How much are pitchfork endorsed indie bands hated on here?

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How much are pitchfork endorsed indie bands hated on here?

Post by Guest1 »

Now that the haze of noughties pitchfork hipsterdom is faded I’m really curious what people think of these “critics darlings”.
I’m talking about bands like:
Pavement
Archers of Loaf
Built to Spill
Modest Mouse
Silver Jews
Flaming Lips
Crystal Castles
Tama Impala
Etc...

There seems to be a divide in the sense that UK publications like the NME were more into meat and potatoes garage revival rock whilst pitchfork was always trying to be on the cutting edge to the point of being contrarian.

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Re: How much are pitchfork endorsed indie bands hated on here?

Post by matedog »

I like Modest Mouse. Never got into any of the others.
Look, you have to establish context for these things. And I maintain that unless you appreciate the Fall of Constantinople, the Great Fire of London, and Mickey Mantle's fatalist alcoholism, live Freddy makes no sense. If you want to half-ass it, fine, go call Simon Schama to do the appendix.

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Re: How much are pitchfork endorsed indie bands hated on here?

Post by Dr. Medulla »

I like that one really popular Pavement record (but apparently not enough that I can even remember its name). I've either not heard the others or they didn't make an impression on me. But I don't axiomatically hate any band that Pitchfork raves about, even tho I find the site's writers hideously up their own ass.
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Re: How much are pitchfork endorsed indie bands hated on here?

Post by gkbill »

Hello,

I don't read pitchfork so I don't know when Archers of Loaf became hip - I thought they were older than the 2000's. I always liked this:



I really like the line "You're not the one who let me down - but thanks for offering".

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Re: How much are pitchfork endorsed indie bands hated on here?

Post by Guest1 »

gkbill wrote:
05 May 2021, 11:12am
Hello,

I don't read pitchfork so I don't know when Archers of Loaf became hip - I thought they were older than the 2000's. I always liked this:



I really like the line "You're not the one who let me down - but thanks for offering".
Archers in Loaf were kind of like a ballsier pavement IMO. They never really got their due but All The Nations Airports, Icky Mettle, and Vee Vee are fucking fantastic records.

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Re: How much are pitchfork endorsed indie bands hated on here?

Post by Guest1 »

Dr. Medulla wrote:
05 May 2021, 11:10am
I like that one really popular Pavement record (but apparently not enough that I can even remember its name). I've either not heard the others or they didn't make an impression on me. But I don't axiomatically hate any band that Pitchfork raves about, even tho I find the site's writers hideously up their own ass.
I really like Crooked Rain and Slanted and Enchanted. Wowee Zowee is pretty great but has a decent amount of filler and then after that it’s hit or miss for me. But yeah pitchfork now has gotten to the point where they endorse mainstream music and I’m not sure if that’s because of the buyout or because it’s some new layer to their pretension.

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Re: How much are pitchfork endorsed indie bands hated on here?

Post by Guest1 »

Flaming Lips are probably my favorite of the lot. They also started out as a mid 80s hardcore punk band and then over the course of a decade and half morphed into something else entirely.

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Re: How much are pitchfork endorsed indie bands hated on here?

Post by Guest1 »

But yeah fuck pitchfork for only giving the Holy Bible an 8.4

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Re: How much are pitchfork endorsed indie bands hated on here?

Post by Dr. Medulla »

RockNRollWhore wrote:
05 May 2021, 11:27am
Dr. Medulla wrote:
05 May 2021, 11:10am
I like that one really popular Pavement record (but apparently not enough that I can even remember its name). I've either not heard the others or they didn't make an impression on me. But I don't axiomatically hate any band that Pitchfork raves about, even tho I find the site's writers hideously up their own ass.
I really like Crooked Rain and Slanted and Enchanted. Wowee Zowee is pretty great but has a decent amount of filler and then after that it’s hit or miss for me. But yeah pitchfork now has gotten to the point where they endorse mainstream music and I’m not sure if that’s because of the buyout or because it’s some new layer to their pretension.
Crooked Rain! That's the album I liked. Still, MES wasn't completely wrong in accusing them of ripping off the Fall.
"I never doubted myself for a minute for I knew that my monkey-strong bowels were girded with strength, like the loins of a dragon ribboned with fat and the opulence of buffalo dung." - Richard Nixon, Checkers Speech, abandoned early draft

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Re: How much are pitchfork endorsed indie bands hated on here?

Post by revbob »

RockNRollWhore wrote:
05 May 2021, 11:28am
Flaming Lips are probably my favorite of the lot. They also started out as a mid 80s hardcore punk band and then over the course of a decade and half morphed into something else entirely.
At this place I used to work there was this absolutely stunningly gorgeous woman who would sometimes where a flaming lips shirt. All I could do was awkwardly smile when I saw her. I wanted to be able to say something but I couldn't make sounds to form words that could be strung together into coherent sentences.

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Re: How much are pitchfork endorsed indie bands hated on here?

Post by Sparky »

I must live a sheltered life nowadays. The only band I can recall hearing is the Flaming Lips.

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Re: How much are pitchfork endorsed indie bands hated on here?

Post by Flex »

I have a lot of time for the Flaming Lips in almost any part of their catalog. I have some random albums by Silver Jews, Pavement and Crystal Castles. I like those bands but wouldn't call myself a fan or whatever. Decent music. Not too familiar with the most of the other bands, tho I think I still actively dislike Modest Mouse. Built To Spill was a band that's been recommended to me, but I'm not sure I know them.

Pitchfork does tons of dumb shit stylistically but they actually highlight a lot of really good music so it's hard for me to be too hard on them.

Faux Addendum: One year I tried to really follow pitchfork reviews and check out their highly recc'd albums and other stuff that just sounded interesting to me and as a result I have this chunk of middling-to-decent indie rock by bands like Tapes N Tapes from like 2011 or whenever that was. All fine enough, but probably was kind of a waste of energy in retrospect.

For rel addendum: lmao, looking at the tapes n tapes discography 2011 was kinda late in the game. I musta done this exercise in like 2009. Jesus, time flies.
Last edited by Flex on 05 May 2021, 12:44pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: How much are pitchfork endorsed indie bands hated on here?

Post by Inder »

Built to Spill and Modest Mouse will always evoke a very particular kind of person I'd run into in my undergrad days, so I cannot ever like them.

Wouldn't really go out of my way to listen to any of these, tbh. They're probably fine, but I find more fulfilment deep diving into no-hit Iowan power pop from 1986 -- there's not a lot of swing on that list.

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Re: How much are pitchfork endorsed indie bands hated on here?

Post by gkbill »

Hello,

I think I posted this elsewhere about the Flaming Lips. It's pretty clever but hard to pull off. I'd go.

https://www.nbcnews.com/now/video/the-r ... 5rN9rDsNUI

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Re: How much are pitchfork endorsed indie bands hated on here?

Post by Guest1 »

Flex wrote:
05 May 2021, 12:41pm
I have a lot of time for the Flaming Lips in almost any part of their catalog. I have some random albums by Silver Jews, Pavement and Crystal Castles. I like those bands but wouldn't call myself a fan or whatever. Decent music. Not too familiar with the most of the other bands, tho I think I still actively dislike Modest Mouse. Built To Spill was a band that's been recommended to me, but I'm not sure I know them.

Pitchfork does tons of dumb shit stylistically but they actually highlight a lot of really good music so it's hard for me to be too hard on them.

Faux Addendum: One year I tried to really follow pitchfork reviews and check out their highly recc'd albums and other stuff that just sounded interesting to me and as a result I have this chunk of middling-to-decent indie rock by bands like Tapes N Tapes from like 2011 or whenever that was. All fine enough, but probably was kind of a waste of energy in retrospect.

For rel addendum: lmao, looking at the tapes n tapes discography 2011 was kinda late in the game. I musta done this exercise in like 2009. Jesus, time flies.


Really good song.

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