Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Creamtastic / Moving Pictures The Crowd Kills Indie Rock, Christopher Weingarten Kills It
Posted by Steve Haruch on Wed, Jun 17, 2009 at 2:51 PM
Here's music writer Christopher Weingarten holding forth at the recent 140 Character Conference. He's in the midst of reviewing 1,000 albums on Twitter (that's what the "140" is about in the conference title). Yes, he laments the death of traditional journalism. Yes, he makes fun of Phish, and indie rock, and NPR, and Fleet Foxes (especially Fleet Foxes). I'm pretty sure he contradicts himself a couple of times in there, but very well, he contradicts himself. The part where he says "everything rises to the middle" is especially funny.
(Via Idolator, naturally, since he writes/wrote for them.)
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I don't totally understand what I just watched. But given the passion that man just showed for music and arts criticism in general, he more than earns another follower on Twitter.
He had me until he said (paraphrasing) all you need to review a record is 140 characters. bullshit. Can you really give the WHY and BECAUSE with 140 characters? If he believes this, then he is basically agreeing that records have truly become worthless 'here today/gone tomorrow' commodities.
What you CAN do with 140 characters is be a jaded smartass williamsburg hipster. problem is, chris, there's already millions of those. i checked out his twitter page, expecting smarmy 'reviews', and GASP! guess what i saw????? exactly what i expected to see: made-for-williamsburg/(east nashville?) zingers. didn't see any 'poetry'.
I imagine this dude would call me a pretentious self-important elitist for arguing that it takes at least a paragraph to convey meaningful thoughts on a record. Maybe i'm guilty as charged. If I had a half hour to spend, I'd rather read an entire essay about one album that I'm interested in than read some hipster's cracks about 40 records. (there will always be somebody smarter and funnier than you, chris). And besides, thats precisely the genius of the likes of Pauline Kael(yes, movies, but still...) and Nathan Rabin: you get the read meat criticism, and you get the wisecracks, all woven together with beautifully poetic phrasing. and it takes all of 90 seconds instead of 3 to read.
But I really don't think Mr. Weingarten believes what he's saying. I think he's just as saddened about the commoditization of music as anyone else. I think he's just selling out to the ADD generation...dumbing down to keep a job. or stay relevant, with or without a job, as least. like a pandering politician who's career is on the skids. arlen specter. its the oldest tragedy in the history of the world.
think about it? how do you encapsulate your thoughts on your favorite records in 140 characters? ex:
Kind Of Blue?
Loveless?
Blood on the Tracks?
Pink Moon?
You Forgot it in People?
Daydream Nation?
Arthur?
A Love Supreme?
...I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One?
@luke 140 characters or less? I'll take a stab at that..
1. Non-committal jazz begs question - why not all the way blue? Blue is a nice color. 6/10
2. Loud, quiet, loud, quiet. wouldn't be so revered if dude quit being lazy and put out another record already. 6.5/10
3. hehhhhhmehehhhh mmmmeeehhhh mememem mEH divorce ehmahhehehehehe ehmeh divorce. 7/10
4. It's amazing how douche-y dead people get once they have a car commercial. 5/10
5. Dumb. 2/10
6. Best thing that ever happened to the city of Providence. 8/10
7. I fucking love Dudley Moore. 7.5/10
8. These kids and their euphamisims for drugs. What's next, smoking your lawn? 6/10
9. Return to Hot Chicken. 'Nuff said. 7.5/10
sean,
why are you such an asshole? cynicism can in fact be funny, and is the primary reason why i love the cream. However, you just plain shit on everything, often times without any good reason. you're too good a writer to be such a shit.
1. I don't like Jazz, but I guess this one is pretty important. 8/10
2. Crazy dude spends $500k in 1992. Result: BEST ALBUM EVER. 10/10
3. Not a Dylan fan. ?/10
4. Still beautiful despite its commercialization. 9/10
5. Saw them at 12th & Porter. Didn't expect them to be so: 1) young 2) French. 8/10
6. The best album of the 80's. THURSTON? WATT. THURSTON? 10/10
7. WAT? ?/10
8. See #1.
9. My first YLT album and still my fav. 9/10
@brandon I don't shit on everything , you just ignore all the posts that aren't about white people in skinny pants. Also, if you need reminding, I'm a CRITIC. I criticize things for money -- and for fun. It's what I do, whether you're in on the joke or not is not something that really concerns me.
i think sean was just having some fun with luke's challenge. not shitting. i started to write something about this video yesterday. i see his practical points but i'm left with a feeling of cynicism trumping imagination put towards the future. bands, artists, song writers have been dealing with said 'shit spiral' for years now. i think magazines like chunklet are a great way to sort of re-envision music based writing. of course, it's not a steady job but they've created a 'name'. no matter how a.d.d. people get, a unique "brand" will always enjoy some moderate success... i believe. i hope.
this is an awesome post!! this sort of cultural analysis is so hard to come by, unfortunately. i savored this gem. please post more of this sort of stuff, it's like when that artist allen moore said that in contemporary culture, the artist gives the people what they want but they should really be giving the people what they need
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