Comments on: What Use Are “Best Of” Lists, Anyhow?

By: Murk

Murk — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 12:01:37 +0000

I enjoy 24, does that count? Or, better: who the fuck cares?

The OED is yr friend, LiquidHeaven.

By: manyjars

manyjars — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 07:15:35 +0000

Tiny Mixtapes is running what appears to possibly be kind of a parody of the Pitchfork year-end reader survey, maybe:

[www.tinymixtapes.com]

By: joe bananas

joe bananas — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 03:34:07 +0000

well, this is certainly flattering.

I tried on 24, but I think it's just not for me. I came to it too late in the game, perhaps.

LOST, on the other hand...

By: westartedthis

westartedthis — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 02:11:54 +0000

@Murk: "who cares? who cares?"...you're a child. it's not like i'm gonna make you read my top ten list. dumbass.

for the record, it was J. Edward Keyes' top ten (or however many) list that got me into Paramore (and to be honest, i hadn't really heard of them from any teenage girls at that point either). try as i might to get him to render a verdict on every piece of mass culture i think i might like, but lack the intellectual capacity to decide about on my own, he hasn't gotten back to me yet on "24." you're probably better off not watching it until we know for sure.

By: LiquidHeaven

LiquidHeaven — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 06:33:49 +0000

legitimated lol

By: westartedthis

westartedthis — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 05:42:05 +0000

@Murk: and btw, i think this would be an interesting argument. since i'd like to know if you limit "mass culture" to the disney channel pop you parade about as trophies of your off-the-shelf "poptimism" or if you also enjoy, you know, pro football and NCIS and putting your money in failing banks and stuff. because i know i do.

By: Murk

Murk — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 03:24:20 +0000

>>i probably never would have given Paramore a chance if it hadn’t been on the year-end lists of people who are not teenage girls (hey, i have an idea – let’s have a big argument about why i shouldn’t be allowed think music writers have more trustworthy opinions than teenage girls. please – let’s do that right now.)

Actually, genius, the argument would be about how you’re afraid to value mass culture unless it’s legitimated for you by people you allow to dictate your thinking.

By: Murk

Murk — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 03:21:10 +0000

"i'm pretty much over being over year-end lists. i like making them. i like reading them. i'm tired of hearing it loudly declared that one does not give a shit about them."

Who cares? I can't imagine giving a shit what some pseud on the internet thinks were the best albums of the year - or what he thinks about lists of any kind, for that matter.

Year-end lists are boring. For the most part they reflect the ways artists were packaged throughout the year, a phenomenon whose apogee is reached by the heavy-breathing tin-eared scribes of Pitchfork (how's that Clap Your Hands Say Yeah record holding up, gents?).

What's sometimes useful are individual ballots - I'll check out what Xgau, SFJ, Matos, &c, thought, since their tastes have often tracked with mine.

By: westartedthis

westartedthis — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 02:20:55 +0000

@Murk: good to have you back. where've you been, dude?

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 12:54:34 +0000

I do, I'm pretty sure I have every year for the lat few, mostly CD's that I thought at the time that I should get them promptly forgot about when i couldn't find it at my local record store (which I should add is in Korea), usually I use them when I head home for a holiday / go on an amazon /i-tunes binge.

But just end of year lists about the last years music, endless lists I skip.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 12:45:39 +0000

@Lawson: ditto here, i also just look to see if anything i've bought ends up on a random list, but even then i don't put much stock in any best of list.

on another note, i just did the pitchfork reader survey, and what a load of crap that was. you can only pick 5 albums out of a pre-selected pf4 approved list of 75 (maybe it was 100), with one write-in. and then for selecting best single, the choices were even fewer. it should be called what it is: out of the songs/bands that pitchfork likes/hypes who do you align with and agree to shit upon a year or two later when they're no longer fashionable. definitely NOT a user interactive survey by any stretch. oh i miss the days of their snarky surrealist reviews - too bad they've gone so legit. soon they'll be rolling stone.

By: RaptorAvatar

RaptorAvatar — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 12:24:55 +0000

I usually go through sometime around early January when there isn’t much coming out and use that as my catchup time. Having a pile of lists can really help bring things into focus in terms of stuff I might have missed.

By: LiquidHeaven

LiquidHeaven — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 12:12:22 +0000

I haven't bought anything (and don't and won't) but the gorillavsbear list gave me some new stuff to check out.

Maybe I'll attend one of the artists' concerts down the road or something.

By: Dick Laurent is dead.

Dick Laurent is dead. — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 12:03:46 +0000

@Audif Jackson Winters III: This.
@Tauwan: Also this.

Though The Quietus' list I was glancing through this morning may change things.

By: Lawson

Lawson — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 12:03:22 +0000

i pretty much scroll through them looking at stuff i’ve already bought either to, a) confirm my ‘finger is on the pulse’ or b) actually read something interesting about music i already know and have listened to. i think it’s hard to get someone to just listen to something off the bat solely because it’s in a list. maybe a good review or discussion is what is needed…

By: AL

AL — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 11:14:50 +0000

I’ve definitely discovered a lot of albums via Pitchfork lists in the past. These days, since I’ve probably heard a little bit of whatever will make their list, I find I turn more toward specific critics’ year end lists. Last year I noticed that Jess’s top 10 included 4 or 5 albums that were also among my favorites, so I checked out the others and found a few I liked (Jesu is one that particularly comes to mind). I also like Eric Harvey’s year end mixes.

By: Josh Mock

Josh Mock — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 08:45:35 +0000

I originally got into TV On The Radio because they got so many plugs for Cookie Mountain on year-end lists. And now I'm a big fan, so it's worth it for me. That's just an example.

By: D.R. Mosby

D.R. Mosby — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 06:31:58 +0000

I checked out Steinski, Fleet Foxes and Burial around about the middle of the year when they were all very highly ranked on Metacritic. I got hooked on Steinski – I’ve listened to the What Does It All Mean? probably twice as much as any other album this year. Fleet Foxes I had orginally written off because I didn’t dig “White Winter Hymnal” all that much, but I gave it another chance, and I found I really liked the rest of the album. Burial – uh, I tried to like it, but it wasn’t my cup of tea. So, two out of three isn’t bad.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 06:22:52 +0000

I think that, like many many aspects of the music industry, the idea of year end lists inspiring new musical finds is fading into the dustbin of history. I remember when I was in high school and Spin year-end lists would help me discover great little oddities like Cornershop or Quasi. But of course musical saturation on teh internets makes “discovering a great little oddity” less and less likely. Blogs hype certain bands all year, and then those bands show up on blog year-end lists, and on and on through the cycle.

By: the rich girls are weeping

the rich girls are weeping — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 05:39:46 +0000

I second that shout out to the Quietus list, btw.