Album Rating: 4.0 | Sound Off

@johnny can admit that sowing is perhaps not the best example here but my point is that there is a writing style for many reviewers that does not engage with music in the same context it was created and instead reduces it down to very arbitrary observations from a perspective that is often partially or entirely non-musical. it's not a matter of whether you like it or not, you can think an album is the worst thing ever created but when as a writer you're using the work of musicians as a platform for your own work, I think the best reviewers are able to not exclusively, but at least partially discuss the merits (or lack thereof) of an album in a way that puts the music at the forefront. or at least uses it to substantiate claims like "this song is banal, this song is tepid, this song is indulgent." I think a lot of your best reviews do that but if you focused on it a bit more for your scathing critiques they would benefit from it a lot, maybe not purely from a writing standpoint, but in the sense that the reader comes away from it reflecting on the structure/composure/overall design of the collection of sounds they're reading about. and that's just what I think a music review should accomplish at the end of the day. you might do this to a further extent than I realize (you have a lot of reviews and most of them are for genres I don't really care about and obviously I don't read every single one) but some of it comes off as being written in a way that is elegant and impressive but conveys very little of substance. it is not a matter of writing ability (who would I be to earnestly make that critique, I don't think any of my reviews on here are particularly good yet) but rather your intent and approach to music criticism at times

Album Rating: 4.0 | Sound Off

case in point: elaborating on your opinion on NFR by saying "that album smacked of privilege" or much worse, describing The Wild Hunt by saying "every single facet of it just reeks of brittle white bread open mic pseudo-hillbilly concerted love-me-(puppy-eyes)-shitvoice naffness so rancidly that I don't think I'll ever come close to needing a rational pretext to hate it"



well articulated, means nothing

Album Rating: 4.0 | Sound Off

"is really this about LDR or something you think routinely happens (and in practice very much does not) on staff dibs, or is this you struggling to cope about something very specific and unrelated hmm"



I do not know what this means, or why you are talking about Hitler

' intent and approach to music criticism at times...'

don't tell me you hit a character limit here.

Album Rating: 4.0 | Sound Off

read it again

It was more of a lite-jab at the block of text/.

'well articulated, means nothing'

pick one

also if you think that sentence means nothing, im afraid you need to read a book

stop outing yourself so consistently as braindead

Album Rating: 3.5

Some of the bois here are deeping this too much. Comments about ‘approach to reviewing’ etc. it’s such a cliche but all these complaints against the review seem to boil down to being in disagreement with the opinion presented and not much else. Yeah the piece is indulgent for sure but it mirrors the album in that way and the notion that Johnny has some kind of personal vendetta against the artist is really dumb.

no no, it's the kids that are out of touch. also ironic that we've just started some threads discussing how to review music and these pages are being blown up waffle style here. truth is it's a 'attack johnny' thread dressed up with circling, hand-holding, opinion wrong arguments.

Some of these guys should take the bubble wrap off, do better (write your own reviews) and spend less time giving Johnny false therapy. I don't normally go out to bat like this, but it seems like every time _Well takes a somewhat popular to popular album these same peanuts reveal themselves.

Album Rating: 1.5

I ain’t reading all this



I’m happy for you



Or



Sorry that happened

Album Rating: 4.0 | Sound Off

like I said idc if the review is negative I just think the critiques could be made in a more substantive way

Pump and Gnocci with the facts

Album Rating: 2.5

(sorry everyone else)

@colton

"that the reader comes away from it reflecting on the structure/composure/overall design of the collection of sounds they're reading about. and that's just what I think a music review should accomplish at the end of the day."

i think the main disagreement here is that i think the context an artist creates for themselves within (and without, if similar) their music can be as important if not more than the Way The Music Sounds. or rather, i think that it can be more valuable for a critic to use their experience and perspective to discuss the real or potential resonance of the Sounds or the/a/any listener than to prioritise unpacking the way the Sounds are constructed and scan aesthetically. i don't think it's really my place to focus on critiquing the craft of most records - sure, i've got some experience and knowledge that partially equip me to do so, but whatever i can draw from those is far less valuable than tackling the questions of whether you should listen to the record to begin with, or what you are exposing yourself to if you do...

"I think the best reviewers are able to not exclusively, but at least partially discuss the merits (or lack thereof) of an album in a way that puts the music at the forefront."

...but that said, i do agree with this, and i do think detailed musical analysis is an important and often underused tool for tackling broader questions and capturing the spirit of whichever album, and that tbh was originally a huge factor in why i originally applied for contrib, even if i don't think it's as much the be-all-and-end-all as i used to.

Album Rating: 2.5

to bring this back to the main issue of why don't you talk more in more detail about the music in this specific review (which is a v fair question), the short answer is that i wanted to avoid bloat at all costs and didn't want to belabour critiques that were already harsh enough to verge on overbearing by trotting out an extra basis for them. the tedium of this record overrides the details for me; the mere presence of stylistic switchups is in most cases far more interesting than the specifics of their execution (i'm thinking Fishtail and Peppers in particular here); i don't think the fact that it's well engineered has much to do with how good or bad it is, although as touched on, i think that that Antonoff's ornate/organic chamber pop style comes of as overly precious in its polish and is ultimately a detriment (i.e. i think that LDR's fantasies and musings sound off-puttingly kitsch when presented as perfect, but have far more appeal with a few cracks in the veneer). my compromise here was a lot of fleeting engagement on song level, but sure, this could have used a little more contour (the lilt in Paris, Texas' vox/piano unison, something about the A&W kick drum conveying nausea, a dig at Antonoff's mic prod on Margaret would have been the first ports of call). i don't think any of these are that integral to the points in question, but ig they wouldn't have hurt

Album Rating: 2.5

also, appendix - pretty considerable difference to unpack between these two statements:



""that album smacked of privilege""

this is a substantive critique, though obviously very cursive - it isn't something i expected to have to unpack in this thread, but if it helps, treat it as a pale echo of this absolute champion para from Chan's NFR review:

Throughout, Norman Fucking Rockwell is so apolitical that its lack of politics almost swings back around toward making a social statement by accident. This is music for and about the idle rich, full of lyrics about shiftless days spent dancing, fucking, and getting high in Los Angeles. When she writes about love, there is always a beautiful longing, always a desire to do something to someone or have something done to her (desires that often seem to go unfulfilled). She is easy to relate to in those moments, but as the album continues past sixty minutes, the emptiness at the heart of the album becomes apparent. The world presented here is so insular as to be nearly impenetrable: a life lived in a bathing suit during the day and a party dress at night. Dancing and diamonds are omnipresent, but so is a sadness exemplifying everything missing from a life that’s had any kind of meaning scooped out and replaced with something worse than nostalgia, with a need for a nostalgia that never quite comes because the past was never fulfilling. Del Rey doesn’t open a window into her life or identity, choosing instead to make tiny incisions where the bone is already close to the skin. Her willingness to repeat phrases and ideas feels less thematic than lazy, especially on an album as long as NFR.



""every single facet of it just reeks of brittle white bread open mic pseudo-hillbilly concerted love-me-(puppy-eyes)-shitvoice naffness so rancidly that I don't think I'll ever come close to needing a rational pretext to hate it""

this is a lurid way of saying "everything about this record smells so absolutely foul to me that i do not want to approach it any further to the point that we could even discuss it in detailed substantive terms." it is not a stance that i'd consider appropriate for a review, in case there was any ambiguity there

Album Rating: 2.5

"the notion that Johnny has some kind of personal vendetta against the artist is really dumb"

fwiw i do get the optics here and can sympathise with anyone aware of Chemtrailsgate and (understandably) ignorant of that fact that i enjoyed BB and hoped this would be decent drawing that conclusion

Album Rating: 1.0

Johnny is clearly nitpicking and biased

having an opinion is certainly pretty biased and lame

🫢🍿munch