 21:37 (eighteen years ago)

Wagemannly

― Mike Dixn, Thursday, 3 May 2007 22:04 (eighteen years ago)

classically-trained

And the weakest fucking one that I saw over and over again in the ent. section of both my college paper and the local rag— unique. A unique sound! That tells me so much!

― I eat cannibals, Thursday, 3 May 2007 23:02 (eighteen years ago)

ethereal

― circa1916, Thursday, 3 May 2007 23:30 (eighteen years ago)

notes

― sw00ds, Thursday, 3 May 2007 23:32 (eighteen years ago)

FUCKING BRUTAL

― Jeff Treppel, Thursday, 3 May 2007 23:32 (eighteen years ago)

delicious

― Alan, Thursday, 3 May 2007 23:33 (eighteen years ago)

AOTMFY

― Drooone, Thursday, 3 May 2007 23:35 (eighteen years ago)

In classical music criticism:

"magisterial"
"mercurial"
"freshly-sprung"
"Janus-like"
"curate's egg"

I could keep going...

Please do...

― Tinky-Winky, Friday, 4 May 2007 01:11 (eighteen years ago)

That thing where they go "Its like Pavlova mixed with Orange Juice, remixed by Kylie Minogues's fictional alter-ego Buttons with her left shoe in like a retro-futuristic Blaxploitation movie directed by Zelda Fitzgerald"

Paul Morley does this a lot where he kinda says something like "the venn diagram intersection of Missy and Moby, Tricky and Transmission Vamp, The Go-Go's and The Go!Team".

It's quite annoying and doesn't really mean anything at all.

― I know, right?, Friday, 4 May 2007 02:08 (eighteen years ago)

"masturbatory"

― Mr. Snrub, Friday, 4 May 2007 02:12 (eighteen years ago)

someone needs to do an inverse of these "critic cliche" threads--there've been a lot of them over the years, haven't there?--where they say what words and phrases are acceptable to write instead, preferably before those words and phrases themselves become the new cliches, because as it is, i'm kinda terrifed to write my next sentence.

― sw00ds, Friday, 4 May 2007 02:13 (eighteen years ago)

In classical music criticism:

"magisterial"
"mercurial"
"freshly-sprung"
"Janus-like"
"curate's egg"

I could keep going...

Please do...

-- Tinky-Winky, Thursday, May 3, 2007 9:11 PM (1 hour ago)

yeah, i really could listen to someone reading such terms for hours. it would be great.

― the table is the table, Friday, 4 May 2007 02:17 (eighteen years ago)

"Incendiary."

Also, Jewish explains why 50% of my reviews are cliched. Oops.

― Mordechai Shinefield, Friday, 4 May 2007 02:21 (eighteen years ago)

xpost there are like 3 other threads about this already

― billstevejim, Friday, 4 May 2007 03:02 (eighteen years ago)

I hear the Jewish thing. Have the same problem, myself.

― Jeff Treppel, Friday, 4 May 2007 03:05 (eighteen years ago)

i love my cliches. my thick steely slabs of blackened death.

― scott seward, Friday, 4 May 2007 03:36 (eighteen years ago)

Skipping 42 messages at this point... Click here if you want to load them all.

I remember seeing Bill Bruford's jazz group in concert one time, and he introduced the (upright) bassist as "And...providing solid underpinning on the bass, we have [X]," and then went on to laugh that in all the reviews they read the critics would all write "the solid underpinning of the bass from [X]".

― Joe, Friday, 4 May 2007 12:52 (eighteen years ago)

"Is [x] a good bass player?"
"Yeah, he underpins REALLY solidly!"

― braveclub, Friday, 4 May 2007 12:55 (eighteen years ago)

This seems to arise from a tendency to want to describe what every single member of the band actually does, inevitably never thinking of anything interesting to say about the rhythm section.

Singer, howling like a man posessed, ice cool guitarist churning out squalls of noise, bassist underpinning solidly, drummer, uh, keeping time adequately, and that

― Michael Philip Philip Philip philip Annoyman, Friday, 4 May 2007 13:13 (eighteen years ago)

My all-time favorite school of critical cliche, besides the classical music one I mentioned above, is the mid-to-late 80's Forced Exposureish school of music-as-physical-assault.

"[album title] by [pigfuck act] invades yr dome like a hydrophobic possum, scurrying its way unneringly to the bedroom where it shreds sheets, thigh flesh and walls alike. Rotating blades of skree turn yr vitals into a red/yellow/green Pollock nightmare by the middle of Side A. An extended dirt-nap is required before the flip, when it starts all over again..."

It was like, look, yes, this record might amaze, exhilarate and/or terrify me. But it simply cannot do me physical harm.

― Jon Lewis, Friday, 4 May 2007 15:22 (eighteen years ago)

Degenerate.

Actually, I want to see more of this one, used unironically.

― Erroneous Botch, Friday, 4 May 2007 15:28 (eighteen years ago)

A writing style utterly devoid of cliché becomes a bit of a cliché in itself.

STFU pleae...

― Tinky-Winky, Monday, 7 May 2007 00:47 (eighteen years ago)

elegiac (unless the song is about someone dead)

Not to be pedantic, but:

el·e·gy (ĕl'ə-jē) pronunciation
n., pl. -gies.

1. A poem composed in elegiac couplets.
2.
1. A poem or song composed especially as a lament for a deceased person.
2. Something resembling such a poem or song.
3. Music. A composition that is melancholy or pensive in tone.

[French élégie, from Latin elegīa, from Greek elegeia, from pl. of elegeion, elegiac distich, from elegos, song, mournful song.]

― Hurting 2, Monday, 7 May 2007 03:49 (eighteen years ago)

Not so much a cliched phrase as a cliched approach - when music writers lazily generalize about "all these bands that do such and such," either pointing out how the band being reviewed stands out among them or how it's just another example of the same alleged trend.

― Hurting 2, Monday, 7 May 2007 03:54 (eighteen years ago)

"Chiming" as in "the chiming guitars are simply euphoria-inducing on r.e.m's newest release "we've run out of things to say but, dammit, we're too old to hold regular jobs.""

― violoncellos, Monday, 7 May 2007 04:04 (eighteen years ago)

There oughta be a 50 year long moratorium placed upon the use of the word "pretentious" in all reviews. In fact, it should be excised from the vocabulary of all sentient organisms. What does it even mean at this point in human development? I ask out of abject curiosity. What is it trying to convey? It's a word whose extinction is long overdue.

― violoncellos, Monday, 7 May 2007 07:49 (eighteen years ago)

spiteful

― Rowlando, Monday, 7 May 2007 11:04 (eighteen years ago)

"wall of sound"

― MC, Monday, 7 May 2007 21:18 (eighteen years ago)

Jacobean

― Noodle Vague, Monday, 7 May 2007 21:24 (eighteen years ago)

I used "pretentious" in my last review, but it was affectionately meant. (Rufus Wainwright.)

― mike t-diva, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 09:01 (eighteen years ago)

I only ever use "pretentious" as the highest of compliments!

― Marcello Carlin, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 09:02 (eighteen years ago)

Hurting - my point, which didn't come across, was that I think it's an overused cliche to call any sad-sounding peace of music elegiac, whereas I would have no problem if people were using it in the older sense (definitions 1 and 2).

Pedantry = classic, though, so cheers!

― Jamie T Smith, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 10:18 (eighteen years ago)

Whoops - so the original greek meaning is mournful song. So I mean I want it restricted to it's more recent definition.

― Jamie T Smith, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 10:20 (eighteen years ago)

peace = piece

me = idiot

― Jamie T Smith, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 10:21 (eighteen years ago)

cheers!

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 10:28 (eighteen years ago)

not just another singer / songwriter

― BenTyler, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 12:01 (eighteen years ago)

Sounds like (insert really obscure band name)

Sounds like a cross-in-between (insert really obscure band name) (insert another even more obscure band name)

― Geir Hongro, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 12:35 (eighteen years ago)

Alicia Karen Elkins wipes the slates:

I have to confess that I find jazz extremely relaxing. The only way I can stay awake when listening to good jazz is to dance a lot. I was sound asleep on top of my keyboard before the end of the sixth track the first time I listened to this CD. That's what I call great jazz! If it relaxes me that much, it gets my stamp of approval.

― bendy, Saturday, 12 May 2007 11:22 (eighteen years ago)

FFS, I omitted two "O"'s. Humanity should have effectively wiped itself out (with the help of the missing honeybees) by then.

― violoncellos, Saturday, 12 May 2007 15:45 (eighteen years ago)

slept-on

― kingkongvsgodzilla, Tuesday, 15 May 2007 17:31 (eighteen years ago)

two months pass...

I'm always bothered by the phrase "vocal stylings". Ugh!

― Jena, Saturday, 28 July 2007 12:53 (eighteen years ago)

"They sound like X and Y doing drugs together".

― groovemaaan, Saturday, 28 July 2007 13:25 (eighteen years ago)

"jazzy"

"sounds like daft punk"

― haitch, Saturday, 28 July 2007 18:17 (eighteen years ago)

"relevant" "not relevant" "important"

file under, LONGER WAYS OF SAYING "I LIKE THIS" FOR TO FILL MY OVERLY LONG 80 WORD REVIEW SLOT

― Ronan, Saturday, 28 July 2007 21:11 (eighteen years ago)

um...

"relevant" = 1 word
"i like this" = 3 words

just saying.

― xhuxk, Saturday, 28 July 2007 21:39 (eighteen years ago)

Heh, "relevant" isn't a sentence, "i like this" is!

― Ronan, Saturday, 28 July 2007 22:26 (eighteen years ago)

"curate's eggs" ?????????

― m0stlyClean, Sunday, 29 July 2007 20:03 (eighteen years ago)

"arguably"

― Zeno, Sunday, 29 July 2007 21:40 (eighteen years ago)

"Relevant" does bother me, and yet I can't help but feel like it means more than "I like this." Like Devendra Banhart somehow seems very *relevant* even though I fucking hate him. Whereas certain local bands I've heard here seem completely irrelevant and I fucking hate them.

― Hurting 2, Sunday, 29 July 2007 21:43 (eighteen years ago)

Actually, I can think of plenty of bands I like who don't seem especially relevant at all. Whereas Nickelback and Dave Matthews are relevant whether I like them or not. (The answer is "not.") So right, no way are those the same thing.

― xhuxk, Sunday, 29 July 2007 22:29 (eighteen years ago)

"tequila-soaked vocals"

― Romeo Jones, Monday, 30 July 2007 00:03 (eighteen years ago)

"double-barell asault"

― Romeo Jones, Monday, 30 July 2007 00:04 (eighteen years ago)

"balls to the wall"

― Romeo Jones, Monday, 30 July 2007 00:04 (eighteen years ago)

oh .. and that "disco-not-disco" or "house-not-house" kinda thing ... that's the absolute worst.

― Romeo Jones, Monday, 30 July 2007 00:09 (eighteen years ago)

"Actually, I can think of plenty of bands I like who don't seem especially relevant at all. Whereas Nickelback and Dave Matthews are relevant whether I like them or not. (The answer is "not.") So right, no way are those the same thing."

relevant to who/what? how many fans/sales does an act need to have before becoming relevant?

― Ronan, Monday, 30 July 2007 09:45 (eighteen years ago)

also I think it's "relevant" used as if this is something more worthy of praise than "irrelevant" that particularly gets the goat.

― Ronan, Monday, 30 July 2007 09:46 (eighteen years ago)

and I guess where the "I like this" thing comes is that often when "relevant" is used in that way there's this sense that you're supposed to believe the writer, unlike you the reader, has their finger on the pulse of something or other, but it's often used more in hope than in truth, so not about Dave Matthews Band but about some indie act who may or may not sell a huge amount of records.

In which case is the act really "relevant" or is it just that they like them and want to sell them a little more strongly?

I don't think I'd mind someone calling Dave Matthews Band relevant, especially if they didn't like them.

― Ronan, Monday, 30 July 2007 09:51 (eighteen years ago)

five months pass...

"Like so-and-so and so-and-so's love child"

― musically, Thursday, 24 January 2008 05:40 (seventeen years ago)

on WEED!

― Hurting 2, Thursday, 24 January 2008 05:41 (seventeen years ago)

....meets...in a dark alley...on the moon while. . . watches from afar ON ACID!

Well, a combination of the last two posts, but elaborating on the first one. Either one nevertheless screams "Look at me, I can't write write music reviews!"

― mehlt, Thursday, 24 January 2008 05:59 (seventeen years ago)

Basically any review that is founded upon tautologies doesn't work.

― mehlt, Thursday, 24 January 2008 06:01 (seventeen years ago)

tequila-soaked vocals

Today's Washington Post has a rather sad profile of Amy Winehouse, the British soulstress whose voice sounds like it's been soaked in bourbon, and how she's made her way across the pond.

...her Mercury Music Prize-nominated debut, Frank, blew away critics and fans with her whiskey-soaked vocals...

She looks like '60s girl-group icon Ronnie Spector, sings like a gin-soaked '40s jazz queen, and writes lyrics that could serve as a soundtrack for every unsuspecting subject of A&E's Intervention.

Her gin-soaked voice just kinda pours down into your ears and wraps you around.

The album is wine soaked, pot-smoked and cheatin obsessed.

One wine-drunk, wine-soaked Winehouse of a public disruption that puts a kick to your step like a heel in the small of your back.

...perfectly compliments Winehouse's new found alchohol-drenched rasp...

Amy is in no danger of losing her license to kill as with THAT voice and THOSE lyrics neither the contenders for her throne (Lilly Allen, Jamie T) or her contemporaries from the new jazz revival of 2004, can match the pace of this booze drenched oeuvre.

"Next time I'll be black and 32 - no, I will. I'll have a turban higher than Erykah Badu's," she deadpans about her striking, jazz-soaked vocal.

London's favourite dark-haired, soul-drenched diva makes a welcome return to the limelight

There's little of the debuts jazz leanings as Amy delves back into the girl groups of the sixties for this soul drenched little cracker.

...beautiful slice of soul drenched honey-of-a-single...

Back To Black is a record drenched in soul

So it's anyone's guess why Amy Winehouse's souled-out, Motown-drenched follow-up isn't called "Frankly Foul-Mouthed".

The album kicks off in familiar fashion with the Motown drenched Rehab, the lead single.

Drenched in ‘60s girl-group cool, and sparkling with bad-girl attitude

Winehouse revels in their 60s-soaked creations and, perhaps as she has less to prove this time around, her husky Bassey-esque voice comes across in a truly impressive, natural way.

Back to Black is essentially a heartbreak album drenched in the sounds of girl groups like the Shangri-Las and the Supremes.

...drenched in emotion...

Hers is a voice marinated in regret and pulsing with pain, yet soaked in snarkiness while fully rooted in the saccharine sensibilities of '60s girl groups.

That’s especially true on songs like “In My Bed” and “He Can Only Hold Her,” both of which are dripping with wanton sensuality.

The second half of the record is dripping with soul, as songs like "Josephine," "Gotta Hold On" and "You Know I'm No Good" all have smooth arrangements and great choruses.

...impeccably contemporary but marinated in Motown and old time jazz.

For some reason, the singer-songwriter is swimming in praise over in her native England.

― dabug, Thursday, 24 January 2008 06:44 (seventeen years ago)

Results 1 - 10 of about 125 for "amy winehouse" "crack-addled"

― dabug, Thursday, 24 January 2008 06:47 (seventeen years ago)

(Pretty sure none of those are music critics.)

― dabug, Thursday, 24 January 2008 06:48 (seventeen years ago)

good work

― J0rdan S., Thursday, 24 January 2008 07:27 (seventeen years ago)

Overrated. Except that may be used more by fans than by critics.

― Geir Hongro, Thursday, 24 January 2008 11:14 (seventeen years ago)

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