Yeah, this is that nagging thing about MBDTF. “On Monday Mr. West, who is 33, will release his fifth album, ‘My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy’, and it’s terrific — of course it’s terrific — a startlingly maximalist take on East Coast rap traditionalism. And yet that doesn’t matter nearly as much as it should, at least partly because of Mr. West’s insistence on his own greatness. By not allowing for responses to his work other than awe, the value of the work itself is diminished; it becomes an object of admiration, not of study. Instead the focus is on the whole of Mr. West’s persona and character, which is more fractured, and subject to a far wider range of responses. The result is that Mr. West becomes a polarizing public figure who happens to be the most artful pop musician of the day, not the other way around.”

Thoughts on the tendency of the internet to empower and break down niches. “You can be a niche, but you’re a public niche, so you can’t expect to be left alone about it, or understood on your own terms. The internet makes niches possible, but it’s also a massive space in which loads of different people communicate — and spaces like that tend to pull everyone toward the middle, developing conventions and enforcing a cultural center. So far, this hasn’t stopped plenty of corners of the internet from getting extremely insular and specialized, but it’s still a form of cultural policing on this front.”

Another ‘response album’ from Marc Weidenaum's blog minions, this a collection of recordings that use a human sigh as their source material. The response is to the grumpy, narrow-minded art critic Richard Dorment, who questioned the integrity and quality of artist Susan Philipsz’ Turner Prize-winning ‘Lowlands‘, as well as a number of other artistic endeavors that he considers unworthy of anything more than a ‘long low collective sigh’.

"Overall, there seems to be a critical disconnect between the way the predominantly white, male critical establishment writes about violence and misogyny—especially as it’s primarily exhibited in hip-hop, i.e., music made predominantly by black artists. Critics such as these seem uncommonly drawn to violent, misogynistic music simply because it is shocking. This thrill of novelty seems to be nothing more than a fetishization of an alien culture."

A good overview of where music creation and criticism is in late 2010. At least in terms of the sorts of bands who are making music for the sorts of people who are reading these sorts of blog posts (a lot!).

"If somebody you care about is bleeding profusely, it’s not loving to insist that she’s flawless and has nothing to worry about. The loving thing is to stop the bleeding then get her to a doctor. If a guy is clearly suffering from blood poisoning, ignoring the problem isn’t loving. Instead, say, 'Dude. You need to get that looked at immediately.' Or, better yet, go with him. Do what you can to make things better."

"To mark the publication of rock critic Rob Sheffield’s second book, an 'I Love the 80s'-style tribute to the music of his youth called Talking to Girls About Duran Duran, eMusic’s Michaelangelo Matos took a unique approach to the author interview: a jukebox jury in which music critics, rather than songs, were the focus of discussion."

Is Lil Wayne's 'Rebirth' really that bad?

Getting politics wrong and getting pop wrong.

They're are distraught and stuck in a pre-maturity funk.

Nitsuh Abebe on exactly why people need to stop talking about how "white" Vampire Weekend are.

Not so much 'debunked', but this article calls out Krakauer on a number of conclusions and omissions from his book (and the subsequent movie). To summarize: the poison/moldy seeds theory doesn't hold water, and McCandless probably just simply starved to death. McCandless had money and a map with him on his final trek, but the book and movie omit this. Also, one of the final self-portrait photographs might have a clue as to the "injury" alluded to in his final note: one sleeve of his shirt looks armless.

"You can try to know, and own the fact that there are things you do not know, or you can be knowing, and hide your own ignorance with sideways shots of been-there done-that familiarity. You can understand that shit happens and try your best to keep things together and accomplish something against all odds — YOU CAN DANCE, as this album begins — or you can blow up the hospital just to show everyone that at any moment anywhere, a hospital can blow up for no fucking reason whatsoever."

Jim Carrey as a genius, the "representative jester of our time." "Carrey’s dream sequence of movies is a prophecy, a warning that this clanking ego-apparatus in which each of us walks around, this fissured, monumental self, half Job and half Bertie Wooster, cannot be sustained. Out of his own seemingly bottomless disquiet, Carrey writhes and reaches into the bottomless disquiet of his audience."

Interesting. "Patt can work on his colors and alignment, and hopefully please his user base with a helpful tool. Meanwhile the rest of us would be wise to work on the quality and value of our criticism."

"I’d go so far as to say that the majority of the Web design field, by and large, is too easily motivated by technique, that the majority of us are thinking tactically far more often than we’re thinking strategically."

"If I was in a band I would write a slow song with an 808, reverb, and a female vocalist, and call that song 'Zach Braff’s Eyes Reflected in My Nano.'"

"This track is like being raised on velvet pillows and then, on your 18th birthday, having a crazy albino mannequin begin to rub sandpaper on your face."

Stylus is shutting down, unfortunately. Here's their own excellent guide to the best of the site. Great weekend reading.

"An artist is Advanced when they do something that is neither expected of them nor the opposite of what is expected of them." Tongue-in-cheek, but the article lives on. Note the notes on Val Kilmer and C-Murder.

On Advancement Theory: it's not bad; you just don't get it. "The most Advanced figure of all time is Lou Reed [who in] 1986 released the song 'The Original Wrapper,' in which he raps about AIDS, Louis Farrakhan, and waffles."

"Your guide to understanding Lou Reed, Bob Dylan, David Bowie, and other highly Advanced musicians." If a genius does something you don't understand, it's probably even more genius.

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