Passion of the Weiss (Free subscription) | 07/08/2008
Per Idolator. I apologize for the inaction around these parts. Things will get back to normal soon. In the meantime, if you’re bored write your own lists in the comments. The Wikipedia album list and Robert Christgau’s website should help you in the quest. And if you’re looking for any meaning from this post, it’s [...]
Unlimited Chirp (Free subscription) | 06/10/2008
Josh Eells, Robert Christgau, Nick Sylvester and I are doing a lil' Lil Wayne roundtable over here , today and tomorrow.
Gawker (Free subscription) | 06/06/2008
This week's award for most amusing disclosure goes to former Village Voice music critic and section editor (and DEAN OF AMERICAN ROCK CRITICS) Robert Christgau, reviewing a novel by former Ed Park....
Ear Farm (Free subscription) | 06/04/2008
Band: Steinski From: New York, NY Sound: the O.G. of sample-based hip-hop sound collages Similar Artists: DJ Shadow, Girl Talk, Cut Chemist, Liam Howlett, RJD2 Listen Now: "The Payoff Mix" Robert Christgau on Steinski: "He's just a perpetually disillusioned optimist who still assumes that the sounds and images rippling through the American consciousness are, forget copyright, every American's birthright--that...
prefixmag.com (Free subscription) | 05/29/2008
In a fascinating interview with Roots drummer Ahmir "?uestlove" Thompson at Westwood's Backbeat Online blog, we learn of ?uestlove's, um, ...
Zoilus (Free subscription) | 05/28/2008
The most quotable quote from this year's EMP Pop Conference was probably Robert Christgau confessing, "I miss the monoculture" - that storied (and arguably mythic) time when "everyone" listened to the same songs, watched the same shows, and so on. A similar sentiment animated the TVO's Studio 2 panel I did in April, asking what ever happened to the big hits that "everybody" danced to. Leave it to...
Dial "M" for Musicology (Free subscription) | 05/09/2008
A couple of weeks ago I did a paper at EMP, the experience of which was a drag -- tepid reaction and a tiny audience, which got a bit smaller when Robert Christgau, who walked in late, walked out again...
Metroblogging Seattle (Free subscription) | 04/14/2008
blue scholars (geologic) // emp pop conference // 12 april 2008. Who knows if you’ll make it to the end; so let’s start with the best part, shall we? It’s Saturday and I’ve just wandered in a few minutes before the ostensible lunch session[1], and there’s Robert Christgau happily eating [...]
The KEXP Blog (Free subscription) | 04/11/2008
Last night’s keynote panel kicked off the 2008 Pop Conference at EMP|SFM. This year’s Pop Conference, the largest so far, features over 160 presenters and 40 panels, covering topics over the broad spectrum of the theme “Shake, Rattle: Music, Conflict, and Change.” Besides the engaging panels (KEXP’s own Jon Kertzer will be sitting in on [...]
The KEXP Blog (Free subscription) | 04/10/2008
Could the Pop Conference at EMP/SFM, as it’s now called, really be in its seventh year? Apparently, and the 2008 edition is bursting at the seams with 160 presenters and 40 panels, making it the biggest to date. Pre-registration is closed, but admission is free — trying your luck at the walk-up registration table is [...]
Seattle Post-Intelligencer (Free subscription) | 04/10/2008
EMP's Pop Conference brings together academia and the music world.
Alex Ross: The Rest Is Noise (Free subscription) | 04/09/2008
I've placed Alan Rich at the head of my mini-directory of classical critics for the simple reason that he is the dean of the profession — at once the most venerable and the most youthfully curious music writer in America....
PowerPop (Free subscription) | 03/31/2008
Not back from Philadelphia yet, but in the meantime a question: Is Foreigner still, in Robert Christgau's immortal phrase, the most useless band ever? Or has someone surpassed them in the intervening years? Discuss.... [h/t Sinfonian ]
Music Musings and Miscellany (Free subscription) | 03/30/2008
The other night I spent an hour adding some of my records to Rate Your Music (http://rateyourmusic.com) and dutifully grading them before suddenly thinking “what the hell am I doing wasting time like this'” It got me thinking again, though, about that age old chestnut (and a bugbear of mine since I began to read the [...]
The Cedar Lounge Revolution (Free subscription) | 03/29/2008
Demented is one word that springs to mind when thinking about the Fleshtones… exuberant is another. Since the late 1970s they’ve been playing a mutated form of garage rock crossed with psychedelia, blues and soul. For those of you haven’t heard them think of a less early middle-aged, less branded Blues Brothers (whose music I [...]
