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After debuting in June with a Powerpointy exegesis on Bright Eyes’ seven-night run in New York, the “artist and blogger” Andrew Kuo has been contributing charts to the New York Times‘ online music section pretty regularly. Kuo’s charts are very pretty and would no doubt look quite nice framed in a Roche Bobois-designed room, but since about the third one they’ve hewn to a very strict theme: Indie-cognoscenti-approved music tastes (Vampire Weekend and R. Kelly oui!; Fat Joe and recent New Pornographers non!) that are shallow enough to be summed up in three words or so, scattered about the screen in increasingly inscrutable arrangements of lines, dots, circles, and home-accessory-ready colors. Inspired by Kuo’s latest effort–“The Projected Longevity Of 2007’s Top 10 Songs,” in which he bravely posits that Panda Bear’s “Bros” “will sound even better five years from now” than any other song he’s heard this year*–our own “artist and blogger,” Jess Harvell, whipped up Idolator’s official response to the person who may, in fact, be crafting the most annoying music criticism on the Internet (and you know that’s saying a lot):
The Projected Longevity Of 2007’s Top 10 Songs [NYT]
* Call it a hunch, but I bet you this prediction will be tossed aside come May ‘08 or so.
Perfection.
Jess, brilliant.
i am merely the vessel for maura’s irritation.
The worst part is the implicit message of the chart, which is basically “the 2 indie rock songs on here are timeless, but most of these hip hop and R&B songs that I like right now have an expiration date.”
…wait, that Kuo thing really is actually meant to be a chart.
Head. Hurts.
I challenge Andrew Kuo to a battle of quantitative prowess. It will be the lamest music “criticism” duel ever — my Cronbach’s alpha will destroy his puny vector-based graphics!
It does seem like Soulja Boy will end up at #85 of VH1 Greatest One Hit Wonders of the 2000s, though. He was like built for that.
RIAA encourages Pacman to sue popular music commentary website. “Just beacuse,” according to spokesperson.
does Tufte know about this?
@dippinkind: I think Tufte would be kindly dismissive of Jess and brutally dismissive of Kuo, no?
That’s the most useful graph I’ve seen in some time, Jess. Kudos.
Jess’s zing is equally applicable, perhaps moreso, to this site:
[www.jamphat.com]
The funny part is that “Trapped In The Closet” will outlast everything mentioned on these charts. I’d put that shit on the next Voyager spacecraft.
Also, can we all call ourselves artist/bloggers now? Snark is the new paint.
r kelly is more indie than the new pornographers?
@GovernmentNames: oh, hell yes.
@GovernmentNames: @maura: I laughed at the charts / graphs / etc. on that site. Does that make me a bad person???
@DHMBIB: Not at all, some of them are very funny. It’s just that there are, like, hundreds of them that aren’t, or are so mathematically or graphically flawed that they flub the joke.
Also I will say that Kuo’s chart of Wu Tang albums for NYT is actually pretty well done and compresses a really large discography into something kind of informative and interesting.
@GovernmentNames: yeah, but he missed the masta killa records.
Old fogey alert: I totally remember Andrew from the mid-90s. He used to do a zine called Trash Heap; I contributed a story about the time my band got gonged at the high school talent show. This is the first time I’ve heard his name in a decade. Huh.
wait, whose Top 10 is this anyway? Kuo’s own?
@Matos: yes.
I’m actually kind of with him on those top 3 songs.
and while I do think it might be a little too quirky, I do like that it’s at least different. most blog rants run together at this point.
as you usual, you guys are hating on someone with a new idea. why? this one’s fun and creative. so what if you disagree with his picks, etc?