Friday is (usually) fun. It’s about music. So there’s links and playlists. Today, the death of Pitchfork, the review site. But hey, there’s still a great playlist if you make it to the end eh…
Nice piece, Simon. Although for me as one of the last remaining music journalists (I feel, shouting in to a void) it did at one stage have a standard to aspire to, or at least try to better. Also, their voice gave a benchmark to agree or disagree and another place to find facts (which you'd naturally have to check). They werent Rolling Stone, NME or Melody Maker at the height of their powers but then, nobody is. I feel the huge entertainment industry moguls love it when alt voices go silent. Their algorithms can work so much more effectively when the distractions of critical thinking or fandom championing is absent.
I’m the opposite. I thought Pitchfork got better over the years. Their semi-literate fanboy raves about landfill indie used to drive me nuts but then after a brief doom metal crush they started employing real writers, a lot of them women. People like Elizabeth Nelson, Amanda Petrusich and Alfred Soto are both great writers and sharp minds. Yes the point system is daft and the over-praising of old releases is getting silly but they became a genuinely useful source of what to listen out for. I’m going to see Wednesday this month because I got into Rat Saw God because I listened to it because Pitchfork gave it 8.5. There’s a lot that. I will miss them.
Fair point about some of the great writers they picked up, or platformed in the last decade of their run. But landfill indie deserved to be called landfill indie still, right :) ?
Speaking as a purveyor of landfill indie I’m pretty sure it will always be with us. If Pitchfork rave about something now there’s a much better chance they’ll be right than when Ryan Schreiber was typing.
Remember Parquet Courts and the like? Or were they Parkay Quartz? Or both sometimes? So silly...I guess, also, the thing is, time gets called on things. And Pitchfork’s run, all up, was not insignificant. Whether you liked them for 2 years, 10 years or 25 years - it’s still good going...
this is an AMAZING piece of writing. I think about this sterilisation of music journalism obsessively and i reckon good riddance pitchfork. let’s have something new why don’t we and stop poking dead corpses who were once young and pretty. that being said, i do love creem2.0 a lot so call me a hypocrite i guess. it’s the only journalism i can stand these days.
Nice piece, Simon. Although for me as one of the last remaining music journalists (I feel, shouting in to a void) it did at one stage have a standard to aspire to, or at least try to better. Also, their voice gave a benchmark to agree or disagree and another place to find facts (which you'd naturally have to check). They werent Rolling Stone, NME or Melody Maker at the height of their powers but then, nobody is. I feel the huge entertainment industry moguls love it when alt voices go silent. Their algorithms can work so much more effectively when the distractions of critical thinking or fandom championing is absent.
I’m the opposite. I thought Pitchfork got better over the years. Their semi-literate fanboy raves about landfill indie used to drive me nuts but then after a brief doom metal crush they started employing real writers, a lot of them women. People like Elizabeth Nelson, Amanda Petrusich and Alfred Soto are both great writers and sharp minds. Yes the point system is daft and the over-praising of old releases is getting silly but they became a genuinely useful source of what to listen out for. I’m going to see Wednesday this month because I got into Rat Saw God because I listened to it because Pitchfork gave it 8.5. There’s a lot that. I will miss them.
Fair point about some of the great writers they picked up, or platformed in the last decade of their run. But landfill indie deserved to be called landfill indie still, right :) ?
Speaking as a purveyor of landfill indie I’m pretty sure it will always be with us. If Pitchfork rave about something now there’s a much better chance they’ll be right than when Ryan Schreiber was typing.
Remember Parquet Courts and the like? Or were they Parkay Quartz? Or both sometimes? So silly...I guess, also, the thing is, time gets called on things. And Pitchfork’s run, all up, was not insignificant. Whether you liked them for 2 years, 10 years or 25 years - it’s still good going...
Just when it was looking like an institution. I love PC of course.
Great “content” today Simon 😁👌🏽
{lol-emoji}
this is an AMAZING piece of writing. I think about this sterilisation of music journalism obsessively and i reckon good riddance pitchfork. let’s have something new why don’t we and stop poking dead corpses who were once young and pretty. that being said, i do love creem2.0 a lot so call me a hypocrite i guess. it’s the only journalism i can stand these days.
Thanks